Skinny dipping seemed entirely appropriate right about then. He glanced at the lake. What he knew of the terrain, even the way the wind tickled the surface, gave the clues as to its depth. This one was man-made, and as such, would have a nice slope toward deeper waters. Likely a smooth bed of gravel underfoot. Currents would be minimal. He could swim it easily. Probably underwater half way to the other side at the very least. It’d been a few years, though. The Legion didn’t have a swimming standard in PT. Hell, in the marines, he took an entire combatant scuba course. Now that was a hard fucking final exam.
They could duck away, hand in hand, stifling the simultaneous laughter and abject horror at being caught, doff clothes, gasp at the cold water, and huddle close for warmth. It sounded glorious. Though, maybe not the best of ideas in a public park. A nice secluded river would work. The kind with big rocks making walls along one side; baked warm by the sun. Clothes streaming from branches. Truck a haven as good as any palace afterward. Music blaring. Drinks swimming in coolers dragged to the river bank…
God that sounded amazing. Not that he’d ever done that before….
Despite the fact that Jay forced his legs forward, despite the fact that he wanted to sprint as hard as he could, Natalie was distant. Like a fog covered her. Maybe a veil. Maybe whatever they had could never be repaired. Maybe he screwed it up too much. The item in his pocket felt heavier than ever before.
Which was exactly why he dug it out and showed it to her. “Someone is really wanting to talk to you.” Alistair’s wallet device was light as a feather in his palm. The tech so advanced, he didn’t even want to know how Alistair delivered it to Natalie.
He turned it over in his hands as he came closer. The thing was his only lifeline to the one that could get him the answers he wanted. Yet Alistair already refused to do it despite every bait Jay knew how to offer. That man had answers. He only wanted a small sacrifice in return. Jay paused on the sidewalk, looked at the lake, knowing what he had to do. The decision was made even when he first saw her. Hopefully Natalie wouldn’t curse him afterward. Hopefully she understood the gamble. Muscles coiled, gaze focused; heart ready. The high-school baseball all-state athlete showed itself, then.
He threw the thing as hard as he could.
It sailed. It fucking sailed through the air. The tiny splash in the lake was its final goodbye. When he turned back to her, he offered a palm. ”Please come with us.” And silently begged her to agree.
He went quiet. She didn't tread on those thoughts, just pulled her attention away. The sarcasm of her reply had been all rusted edges, and the volatility of her mood now was like a landmine. Easy enough to navigate, if you knew how. She had all day to shift through her thoughts and pack them neatly away, but the road forward had been the consideration to occupy most of her time. Focus carved her a space away from paltry emotions. She wasn't given to expressive displays even without a generous blanket of apathy as a buffer.
"We haven't spoken in five years. I don't know what changed his mind, and I'm not sure I care." Yesterday emotion clogged the word dad like an ugly scar. Today there was nothing; just a flat wall of stubborn spite and refusal to even speak his name. The media painted her a daughter in the image of her father after the fire; not without due cause, of course, though Natalie's only crime at the time was trying to cushion that devastating fall. Despite what he'd done. But the tar stuck. She'd never climbed out of that shadow.
Yesterday she'd wanted to explain. But today she wasn't in the mood to exonerate herself. Restlessness was beginning to hum through her bones, the heft of silence driving it deep. She didn't savour goodbyes, and the tension pushed pins beneath her heels; urged her to do something to end it quickly and save either of them the awkwardness. She was cold enough for that, even if he wasn't. At least she thought she was.
She stood, a thousand miles away despite the distance he bridged. Or maybe just to spite it. But the arc of his arm gave her pause. Her weight fell against the edge of the table, arms folded, and her gaze followed the wallet's trail. Relief watched it sink. She couldn't decide if the gesture was profound or simply stupid, though of course Jay did not know the litany of silent messages that preceded whatever desperation urged her father to break into the apartment in Moscow. Which also made it somewhat futile, though she wasn't going to share that.
"You're terribly dramatic, did anyone ever tell you that?"
She didn't meet his eye. Had no intention of doing so. Somewhere deep her emotions flared, unsure what to make of it, but he'd already turned with an open palm and words that stilled the search for an answer. Surprise fazed her expression like ripples in still water, the first indication that something flesh and blood still dwelt beneath all that ice. The plea dropped heavy as an iron weight, dragging down on those chains around her heart in a way that made her chest lurch. Her brows lowered, as insulted as he had been when she'd suggested he had been paid to pull her out of the tunnels.
She realised then that he thought she had been leaving, as if any of this could be so easily washed away. As if she would wish to wash any of it away.
