by Amelia Autin
After a minute a deep voice sounded in her ear in the musical cadence of Zakharan...the sound of home. “Mara?” Andre asked, and though he didn’t say it she knew she had woken him. When she didn’t answer, he asked, “What is it, dernya? Is something wrong?”
The loving concern, the use of the endearing nickname only he used, shattered the ice encasing her. “Andre,” she began, but then tears clogged her throat and she sobbed.
“Mara!” She could hear the anguish in the way he spoke her name, and knew she had to tell him...something.
She sank to her knees beside the chair, her legs no longer able to support her, and fought the sobs wracking her body until she could speak coherently. “I need to come home,” she managed in a voice that shook with grief. “Please, Andre. Please send a plane for me. Now. Tonight. I cannot stay here. I need to come home. Please.”
How long she knelt by the chair after she’d hung up the phone she never knew. But her body was stiff and aching when she finally stood up. There were no more tears. Tears were a luxury she couldn’t afford. She needed to start preparing to leave, needed to mobilize her household, needed to think of everything that had to be done. And to do that she needed to be strong. Strong...like Keira. No, not like Keira. Keira made her think of Trace. And she couldn’t think of Trace. Not now. Not ever again.
Click. Click. Click.
* * *
Trace keyed in the electronic code to open the estate’s driveway gate, and thrummed his fingers impatiently on the steering wheel until the gate was open and he could drive through. Then he electronically closed the gate securely behind him. He drove up the winding driveway and parked his truck in front of the guest house, noting absently that the four-wheel drive Alec drove was already parked there, but Liam’s wasn’t. His brows drew together in a frown. Liam’s supposed to be on duty today, he thought. Did he and Alec switch and they forgot to tell me?
He rubbed his hand tiredly over his face—he hadn’t slept much the past few nights away. His conscience had been brutal, denying him sleep. He’d finally reached a decision this afternoon, and had hightailed it back here determined to make things right with the princess. To take back the lies he’d let her believe. Even though they still had no future, he’d hurt her more than he’d ever believed he could hurt a woman, and he would have no peace until he begged her forgiveness.
He jumped out, headed straight for the main house and rang the bell, but no one answered the door. He rang again, but still no answer. Wondering, but not really worried, not yet, he pulled out his key ring to unlock the door. But just as he was reaching for the doorknob he heard footsteps crunching in the snow behind him, and he swung around.
Alec stood there bareheaded, his jacket hanging open as if he’d just shrugged it on and hurried outside when he heard Trace’s truck. “She’s gone.”
“Gone?” Trace asked blankly, staring at the other man. “What do you mean? Why didn’t you call me? She wasn’t supposed to leave until Christmas Eve.”
“They left Saturday. Not just the princess, her entire household. And I don’t think she’s coming back. She had her horses shipped by rail to the coast and then by sea to Zakhar—her groom accompanied them.”
An icy, empty feeling settled over Trace, but Alec wasn’t finished. “She left you something,” he said, his voice as cold as Trace felt. “Liam and I drew straws to see which of us got to be the one to tell you—and I won.”
“Tell me what?”
“That whatever you did to her, we hope you’re satisfied.” Contempt mingled with repressed anger in Alec’s face and voice, and was reflected in the rigid tenseness of his muscles. “Because Liam and I—we just wanted to cry.”
Trace’s right hand slowly clenched into a fist. “Just spit it out, damn it,” he grated.
Alec shook his head. In a soft but deadly voice he said, “See for yourself. She left it in your room.”
Trace held Alec’s gaze for a minute, then stalked toward the guest house, his footsteps in the crisp snow the only sound in the stillness. Foreboding clutched at him, and a fear such as he’d never known filled his chest. When he reached his room he pushed the door open. And froze.
