by Linda Howard
The facts were, with Markham dead the threat to the child was past, and there was no reason for Lenna to remain here to see to the child’s safety herself. Nevertheless, there was time to do things her way—not a lot of time, but time enough. And he didn’t have to like it; he simply had to do it.
Vae, he had never before even considered completing an assignment to someone else’s specifications. Then again, he had never before taken his target as a lover.
This was likely his last opportunity to be private with her. When they left the hotel today, the odds were they wouldn’t be returning. And because this was likely the last time, he seized the privacy they had now and laid her, naked, on the bed … one last time. He lost himself in her, one last time. She wrapped her legs around him as if she could hold them together, as if she could keep them linked and earthbound and caught in a never-ending whirlwind of physical pleasure.
If only …
The sex was quick and hard, an almost brutal goodbye expressed with their bodies, in sweat and racing hearts and finally a sharp pleasure they shared. Lenna shook and sighed and whispered his name. He was silent, because what was the point in speaking what they both already knew?
Did she understand that being close to her for days on end had been torture for him? Did she understand that he would miss her when this job was over?
Vae.
Afterward, they showered again, then Caine quickly dressed and collected his weapons, strapped them on. At first he intended to leave the computer in the hotel room for a maid to find. It wasn’t as if he could take it with him; a trip between worlds would fry the circuits. But he thought of another use for it, and all but dragged Lenna with him into the parlor, where he downloaded a video. He was certain there was no Wi-Fi on Wiley’s island, and he wanted Elijah to see something.
As he prepared himself for departure, Lenna put on her white dress, the one that made her look like the powerful, regal being she was. He watched her dress, the male part of him scowling as each glowing inch of flesh was covered, but not wanting to miss a single second of having her near. She retrieved a handful of jewelry from the bottom of her bag. Like any woman adorning herself, she sat on the side of the bed and slipped on large, sparkling rings that suited her, as well as a bracelet that was obviously not of this world. The light from the pale green stones danced and splintered, like tiny rainbows.
She was not of this world, and now she looked it. Lenna—Strength—glowed. She sparkled. No matter what world she inhabited, she would draw every eye.
“What about not calling attention to yourself?” he asked wryly.
She smiled as she stood and walked to him, wrapped her arms around his neck, and leaned into him. She came to him so easily now, and he accepted her the same way. His arms automatically adjusted to holding someone so much smaller than he, his head automatically bent to find her scent, to take her lips. They fit, as if she belonged here, with him, always close.
“You’re one to talk,” she chided, glancing pointedly at his laser blaster.
“I know how to avoid detection—it’s part of my job.” She, on the other hand, screamed, Look at me! And it was completely unconscious, a simple grandeur of being, rather than dressing or acting for attention. The attention was already hers. She dressed to please herself, for the joy of a luxurious fabric, for the beauty of the jewels.
“I won’t be here on Seven much longer,” she explained. “When I go before the Emperor, I need to be myself in all ways. Elijah has already seen me as I am, and there’s no need to disguise myself for Wiley and Chantel.” She smiled. “Besides, now that I have spent a few days here, I understand that there is no true norm. If anyone else sees me, they’ll dismiss me as a …” She stopped, searched her brain—what she had of his brain—and finally finished with, “An odd duck.”
Caine snorted. Lenna was no odd duck. She was a treasure, a goddess, a remarkable woman.
She smiled up at him. With all the turmoil ahead of and behind them, she still managed a radiant smile. “You’d have me wear baggy flannel all the time, if I left the choice to you.”
It wouldn’t matter what she wore. Flannel or silk—she would always draw his attention, and he’d been a fool to think otherwise.
“You don’t deny it,” she teased when he didn’t respond.
“No, I don’t,” he said in a low, strained tone.
He didn’t want to lose her, either, but he didn’t see any point in talking about it. She would soon return to her life, and he would return to his.
With that, he brought himself sharply back to the hardness of reality. “Boots or barefoot?”
