by Lauren Dane
“Abbie is atrociously ungenerous with her, I’ve noticed.”
They started downstairs, Abbie ignoring their playful banter.
Wil came into the grand foyer and grinned. Roman deftly snatched Mera from Daniel and danced her past Wilhelm’s grabbing hands. “And here is another male I find myself having to fend off. From my wife and my daughter.”
“If only those people you all scare so routinely could see you felled by a wee baby.” Abbie looked on, grinning. “Now, Mera, give your father a kiss. He has business and you and I have a date with your big brother. I wouldn’t be surprised if we found both your brothers waiting.”
Mera only knew she was loved. She only knew the safety of his arms, of his house, of a snuggle at her mother’s breast and the constant attention from her family. He never wanted her to know the kind of fear so many of his citizens did at that point in their history. And he sure as seven hells wanted to assure a safe and healthy future for them as a result of the ugliness of the war.
She made a little gurgling coo, and he couldn’t give her back to her mother just yet. “Will you be sure your mother keeps out of trouble, my darling girl? She’s reckless.”
He kissed the dark silk of Mera’s hair, already thick like her mother’s, and then handed her back to Abbie, pausing to kiss her as well. “Stay here today?”
She chafed at the situation, he knew. Wanted to get out and about, wanted to take Mera out to see her grandmother and aunt. Instead they all came to the house because it was safest. Safest in a world where the violence all around them could easily land anywhere, and he wanted his loved ones to be in the most well-defended place they could be.
“My mother is coming to visit when she finishes at work.” She kissed him back and his heart sped. Only for her did he respond that way. Only Abigail got past all his filters and upbringing to have lodged her rabble-rousing self right in his heart. “I’ll expect you for luncheon? Corrin and Deimos will be here as well. Mercy is making something suitably delicious.”
Corrin and Deimos were his sons from his first marriage. Both adults and both utterly smitten not only with his wife but their new sister as well. If only everything else in the damned ’Verses was going so well.
“I’ll be there unless something comes up. If Deimos is in the greenhouses, can you send him back to my office? He’ll need to be in on this briefing.”
She nodded and left, singing and laughing as their daughter snuggled into her hold.
“Now, let’s get down to business, shall we?”
Once everyone had taken their seat, Roman turned on the display screens and nodded to Wil.
“As you can see, we’ve made major gains in the Imperial Edge ’Verses. We now control seventy percent of Silesia. Including the main portal station and those rogue portals we’ve located. We’ve got the upper hand on Fortuna, though the geography is more of a challenge than Silesia has been.”
Wil let each person process what they saw on the screens and take notes. Roman had chosen well in the nearly seven-foot-tall Comandante. Wilhelm Ellis had a sense of justice and loyalty unlike any Roman had ever seen. He understood strategy but above all, he understood people and that made him more than just an asset, he was a weapon against an enemy who’d ceased caring about what people thought and why they did what they did. And that was one of the main reasons why the Federated Universes would take every single Imperialist ’Verse up to Caelinus.
There would be a bill for Ciro Fardelle to pay for killing so many Federation citizens. Roman Lyons would not only punish that violence on Fardelle’s part, he’d take more territory than he needed to give the Federated ’Verses a wide buffer. Fardelle would not be in charge when this was said and done because it would not end until he was dead.
“Vincenz and Julian are working on a plan now to locate and destroy the last remaining portal-collapsing device. The woman they freed on Parron, Hannah Black, is in possession of information that could be integral to us, though we don’t know what it is yet. Julian is continuing a long-term debrief and finds new information frequently as she gets better.” Wil leaned back and looked them over.
“Why hasn’t she been moved to the center?” Roman sipped his kava. These teams of operatives had their own rhythm and code; suddenly having an outside influence with other goals and needs not included in the parameters of the operation was a complication they didn’t need.
“She has an uncanny ability to break down code. Vincenz says—and I’m quoting him—Hannah is a beast with code and numbers.” Wil hid his expression behind his steepled fingers. “I’ve seen some of her work. It’s impressive. She’s developing some programs Vincenz will use when he arrives at the labs to extract, upload and destroy all data from the source.”
“I’ve read the reports. She’s not a military corpsman. She’s not an operative. She’s a woman who was mentally tortured for a year. She’s unstable. I don’t like the idea of her being on an op with my people.” Roman trusted his people, but this woman was not someone he knew at all.
Wil had approved her to go on this caper and Roman respected his judgment. At the same time, he wanted to be convinced.
“I admit I had my concerns about this as well.” Daniel sat forward. “But I’ve spoken in detail with Dr. Pesch and while he agrees her healing will take a long time, he does not harbor any fears of instability. In fact, he says her ability to pitch in and help has aided in her long-term recovery.” He shrugged. “We need her and what she’s doing.”
Wil leaned forward. “Some of my operatives were born the way they are. Canny. Quick. Merciless when necessary. Three years ago I’m sure Hannah Black would have been entirely ill suited for such an assignment. This woman survived daily torture.”
Wilhelm paused because he was still processing just what he thought of Hannah, but it was important for them to hear.
