Sacrifice

by Denise Grover Swank

  Instead, he focused on getting into his apartment, The goal was Will’s sole purpose for existence at that moment. He convinced himself that if he could just get inside and surround himself with something familiar, he would become himself again—confident and decisive. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could continue living in this haze.

  He entered the building without incident, his anticipation growing with every step. When they exited the stairwell onto his floor, he stopped halfway down the hall and lifted the edge of the carpet to retrieve his emergency apartment key. “It’s gone.”

  James’s hand moved to his gun, hidden under his shirt. “Do you remember taking it out?”

  Still squatting, Will ran both hands through his hair. “No, but I probably took it out when I was here with Emma. If my truck blew up, my keys probably blew up with it. The question is, why didn’t I replace it?”

  “Maybe you thought you wouldn’t be back.”

  Will rose slowly, letting the finality of James’s statement soak in. The idea made sense.

  “You haven’t been here for a month,” James said, glancing up and down the hall. “Which means you haven’t been around to pay your bills for over a month. Is the apartment still yours?”

  Will forced himself to concentrate when his touchstone to reality was less than twenty feet away yet agonizingly out of reach. “Um, yeah. I never knew when I’d be here or on a job, so all of my bills were set up on automatic electronic payments.”

  “Until the Vinco Potentia seized your bank account a month ago.” James rubbed his chin. “But they give you a grace period, so you’re probably okay. Now we just need to get in.”

  Will hadn’t come this close just to be thwarted. He pulled out his lock-picking kit and set to work unlocking his deadbolt.

  A minute later, James scowled, leaning over Will’s shoulder. “What the hell is taking you so long?”

  Will grunted in frustration.“I put these locks in to keep unwanted visitors out.”

  “Oh, the irony,” James laughed, slapping Will’s back. “And here you’re supposed to be the master at this.”

  “Shut the fuck up.”

  James pulled out his gun. “Here’s another way to do it.”

  “You can’t shoot my door, you asshole. Have you lost your mind?”

  “Well, your way’s obviously not working.”

  Will stuck a pick between his teeth and mumbled, “Just give me a minute.”

  “I’ve given you two.”

  The lock clicked and the door sprang free.

  His stomach twisting, Will walked over the threshold. The apartment looked the same as always. Neat and clean. And impersonal. In his desperate search for normalcy, he’d ignored the fact that his apartment had never felt like home. His sister had decorated it for him, but he rarely spent time there. Home had always been his mom’s. Not that his mother’s house was an option.

  “There’s an empty ice cream container in the sink,” James said, looking over the counter into the kitchen.

  “My emergency cash stash was hidden in there. We had probably run out of money. My guess is that all my weapons are gone too.” He knew some were in his duffle bag.

  “You showed up at my place with a small arsenal.”

  “It wouldn’t hurt to check it out.” Will moved into the single bedroom. A thick layer of dust covered the furniture and the closet door stood open. A quick glance in the back confirmed he’d taken all of his guns and ammunition as well as all of his fake IDs. James was probably right. He hadn’t planned on coming back.

  “You have three messages on your answering machine.”

  “Megan.” Only two people had his land-line number. James and his sister. He went through so many cell phones that the land-line was the only certain way to contact him other than e-mail. But Megan rarely called and she wouldn’t have left that many messages unless something was wrong.

  Will walked to the kitchen and pressed the play button.

  “Will.” Megan’s voice spoke through the scratched answering machine tone. “I need you to call me back as soon as you get this message.” The machine time-stamped the message as having been a week ago.

  James caught Will’s eye. “I wonder if the Vinco Potentia paid a visit to your sister. That was right before they captured you.”

  Will’s breath caught. He had so little contact with his family that he’d given it little thought.

  The next message played, his sister again. “Will, I’ve sent you an e-mail and I still haven’t heard from you. I need you to call me. It’s important.”