Reaction burst like a supernova, banked by iron control that nonetheless shuddered her to contrary action. Her gaze drew up, making the same tireless mistake over and over. She should walk away, like any sane person. Obligation wasn't worth this dance on broken glass. Only that was a lie grown threadbare, and it wasn't obligation keeping her rooted.
She took his hand, no hesitation or coy games this time, though neither did she shift from her perch against the picnic table. A twist brought his knuckles up to face the sky. She didn't remember him punching the wall, but she'd seen the evidence of it this morning. An easy detail to brush aside when it did not quite fit the narrative she chose to pour like acid into her own wounds. Confronted with the evidence now, she didn't know what to think, reluctant to wade through shadowy memory seeking clues for fear of what else she might discover. Her thumb swept the sore peaks and valleys of his skin, both firm and gentle. A musician's touch, fond as a caress of ivory keys. Though his was a warmth more intoxicating. Probably to her ruin.
"Why?" It came out rawer than she'd meant it. Not a question of why she should go, but a muddy question of bruised knuckles and slammed doors. Of Anna Marie and her father's wallet. An abject wall of silence surrounded crossed swords, misunderstanding time and again, but the demanding edge to her now would not be turned aside. She followed him across the ocean on wings of trust; a folly she was not particularly given to, though it had seemed natural at the time. No regret marred that decision, just as no regret marred the answer she knew she would give whether he chose to answer honestly or not. Though it was brutal truth her pale gaze beseeched, and they both knew he was a shit liar.
Her comment floated like accusation. Though it sounded more like an innocuous insult, it made him grin. “You know, I have been told that before,” even as the utterance passed his lips, the smile grew like a secret suddenly shared between them.
The plop of water turned to a memory that he had little intention of dredging anytime soon. She made him wait, then. Maybe the decision was a mistake? He’d made enough of them lately to damn the soul tomorrow. Didn’t matter, really. Not for his own destiny, at least. That was settled long ago.
Instead, she made something of a show of it, but if her former insult was masked as a tease, this was torture masked with indecision. He’d wait, though. Until the sky faded black and cold rushed their faces. If only to savor the possibilities painted what-if. Just to watch the horizon creep first promises of light following the swarm of night’s terrors. Just because. Then he caught the hint of movement; the sweep of a slender arm. Relief swelled like the tide when his fingers closed around hers. Arm yanked into its embrace, but Jay buried the flinch that stirred. He hung on like he never wanted to let go.
Her thumb grazed like sandpaper on raw skin. Light as a feather were her musician’s fingers, but the ache delved deeper than bare boned knuckles. There was no soothing away the rolling fury that threw his arm the first time. Flaring it alive now only served to resurrect the demons Jay had yet to slay. There were plenty to keep a guy busy.
Why?
No quippy remark curved his lips. If it weren’t for the anchor of pale eyes, he might turn the coward and flee. Just to avoid answering the simplest of questions. The thing was. The answer wasn’t simple. Why?
Because she glimpsed the darkness but braved the it anyway. Because she came to bloody Iowa when a million other places were more tempting. For the redemption of a kid whose mind was brutalized with poison. For Cayli.
The words stirred like leaves caught in a storm. Fragile things that crumbled at the merest touch. His thoughts raced; crumbling. He just looked at her. Lifted their twined hands between them. The hands of a graceful musician roughed with the toils of labor. The hands of a soldier softened by a fool’s heart. And what a bloody fool he was. Just say the words.
In the last few minutes, the blazing sun ducked beneath the horizon. The glow was fading. Either Natalie would follow him to the shadows or she'd seek brighter futures. As he pushed errant hair behind her ear, wondering if it was the wrong time to pull her close just to feel the nestle of warmth against his chest, he realized the answer.
She's just as damned as me.
A stillness settled over his soul with the epiphany. Still as those calm lake waters. Though it wasn’t exactly comforting.
He thought of the baby sister dying in that bed. He thought of the frantic fringes his mind splayed when he realized there was nothing he could do to save her. The picture on the mantle laying unjustified. The star once proudly worn; now hidden. He barely heard himself say it. Probably the rawest honesty ever shared. Lies were only directed at himself; better to not speak at all otherwise.
”Because I can’t do this without you.”
The skin stretched raw as his fingers squeezed one last time before releasing her. She was free to choose. Jay wouldn’t be the one to slam the bars. It’d tear his heart out to watch her walk away; but he’d not stop her.
God help him. He’d not stop her.
Natalie had never found patience difficult. Silence that made her restless and miserable only seconds before hit a different note now, perhaps calmed by the brush of Jay's fingers. She'd never thought to find comfort in so innocent a touch, but it narrowed the weight of her thoughts to the whisper of her own breath. In that quiet place she was prepared for a hard truth, and unafraid to hear it. Though he stared a long time. At their hands. At whatever he saw in her expression when he tucked the hair from her face.