“I’m aware and I respect that. But it doesn’t mean she’s what these men are,” Roman countered and Wil forged ahead.
“She isn’t. She’s something else entirely. What she’s endured used to be called a trial by fire. She didn’t choose what happened to her. But she didn’t give up either. They caught her marking time in her cell and they’d go in and paint over where she had her tally marks. So she cut her scalp at the base of her skull so they couldn’t see it. But she knew. That young woman never broke. The strength of fortitude that takes, the character of this person to agree to go on this mission is exactly the kind of strength I look for in all my operatives. She’s not a permanent member of the team like Piper. I expect when this war is over she’ll find a way to get back to work in her own field.”
She had become part of Vincenz and Julian. He’d seen enough to know it was more than just brotherly concern. He didn’t know how far it went and it wasn’t any of his damned business. But he knew that since she’d been around Julian had been less angry and Vincenz more comfortable. Whatever part she played in that it was a good thing. Moreover, it would make the team stronger to have her there. And that was a point that couldn’t be ignored.
“But will she slow them down? Who’s to say she’s not better off away from them? In a facility where she can get help? Or at least where she can see a doctor on a daily basis. Does this serve her? I have a responsibility to her as well.”
Of course Roman cared about that. It was one of the myriad reasons Wilhelm trusted him without hesitation.
“Pesch states that putting her in any kind of facility would be disastrous to her recovery. And it is my sincere belief that if she is left behind, they’ll be slowed down anyway because they’ll be worried for her. Her place on the team makes them all stronger.” He took a breath. “She’s important.” He didn’t say he felt it, or that he guessed it. He knew it.
Since he’d been a young boy, sometimes Wil had just understood things in a different way. He’d known when someone was key, not always why or how, but that they were. It had served him throughout his life, especially as he got older and had lost the anger tha
t’d propelled him through his tumultuous youth.
Roman looked at him and then nodded. “That’s all I needed to hear.”
They finished up and he sent everyone on their way, pausing to speak with Roman privately.
“I’ve got Andrei and Piper moving toward the Imperium. On the way they’ll stop and look into all this talk of uprising.”
Roman’s jaw hardened, but Wil was totally convinced this path was necessary and it was his job to protect his government and his Federation.
“I thought we agreed to table this for now. They don’t need the attention. They’re not organized. It’s that branch of the Walker Family who were disassociated. They have nothing but a grievance. To give them any attention only sends a message that they’re worth worry. They aren’t.”
As if he were a novice on his first mission and would rush in with vid cameras and spotlights. He snorted and threw a sideways glare at Roman, who had the good sense to look a little guilty.
“And who makes sure that happens? I do, Roman. This is my job for a reason. You have enough to manage. As we suffer casualties and spend credits some Families are going to continue to call for us to withdraw and collapse the portals behind us to keep the Imperium out for good.
“This has the potential for a godsawful distraction and we can’t afford it right now. We should know who they are and if necessary relieve them of this fantastic notion that they can take your seat and control of the Federated Universes.”
“Abbie said the same thing to me yesterday.”
“Your wife is a far more intelligent creature than you are. At least you have the wit to have captured her. Go be a husband and a father for now. There’s a chill; you should take a shawl out to the gardens. The babe may be cool.”
Roman raised a brow. “If I didn’t know what a heartless cad you were, I’d suspect you’ve taken a shine to my ladies.”
“I’m too crusty and set in my ways to be sweet on your ladies. I’m on my way out. I am to be in another meeting right at this very moment.” Wil tipped his head in deference and with a wave and a quick turn on his heel was already headed out.
Coming to the house was an important reminder of everything that was at stake. Deimos, Corrin and Mera were the next generation and they’d lead the Federated Universes. They and millions of young people all across the ’Verses deserved a future. A good future. And it was his job to help them achieve that.
Julian brought several boxes inside from where they’d been waiting. He put them near where she’d been sitting on the big rug.
She looked at them, and then up at him. “Would you stay?”
Vincenz had been gone the last day, out scouting. Julian had taken care of all the paper and documentation they’d need for their trip, but Vincenz had some important contacts left in the Imperium and they only spoke to him.
But out of the blue when she’d woken up that morning she’d informed him she was ready to go through the boxes of her parents’ things Vincenz had managed to pull together.
He sat with her, leaning against the nearby couch. “Of course.”
Gingerly, she opened the top and peeked inside and her breath caught as she drew out the first item. A misshapen green lump.
“I’m good with numbers, bad with clay.” She met his gaze with a watery smile. “I made this in school and presented it to him quite proudly. He wasn’t a man prone to a lot of emotional displays. He took it solemnly and looked it over. He thanked me with a kiss on my forehead. But it wasn’t until years later that I caught sight of it on his desk. He’d had it there all along.”
He watched her handle the death of her parents anew with each item she pulled from the two boxes. The odd photograph, a cuff link, her father’s name badge. She took her time, examining each thing. Sometimes she’d offer him a story about it, others she firmed her mouth and moved to the next thing.
And then with a gasp, she pulled one last thing out.
“What is that?”