  If Kramer had messed with his sister or her family…

  The next message started. “Will, now I’m really worried about you. Listen, I didn’t want to leave this in a message but I have to tell you. Um…” She paused. “Mom’s in the hospital. She’s got advanced breast cancer and she’s dying.” Her voice broke and Will heard her take a breath to compose herself. “She’s asking for you, Will. She wants to see you before she dies, but she’s failing fast and I’m not sure how much longer she’s going to last. Please, Will. I need you to come home.”

  The machine beeped and said the call had been made that afternoon.

  His mother was dying.

  Will sat down on the sofa, looking up at James with wide eyes. How much more could he take?

  James’s face paled. “Do you think this is a set-up?”

  Will shook his head. “What? No. I don’t think so.”

  His mother was dying and she wanted to see him. The real question was, did he want to see her?

  James pulled his laptop out of his bag. “I’ll do some digging and see if it’s true.”

  Lowering his face into his hands, Will growled, “If the Vinco Potentia set it up, they’d have to use my sister and I don’t even want to go there. But if they are responsible, they’ll be thorough enough to plant fake medical records and show her as a patient at the hospital. You’re wasting your time.”

  “So what are you saying? That you don’t want to see your mother? What if she’s really dying?”

  “So I’m supposed to give a fuck about her now because she decides it’s convenient for her to see me? What about the last three years?”

  James groaned and set down his computer before going into the kitchen. He returned with a bottle of whiskey and two glasses, which he set on the coffee table with a clunk. “If anyone ever needed a drink, you do, my friend.” He unscrewed the cap and poured two generous glasses.

  “I don’t drink. Not anymore.”

  “Yeah, I can see that. The bottle I gave you two years ago was still unopened.” James picked up the glass and set it in Will’s hand. “But tonight you do. I know you swore off anything stronger than beer after your weeks-long drunken spree when you came home after your discharge, but tonight you need to make an exception. Consider this medicinal.”

  Will held the glass in his hand, swirling the amber liquid. “And what really drove me to my weeks-long drunken spree, James? It sure as fuck wasn’t my court-martial.”

  James pushed the glass up. “Stop thinking and just drink.”

  Will brought the glass to his lips and swallowed a generous gulp, the whiskey burning as it went down.

  “Lucky for you, getting the alcohol in your system is more important than savoring a sixty-dollar bottle of eighteen-year-old Jameson, or I’d wring your neck for that.”

  “I’ll tell you what drove me to my drunkfest. My mother.”

  James sighed and rested his hand on Will’s knee. “I know.”

  Will leaned back into the sofa and put his feet on the coffee table. “She deserted me when I needed her the most. For him. She didn’t even love him. Why?” He gulped another mouthful, suddenly eager to deaden his pain. It bombarded him from too many directions.

  “All the more reason to see her. Ask her that very question. She owes you.”

  “Yeah.” He sucked the last of the whiskey from his glass. “She owes me.”

  James poured mo
re into Will’s glass. “I’ll do some digging and if it all checks out, we’ll go see her tomorrow.”

  He was going to see his mother.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Rise and shine, sleepyhead!” Alex called out in a cheerful voice.

  Emma pulled the covers over her head. She’d had the best sleep she’d had in weeks. It was amazing how easy it was to rest when you weren’t terrified for your life.

  “It’s Freedom Day and we’ve got a drive ahead of us. Let’s go.”

  She lowered the blanket and sat up. “You’re serious. You’re going to let me go?”

  Alex rolled his eyes. “I made it perfectly clear that I want to be around you as little as possible.” He shrugged. “No offense.”

  She climbed out of bed. “None taken.” She grabbed a change of clothes out of her bag and headed for the bathroom. “I need a shower.”

  “Make it quick. Turns out we’re pressed for time.”

  Pausing in the doorway, she glanced over her shoulder. “We have an appointment?”

  “Something like that.” Alex walked into his adjoining room, his words muffled. “Bang on my door when you’re done.”

