by Aimee Laine
Her mother may never have admitted it, especially so soon after meeting a man Taylor had feelings for, but she recognized the tone. Somehow, Ian had won her over already.
• • •
Ian waited in the hall, Riley at his side, as Janet broke apart from her embrace with Taylor’s father and walked toward them.
She took Ian’s hand from the counter. “I want to thank you, Ian. You’ve been here the whole time—” Her eyes filled. “—I don’t know how better to thank you.”
“None needed.”
“I don’t know why you’d give so much of yourself to her when you barely know her. But for that, I thank you.” She moved away.
For the next three hours, doctors and nurses flitted in and out of Taylor’s room, Taylor’s mom returning with them. Since no screaming, no codes, nothing but calm escaped the room, Ian went back to the conference room.
He used his time to do more searching using his laptop. While he had plenty of data stored about the Branches of Life, he needed to search about his and Taylor’s former lives, too.
Taylor’s ability. The photo. The DNA. Names. Dates. Missing persons. Murder. It all mixed in Ian’s mind.
His thoughts returned to his friends.
Tripp and Lexi had been given impossible odds and found the loophole.
In his own case, Ian found nothing except cold hard facts and huge coincidences even a Junior DA could argue against him.
Two more hours passed before Janet ventured to the room Ian occupied, with Riley at her side, and stood in the frame of the door. “She’s showering and getting dressed.” She glanced up toward the far wall. “I can’t believe it’s almost ten.”
Ian turned to the clock there. Sure enough, the day only had two hours left in it.
“She’d like you to join her, Ian … when she’s done, of course.” Despite the sweet tone, her lips pursed.
Don’t like being kicked out? Or don’t want me to see your daughter naked?
The three exited, but only Ian returned to Taylor’s room, where she sat in the chair he’d slept on. He slipped onto the spinning stool the doctors and techs used each time they came in to treat Taylor.
“Do you believe in second chances, Ian?” Taylor’s fingers dug into his arm. “Or thirds? Maybe fourths?”
Ian chuckled.
“Do you, Ian?” Her tone held a firm insistence.
“You like to ask deep, philosophical questions.” He traced her cheek with his fingertip. “I believe everyone has a chance to make up for what they’ve done, but that most people don’t know how to get through the problems that got them in trouble in the first place.” Like how I killed you, and why and how I can avoid that now.
“I think I have another chance.”
He nodded. “You just may. The docs say there’s absolutely nothing wrong with you.”
Her smile grew. “I know. They want me to stay the rest of the night, but I want to get out of here. I want to go with you and to enjoy that hotel room again.” She rubbed at the long scratch on her arm that had become a white scar along her skin. “I want that date you and I were supposed to have.”
His heart flip-flopped. “How about you stay, just to make sure. It was a rough night … nights, plural.” He tucked her hair behind her ear.
“We barely got started, Ian. I want that chance.” She ran her thumb over the tattoo-like band around her finger.
Ian’s heart tightened in his chest. “There’s a lot I’ve found out in the last couple days.”
She stopped him with a finger to his lips. “I’m sure there is, but Ian?”
He stared deep into her eyes.
“Not now. Just take me home or get me out of here. Being … here … can’t be good for me.”
“Your mom’s probably going to think I coerced you into leaving, you know.” He stood and took her hand, pulling her to her feet. She wobbled, and he righted her, holding her steady.
“Mama never believes anything unless she sees it, Ian. Bad or good. I get a little of that trait from her.”
• • •
Despite Taylor’s desire to leave the hospital for fun and frolic, her weakened state had her sound asleep by midnight. Ian rose, returned to his laptop and his research on Greek mythology, magical history and anything else he could come up with that might lead him somewhere other than where his heart told him to go. His biggest problem came in what he didn’t know. That left him unable to find any solid answers.
As the sun rose, filling the hotel room with warm light, Taylor stirred. “Ian?”
