“Hey Lona, what are you doing up here?” I asked, shielding my eyes against the glare of the sun reflecting from the mirrored glass of a nearby building.
“Just thinking about those girls,” she answered with a hint of sadness, “and what they must be going through.”
“How so?” I asked. “I mean, sure, it’s not going to be easy. But they are safe now, and I’m sure once we know who they are, Dara will help reunite them with their families, like she did for you.”
She gazed out over the city for a moment and I noticed the blaze of the sun reflecting off the moisture in her eyes. “That’s just it, Lucy. They may be safe now, but what comes next is going to be difficult to endure. I suspect that some of them were abducted years ago. People change, their friends have moved on, and their families may have already held memorials, thinking the worst.”
“I hadn’t actually thought of that,” I admitted. I should have though. Lona’s own family had held a memorial service seven years after her abduction.
“I'm sure they'll want to go home, see their families, and go back to a normal life. But Lucy, there's no such thing as normal for these women anymore. They can never tell anyone what happened to them. They...” she sniffed and turned away. “They'll have to choose between the life they remember and their children, that is, if their children even survived.”
“Wait a minute. Why would they have to choose? Why couldn’t they bring their children with them? I understand there might be a stigma against them, or even their kids, if people thought they were fathered by a rapist, but they don’t have to tell people that.”
“That is a big part of it, but Lucy, those kids are different. They are mods. Don’t you think someone might notice something a little odd about them?”
“Not really,” I stated bluntly. “You were the first person to notice anything was weird about my eyes. Don’t get me wrong, people commented on the color, but no one ever said they were weird, not even my eye doctor. My driver’s license says I have brown eyes.”
“Really?” She looked at me in surprise. “Well okay, maybe I’m wrong on that one, but besides that, it won’t be easy if they do decide to go home. The media will certainly take notice if the victim of a long ago abduction suddenly showed up. Everyone will want to know what happened. They’ll basically be living the aftermath of a made up story and you know what? That’s a lot harder to do than you would think. Sometimes it’s hard for me to remember who I was before I was abducted. I know, my situation was a lot different, but some of the trauma is universal.”
“You’re right,” I said with a grimace. “Honestly, I don't know how you keep it together.”
“Me?” she laughed derisively. “Hardly. I've just been busy enough to keep from having a complete meltdown. Bringing a child into the world changes your entire outlook, Lucy.”
“I suppose it does, but you have the best doctor on the planet and he's already assured you that everything is fine, right?”
“Of course, and I'm not doubting Abe. But there's so much more, some rational, some not, but in the last month I've had nothing but time and sometimes it's overwhelming. I worry about anything happening to Miles. Hell, I worry that all the worrying I'm doing is bad for the baby!”
“I had no idea, Lona, I'm so sorry.” I felt like such a jerk. Here I had been so wrapped up in my own problems that I went out of my way to avoid others while they were dealing with worse issues in a more adult way.
“Don't be, you've had just as much reason to be overwhelmed as anyone else.”
“That doesn't excuse me from being selfish.”
“A wise old lady once told me, the only person who expects you to be a super hero is you,” Lona said with a wink.
“Ida?” I asked with a grin.
“Who else?” she replied with a light chuckle. “I think it's time to wake Miles, though for what, I don't know. Is Evan still with Benson?”
“I think so.”
“Something about this whole situation just isn’t adding up,” she said with a scowl. “I don’t like it, Lucy. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”
“You’re not the only one. I only met Jack Benson once. He was kind of a prick, but he didn’t seem like a genocidal prick.”
“I suppose we’ll find out soon enough,” she said with a sigh. “Be careful, okay?”
“You too, Lona.”
Chapter 24
After Lona left, I took the spot she had vacated and watched as the lights of the city began to twinkle to life below me. I had always loved the city at dusk, but now it just made me sad and frustrated. There were thousands of people down there, completely oblivious to the dangers lurking in the shadows, going about their daily lives and dealing with their own daily worries. In a way, I almost envied them.
As I leaned out over the high wall, lost in my own thoughts, I almost didn’t hear the sound of footsteps behind me. I turned around just in time to fall into Andre's arms as they reached out to wrap around me. He looked like he had been through hell, but I didn’t care. My heart fluttered with relief as I flung my arms tightly around him and buried my head against his neck.
“I smell terrible,” he muttered hoarsely. He was right. There was a vaguely burnt chemical smell clinging to his clothes and the sweat on his face and neck made streaks through the fine layer of grime that covered him. My eyes stung from what was possibly industrial fertilizer, but I barely noticed.
“I don’t care,” I said breathlessly. “You’re alive. You’re here, that’s all that matters.”
For a fraction of a second, he stiffened, but then held me tighter and stifled a small, strangled growl before he pulled away and took my hand. “I care, come on.” He tugged my hand gently and I followed him back to the elevator and down to residential.
Wordlessly, I let him lead me to his quarters and into the bathroom. The near scalding shower was a balm that carried away more than just the dirt and sweat of a long and terrible day. As I rinsed my hair, I felt Andre’s hands fall gently onto my shoulders and I opened my eyes to see him staring at me with a tortured vulnerability that struck me as both beautiful and heartbreaking. The intense, yet almost painful desperation with which our bodies were drawn to one another was as magical as it was terrifying. Every kiss ignited a previously undiscovered desire. Every touch ached with a longing, as if it had not been mere hours since we had seen each other last.