The world's eternal revolution might turn over this moment a thousand times, yet even such a jaded soul as hers would never inure to the impact of meaning in those words finally spoken.
A protective stir in her chest insisted that yes, he could, whilst at the same time dawning on the realisation of how fiercely she did not wish him to have to. The sparks of dying light drained her eyes almost colourless, though the planes of her expression had softened. She did not plunge too deep into the currents of those emotions, like they were something fragile, too easy to shatter.
But understanding slipped beneath the walls she surrounded herself with; settled some place she was not yet ready to explore.
His bruised hand slipped away. She'd missed the sunset but noticed the creeping shadows now, dragging grey and robbing colour. The grass was cold beneath her feet, and chills chased bare skin, though maybe the latter was not the weather. Natalie did not believe in destiny. She did not believe in kismet. And her heart was far too fucking sore to think anything like fate might have tangled them in such a knot, unless it was simply to give them enough rope for hanging. Oh, her cynic's soul could believe that.
Forgiveness was not in her nature, and she'd armed herself too fiercely to lay down those weapons entirely. Maybe guilt loosened his grip on her hand, and if so she did not regret that he felt it. He deserved to feel it. But there was something stronger than the spite snapping revenge for her own pain, or at least something more durable. He would be foolish to think she was no longer angry, or hurt, but more foolish to think it made any difference now. Not to the things that mattered.
Her gaze searched for evidence that he truly thought she would turn her back; or at least that he thought she would do so because it was what she actually wanted. Maybe alcohol blunted the reach of yesterday's confessions, but it made their essence no less true. Likely he did not realise her refusal to speak to Alistair was in retaliation of a betrayal endured, not irritation at a broken compact. She wasn't about to walk away.
The weight of Jay's shadow fell like warm wool when she moved away from the picnic table, though possibly that was the temptation of how close a single step brought her. Her fingers grazed the back of his hand, fluttering beneath the edge of his sleeve to caress the soft inside of his wrist without seeking to grasp, waiting patiently for the realisation to begin settling like the first stalwart stars peeking through the darkening blanket above; always there, even if no one bothered to look up. It was cruel to taunt, but then she had always been a tease. The curve of a smile began to soften her mouth, though she was not sure Jay knew her well enough to recognise the tells that intimated her warped sense of humour. Aaron never had.
Because if Jay was given to drama, Natalie was inclined to irreverence. It got her into trouble more often than it sparked the sorts of grins that tugged at Jay's lips and curled ties in her heart when she wasn't looking. Even the last few moment's torment flashed a trail of them, small beacons through a storm that felt dangerously like it led to home. A thought that threatened to scald, advising caution which she knew she would not heed. So for now she didn't think about it.
Her reckless heart beat hard when she pressed up on her toes, capturing the roughness of his cheek to pull his attention close. The brim of his hat shadowed them both when her face hovered near enough to steal the breath from his lips, enraptured. Toying with her own boundaries of control. The faint curve of her smirk sharpened wicked. "Then stop letting me go, stupid." The breathy words cut a caustic tone, intentional. She knew enough to know she hated what he had done, all of it, and wasn't likely to shy away from the ugliness of that truth even to spare his guilt. But if it was scathing it was playful too, unravelling that darkness with the promise of her presence regardless, and poking holes in every doubt with a brazen dare to contradict her certainty.
She floated close as a breeze. A wind that touched his cheek; words that circled unrecognizable. He didn’t want to breathe for fear of chasing it away. Didn’t want to breathe at all.
"Then stop letting me go, stupid."
A huge smile broke like sun through clouds. The last thing he saw were the sinful eyes that he’d swear he’d see the moment he died. Hopefully that was a long day off. Until then, every single day.
He sank into her arms, arms circling snug. Tendrils of golden hair tickled soft on rough cheeks. He’d still never shaved even after the long-waited sleep at the hotel. Shade darkened their world with the lilt of the hat. He wished it was bigger if only to hide them completely.
That hair tangled in his hands. Mindful he wouldn’t hurt her, but the ropes of his discipline were frayed and dropped completely. Anna Marie kissed him with almost as much hunger, but unreciprocated. It was a hunger for the past; for mourning a future befitting neither of them. Oh they could have done it. Jay might never have enlisted in the first place; might have accepted the swordarm of fate and remained severed from the world beyond these green plains. Stayed behind on the farm. She’d be the hot-shot pharmacist; he the rancher. Thanksgiving and beer. Kiddos and baseball. Thing was, he’d be out of his mind by 30. Alcoholic probably. Numbness was bliss, after all. Shame erased. Pride left behind in the dirt. Maybe as addicted to something as his own dad.