He moved back to the bed, leaving the laptop with its screen up. A kiss to her lips ignited the fire within him, but until she hammered a nail again, he had no intention of tempting any more fates.
“What were you doing?”
“Research.” He snuggled with her on the bed.
“All night?”
He knuckled his eyes, tired but desperate for answers. “Yeah.”
“Want to tell me about it?” She entwined her fingers with his.
“Not yet. You’re barely over it all as it is.”
“Dammit, Ian. Don’t coddle me.”
He jerked back.
“I woke with my heart tearing in two thinking I’d lost you forever …” Her breath hitched. “Thinking I’d never see you again, that a week wasn’t enough, especially with all that went on. And thinking, damn, why didn’t I see this right? I remember everything we’ve been through in this life. The branches. This symbol—” She pointed to her finger and took his hand. “One left. This is our one left.”
“I know that.”
“Then tell me, Ian.” She shifted, facing him straight on. “I want to know what you know. I want to know why I thought I’d never see the light of day again, why I have to reconnect with you this way.” Her tone adjusted to one of desperation. “So, tell me. Right now.”
A breath whooshed from him. “I thought you might think I was batshit crazy, but given that little tirade, I’m pretty sure you are instead of me.”
Taylor crossed her arms over her chest even as a small smile breached her face.
“You know the DNA sample that we sent to Michael?”
“Of course. Emma practically tore off the inside of my cheek rubbing that swab against it.”
“It’s your DNA.”
She didn’t even flinch.
“And the two in the photo?”
She angled her head back up.
“There’s no doubt one was you—given the DNA. You and me is my guess, given the look, the rings, etcetera.” She still hadn’t changed her expression, so he continued. “The names are ringers. Her birth date is your birth date. His death date is my birth date. And, you know the bones in your yard?”
“How could I forget them?” She slumped against the headboard. “They started all this mess.”
“She—you—she was buried, presumably alive, with her hands tied behind her back.”
Her face tilted down.
“You can’t stand having your hands tied behind your back. I’ve seen it. Nothing breaks you except, based on what Riley told me, fire, water and earth, which coincidentally are three of the four elements. Outside of those, you seem to be the toughest chick on the planet. Then, there’s the last element. Air. Which you can control.”
A small laugh escaped her.
He described the game as Jessie explained it to him, linked it to Zeus and tied it back to himself and Taylor.
“So, it bothers you that you could kill me, but not that I could kill you? Now who’s batshit crazy?”
A laugh burst free from Ian. She had a point, but not the right one. “Yes, it bothers me.” More than bothers. “But, if we keep restarting this process, then it’s obvious, I keep killing you. Therefore—” He took on the tone Tripp used to prove a point. “—something’s fucked up.”
Taylor stared at him.
“You called out John, Taylor. You cried out that name as if you were in pain. That was his name. My name. We�
�re in the game. You. Me.”
“You’re wrong, Ian.”
He clenched and released his fists. The pieces of the puzzle all fit. “How am I wrong? What do you think will happen this time?”
“I said his name in passion. I loved him. He loved me. I could feel it—every bit of it. The longing, the deep desire. When we were in the hotel, in the tub, I—I had a vision, a memory. It was all real.” She inched up and ran a hand along Ian’s arm. “There’s no way in hell he killed her, me, her back then. He didn’t. This is our opportunity. Our chance. I know it. We just have to look at it differently. Since we know what happened before, we can—”
Ian shook his head, closing his eyes and heaving a breath. “It’s not fourth time the charm. It’s third time. And, third time didn’t work. Probably for a reason.”
“You don’t know that a fourth won’t.” Taylor cupped his cheeks in her palms. “You feel these connections, Ian, but I can see them. When we’re most intimately connected, I live it. I know how we felt about each other. I know it.”
A small smile took hold of Ian’s lips. “You’re a funny girl, Miss Marsh. Anyone else would have run from the room screaming that she was a dead woman walking, yet you’re here trying to convince me I’m not going to do what is clearly coming.” Ian inched toward the edge of the bed.
