Of Stone and Sky

by Charissa Stastny

  “Nice work,” Angel said to me.

  “You weren’t too shabby either.”

  I aimed the gun at the other devils. “Who wants to make my day? I might not have bullets to kill you all, but I’ll send several of you to hell.” Where they belonged. “My daddy taught me how to shoot.”

  We were dead. Outnumbered. My husband bleeding out. I kept Duke’s gun raised, but all I could think about was Lincoln. Would he die before I could get to him, as Baba had all those years ago? I waved the gun in front of me, making several of the men step back.

  “Put the gun down, girlie,” a man with missing teeth said.

  I aimed low and shot at him. Baba hadn’t taught me to handle a gun, but Ken Barber, my foster dad, had.

  My aim wasn’t too far off. I’d been aiming for the man’s nether regions but hit the middle of his leg. He fell to the floor, holding his leg.

  “Rush her, you fools!” Duke yelled.

  Angel slammed Duke’s head into the cement, but not before three men heeded his words and rushed me. I fired another shot and missed. One of the men tackled me to the ground, and the gun flew from my hand, sliding across the floor toward Lincoln.

  The man crushed air out of me, and I knew we were goners. Though these men deserved to die, I hadn’t been able to kill when the moment had come. I hadn’t been able to shoot at their black hearts. Baba’s voice had whispered to leave judgment in God’s hands. And I had.

  But they wouldn’t be as merciful.

  68

  Lincoln

  My wife was manhandled to her feet, and I wanted to scream. She was bleeding from her mouth and had scratches on her hands and bloody holes in the knees of her pants. She looked as if she’d run through a battlefield.

  And I could do nothing to help her.

  I wanted to hold her before I died, tell her I loved her. Blood seeped from my wound as I helplessly witnessed my wife’s humiliating last moments.

  Why, God! I cried. Why do you take everyone I love? Take me instead. Let her escape.

  “Drop your weapons, you sick bastards.”

  My eyes widened at that voice. Though it caused immeasurable pain, I turned my head to see what couldn’t possibly be.

  Gramps moved out from behind a stack of boxes, holding a gun with both hands, looking like a soldier, not a dying man.

  “The police are on their way,” he said in a commanding voice. “Let the girl go and get up against the wall if you want to live.”

  The man nearest Saemira grabbed her in a chokehold, pulling a knife from his pocket and holding it against her neck.

  “I’ll kill her!” he screamed, using her as a human shield as he moved backward.

  Saemira, my brave, courageous wife, slipped her foot behind his leg, then brought her hands straight up, catching him off guard. He tripped over her foot when he tried to turn, and she pounded his groin, doubling him over.

  I reached for the gun she’d dropped, and aimed the weapon at two of Duke’s minions moving to intercept her. “Saemira!” I called. “Get behind me.”

  She hurried over, taking vigil beside me as I collapsed. She retrieved the gun and stroked my head.

  “Face the wall,” Gramps ordered the thugs.

  Two of them tried to rush him. Gramps dropped one with a well-placed shot in the knee. The other guy dropped from a shot fired from another direction.

  “Mr. Wilder?” Saemira said next to my ear.

  “Put your hands in the air,” Alex said, before calling the criminals words only a soldier would speak. They deserved each epithet he flung at them.

  “We need a medic,” Gramps said.

  “Already ahead of you, old boy,” Alex answered.

  I pulled my wife close. For the moment, we were safe. Alex and Gramps had all seven men against the wall, guns trained on them. Right then, it wasn’t difficult to picture them both out in the jungles of Nam, hunting the Viet Cong together.

  My wife pulled away. I opened my eyes to see Tayne and another officer tugging her away from me. Hallelujah. They’d arrived.

  “It’s about freaking time,” Saemira snapped at the detective.

  “The paramedics are just behind me,” he said, lifting my shirt and rolling me onto my side. “Looks like the bullet went right through. That’s good.” He applied pressure, making me suck in air and hiss.

  “It hurts…like…Helen…Keller,” I said through clenched teeth.

