to appear that his outplacement was a group decision.
Bella was on the balcony, still clothed in her white nightgown, but wrapped in an equally pristine terry cloth robe. Her long, black hair was unbound, spilling down the sides of her face and over her shoulders in dark slashes.
“The wind off the lake is cold,” he said, and she didn’t startle at his sudden reappearance.
“I like to be in the sun. And the cold does not bother me.” She wrapped her arms protectively around her stomach and smiled up at him. “And she is warm enough in here.”
She’ll be in piss-poor shape if her mother dies of pneumonia, Max thought, but he didn’t say it. He didn’t want to spend some of what could be their last day together arguing. “Listen, I have to talk to you about something.”
“Oh?” Bella gestured gracefully to the other lounge chair, closer to the railing.
Max pulled the chair up close to Bella’s, though he wasn’t sure he’d ever be close enough to her. The thought of spending mornings away from her, of not waking to her beautiful smile, her warm, clean scent…He pushed those grim thoughts aside. “You know, he’s still out there.”
He saw her chest hitch in a sharply drawn breath, but she caught it before it could make a sound and pretended—badly—not to comprehend. “Who?”
Better to do it like ripping off a Band-Aid. “The Soul Eater. He’s still out there, and he’s still going to go through with the ritual that will make him a god.”
“What does this have to do with us?” Bella’s voice held a note of steel, as if she could will Max’s past to vanish. “You are no longer one of them. It is not your concern.”
He smiled and pushed some of her hair off her face. The very first time he’d seen her, she’d been wearing her hair back. She’d always worn it that way, scraped back from her face so severely that her skin had looked tight. It had made her seem hard, and she was, to people who didn’t know her. But now Max knew her, and he saw the currents below her deceptively smooth surface. She was frightened for him, and for their child, and she looked as vulnerable and young as he knew she was.
“You’re right. I’m not one of them. But I’m half of them,” he reminded her, and he dropped his hand to place it over the bump of her abdomen. “And she’s half, too. I don’t want to take the chance of his goons waltzing in here and grabbing you. I’m going back to the States to get this all sorted out.”
She whipped her head up sharply to glare at him. “You will leave me here?”
“I’m not going to drag you into a war zone. I’m sorry.” He looked away, to the vast expanse of black water on the lake. “If I don’t go, and he becomes a god, I’ll be here, trying to protect you from a god. If I go, and we can beat him, yeah, I’ll be away from you, but you’ll be safe.”
“My father put you up to this.” She said it flatly, providing no room for him to argue.
And it was damned tempting to say, “Yeah, your father is a real prick and he’s sending me to fight the Soul Eater knowing that the odds are pretty good I won’t be coming back.” But what good would that do? He’d still get sent away, still might die, and then Bella would be estranged from the one person who had the power to protect her. Not that her anger toward her father would stop him from watching over her—in fact, it might make her a virtual prisoner for the rest of her life, and that was something else Max just couldn’t accept.
“He didn’t put me up to it. We talked out this solution together.” It ground his guts to have to make the man look decent through a lie, but Max forged on. “Besides, you know that Nathan and Carrie will still be involved. They’ll need me.”
“If they are still alive,” Bella snapped, then her expression softened. “I am sorry. I do not mean to speak evil thoughts out loud. But you do not know where they are or how they fared in their mission. And you cannot do this thing alone.”
They sat in silence, both staring out at the lake, the occasional foam cap peaking on the dark surface. The wind had picked up. Bella’s hair whirled in it and slapped against her face.
“Let’s get you inside,” Max said quietly, and before she could argue he lifted her into his arms.
“You are right. You have to go,” she said as he settled her onto the bed. “It would be against everything you believe to leave your friends in peril. And it would be against everything I believe to be with a man who would do that to the people he cared for.”
He lay down beside her and took her hands in his, frowning down at his, the way his missing fingers and gnarled scars seemed grotesque against her perfect skin. “I’m glad you have so much faith in me. Because I’d much rather stay with you.”
She lifted his hands to her mouth and pressed a kiss to each of his palms. “No. You would go where your friends needed you.”
He wanted to argue, but she opened her mouth and sucked one of his fingertips inside, swirling her tongue around it. She laughed at his groan and released him, her hands wandering down, over his chest, to lift his T-shirt.
“Finishing what you started earlier?” Max asked, trying to keep the hopefulness out of his voice. “Because otherwise, this is just cruel.”
Her golden eyes glittered as she slipped her fingers inside the waist of his jeans. “I cannot let you leave without a proper goodbye.”
He couldn’t say he didn’t agree.
Chapter Three: Resurrected
“Hello? Is anybody there?”
There was no way it was possible. Ziggy was dead. I’d seen him die—or had I? Nathan had told me of his death, but I’d never checked. Still, there was no way he could have survived the injuries. No human could have.
Please, God, no.
Nathan took the phone from my shaking hands. I could hear Ziggy calling, “Are you still there? Is anyone still there?” over the line.
Nathan heard it, too. I covered my mouth and nose with both hands, eyes wide as I watched him. Slowly, he lifted the phone to his ear. I watched his face as he listened. One moment he stood before me, holding the phone, listening to his dead son’s voice imploring him to talk to him. The next, his knees shook, collapsing him to the floor. He held the phone like a drowning man clutching a piece of debris after a shipwreck, unable to believe his luck, terrified he’d lose his hold on the one thing saving his life at the moment.
Ziggy’s pleading on the line halted. My heavy breathing seemed to only heighten the tense silence. I caught the tinny whisper of Ziggy’s voice in Nathan’s ear. “Dad?”
Nathan’s lips pulled back in a grimace or a smile—I couldn’t tell which—as his shoulders shook with silent sobs and he covered his eyes with his hand. “I’m here,” he managed, his voice strangled.
“Don’t cry. Christ, Nate, don’t cry.” Even at reduced volume, I could tell Ziggy struggled to follow his own command.
Nathan’s emotions overwhelmed him to the point he couldn’t stop them from slamming into me like waves in a storm. I’d never