Taylor grabbed his arm. “Don’t leave.”
A rumble came from his stomach. “How about you take a shower, I’ll get us some breakfast, and—”
She jumped up from the bed but leaned back into it. “Yes. A shower. I really, really, really want one.”
“Is fifteen minutes enough time?”
“Give me twenty since I’m slow on my feet. That is, unless you want to join me?” She wiggled her hips but only for a second, reaching for the wall and stabilizing herself again. “I really hate being weak. Messes up my life.”
“Go on. Relax and enjoy it.”
As Taylor maneuvered to the bathroom, Ian went back to his computer. With the water pouring and his laptop’s cursor blinking in the username field, he closed the machine. “I’m not going to put you through a fourth.” Ian heaved a sigh. “I’d never put someone I love through that kind of pain.”
Taylor’s out-of-tune hum came through the door, crushing Ian’s heart in on itself. He opened the door, not worrying that she’d hear. She should have been expecting him to leave.
Two doors down, he knocked on Riley’s entryway. It took a second knock before a groggy, half-lidded Riley opened the door. “You know it’s not even eight, right?”
“It’s not like you’re on vacation.”
Riley squinted, tilting down and returning to Ian’s face. “Why do you have your laptop bag?”
“Can I come in?”
With the door open, Ian entered. He turned as Riley stood in the walkway. “Would you believe me if I said Taylor and I are reincarnated people who have had three chances to make a go of it but failed?”
Riley didn’t even flinch.
In five minutes, Ian relayed the story about the rings around his and Taylor’s fingers, her dreams, and about the game. Riley said nothing, but his eyebrows worked overtime as if processing the information between up and down movements.
After a moment of silence, Riley said, “So, you think by walking away, by giving up, you’ll keep her safe?”
“Not give up. Save her. It’s a self-sacrifice kind of thing. If we’re not together, I can’t hurt her. I’m not interested in playing Romeo and Juliet. Alive is far better than dead. Just get her to go on about her life, and make sure she stays safe. I’m sure you can deal with it.”
“You’re going to piss her off you know.”
“Better a pain in the heart than a nonworking one. One will heal. The other … well … it won’t.”
Riley nodded. “All right, then.”
Once Ian found an ally in Riley, his decision stuck. He stepped forward and held out his hand. “It’s been fun. Well, not really, but you understand, right?”
Riley gave him a half-smile.
“Ten minutes. No more. She’ll be out of the shower, and you have to be there.”
“I will be.”
“She’s all yours.” His voice broke as he walked through the door.
• • •
Taylor sang along to the thrum of the shower head’s pulse until her fingers pruned and she figured she’d used up enough of the water to warrant the huge hotel bill Ian had to have footed.
With her hair in a towel, she sauntered into the room, but Ian hadn’t returned with breakfast. She cocked her head.
Something had changed, she just didn’t know what.
The knock had her spinning toward the door, a goon-like smile taking hold of her face. She adjusted the towel around her waist so she could drop it as soon as he entered and tiptoed to the door.
At the second knock, she opened it.
Her gasp came with her attempt to keep the towel secure and the one around her hair from falling to the floor. “Riley! What are you doing here?” She scrambled backward, making sure her butt didn’t show under the short towel. A drop to the bed and crossed legs helped cover her a little—at least the parts that counted.
Riley stepped in, closing the door behind him, his face blank.
Taylor’s heart sank. “He left, didn’t he?”
24
Taylor sat on her own couch, in her own living room, with her own mug of hot cocoa in her hands. Through the unencumbered window, she watched as geese landed in the empty patch of grass that had been covered in sod that morning. She’d worked from sun up to sun down, recreating the peace and tranquillity she’d intended to give to that splotch of land before she’d been jailed, hurt, sick and put on health arrest for a week and a half. It burned her psyche that she hadn’t been allowed to exercise, that her mother hovered, and, more so, that Ian hadn’t even called.