She dropped her arms from around his neck and crossed the room to grab the boots she’d been wearing since arriving on Seven. He was, out of necessity, right behind her. She sat down to pull on the boots. Any other woman would look ridiculous, in a flimsy white dress and winter boots, but she didn’t, because she didn’t care.
It would be a waste of time to tell her how he felt, so he didn’t bother.
“Ready?”
“For it all to end? No. To see Elijah? Yes.”
He put his arms around her, and took them there.
“You’re back!” Elijah shouted from the front porch of Wiley and Chantel’s island home. He didn’t look at all distressed. In fact, there was a bit of color in his cheeks, as well as a bounce in his step as he ran down the steps to meet them. He was already slightly tanned, a little grubby, totally ecstatic.
Lenna braced herself as Elijah launched himself at her. She caught him and then she laughed, as her heart broke a little—laughter and pain, wrapped together in one important moment. She shouldn’t care so much for a human child—she knew the difficulties—but she did. In the fatalistic approach of Seven, it was what it was. Elijah was hers, now and forever, in a way she couldn’t explain.
He wiggled in her arms, and she released him. Evidently finished with her, he turned to Caine, tilting his head as he studied the multitude of weapons Caine wore. The hug he gave was more sedate because he had to avoid touching all the guns and knives, but no less forceful. Caine’s big hand rested on the shining dark hair for a moment, stroked down to the thin little shoulder.
“Why are you wearing your weapons again?” Elijah asked as he finally released Caine and backed away. “Are you going to war? You look like you’re going to war. I caught a fish, and Chantel cooked it for supper last night! I didn’t think I could eat a fish I’d seen while it was still alive, but I did, and it was good. I’m glad I didn’t give it a name. She made cookies, too. They had coconut in them. I like coconut.” He turned and looked up at Lenna. “You’re wearing your nightgown again! How come?”
“It isn’t a nightgown,” she said, as she had upon arriving in this world.
“It looks like a nightgown, kinda,” he said. “But it’s pretty. I like it.”
Caine put a hand on Elijah’s shoulder. “Before we leave here, there’s something I’d like you to see.”
Wiley and Chantel stood on the porch, watching and smiling at the enthusiastic reunion and Elijah’s flood of questions. Probably they’d heard their share of questions from him, too. As they went up the steps Caine nodded to Wiley, and Wiley nodded back. It was as if they used some type of man-communication that didn’t need words. Everything all right? Right as rain. Finished with this mess? Hell, no.
Or something along those lines.
Inside, Caine placed the laptop on the table and turned it on, waited for it to boot up. He pulled up a chair and sat down, motioned for Elijah to climb on his lap. The child clambered up without a second of reservation, sitting astride one of Caine’s muscular thighs, leaning back to rest trustingly against him. “Are we going to watch a movie?”
“No, I’m going to show you some people who know you.”
“Know me? How? Do I know them? Why are they in a movie?”
Instead of reiterating that it wasn’t a movie, as soon as the computer was ready for use, Caine pulled up the clip of th
e interview with Elijah’s grandparents.
Lenna tensed, watching Elijah’s face for any sign of upset. She wanted to slam the computer shut, protect him from something he might not be ready to see. His grandparents were strangers, strangers who expected to take him in and attempt to take the place of his mother. How would he feel about that? Would he understand what they wanted? No one could replace his mother. No one could undo what Markham had done to this child.
The man had died too easily, in her opinion. She wished she had been there, at his death; then he’d have known suffering.
Caine played the interview. Elijah’s grandparents’ voices filled the room. Elijah tilted his head to the side, wrinkling his nose, then scratching his ear. Lenna was prepared to snatch him away at any second, at the first sign of a tear. Instead … Elijah leaned forward and touched the screen with one grubby little finger. “That’s my granny, huh? I dreamed about her, a bunch of times. Mostly I dreamed about sitting on her lap. She smelled like cookies.”