For what seemed like an eternity afterward, we just held each other while the steam billowed around us, as though we each felt the other would disappear the moment we let go.
“We should probably get out,” I suggested weakly. I really didn’t want to move. The hot water was soothing to my aching muscles and the sensation of Andre’s skin against mine was soothing everything else. He nodded silently, but as he turned to shut off the water, he gave a shuddering sob and sank to the floor.
“Andre, what is it? What’s wrong?” I fell to my knees and held him as his shoulders shook and he buried his face in his hands. “Andre, talk to me.”
He lifted his head and gazed at me with such a raw pain that my heart, long over filled to capacity from our intense lovemaking, burst into a million pieces. “Lucy, I…” He sighed shakily and put his arms around me. “I’m sorry.” He pulled himself up and helped me to my feet before handing me a towel and opening the door. He turned back as if he was going to say something, but paused. Instead, he leaned in and kissed me softly before turning to leave.
I lingered over the act of brushing my hair to give myself time to analyze what had just happened. It wasn’t as if we hadn’t had intense lovemaking sessions, nor was it the first time I had seen Andre cry, but for one of these events to lead to the other was unsettling to say the least. There was an undercurrent of foreboding that made me wonder if my fears of losing Andre were about to become a reality and that scared me more than any murderous vampire or government plot.
When I finally emerged from the bathroom, Andre was sitting on the edge of the bed with h
is head in his hands. Part of me wanted to comfort him and find out what was wrong, but part of me feared that my presence was what was causing his pain. Instead, I stood frozen in the doorway until he lifted his head, gave me a sad, tearful smile, and motioned for me to sit next to him. For a long time he sat in silence, occasionally wiping away a tear or taking a deep breath and letting it out.
“I was called to Paris because the team had discovered a new lab,” he said at last. “That’s all I told you and to be honest, I never intended to tell you any more about it, but after today, well, I realize you deserve to know the truth.”
“Andre, wait.” Despite my previous frustration over being kept out of the loop, the ominous tone of Andre's voice made me think I didn't want to hear what he said next. “Are you sure you want to tell me this? If you…” I couldn’t finish the thought.
“Lucy,” He tilted my head gently with his hand until he could look me in the eye. “The reason Evan sent me to Paris was because their scientists discovered DNA in the lab that defied logic; a hybrid vampire with the hunter’s enzyme.”
“Mine?” To say I was shocked was an understatement. While it was true that the vampire who had kept me hostage had intended to use my blood, presumably to make other vampires like me, their compound had been destroyed completely.
“Yours,” Andre confirmed with a nod. “I sent a sample to Abe, who confirmed the findings. I suspected at the time, that Oscar had collected some of your DNA and passed it along prior to our knowledge that he was watching you. Now though, I’m not so sure. You saw for yourself that the ES had been in communication with Bluebeard. Regardless, I gave the order to have the lab destroyed. I didn’t want to risk anyone in the Paris office discovering the origin of the DNA.”
“That was probably a good idea.” Indeed, with the corruption that had run rampant in the Paris office, and the problems we were now facing with the government, the less anyone knew about me the better.
“It would have been,” he said with an anguished sigh, “had I thought to investigate further. Lucy, they weren’t just trying to use your DNA to create new life. I should have realized that the ES aren’t selflessly creating the next generation of mods, they want immortality and they want your abilities. They were experimenting… on children. Mods, yes, but children nonetheless and when I gave the order to destroy the lab…” He broke off with a convulsive shudder.
“Andre, you had no idea,” I told him gently. It was awful, yes, and I understood now why Andre had been suffering nightmares and I couldn’t blame him.
“No, but it doesn’t make it any easier to accept. I thought today… at the plantation, I had a chance to save lives, to redeem myself just a little for what happened but, my god, Lucy you have no idea. When we got to the nursery and the soldiers were already there, I snapped. The only reason I was able to save two of them was because Mercy threw herself over the babies like a human shield. What I did to the bastard who killed them…”
“Was probably more humane than they deserved,” I said fiercely. “Andre, what happened today nearly destroyed my faith in humanity and I’ll be having nightmares about the girl I couldn’t save until the day I die. But you can’t blame yourself. You may have only saved two lives, but look at the lives you saved. Babies, Andre, innocents who will never know the horrors that the older kids had to live through, thanks to you. No, it doesn’t make up for the lives lost today, or those in Paris that you didn’t know about, but none of that was your fault.”
“That doesn’t make it any easier,” he said quietly.
“No,” I agreed and wiped a tear from my own eye, “it doesn’t.”
“But it does put things in perspective,” he said and shifted so that we were facing each other. “I don’t know if he told you, but while I was scanning Isaac after we rescued him, he told me about your mother. I wasn’t comfortable at first because I didn’t know if it was something you would want him to tell me, but he seemed to feel it was important, and I now know why.”