That epiphany almost broke him away from Natalie.
Almost.
For her bravery. For her bloody grit. For devotion he never deserved and couldn’t understand. But like that wind, if he grasped at it too fiercely, it would stream onward uncatchable.
He returned every fevered touch. Her hands flared his ribs hot while his dug grips into her back. Palms raced the length of slender arms. Fingers twined together and splayed apart. He wanted to walk her somewhere. Anywhere. Sink into a carpet of grass and twist together until the stars twinkled diamond in her pale gaze. It couldn’t end. Didn’t want it to end. The world could burn for all he cared. It would burn before he found the will to pull away.
His mind fell quiet for once. A blessed silence that echoed only with the sounds of Natalie’s breath and the croak of a spring twilight. His heart could beat no more steady in that moment.
She tormented herself as much as him. Devilishly close; just the brush of her hand against his cheek, a tease perched on her lips but in the end unspent. It was his smile, that bloody smile, which did it; sparking something kindred that unspooled in her chest, and she was utterly content to unravel. His arms captured as she bridged the distance, the flush press of his body chasing fire that had probably been banked for longer than she cared to admit.
It'd barely been days since they'd kissed at the ball, but a chasm spanned the eons between then and now. Life and death. Wars won and lost. Unconquered demons clawed her lower than she'd ever wanted anyone to see, a path she'd probably trip down again, though for now she vowed not to. Good intentions wrought dangerous crossroads, a snare apt to catch them both. Even now the future flickered uncertain; she wasn't that kind of foolish. And yet she sought to find joy for them where she could, or make it even in those dark places where dawn's light never touched. Stupid promises probably, and not ones he'd ever hear her utter. But she'd lead him on, a co-conspirator to that madness; wearing a wicked smirk and beckoning for as long as he chose to follow her into that timeless sanctuary.
The sun brushed below the horizon, but it was not yet dark. Shadows skipped but did not cover, and the last time she looked boats still clung against the darkening blue. They were hardly far from the main path, either, plain enough to passers-by or impatient little sisters. But sense didn't penetrate very far. Not when his hands threaded through her hair like that; not when she felt hesitation fray loose and the world quiet around them.
She tugged him gently backwards, thinking of the sheltering trees all around, path thwarted by the table she'd forgotten was there, though hands at her waist made short work of the obstacle. Her fingers brushed up beneath his shirt, begging closer contact. With her thighs cradling his hips, the weight of his touch began to spiral more urgency. But frustration built its peak too. She wanted him far more thoroughly than a fumble to satisfy base needs. To peel him from his clothes slowly, and explore every facet beneath with fingertips and mouth; to feel that soul-tugging grin against her kiss, the melt of his breath in sigh and in hunger, until escape to the brink bordered on exquisite.
Hooting and hollering across the water pierced her consciousness slower than it should. It wasn't like she was shy. No blushes warmed her cheeks beyond the flush of desire, and she didn't flinch or pull back upon recognition of an unwelcome audience. She did laugh though, even if it was the cruellest of jokes. How much control was one person supposed to have? Light. "Maybe next time we choose somewhere more convenient to make up." Though if he offered a hand now, she'd take it; even if it led to the very edge of the universe. Especially if it led to the very edge of the universe. She almost wished he would.
But looking at him now, trying to ignore the flare of her pulse, her mind circled back to that earlier question. It would be easy to go with him and say nothing; easy to pursue her own line of enquiries and never admit to what she knew or how she knew it. She could work around his ignorance, knowing he would never countenance the sort of danger she was apt to put herself in when the risk was acceptable (and sometimes when it wasn't).
But it would mean letting go of this. Quiet deceptions would be a betrayal she couldn't bring herself to meet his eye after, not with the value she placed on truth. The boundaries bordering acceptance were not things she trusted; sometimes honesty itself brought its own ruin. But she preferred it over false comfort. And if she was brutal, she would rather rejection because he saw her plainly than an acceptance born of illusory silence. She couldn't let go, but she couldn't stay quiet either.
Maybe he would hate that she shattered the peace, though for her this was only a different kind. Her pale eyes were piercing; translucent honesty, if he cared to look. He would either understand, or he wouldn't. Still, the words were soft. "You were talking to yourself in the barn. I found Zacarias's name on the ball's guest list. I was angry you didn't tell me. I was angry you didn't trust me." She was going to regret it if he recoiled; she could already feel the numbness spreading out like a foregone conclusion. But she'd regret saying nothing more. "I read that file this morning. Texas buys us time, but it isn't a solution."