  Freedom was a foreign concept after her week with Raphael. But she and Alex had flown on a private jet into Kansas City, and checked into two adjoining rooms in a hotel downtown. She could have left any time she wanted, which in reality was a lie. Raphael would have found her. But Alex chose to let her make her own decision, no pressure either way, which surprised her. She’d considered him more manipulative.

  Showering quickly, she dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, almost regretting her decision to not bring skirts. While cooler in the Midwest heat, they were difficult to run in if necessary. She’d deal with the discomfort.

  Alex said it was Freedom Day, but they had to drive somewhere. Where were they going? And would he give her money to live on for the next few weeks? All she had was the little cash she’d stolen from Raphael. She’d never asked for a handout in her entire life, but she didn’t have time to work for minimum wage or wait tables for crappy tips. Besides, these assholes owed her.

  After a quick blow dry of her hair, she knocked on Alex’s door.

  He opened it and eyed her up and down, his eyebrows raised in appraisal.

  For the first time since she’d seen Alex a couple of days ago, she felt intimidated by him. Why was he looking her over like she was about to be put up for auction?

  He shook his head and smiled, eerily close to his father’s political mask. “Well, okay. Let’s get going!” He grabbed her bag off the dresser and led her into the hall.

  Following behind, she was suddenly unsure she’d made the right decision, but there wasn’t much she could do about it now.

  ***

  James drove to Morgantown, Missouri while Will slumped in the passenger seat, nursing a hangover. He rubbed his temples, shutting his eyes to the blinding sunlight.

  “You ready to see your mom?”

  Grunting, Will sunk lower into the leather. In the history of asinine questions, this had to top the list, yet Will knew that James grasped for something to ease the tension.

  “Well, you better get ready. We’re about five minutes away.”

  Will didn’t even answer with a grunt. He wished he hadn’t drowned his sorrows quite so much last night. Instead of facing his mother with a clear head and carefully thought-out questions, a piercing pain stabbed his skull. One thing in his favor was that he didn’t dream of Emma. Maybe she was gone, exorcised from his brain like James wanted. Did Will want that too? He couldn’t deny his life, not to mention his sanity, would be better off. Yet, something inside him still clung to her.

  James pulled into a parking garage and found a spot on the second level. “We’re entering through an auxiliary building. That way if the Vinco Potentia is watching, we might be able to elude them.”

  Two men sat in a car close to the entrance as Will and James approached. “What do you think?” James asked.

  Will rubbed his aching forehead. “Looks suspicious. We need a diversion.”

  James pulled Will between two parked cars and squatted. “Yeah, I’m on it.”

  A woman pushing a stroller and tugging a school-aged boy approached from behind. James tugged a baseball cap over Will’s head. “Meet you inside, Daddy.”

  Will fell into step with the family, grateful that the mom was distracted by the whiny toddler in the stroller. He passed through the doors, touching the boy lightly on the shoulder. The men cast a quick glance in his direction, then looked way.

  Hiding around the corner, Will waited for several minutes before James walked in, pushing an elderly gentleman in a wheelchair and wearing a safari hat on his head.

  “That was easy,” Will mumbled as he moved down the hall.

  “Speak for yourself. I had to break into a car to get this hat, then I had to convince Mr. Turnball I wasn’t going to assault him.”

  “Well, we’re in now.” With Will’s every step, a rebellion festered. Once again, he’d let James call the shots. For days he’d followed James like a fucking lost puppy. Yeah, his life was shit. But it had been shit before and he could guarantee it would be shit again. This wasn’t him. Hiding and cowering behind James’s skirts wasn’t Will Davenport. It was time to take charge.

  They rode the elevator to the third floor and James followed Will into the hallway.

  “Stay in the waiting room, James.”

  Wide eyed, James looked around, spotting the nearby waiting area. “Why?”

  “I need to do this on my own.