  Saemira returned to my side, kissing my cheek, and stripping off her ripped blouse. “Use this to stop the bleeding,” she said, handing it to Tayne.

  “You’re bleeding, too,” he said, before wadding the cloth up and pressed it against my wound.

  Was my wife wounded? Had the man with the knife cut her?

  “I’m fine.” Saemira whispered in my ear. “You’re not allowed to die on me, do you hear? If you do, I will personally kill you myself.”

  I winced as Tayne kept applying pressure.

  Saemira squeezed my fingers. “You officially have hero status, so no more heroics.” She swiped at her eyes.

  “Love…you,” I said, beyond grateful that the bad guys couldn’t hurt her any more.

  “Shhh. Tell me later, with lots of kisses.”

  I closed my eyes, head swimming with pain. But my wife was safe.

  That was all that mattered.

  My body ached. My stomach burned. But my eyes feasted as I opened them. “Aren’t you the…most lovely sight. Ever.” I found it difficult to speak, like my mouth was lined with cotton.

  Saemira sat beside me, stroking my arm. “You look like caca-doodoo.”

  I smiled…or tried to. My lips were dry and cracked. She didn’t look much better, honestly. She had an awful-looking black eye, a nasty cut on her swollen lips, and a bandaged arm.

  But she was alive!

  “Now that I know you’re going to live, thank you for saving Angel.” She pressed a kiss to my cheek. “If you’d died, I never would’ve forgiven you.”

  “How did Gramps find us?” I must’ve lost consciousness because I couldn’t remember anything after my wife had taken her shirt off to staunch my bleeding.

  “He’s Superman.” She lifted my watch from the table. “The sly old soldier tracked us with this. And my ring. He said he felt nervous after the talk with Officer Tayne. Gramps and Alex came up with a plan to track us in case something went wrong, which it totally did.”

  Good old Gramps. He’d always been there for me, saving me literally and figuratively throughout my life. “I love you,” I said.

  Saemira blinked and looked away. “I have so much to atone for.”

  What did she mean?

  “I’ve ruined everything. Cost you millions. Cost you your house. Almost cost you your life.”

  “Shh.” I put a finger to her battered lips. “Angel’s right. You talk…too much.”

  A knock kept me from assuring her that none of those things mattered.

  Alex Wilder entered with flowers. As if I needed any more of those. My room already looked and smelled like a damned floral shop.

  “Alex.” Saemira wrapped the old soldier in a hug. “My brave protector. Thank you for coming.” She took the flowers. “These are beautiful.”

  “Ed is resting at home. He’s dizzy and told me to tell you to hurry up and get better so he can see you.”

  I still couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that two old men had saved us. If it hadn’t been for Gramps’s timing, one—or all of us—would’ve died. “Thanks…for saving us,” I said.

  He growled. “It’s galling what you two have endured.”

  Saemira’s eyes glistened with tears, and I understood what I had to do. Wilder’s visit was fortuitous.

  “Honestly, Alex, it’s galling…what I’ve done to you.”

  He gave me a weird look. “What do you mean?”

  “I have a…confession.”

  Saemira’s eyes widened. She seemed to grasp immediately what I intended to say. She pushed between Wil
der and me, blocking him from view.

  “My husband’s loopy right now from the meds.”

  “I’m lucid. Let me get this off my chest.”

  “Maybe you should come another time.” She tried to tug Alex toward the door.

  “No. He needs to know the truth.” She wouldn’t stop me. “Saemira and I…weren’t engaged.” A weight seemed to release my chest from the burden I’d carried for months. “When Scaglione got overly friendly with her at our first meeting, I lied and said she was my fiancée to get him to bug off.”

  “He’s delusional,” Saemira said. “Don’t listen to him.”

  “Go on,” Alex said, looking at me.

  Saemira slumped, knowing she’d lost.

  I licked my stinging lips. “It’s my fault. Saemira wanted to tell you but I persuaded her to go along with the ruse. For the money.”

  “He’s making himself sound worse than he is,” she said.