Excitement fluttered a rapid pulse. Skin burned. Flared to life by the graze of a musician’s touch. He found himself shuddering beneath her tease. But the shudders pulled lips to wide smiles smothered with hers at the very same time. Jay wanted to laugh. Delight burst like sunshine breaching stormclouds. Where Natalie led he followed blindly, glimpsing only the halo of golden hair for a guide. How could something so perfect existed after so much was broken? Neither of them were the model of faultlessness. But somehow, the broken pieces of each soul fit with the shards of the other until something beautiful was created in the combination. Strangers apart, scattered and searching. The flickering light drawing each nearer. The night was less frightening. Less lonely. That need drew Jay’s hands around Natalie, pulling close. Yet not close enough. Her gasps and breaths darted like shooting stars; sparking the need to seal the meager distance all the more fiercely. Designs formed in his head. Heedless of all rationality. Remembering nothing about the present; but remembering everything about forever.
Her laughter sparkled like golden treasure. Jewels to be hoarded, chased down until the next one glimmered in random light. He laughed just as much. Glancing ever so slightly toward their witnesses. Grins curled lopsided, but the weight of his head after so much weightlessness was unbearable. He sank his face into her shoulder, drowning in a golden blanket of silk. She smelled like the forest flanking a wayward trail home. He’d plunge reckless into that thick tangle of the future so long as he knew she waited within. He’d never stop searching; even if he walked in circles until dust he returned.
The joy piqued. Jay trailed a finger around her face. The muss of her hair apparently tossled by his own ardent desires. From chiseled perfection at the ball. A sculpture of a woman carved from ice and marble, to one flashing with warmth and desire, the constant flickering of her two sides made him possessive of the fact he glimpsed both.
Yet they were both a long ways from where they needed to be. Need and duty eventually drove Natalie back to reason. A dream of a moment burst. But no less real for the moments it existed. He could sustain on that memory alone for the rest of his life if necessary. Hopefully that life stretched out longer than the next few days.
He caged her hand in his, trailing the smooth palms with his own rough fingertips. Her nails shone, but it was the well-healed scars on her wrists that Jay yearned to cover like a heavy blanket. Skin patched together, but wounds remained. Such delineation of healing was a concept he quite astutely appreciated.
Zacarias’ name haunted him like a ghost that would never leave. Thing was, how did a man exorcise a haunting beyond his control? If he killed Zacarias, another spirit would likely rise from the grave. Dismantling an entire cartel took the work of governments, special forces and SEAL teams. Jay was but one man. Maybe he held more weapons than ever before, but thing was, even slamming the cartel with everything they had once before only drove the beast back into the den. It licked its wounds and emerged angry. Zacarias was a figure: a flesh and blood enemy. But out there somewhere another amorphous devil commanded the horde.
His shoulders sank despite the ally in Natalie. He’d wanted to shield her from all this, but the war within to tell her was at bloody stalemate.
He looked at her with a longing so deep that he was sure she’d read his mind.
“You have to know. I couldn’t tell anyone.” Images flashed like lightning, burning the back of retinas already red and blistering. A dark beach. Water flowing. Jungles and humidity. Excitement twisted in the gut until there was no room for anything except brute motor function. Action, calculated, but robotic. Analyzing every moment. Poised to react to a million different outcomes. Yet small things burst in his memory. The sound of a bird breaking the silent humidity like thunder. Boot catching on an unexpected rock. The color of that little girl’s shirt as she huddled against Andres, the man threatening the kid like a dirty hostage.
“Guess it’s not like my oaths to the Constitution mean much anymore, though.”
Most people, foreign and domestic, assumed the military served the federal government. Maybe the President directly. In wartime, the President acted as head of the military once Congress delegated such power to him; an authority Congress could reverse at any time. Such was the balance of powers between the arms of the government. But it wasn’t true; not exactly. The armed forces served the Constitution; not any one man. Not a body of men. The Constitution. The first line of Jay’s oaths were writ on his bones. I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same. Admitting their loss was like ripping his skeleton from his skin. Not exactly a pleasant thing to endure.
Head hung, hands still. Natalie’s felt heavier now, but to them he clung. Just like he clung to the vow of blood binding him to Cayli. Oaths, vows, blood and allegiance. They all twisted to tangles unrecognizable. He licked his lips. Throat wanting to deny what his heart yearned to utter. But he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t tell her everything. Not yet. To do so meant those oaths were dust blown away by the winds of a torrential life. Jay couldn’t let them crumble yet. He could tell her one thing, though.