Lenna was taken aback. Did Elijah actually remember these people he hadn’t seen for years? He would’ve been a toddler, or not much more than that, when Amber and her parents had their falling out. He shouldn’t remember much of anything of that time, but the human mind was a wondrous thing. He’d told her he had no grandparents, that he had no one other than his mother, but seeing the Tilleys on the computer screen had apparently jogged a memory, or two.
“I dreamed about him, too!” Elijah said, pointing to his grandfather. “He laughed a lot.” Then his expression darkened. “He’s not laughing now. They look really sad. Are they sad because they miss me?” He didn’t mention his mother, but he had to handle that in his own way. At first it had consumed his every thought. Now he was trying to create a space without sadness. His moment to grieve would come around again, in its own time.
“Yes,” Caine said.
Elijah looked up at Lenna, up from his place in Caine’s lap. His brow knit in concern. “Will Uncle Bobby hurt them, too?”
She gently touched his head, smoothing a strand of hair that immediately popped back out of place. “Uncle Bobby is gone. He won’t bother you or anyone else, not ever again.”
“Gone forever?”
“Gone forever,” Caine said. “I promise.” That was good enough for Elijah; he didn’t ask gone how, dead or in jail, because that didn’t matter. All that mattered was gone.
Caine left the laptop for Wiley and Chantel. It would make a nice paperweight, once the battery discharged, or Wiley could take it somewhere and sell it. Maybe they could keep it charged, somehow.
Chantel knelt to give Elijah a tight hug, rocking back and forth with him in her arms. “Don’t forget us, okay? You can’t talk about us, but at night look up at the star Wiley showed you and we’ll look up at it, too, and think about each other.”
“Okay,” Elijah said, and kissed her cheek. “Maybe someday you can send me a letter and I’ll come visit.”
They all said their goodbyes, then Caine gathered her and Elijah to him. Elijah glanced up, his expression one of concern. “Wait, we forgot my magic set.” He did not mention the new clothes. Priorities.
Lenna was ready to collect the child’s things for him, but Caine had other ideas. “Wiley really needs to work on his magic. Would you mind if we left the set with him? You will have access to others. There is no Walmart here.”
Elijah’s chin stiffened, and he said, “That’s a good idea.” Then he lowered his voice and added, “Wiley really does need some practice.”
With that, Caine teleported them to the street where Elijah lived. They landed not in or near Amber Tilley’s house, but instead were down the street, close to the house where Lenna had entered Seven.
And in that instant, she knew what Caine intended, what he’d intended all along.
“We should be the ones to deliver Elijah to his grandparents,” she said, fighting to keep her voice even. Now that the moment was staring her in the face, seeing it through was taking more effort than she’d expected. She swallowed, because she couldn’t let Elijah see how upset she was. This was for him, for his future.
“We can’t do that, and you know it.”
She wanted to argue, but she couldn’t. She did know it. She and Caine couldn’t bring that sort of attention to themselves. Still, her stomach was once more twisting with dread.
As they had last night, they stood back and looked into the home from a shaded side yard. It was still cold, though most of the snow was gone, revealing the brown, winter-dead grass lawns. That house had represented safety to Elijah when he most needed it. The people inside would welcome him joyfully into the warmth.
Caine knelt down on one knee to look Elijah in the eye. “Your friend and his family will take you to your grandparents.”
Those big brown eyes apprehensively searched Caine’s face, and his bottom lip began to tremble. “Why can’t you and Lenna take me? You’d like them! They’re nice! I know they’re nice!”
“I’m sure they’re very nice,” Caine said gently, “but Lenna and I have important work to do and we need to get to it.”
Lenna saw in Elijah the same kind of pain she felt as he said, “I thought I was important.”