  “No, I did wrong. To both of you. I bullied Saemira into playing a part.” I reached for her hand. “Our marriage is real now. I love her. But I’ll understand if you want your money back. I manipulated you in the beginning. And her.”

  Saemira buried her head in her hands. I wanted her to look up, to see that I loved her.

  But she was too distraught.

  69

  Saemira

  Lincoln squeezed my hand, but tears leaked out in a fissure of pain. Why was he doing this? Ruining everything we’d worked so hard to secure? This was a terrible time to come clean. We’d told Gramps and Alex about my real name and why I’d hidden behind an alias. But the rest of it—the fake engagement, the fake marriage in the beginning—hadn’t mattered since we loved each other now.

  Alex was a hard-nosed solider, as proved by his and Grandpa’s rescue mission. He wouldn’t look kindly on being manipulated, even if everything had turned out right in the end.

  “Step outside with me, my dear,” Alex said.

  Maybe I could do damage control. Clear Lincoln’s name and take all the blame.

  He gestured to a bench in the hallway, and I sat. He sank down next to me and patted my hand.

  “Do you love Lincoln?”

  I swiped at my stinging eyes. “With all my heart. But he deserves better than me. I fooled him into caring for me.”

  His white brows raised. “Your husband hasn’t been fooled, my dear. You only have to search his eyes to see the truth. The man is completely smitten by you. But what’s this about him lying about your engagement?”

  “It was my fault. I feel horrible for deceiving you since you’ve been nothing but good to us. But I thought it’d be the best way to get you to invest in EcoCore.”

  Alex watched me intently. “Tell me exactly what you two did.”

  How could I spin Lincoln in a good light? He’d suffered too much already because of me. I didn’t want him to be hurt any more.

  “Lincoln was trying to save me from your CFO. He obviously doesn’t think quickly on his feet because he’s not a practiced liar, so he told Scaglione we were engaged. He never expected Scaglione to tell you. I played along and forced Lincoln to go along with it longer than he wanted. You mustn’t blame him. He’s an honorable man.”

  Alex patted my hand. “You really love him, don’t you?”

  I hugged my body. “He’s my everything.”

  “That makes me happy to hear. I worried about Lincoln at first, wondering if he’d do the right thing by you. It took his mind more time to catch up to his heart than yours did. But even that first night we met, I had no problem believing his lie could become the truth.”

  What?

  He winked. “My dear, you didn’t really think I bought his lie that night, did you?”

  My mouth fell open.

  He chuckled. “Lincoln really is a terrible liar. Scaglione bought it because he was blinded by guilt. The man’s married.”

  I gasped. “That snake.”

  “Yes. But he’s a snake who’s genius with finance. Still, I wish you could’ve seen Lincoln’s face when Scaglione took you out on the dance floor. I thought he would burst a blood vessel.”

  “All I remember is feeling invisible that night.”

  Alex laughed. “Oh, my dear, believe me, you were not invisible to a soul there. Lincoln couldn’t keep his eyes off of you. I watched you two interact and could sense your attraction, yet you both tried so hard to act unaffected. It was comical. When Lincoln abruptly left the table, I knew he was finally ready to stake his claim. Scaglione returned and asked if I’d known you two were engaged. I decided to play along to see how you’d react.”

  “You wily fox. When will I learn not to underestimate you? Here we thought we were pulling one over on you, and you pulled one over on us.”

  His eyes crinkled. “It worked out for the best, did it not?”

  I hugged him.

  He patted my back. “You truly are a gem, and your husband recognizes that now. I dare say he made his confession for you, not me. He seemed to want you to understand he didn’t care about losing my money, which you haven’t. He cares about you.” He kissed my head and stood. “I’ll leave you two to talk things out. But before I go, I have one more secret to share.”

  I didn’t want any more secrets. I wanted my life to be an open book from now on.

  “I hired a private investigator to dig a little deeper into Lincoln’s ex-wife after she came to me with some ‘evidence’ against your husband.”

  I grimaced. What had that vile woman given him?