“Zacarias is right to want his revenge.”
Shame stirred like the tornadoes of his stormy life kicked that dust skyward. Hopefully Natalie wasn’t too frightened by the prospect. Images likely formed in her own head then. Brutality satiated within the man she kissed so passionately, but it was only a matter of time before blood in the water drew the beast to the surface. She’d read the file; she already knew. Why didn’t shame veil her eyes when she looked at him? They veiled his.
Texas bought time, she was right. But they needed that time. Each day helped. “I am trying to find the one that ordered the strike in the first place. There’s something going on that ties us all together, but I don’t know what it is, or who to seek. We’ve stumbled upon something that stretches higher than I’ve ever considered. This is governments, Natalie. Zacarias was at the ball. He walked in the shadow of Ascendancy. The Pentagon, maybe Congress is involved. The White House? I don’t know.” His words dribbled forth like raindrops once the cloud finally broke. All he knew spilled forth.
“Cayli’s doctor is somehow woven in as well. He’s not what he claims to be; he’s chasing channelers; Sickness survivors. And he’s also from Washington. So that bodes well.” He dug around inside a jacket pocket a moment and retrieved a badge. Showed it to Natalie. It was Diaz’s NIH security credentials. “I might have done a little breaking and entering,” an unapologetic smirk crossed his lips. Hard to feel guilty over the bastard. Dark, perhaps. But sometimes a little darkness showed the light.
“Does the name Roswell Jenkins mean anything to you?”
The trail of his fingers captured her attention, igniting a warmth that was harder to tame than simple lust. The foolishness of such a spell exaggerated the breathing in her chest; a softer fall than before.
She listened quietly, knowing no words could calm the storm of those conflicts. Nor would she want to cut such ties clean, complicated as they were, for they were the etchings that made his heart what it was. She'd never considered his vows to country, perhaps because they were not bonds she could admit to understanding -- a faceless devotion, built on unquestioning trust. Natalie could not follow if she did not understand why; in pursuit of such truth, she was fearless.
The words squeezed her chest. She did not know what to do to staunch the flow of that wound, sensing something she was desperate not to become fatal. She listened, though, with a clear gaze that did not blink away -- even when he might rather escape the pierce of it.
"Yes, he's right," she said bluntly. He would find no solace from her there; no comforting platitudes to try and soothe the shame darkening his expression. Natalie placed him on no pedestal; he had not just disobeyed an order, he had mutilated until the man resembled so much as bloody meat. But neither did she flinch from dwelling in the shadows with that coiled monster. No disgust marred the search of her expression. The anchor of her touch did not cease its softness. "But I'm not going to let him have it."
Then, recalling those painful words into the side of his horse, enough to tighten her jaw at the memory. "And nor are you."
Jay was everything Evelyn feared. Torn duties, the bloody conflicts of a loyal heart, a brutality both chained and unleashed to the call of good intentions. Training alone made him dangerous, but the siren hold of power threatened to make him monstrous. A foolish thing to want to protect, and yet she would.
Her brow knit faintly at the name. "No, I don't think so."
There was an easy path here, albeit one currently drowning at the bottom of the lake. For the first time she considered that Jay may have had the same thought; her father commanded federal agents from a cell a world away, after all, and plucked state secrets like overripe fruit. Framed in such a light she didn't blame him for grasping at the resource, though the curl of that thought ripped. The wound flared sore. She didn't want to consider Jay had been prepared to hurt her in the process.
"I don't suppose you fancy that swim? As much as I'm relieved it's gone, I'm quite sure he could have helped. Given sufficient motivation, at least." The words cracked dry, a listless humour. Her willingness to bring it up reared shy, a stillness capturing her expression; protecting the stir of emotion within, and shielding it from sight. If he asked her to break that silence anyway, she wondered what she would say. Probably she already knew the answer. She forged on anyway.
"You realise you can't be seen to be digging into this, quite aside from the fact you already have enough in the way of enemies." She didn't need to list the stakes; the weight of failure would ripple far further than the bubble of Jay's family. The Custody's host of American diplomats was a big deal; a tentative grasp at peace between their nations. An American defector, a channeling American defector, caught attempting to unravel the sorts of secrets Jay hinted at would be a battle cry to every war monger in the shadows. Worse that he had Brandon's sanction to be here.
But Natalie had far less to lose. A shadow chased her anyway.
A father's daughter.
Her attention returned to the badge produced from a jacket pocket, the set of her expression only thoughtful now. "Diaz is on the board of directors for an American pharmaceutical company as well. Seems he's a busy man." The torn scrap of paper had no place in this, and yet the link disclosed was too conspicuous to be a coincidence. If she shut her eyes she could almost see the connections like a faint tracery of webbing, but the common thread forming the pattern was elusive.