Alec’s words reverberated in his mind. Liam and I—we just wanted to cry. Now he understood what Alec had meant. Because he wanted to cry, too. Strewn across his bed was the gift she’d left him. Her hair. Her glorious honey-brown hair. If Eve had looked like you, he’d told her when he’d seen her naked except for those cascading waves, Adam would have gladly left Eden.
He took two steps toward the bed, and then stopped short as her message hit him like a physical blow. She’d left it all behind. For him. Because he’d made her feel ashamed. Ashamed of every intimate moment they’d spent together. She’d hacked it off and discarded it, as if she couldn’t bear the reminder of the times he’d caressed her body through the silk of her hair, as if she couldn’t bear the reminder of how he’d wrapped her hair around his throat and breathed in the scent of her. As if she couldn’t bear any reminder of him.
A slight sound alerted him to Alec’s presence behind him before the other man spoke from the doorway. “What the hell did you do to her, McKinnon?” he asked, the rage in his voice even more a challenge than his words. And a threat.
Trace didn’t answer. Couldn’t. He didn’t even turn around. He just pushed the door shut in Alec’s face and locked it. Locked himself in with his anguish. “I’m sorry, Princess,” he whispered in a ravaged voice, his eyes squeezing shut as the enormity of what he’d done washed over him. “Oh God, I’m sorry. Please forgive me.” There was no answer except the harsh sound of his tormented breathing.
* * *
Trace spent Christmas Day holed up in his cabin in Keystone. He hadn’t wanted to go back there—memories of the princess at the cabin would haunt him until the day he died—but he had nowhere else to go. His condo was sublet until June; he couldn’t possibly stay at the estate now that he was no longer guarding the princess; and although he’d long since been invited to spend Christmas with the Walkers, he couldn’t envision himself making convivial small talk with the Walkers’ other guests. Especially since two of them—Keira’s brothers, Alec and Liam—would be staring at him with the contempt decent men reserved for rapists and child molesters.
He’d brought a bottle of Johnny Walker Black along with the intention of getting wasted, but he couldn’t even bring himself to break the seal. The bottle sat unopened on the counter in the cabin’s tiny kitchen. Nor could he bring himself to start a fire in the fireplace, so he stoically sat on the sofa in the main room, staring at the cold, empty grate, huddled in his ski jacket and woolen scarf until the heater warmed up the room.
He was exhausted. His body craved the respite of dreamless sleep, but for the past five nights he’d only slept in snatches. Every time he dozed off he dreamed of the princess as he’d last seen her, her eyes huge in a face from which all color had fled. All except for that thin line of blood on her lip, crimson as she whispered her worst nightmare come true. Photographs?
How could he have let her believe him capable of such a vile act, such a desecration of her love? She’d cried atop Mount Evans and told him, I would turn around, and there they would be—the paparazzi. Click. Click. Click. I used to have nightmares when I was young...I honestly believe if I were being raped or murdered and the paparazzi were there, instead of trying to help me they would just photograph it. He’d been desperate to break it off with her, but...he should have found another way. With the crystal clarity of hindsight he realized it would have been better to have just walked away without a word than to let her think...
And as if that memory wasn’t enough to rob him of sleep, there were her last words to him—I should have known I could not be loved. How did a man live with that on his conscience? How could he live with that memory and still call himself a man?
D
espair ate at him. Not just the despair of knowing he’d destroyed her fragile confidence in herself as a woman. The despair of knowing he’d lost her trust, something precious, something so rare in his life there weren’t words to describe it.
It was easy to say he’d done it to protect her from his enemies. But if he was honest—by all means, let’s be honest at last, he told himself ruthlessly—that wasn’t the only reason. Long before he’d noticed he was being followed, he’d unilaterally decided there was no future for them.
Who gave you the right to make that decision for her...without discussion? He would never have dreamed of doing that with his former partner. Why had he done it with Mara?