  “The ‘evidence’ was garbage, but my PI stumbled upon quite a load of smelly dirt when he sniffed around some more. Let’s just say that Lincoln need not be concerned about that woman gaining control of EcoCore. Ever. No court on earth will award her a dime when I leak her scandal to the district attorney’s office. And I have documents from an abortion clinic that prove Lincoln didn’t cause her miscarriage. She had the baby aborted an hour before she called the cops and claimed those aggravated battery charges.”

  “Seriously?” What had he found? And would it really keep the she-snake from undermining all of Lincoln’s hard work?

  “Quite serious, my dear.”

  I laughed, feeling beyond relieved. This would make my husband so happy. “How can I ever thank you enough for everything you’ve done? Lincoln truly is the best of men. Thank you for clearing his name. I hope his luck turns, and he can be rid of that woman forever.”

  “He will be, dear. Trust me.” He shooed me. “Now, get back in there and let your husband finish what he was trying to tell you before I stole you away.”

  70

  Lincoln

  The door opened, and Saemira stepped inside, looking relieved and happy. Maybe Alex hadn’t chewed her out.

  I motioned her to my bed. “What did he say?”

  She grinned. “The sneaky old man knew the truth all along. We weren’t playing him as much as he was playing us.”

  “Thank God for the trickster.”

  “Yes,” she agreed.

  “I really don’t care about the money,” I said, intertwining my fingers with hers. “If he’d taken it all away, I’d still be the happiest man on earth as long as I had you.”

  She sniffled. “Your meds are making you talk like a crazy man.”

  “I am crazy for you.” I brought her hand to my mouth, kissing her soft skin.

  “You deserve so much better than me.”

  “Not true. I’m the one who doesn’t deserve someone as amazing and wonderful as you. But love has nothing to do with what we deserve. I’m better with you in my life, Saemira. End of discussion. I hope you feel better with me.”

  “I do.” She kissed me softly on the lips. “I feel like me again.”

  I ran a hand through her hair. That’s exactly how I felt, too. I was me again, better with her by my side. I vowed to work the rest of my life to try to be the man she needed me to be. To show her how much she meant to me.

  I caressed her face. “I’d given up h
ope I would ever be happy again, but you giggled and made me see you.”

  She snorted. “You didn’t want to see me.”

  “Not at first. But now, you are all I can see.” I pulled her down for another kiss. “Marrying you is absolutely the best thing I’ve ever done. Nothing else compares. Nothing else ever will.”

  “Hush,” she said, lips touching mine. “You talk too much.” She deepened the kiss, and though my lips still stung, I didn’t stop her.

  Gramps moved his knight and chuckled when I frowned. “Still thinking about your girl, not your game, I see.”

  I moved a pawn, knowing my rook was a goner. “Can you blame me?” Saemira and the others had gone to bed over an hour ago. Gramps and I tended to get overly competitive when we played chess, which we had done every night since I’d been released from the hospital.

  “Don’t blame you at all,” he said. “Saemira’s a treasure.”

  I studied the board.

  “How’s your wound?” he asked.

  I’d gotten the all-clear from my doctor two days ago to resume normal activities. “Mostly healed,” I said. Was he trying to distract me from a move I was missing?

  “You’re not overdoing it, are you?”

  “I’m fine. I wouldn’t call chess strenuous.”

  “I’m just worried about the emotional turmoil I’m putting you under,” he said with a mischievous wink.

  I chuckled. “What about you? Are you overdoing it?” I kept studying the board. Gramps claimed his pain wasn’t bad, but he’d missed several dinners the past week, instead opting to stay in his room.

  “Nothing I can’t handle.”

  The tumor obviously wasn’t affecting his intellect. I’d lost four of the last five games. I moved another pawn toward his bishop, hoping to draw him out onto the board.

  Through the next few moves, we chitchatted about Angeline’s upcoming legal battle. He knew more than me since Alex kept him apprised of each new development. Three weeks ago, the story had been leaked to the press that my ex was having an affair with the mayor’s assistant and siphoning tax dollars from the city budget. The press was having a heyday with the juicy political scandal. Angeline might end up in prison if a jury found her guilty.