I couldn’t think of any reason why I wouldn’t want Andre to know about my mother, but I was still curious as to why Isaac would tell him about their relationship.
“His story reminded me in a way of my own grandfather,” Andre continued, “Evan’s dad. You didn’t get a chance to meet him, but he was a great man, a lot like Evan, really. He threw everything he had into building EJC, knowing that one day, his kids would take over the business. Evan says that he always made sure to take time out of his schedule for them, even if it meant losing a contract, because even though he wanted to leave them a successful business, he didn’t want to do so at the expense of missing out on their lives.
“You see, my grandmother had died not long after giving birth to my mother. She was only twenty-three, and they had only been married for five years, but like Isaac and your mother, they were deeply in love. I don’t think Grandfather ever truly accepted that his wife was gone. He never remarried. He said he couldn’t, that it would be unfair not only to my grandmother’s memory, but also to the woman who would never have his heart completely.”
“That’s beautiful,” I murmured, “yet so heartbreakingly sad.” It wasn’t fair that people like my father and Andre’s grandfather should spend their whole lives lamenting the loss of their one true love, while so many people took for granted what they had. I hadn’t realized I was crying until I felt Andre’s light touch as he brushed a tear from my cheek.
“I need you to know something, Lucy. Something that I should have told you a long time ago.”
“What is it?” I asked nervously.
“I love you,” he said. “I love you so much and I think I’ve been in love with you from the moment I first met you. I wanted to tell you so many times, but I always held some stupid belief that it had to be some perfect moment. I realize now, especially now, knowing how precious our time together is, that by waiting for that special moment, I was risking the fact that something might happen, and I might never have the chance to tell you that you are the most important person in the world to me.”
I couldn’t believe it. I had been preparing for the worst, for Andre to tell me he was breaking up with me. Instead, his declaration blindsided me.
“I… you really love me?”
He nodded. “Yes, Lucy, I love you.”
“I love you too,” I said through spontaneous, hiccupping sobs. “I’ve loved you for so long, but I was so afraid. I thought you…” My heart suddenly sank. “Wait,” I sniffed as my mood suddenly darkened. “You want kids, don’t you?”
“Eventually,” he said with a confused smile.
“You know I can’t… we can’t,” I stammered, but Andre stopped me with a tender kiss.
“You don’t know that for sure,” he said lightly. “Your father was a mod, but you inherited his human genes.”
“I know, but don’t you think if it was possible it would have happened? I mean,” I cut off and gave him a meaningful look, “we haven’t exactly been trying to prevent it, have we?”
“I suppose,” he said and took my hand in his. “But Lucy, you and I, of all people, should know that families are not always come by in the traditional sense. Do you honestly think I would love a child who wasn’t biologically my own less than one that was?”
“No, of course not, I just thought,” I sighed. “It’s just that when I was holding the baby, you looked, I don’t know, upset. I just assumed…”
“I was upset, but not at you, Lucy. Seeing you holding that child made me love you even more. You looked so beautiful, and scared.” He smiled at me, but his eyes still held sadness. “But at the same time, that was a painful reminder of what happened in Paris, what I had done. Whether we ever have kids or not does not change the way I feel about you. But these are not decisions we need to make right now,” he kissed me again. “Right now, I want to put this day behind me, forget momentarily that evil exists in the world, and fall asleep in the arms of the most beautiful, wonderful, and amazing woman I have ever known.�
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Chapter 25
Dear Lucy,
I would have waked you, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. You look so peaceful, and I know how hard a good night’s rest is to come by these days, so please forgive me. As you have probably guessed, I am returning to the plantation to find Bluebeard and end this once and for all. Don’t worry, I’m not going alone, there are several of us. I’m sure Evan will be happy to give you all of the details when you inevitably go kick his door down demanding them. Don’t be mad at him, he and I both know how much you wanted to be a part of this, but bringing you was a risk none of us wanted to take.
I know that right now you are probably thinking the worst of me. That my profession of love was simply to soften the blow of not including you in this final mission. You need to know how very far from the truth that is. I meant every word I said and then some. When this is over, I plan to spend a very, very long time proving this to you.
Love,
Andre
I don’t know what was worse, waking up alone or finding a note on Andre’s pillow. I was pissed, even if he was right. For the most part, my arm looked normal now, but it was weak. All the muscle had to be redeveloped and I still had trouble with some tasks. Still, I didn’t like the idea that a plan was set in motion without my knowledge and I fully intended to give Evan a piece of my mind on the subject.
“I’ve been expecting you.”
I found Evan in his favorite corner of the rooftop garden, sneaking one of his illicit Cuban cigars. In the bright morning sunlight, it was hard not to notice that his once blonde hair was now mostly gray and the lines on his face were more pronounced now than when I had met him merely a year ago.
“I’m guessing you’re out here because you didn’t want to replace the door in your office?”
He chuckled quietly. “One less disaster to deal with would be nice. I’m sorry Lucy, and you can blame me one hundred percent, but after yesterday’s meeting with Jack, this job became a hell of a lot more complicated. I don’t like being stuck here anymore than you do.”
The Eyes of the Sun: The Complete Trilogy Page 54