The answer, when it came, was brutal in its self-assessment—he’d judged himself as unworthy of her. Because of that, he’d callously ignored her feelings in the matter, and had determined he wouldn’t let her throw away her life...and her love...on a no-name bastard no one had wanted. Not his father. Not his mother. Not his grandparents.
No one had wanted him—the man he was inside—except her.
Pain returned in waves. There is no such thing as a bastard child, she’d told him with fierce determination that first time at his cabin. Was that when he’d realized it was already too late? That the battle against loving her was lost? And when she’d touched him with loving hands, giving to him so selflessly, healing him when he hadn’t even known he was wounded—was that when he’d surrendered his heart?
But not his trust. He’d never surrendered that.
Trust. His princess had freely given him her trust, but he hadn’t given her his in return. He hadn’t trusted her love, hadn’t trusted she knew what she was doing. She’d seen something in him that had torn down the barriers in her heart that had stood for most of her life. But he hadn’t believed she could see the man he really was and love him. No one else ever had, not in thirty-six years. Why should she be any different?
Harsh reality deluged him like an icy rain. You weren’t protecting her, you were protecting yourself. That’s the real truth here. You were desperate to protect yourself from being hurt, so you hurt her instead. You drove her away so you could fool yourself you were being noble. But that was as much a lie as telling her you seduced her on command.
Like an old, old man, Trace removed his ski jacket and let it drop unheeded on the floor. He reached for the SIG SAUER nestled in his shoulder holster, drew it out, and laid it on the coffee table in front of him. Then stared at it for several long minutes. He’d known men who had taken that way out, when the pain of living had made it seem the only escape. No one he was close to, thank God, but men he’d worked side by side with in Afghanistan, men he knew.
He’d always told himself it was the coward’s way out. Had always felt that a real man could tough it out, could take the worst that life dished out. He hadn’t understood. Now he realized that if he’d been a better friend, maybe those men could have confided in him. Maybe he could have made a difference. Even if only one man had changed his mind... But he had shielded himself from feeling too much all his life. Had shielded himself from getting too close to just about everyone...including his ex-wife.
Was that why Janet didn’t trust me? he wondered, seeing the failure of his marriage clearly for the first time. Because I didn’t trust her enough to let her see the man I really am?
With a sense of shock he realized that only twice in his adult life had he ever let anyone inside his defenses. Only two people had been allowed to get close to him emotionally—Keira and the princess. And only once had he trusted. The woman he’d trusted hadn’t been the woman he loved more than life itself.
He buried his face in his hands.
* * *
Two hours later his cell phone rang, startling Trace from a restless, dream-disturbed sleep. He fumbled for the phone, wondering who the hell could be calling him on Christmas Day. “McKinnon,” he growled once he finally managed to get the cell phone answered.
“It’s me,” Keira said in his ear, “so don’t think you can scare me off with your big, bad, bear imitation.”
Trace sat up and rubbed a hand over his face. He tried to see what time it was, but his eyes wouldn’t focus. “What time is it?”
“Never mind that,” his former partner told him sternly. “I have someone here who wants to say something to you.” There was a brief silence, followed by a faraway, “It’s Trace, Alyssa. Tell him what you want to say.”
Alyssa’s little girl voice gurgled in his ear. “Dank-oo, Dace.”
“You’re welcome, sweetie,” he managed. “I hope you liked it.”
Keira came back on the phone. “She loved it. You knew she would. But you’ve got to stop spoiling her.”
“Is she having a good Christmas?”
“All four of my brothers are here. My mom’s here. And Cody, of course. All dancing attendance on her. And Santa Claus left her a boatload of presents under the tree and a stocking filled with a dentist’s worst nightmares. But her ‘Dace’ isn’t here, so she’s miserable.”
Trace laughed. “Yeah, right.”
Keira laughed, too. “Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating a little. Hang on a sec. Cody, can you take Alyssa for a few minutes?” A deep rumble answered her, followed by a moment of silence, and then Keira came back on the line. “Okay, I’m back. Cody’s got Alyssa and I’m barricaded in the laundry room, so I might have ten minutes, tops.”