She put the two ends into her ears and placed the silver disc over his heart, smiling. Removing the buds from her ears, she placed them in his and put the disc over her own heart and he heard it.
“This is a stethoscope. An early diagnostic tool doctors used to listen to heart and lung sounds before the development of digicomps. He had this as long as I could remember. His father gave it to him, he said.” She held it to her chest.
“Does it make you happy to have it?”
She closed the second box and then made her way into his lap, still holding the stethoscope. “Yes. It makes me … comforted to have this part of him. This part that connects us.”
He held her tight, her head tucked in beneath his chin. “Good.” He put this moment with her in that memory bank, the special one, where his most important life moments went. She and Vincenz shared so much of his heart and mind.
“He’d be wildly amused that I know how to use a blaster. My mother would have appreciated the economy of it. A useful skill, she’d have said. But he had a sense of humor, dry. His world was very academic; something like a weapon would have brought him no end of fascination.”
He liked that.
“Thank you.”
“For what?” He kissed her temple, his lips against her pulse beat.
“For being here while I went through the boxes. For listening to me. For respecting my need to do this.” She took a deep breath and swiveled around, placing the stethoscope down and wrapping her legs around his waist. “People want to fix me. It’s touching. But it’s exhausting to deal with it. You don’t do that. It means a lot to me that you don’t constantly try to fix me. That you let me be.”
He hugged her then, not knowing if he could manage to keep it together when she looked at him so honestly and openly.
“No one has ever given themselves to me without expecting something in return. Not the way you have. You’re a gift, Hannah. One I am thankful for each and every day.”
She sighed happily, melting into his embrace, and they remained there together for some time, just being.
Chapter 11
“Why do you call yourself Vincent Cuomo sometimes?” Hannah asked this as she sat on the floor, her body against his leg. She had been helping him untangle a string of encrypted data for the last few hours, curled up there like a cat.
They’d leave in a few hours to take the first leg of the trip toward the Imperium but as always, he was loath to move when she was near.
So he paused, sometimes still surprised by the suddenness of these types of questions. It seemed such a part of her by that point, the way she just blurted out whatever she happened to think.
But only with him and Julian. With others she was more reserved and tightly controlled. That trust and intimacy was a gift.
He hummed a pleased sigh, stroking a hand over the cool, smooth silk of her hair. “When I first arrived here after I … left, they asked me to use another name. Walking around with Fardelle as my last name given who my father is seemed a bad idea. Cuomo is a family name on my mother’s side a few generations back. Vincent instead of Vincenz seemed to stick. Though I prefer Vincenz and only use Vincent when I’m on an op.”
She turned to rest her chin on his knee and look up into his face. “I like Vincenz. It’s very sexy.”
He smiled, bending to kiss her. “Julian says that too. I’m glad it pleases you both. It was my great-grandsire’s middle name.”
“Was it odd then? To come here when you knew no one and have to change your name? Cutting ties but not being trusted all the way? I imagine you’d feel sort of … rootless.”
She got him in a way that he supposed he’d be uncomfortable with in anyone but a very few.
“I was lonely for a long time. And then I began to make some friends in the corps.” He shrugged, and she got up, dusting herself off. But he didn’t want her to move away. He needed to touch her as much as she needed to be touched. He grabbed her hand and tugged her into his lap where she straddled him, sliding her arms around h
is shoulders and hugging him tight.
“Did you know Julian all this time? Was it slow for you, or did you know immediately?”
He laughed, leaning in to nip her bottom lip and trying to ignore the way she wriggled on his lap. “I’ve known Julian many years. We weren’t especially close until the last months when he and Marame would come out here for work. I think I was as surprised by what developed between us as he was. After she had been killed, he …” Vincenz paused, not wanting to reveal more than Julian himself would feel comfortable with. But she was theirs now and she needed to know.
“He lost his way.” Hannah looked at him with those wide eyes, understanding. “She was part of him. And she was gone and he had nothing to fill the spot she’d taken up in his heart. Nothing but anger.”
“Yes. Yes I think that’s true.”
She put her palm over his heart. “Until you helped him fill it with something else.”
He smiled. “I don’t know if I’d say it like that, but I do hope I’ve given him some comfort in a bad time in his life. She was—Marame, I mean—the kind of person everyone liked. Smart, outgoing. Always laughing and joking. She was the light to his broody sort of dark. She died doing her job, which means something. To him and to me, to all of us.”
Marame had balanced Julian. Her personality and the way they’d worked together had kept him from veering too far into the darkness. But then she was gone and Julian had no one left to stop that. No balance to keep him from tipping into all that rage and restless frustration.
And Hannah saw that. Knew it when most didn’t get Julian’s change at all.
“I’m sorry you both lost her.”
He hugged her, content to simply be with her that way.
“But I’m not sorry you found me.”
He tightened his hold, burying his face in her hair. “You’re the best thing I’ve ever found.”
“That was a very nice thing to hear. Thank you. For finding me and for making a place in your lives for me. I was afraid. Every day. For so long it was hard to remember there were other ways to feel. You and Julian reminded me of those other things.”