“You are!” Lenna said as she dropped down to join them. She hugged Elijah to her, and again, her heart broke. “You’re important to me and you always will be.” They separated a little bit, and she brushed a strand of hair out of her eyes. “But it would be best if Caine and I didn’t meet your grandparents or Zack’s family. You see, we don’t really belong here.”
“Would you get in trouble?”
“Yes, I’m afraid we would. We aren’t supposed to be here. We should have gone home a long time ago, but we stayed to help you.”
Elijah nodded, but his lip still trembled. “Will you come to see me sometime?”
“If I can,” she whispered, knowing it would be next to impossible to return.
Strength was a quality, a force of will; through the eons so many had called for it, pulled it from her when they needed it. She held it for others. Never before had she tried to give it without being asked, but how would a child know to ask? With two fingers she touched Elijah’s temple, felt the heat and life of him, and gave. She whispered, “I give to you the strength to be happy.” Her eyes stung with tears. She never cried—never! And yet here she was, near to breaking down and sobbing like a … like a … like an emotional female from this very world.
She dropped her hand. It was done.
“Now, go ring that doorbell,” she said. “Your life awaits. We’ll wait here until you are safely inside.”
Elijah looked up her, then at Caine. He gave them a tiny, uncertain wave. Then he turned to look at his friend’s Zack’s house, and a glow came to his face. “Bye!” he said. “I love you!”
“I love you, too,” she whispered to his back, because he had already turned and was running, running toward the house, toward his friends, toward his life. He stopped once and quickly looked back, and waved. He was smiling. Perhaps her gift of strength was working.
Caine put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close. They watched as Elijah rang the bell, as Zack’s mother answered. They heard the woman’s scream—a happy scream—from where they stood. Through the window they saw the family gather around Elijah, though the father didn’t wait long before taking a cell phone from his pocket and making a call.
They had to leave, before someone saw them, but Lenna wanted to watch a minute longer. So did Caine apparently, because he didn’t whisk them away. She nestled her head into the curve of his shoulder.
“He’ll tell them all about us,” he said, sounding unconcerned.
“They won’t believe him.”
“No, I suppose not.”
“We sound like one of their fairy tales: a Hunter who can ‘poof’ and a woman who crossed worlds and appeared in a walk-in closet, wearing her nightgown, in answer to his call for help.” She managed a smile. No, his tale would b
e written off as the overactive imagination of a traumatized child, a mechanism to help him cope.
And eventually even Elijah would forget what was real and what was not.
Elijah would be fine. He had family and friends who loved him, and he had strength, his own and a bit more. Nevertheless, leaving him was wrenching.
Even more, she didn’t want to leave this Hunter who had become so important to her. Caine had protected her, and Elijah. He’d shielded her. He had loved her. But it was time.
She put her hand on his cheek and said, “Take me home.”
Chapter 18
Derek drove slowly, both hands on the wheel, his eyes straight ahead. The commotion at the other end of the street was impossible to miss. Cop cars, news vans, neighbors—happy smiling neighbors and happy crying neighbors. Shit, there was so much snot running he could probably make a fortune selling tissues.
Well short of the circus, he pulled into the driveway of a house that was up for sale and put his car in Park. Before he could get out, a red sedan sped by behind him and came to a tire-squealing stop at the curb, so close to the excited gathering it almost took out a few people who hadn’t been paying enough attention. People scattered, and almost simultaneously the doors of the red Chevrolet flew open and an older couple jumped out. He thought they were pretty spry for their ages, because they went running across the yard.
He knew who they were: Elijah’s grandparents. He’d seen them on the news. And because he was thorough, he’d even known their car was red, because he’d driven by their house himself to check them out.
As he watched, the boy everyone had been looking for, the boy he had been looking for, bolted from the house and ran toward the couple. He ran the way some kids did, full out and with perfect form, as if he had been made for running. Derek couldn’t see much in the way of detail. Too many people were in the way, including a shitload of photographers—still and video—capturing the reunion for posterity. But now and then the crowd would shift and he’d get a good glimpse.