“Don’t interrupt your Christmas for me.”
“Please,” Keira said drily. “Don’t give me that crap. This is me, remember? Your former partner? The one you didn’t hesitate to ask if I was in love with Cody two and half years ago? The one you didn’t hesitate to ask if I was sleeping with him? Does that ring any bells?”
Trace winced. “Yeah. I seem to recall having the gall to ask you those questions.”
Keira’s voice turned serious. “Alec just told me Mara went back to Zakhar. Lock, stock and barrel.”
For a moment he’d let himself forget, but now it came roaring back, a freight train thundering down the track, smashing right into his heart. “Yeah.”
“He didn’t say, but he didn’t have to—I saw the look he and Liam exchanged when I told them you weren’t coming for Christmas dinner. You had something to do with it. Right?”
“Right.”
“Are you out of your ever-loving, freaking mind?”
Trace was startled into laughing again, a rusty sound that held echoes of pain. “Don’t pull any punches, Keira. Tell me what you really think.”
“I’ll tell you, but I’m not sure you want to hear what I have to say.”
He didn’t respond at first, just rubbed his hand over his face again, then he said slowly, seriously, his tone an indictment of himself and his actions, “Whatever you’re thinking, it can’t be any worse than I’ve already said to myself.”
“I wasn’t planning on calling you names. I was just going to tell you the real reason I wanted you to be Alyssa’s godfather, and let you take it from there.”
Trace hesitated. “Because you knew that if anything happened to you and Cody, I’d protect her with my life?”
“No. That might have been Cody’s reason, but it wasn’t mine.”
Puzzled, he asked, “Then why?”
He could hear her draw a deep breath in his ear and expel it slowly. “It’s two things, really. Because there’s a capacity for love in you far beyond most men. I don’t even know if you’re aware of it yourself, but I see it in you. And because you respect women. I mean really respect them, and not just as women, as people. If anything happened to Cody and me, I wanted my daughter raised by a man who could give her roots and wings. The roots that can only come from unconditional love, and the wings that can only grow strong when you’re allowed to fly free as far as they will take you.”
Trace squeezed his eyes sh
ut and swallowed the lump in his throat that threatened to overwhelm him. But Keira wasn’t finished.
“I love my brothers, you know that. But I grew up with them. I know them inside and out. They would give Alyssa the roots she needs, but I don’t know if they would give her wings. And that’s why I wanted you to be her godfather and not one of them.”
“Keira...” He couldn’t go beyond that one word.
“Alyssa deserves the best. And that’s you.” She cleared her throat. “There’s just one more thing I have to tell you, and then I’ll let you go. Liam told me—he thought it was funny, and it is, in a way, but it’s a little pathetic, too—Mara was taking cooking lessons from her chefs, did you know that?”
“No.”
“Apparently she was trying to make herself more self-sufficient, like me.”
“That doesn’t make sense—you can’t cook.”
“No, but she didn’t know that until Alec told her. What she does know is that you hold me in high esteem. And do you know what she told Alec when he asked her how she’d been injured? She said, ‘I only did what Keira would have done in that situation.’”
Trace uttered a pithy, four-letter word.
“That’s all I wanted to tell you. Okay, that’s not all I wanted to tell you, but I don’t think I need to tell you anything more. You’re a smart man—you’ve never given yourself the credit you deserve, but you were a great teacher and I owe you a lot. The only thing I regret about marrying Cody is losing you as a partner—and if you ever tell him I said I regret anything about marrying him I’ll call you a liar to your face,” she ended with a laugh that had him laughing, too. “He feels guilty enough about it as it is. Oh, and that reminds me,” she said swiftly before he could hang up. “Cody asked me to check on a license plate number for you, along with the make and model of the car it belongs to. He said you thought the New World Militia or the Russian mob might be tailing you.”