  James’s shoulders relaxed. “I know, but after everything you’ve been through, you need me watching your back.”

  “No,” Will enunciated slowly, “what I need to do is to go see my mother by myself. When I’m done, I’ll come find you.”

  “Will—”

  “Why don’t you want me to go on my own?”

  James grabbed Will’s elbow and dragged him toward the chairs, away from a nurse passing by who narrowed her eyes at their exchange. “Will, be reasonable. You’re still recovering and we have no idea if this is a trap or not.”

  “We both know my mother is lying in a bed down the hall, dying. They may be waiting to ambush us, but I’m doing this on my own.”

  “Will.”

  “You’ve treated me like a two-year-old since you walked into my cell days ago, and for some bizarre reason, I’ve let you. But it stops now.”

  James leaned his forehead closer to Will’s and lowered his voice. “Will, you’ve been through a major trauma that would have flattened most men. You just don’t bounce back from something like that.”

  “You treating me like a child is making it worse. Let me work through this my own way. And going to see my mother by myself is the first step.”

  James rubbed his chin, looking around at the dilapidated vinyl chairs. “All right. I’ll wait here. But if you’re not back in thirty minutes, I’m coming looking for you.”

  “Fair enough.” Will’s arm brushed James’s as he pushed past.

  James grabbed his elbow, his gaze locking with Will’s. “Good luck.”

  Will nodded and pulled loose. God, that felt good. He even felt like a sliver of himself.

  ***

  The sun had only been up a few hours but a wet fog hung in the air. A fog Jake had created.

  Aiden beamed. “Very good, Jacob. How do you feel?”

  It was a trick question. Aiden was full of them. “Great,” Jake answered with as much enthusiasm as he could muster.

  “This is a very good start. Next you will make clouds.”

  Easy for Aiden to say. Jake wanted to tell him to make clouds himself.

  “Disobedience will not be tolerated.” Aiden’s anger rolled off of him, washing over Jake in waves.

  Catching his breath, Jake struggled against the toxicity that choked him. Once it eased, he shifted his feet apart and closed his eyes.

  Fog had been kind of easy. Fog w
as tiny drops of water that clumped together and hovered over the ground. He had to control the air around it, but the water readily obeyed. Clouds were harder. The water droplets had to cling differently so that they were lighter and fluffier, almost like steam. He centered himself, drawing his power from deep inside, his body almost singing to the molecules in the air, forcing them to push the water.

  “Very good.”

  Jake peeked through his slitted eyelids. The fog had folded in on itself, becoming thicker and denser, a three-foot fluffy mass that looked like white cotton candy.

  “Now you need to make it bigger.”

  Jake closed his eyes to hide his tears. He was so tired and doing things like making clouds made him more tired. After Aiden’s nighttime visit to his room, he’d gotten little sleep. Jake was worried about Mommy, worried about Will. The shadows had begun moving the moment Aiden left, creeping across the floor and lapping at Jake’s bed, yet he still preferred them to Aiden.

  What would Aiden do to Will now that he knew Will was alive?

  “You don’t need to worry about Will.” Aiden’s voice sounded like thick honey, slow and sweet. He used that voice when he meant the opposite of what he was saying.

  Jake opened his eyes, pulling his lower lip between his teeth.

  Aiden smiled, his eyes glowing. “I’ll take care of everything in due time.”

  ***

  While Will acknowledged James had legitimate concerns about the Vinco Potentia showing up, he was glad he was alone as he walked down the hall. He took a moment to steady his nerves before searching for his mother’s room. He took in the view of the town through a wall of windows he passed, appreciating the fact that his mother had chosen to raise Will and his sister in Morgantown, close to his grandparents. The alternative was to traipse all over the world and be raised as military brats. It had also spared them a lot of years with their controlling father.

  Squaring his shoulders, he turned down the hall and found her room number. It was time to get some answers. He pushed through the door, stopping short as it swung closed behind him.