And might only take one small phonecall, and a sufferance of pride, to reveal.
"He," she wouldn't say his name, "had someone break into the apartment the night we left, but he couldn't have known I was leaving, so I don't know why he left those documents. There was a message too. Something about choosing allies with care. I have the remaining papers if you want to go through them." She thought she'd understood her father's motivation, but now she was not so sure. She hadn't had time to search for links between the two files, and now one half was presumed little more than the ash she had found on her floor.
The offer was raw and spoken with little inflection. But frustration swelled. Her head pressed light against his chest, seeking something solid in a tilted world. It was a somewhat tentative comfort, like she was unsure whether he might wisp like smoke. Weakness was not keenly shared at the best of times, and last night's rejections wounded deeper than she'd ever care to admit. Which was probably why she plunged her hand straight back into the fire, though only for a careless moment. When she pulled back it was to push the hair from her face, stifling a sigh.
"A few days ago even permission for the leave to come home would have seemed impossible, and the means to save Cayli even more so. And yet here we are." They would fix this. They had to.
Eyes scanning the lake, with its ripples and wakes of passed boaters, they had the same idea. It wasn’t the first time he imagined skinny dipping with Natalie, in the most honorable and respectful sort of way of course. But even someone who endured the harshest of training in waterway maneuvers, finding that flimsy wallet on the bottom of a lake bed would be searching for the invisible. Not to mention that diving 30 feet deep may require gear he didn’t have handy.
Not to mention that he didn’t exactly favor another chat with Alistair. Actually, he kind of liked that slick bastard, but probably wasn’t going to work out. Besides, the deal was done. Alistair was out of the picture and out of Natalie’s conscience. They’d find another way.
Thing was, the days were counting down. He was suppose to be in Africa, and there were enough of a horde pounding down his door to deal with currently. Adding Ascendancy’s messengers to that pile was downright daunting. The whole thing was a huge fucking tangle that no manner of hands squeezing into his scalp was going to unravel. A pharmaceutical company. Diaz. Jenkins. Amengual.
They had names. Someplace to hide. Days to figure it out. “Should be doable.” He shrugged on a morbid laugh. There was only everyone’s lives riding on the outcome. “I’ll look at the papers after. We have about a ten hour drive ahead of us. Hope you can sleep sitting up.” He grinned unapologetically. She deserved better than this mess. For some reason, she wasn’t so willing to shuck off. Damned loyalties planted on the wrong person. But he’d protect them, to his dying day if possible.
His own wallet blew up about then. He glanced, only to flinch at the images coming through from Cayli. There was a huge mess back at the cars. Stuff all over the ground. He frowned, showed it to Natalie like she might decipher the chaos. Mom and dad were.. tugging on something? What the—?
Then a sinking feeling carved a fresh pit in his gut. “Oh no.” He looked at her aghast for a moment, licked his lips and took off at a sprint. Though he glanced to make sure Natalie wasn’t left completely behind, he was a fast runner when he wanted. The hat flew from his hair in the wind, but despite how much he loved that Stetson, it lay abandoned in the grass.
He skidded around the vehicles, coming to a dead stop, face pale. Yep. It was exactly what he thought.
Mom and dad were literally pulling on the dark cloth of his Custody’s uniform. Well, ain’t this whole family reunion thing a fucking carnival of horrors?
Shocked by his sudden appearance, dad wrenched the uniform from mom who had seemed to attempt to protect it. Instead, dad turned the sleeve, face red with rage, the patches flashing orange and gray.
A fresh new onslaught of accusations were hurled. Jay just stood there in silence, wishing Cayli weren’t there to witness the bloodbath. She wasn’t anything near as dogmatic about the CCD as dad was, but she wasn’t ignorant either. She took history class. The Custody was everything the States weren’t – the antithesis, really. Enemies.
Jay tuned dad out. Dusty blue eyes went from face to loving face a moment, until he knew what he had to do. There was a place on the edge of the power’s grasp that teetered with one foot on both realms – the physical and the beyond. Straddling both, he lived fully in neither. It was a place, like a void, that cloaked him with a strange sort of new armor. The power called its seizure. A siren sound he ignored for now despite the crushing nearness of its lure.
“Get in the car.” He said far more calmly than he expected to hear himself.
Mom swallowed, unlocking her frozen self and attempted to pick up the belongings on the dirt. Jay’s bag had overturned and somehow the contents tumbled out. A box of ammunition lay sprawled around it.