At the footsteps on the hardwood floor, she turned.
“What should we do today, darling?” Her mom dropped onto the couch with an air of grace and tranquility.
Taylor scanned the room, from her baby blue walls, chair rail and moulding she’d installed years ago, to the marble backsplash around the fireplace and the antiques that graced the mantel. The effect should have made her feel better, not worse.
“Come on, Tay. We can get out for a walk, or I can drive you to the park—”
“Stop it, Mama.” Taylor closed her eyes at her biting tone. “I’m sorry. I’m just not in the mood to ‘do’ stuff right now just for the sake of doing.” She snuggled deeper into her chair, an overstuffed, country contemporary in denim, but would have preferred to run outside and chop a log into a zillion pieces just for the rush of energy that would flow through her body.
Her mom put her hands on her knees and stood. “Well, it has been a week. Maybe I should stop hovering so much.” Guilt wracked Taylor.
“I’m sorry, Mama, really. I’m not used to being coddled, and I feel like that’s all anyone’s doing. Not just you. But Lexi. Emma. Riley. I know ya’ll are trying to make up for lost time, but really, I’m okay with how it was. I like my independence, and I don’t need someone here every hour of every day. I need to get back to work, to my projects, to making money and—” Taylor set the cup on the table and stood, dropping the blanket in the process as she moved to her mother. She wouldn’t say ‘forgetting Ian’ though she knew she should. Her arms snaked around her mom’s waist. “Thank you for being kind during this battle, but I think it’s over. There won’t ever be another of these instances.”
Hands ran up and down Taylor’s back. “And, you’re sure you want me to leave?”
She chuckled. “You live five miles away. I can send smoke signals if I need you. And yes, I know how.”
Her mother’s fingers threaded with Taylor’s. “I really do wish that Ian would stop by again.”
Taylor’s heart lurched. “Riley’s been by every day. Just like you and Daddy. Ian … well, he was … just a friend.”
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“Could’ve fooled me.” With that, she slid away and, grabbing her purse, went to the door. “You’ll call me if you need anything, right?”
The doorbell chimed.
An inner excitement ran through Taylor with hope Ian might make a surprise return.
“I’ll get it, Taylor.”
“Thanks, Mama.”
A soft creak came with the opening of the door, and Taylor made a mental note to oil the hinges as she sank back into her seat.
“Oh, hello, Miss Agnes,” Taylor’s mom said. “What can we do for you?”
“I made some sweet rolls this morning and thought Miss Taylor might like some.”
Taylor’s lips cracked into a smile. When home, her across-the-street neighbor popped out of her house only long enough to ply Taylor with sugar before she and her husband would be off traveling the world again.
“I’ll be happy to give them to her,” Taylor’s mom said.
“Would you, dear? Thank you for that.”
The shuffling at the door didn’t bring Taylor out of her spot. Her mom could drop the dish on the counter before leaving.
“Oh … I forgot.” Agnes’s old lady voice cracked.
“Yes?” Taylor’s mom said.
“Frank and I will be heading to Maine in two weeks. Then we have a cruise through the Pacific over the summer. If you know of anyone wishing for a nice, furnished rental, have Miss Taylor call me or come by. Someone like that nice young man we had last fall.”
Nice young man from last fall? Taylor couldn’t recall any visitors from the fall, only the summer—when a family with two kids had planned to relocate and used Agnes’s home while they found their own. Taylor had been too busy with the reconstruction of Tripp and Lexi’s Victorian to be neighborly. She cringed at the thought her mother would find out she’d failed in her southern hospitality.
“Ah, okay. I’ll tell her,” her mom said. The same creak sounded until the door clicked closed. “She brought you some cinnamon rolls, honey. They’re warm, too. I’ll just leave them on the table.”
“Take one to Daddy, please.” Taylor stared out the window. A crow landed in the center of the yard, scattering the other two birds to the sky.