“Get in the car, please.” Jay silently pleaded with her. When dad literally thrust the uniform in his face, it was his turn to wrench it away.
“I’ll explain on the drive.”
“Explain now. Is this yours?”
The cloth felt heavy as chainmail in his hands. But there was basically no denying what was waved before them all. At least Natalie’s presence probably made more sense. “Yes it is.” He said. Again, that place where the power called just out of grasp deadened what hurt might otherwise sweep him asunder.
Dad looked outright rejected. He scrubbed at his hair, much the same way Jay tended to do. He clenched his jaw the same way. Eyes veiled to what he wanted to see. Ears hearing nothing but silence despite the sounds of explanation trapped in Jay’s chest.
“I thought you went to Africa! What are you? Some kind of defector? A double agent or something? A traitor?”
Armor was actually a nice metaphor. Jay rather wished he was wearing some at the moment. He picked up the bag where it had overturned, deposited it in the back of the vehicle. The remainder of their things were transferred over. So it went wedged in with everything else.
The ammunition, on the other hand, he just stared at.
“Well? Do you have anything to say for yourself?”
That’s when he was pushed over the edge, plunged into the darkness. The power swirled like a storm for that one moment he looked into the eyes of people he loved. Simultaneously, the golden-kid they knew was gone.
The power swept the debris together. Mom hopped like a snake was striking. Cayli gasped. Jensen watched, all too aware. Natalie- he didn’t even want to know what Natalie was thinking.
He channeled in front of them, swept everything back into its case, and lifted the heavy box like it was a bag of feathers to the vehicle. When it was done, he crossed his arms, and said again. “Everyone get in the car.”
He meant to explain himself along the way. Hand to God he really did want to tell them the story. But the first few miles were all too silent. When the silence stretched like the highway drenched in darkness before them, he didn’t break it. This was going to be the longest ten hours of his life.
An uneasy feeling stretched his stomach, and it wasn’t from the Belgian waffle buffet at the casino. It felt wrong to leave without Natalie. She’d been with them since the ball so why would she leave now? Was it a misunderstanding of some sort? Although it was difficult to deny the appearance of the matter, Jensen shared in Jay’s worry. If the danger the Carpenter family was really as dire as Jay said, without a reason to doubt the Legionnaire’s word, then Jensen was obligated to provide asylum where he could. He wasn’t exaggerating about the size of their Preston Hollow mansion; although, after living the life of a vagrant the past few years, he was ashamed of just how much prosperity he and Jessika acquired for a family of four. A small redemption but the gesture still suffused a small sense of the heroic upon the preacher.
He stretched his legs lakeside, admiring the greenery and landscaping when they pulled up. Jay quietly approached, and Jensen felt himself tense at the other man’s proximity.
”Would you stay with them while I look around?”
Jensen glanced at the family. Jay’s mother was easy to talk to, but the family dynamic bound the foursome together like barbed wire not silken strands of love. Jessika and he never behaved so at odds in front of other people. Such things were for private lives. Maybe a lack of privacy was part of the ongoing problem, and time alone with Jay might do the family some good?
“Why don’t you stay and I’ll go?” he asked only to be denied. Jay was hard-headed, worse when the Stetson shaded the intensity of his gaze, that was for sure. Jensen watched his retreat in search of Natalie for a few steps, licked his lips nervously and went to wait with the rest.
They were consolidating items from one vehicle to the other when Jensen heard a thud and a string of curses erupting from Jay’s father. The soldier’s bag had overturned, a few items cascading out. A box of shells scattered along with it. Jensen hurried over to help pick up the mess, but Caroline was there first. She pulled some piece of clothing that was disrupted in the fall with what seemed to be every intention to fluff and refold it, but instead her brow furrowed thoughtfully.
“What’s this?” She asked curiously.
Jensen gasped when he realized what she was holding.
“Let me help,” he hurried to take it off her hands, but David intervened. He snatched at the sleeve, eyes roamed the patches and cloth, fingers gripped the chain. A bright red face turned to Jensen, who had no idea what to do. “I think that’s a, umm, uh,” he was a terrible liar, but frantically tried to think of one anyway. “It’s not what you think it is.”
David didn’t buy it, though. Jensen’s attention snapped toward Cayli, who was now witness yet again to another fight between her parents. He went to go stand by her, looking down upon her apologetically.
Jay returned, dust kicked up around his feet as his skid to a stop. Everything that followed happened so fast that Jensen barely processed it. Channeling darkened the other man’s brow, and Jensen forced himself to look at the ground rather than watch. Soon, they were piled in the car again, but silence loomed like a stormcloud. Thunder could very well be rolling through the car and it would have gone unnoticed.