Raintree: Oracle

by Linda Winstead Jones

  Instead of doing either, he wiped down the bar in an almost-automatic manner as his mind spun with what-ifs and what-nows. Yes, he needed rest, but sleep would not come for a while.

  When the door opened, he jumped. It would take some getting used to, not sensing when that door would open. Not knowing what was on her mind.

  “Echo,” he said. “Did you forget something?”

  “Yes.”

  “What?”

  She walked toward the bar, and him, much as she had that first day. He’d seen trouble in her then. He saw trouble now.

  “You,” she said.

  He should’ve locked the door after she’d left here with her cousins. He should’ve locked the place up and gone to the cottage with Bryna and Cassidy.

  No, that would be the coward’s way. Best to handle this cleanly.

  “Go away, Raintree. Your time here is done.”

  She was not scared. Was she ever? Small and seemingly frail, she was one of the bravest women he had ever known. She didn’t back down. “Don’t tell me we don’t have something special.”

  If he lied to her would she know? Was their connection completely severed? Earlier she’d been able to see into his head, but he’d been blind to hers. That mental link...was it entirely gone?

  In case she could see more than she should, he stuck with the truth. “Perhaps we did have something special at one time, but we are both different now.” She was stronger; he was weaker.

  “We’re not different, not deep down where it counts.” She walked behind the bar. Walked into him, wrapping her arms around his waist and laying her head on his chest. She was warm and soft; she was everything he had thought never to know.

  There were a million reasons for them not to be together, but he didn’t want to argue with her. Not now. He didn’t want to talk at all.

  He grabbed the hem of her T-shirt and inched it up slowly. She shifted away from him, just a bit, to allow him to pull her clothing over her head. With a few more moves she stood before him completely and wondrously naked. Fine from the top of her head to her toes. Perfection inside and out.

  “No fair,” she whispered as she began to work the zipper on his jeans. “I am naked and you are not.”

  He needed her. One last time.

  She slipped her hand inside his unzipped pants; he wrapped his arms around her and picked her up, dislodging that hand, making her laugh. He loved her laugh; it was too rare, too precious.

  He carried her around the bar, to a table in the middle of the room. She’d had this fantasy once—they’d shared this fantasy—before they’d become lovers. Before they’d even kissed. He laid her on the table, spread her thighs, freed his erection and followed her down and down.

  And into her.

  This connection they had not lost. It was heaven on earth, real and unreal. It was truth and magic. He lost himself in her, body and soul. He claimed her, used her, gave to her. For a few precious minutes the world went away, and it took all their troubles with it. Nothing mattered but this. Nothing mattered but her.

  She wasn’t like any other woman he’d ever known. Echo Raintree was a gift. A gift he couldn’t keep, but one he would always remember and hold close to his heart. Ah, he’d realized she was trouble the moment she’d walked in the door...

  His trouble. His woman. His heart.

  She shattered beneath him, crying out softly as her inner muscles clenched and unclenched around him. Her response sent him over the edge. He was no longer capable of thought, no longer capable of anything but this.

  Warm and satisfied and exhausted to the bone, he held her. He’d never expected to feel this way about any woman, had never expected to love this way. She could be home, his home, in a way he had never known. Peace, in a way he had never expected. Here in Cloughban, on her blessed Sanctuary land, in the desert or the mountains or in any city in the world...

  Reality returned too quickly. He could not afford to lose himself in her, could not afford to make her everything.

  Echo reached up, touched his hair and whispered, “I love you, Ryder.” She closed her eyes and sighed. Judging by the expression on her face, she thought all was well. She thought...

  Hell, he had no idea what she was thinking.

  He withdrew, stood, straightened his pants. She was the vulnerable one at this moment. Naked, sated, still lying on the table flushed with pleasure and what she thought was love.

  There was only one thing he could say in response to her heartfelt I love you.

  “You’re fired.”

  * * *

  Cassidy woke in her own bed, in her own home, with a smile on her face. She should go to school today. She really wanted to see all her friends again! There was no more reason to hide out. Not from Echo! A quick glance at the clock told her it was too late to get to school anywhere near on time. After yesterday, it was likely no one would be there, anyway.

  Tomorrow would be soon enough.

  She smelled Granny’s porridge, and bacon and eggs, and suddenly she was starving.

  Cassidy jumped from the bed and ran into the kitchen on bare feet. Granny was awake and had been for a while, by the look of it. She was dressed and her hair was gathered in a neat bun.

  “Is Mr. McManus joining us for breakfast?” Cassidy asked. There was a lot of food on the table.

  “No, dear. Perhaps we’ll see him later today. I suspect he’s sleeping late, as you did.”

  “Lots of people are sleeping late today!” In her nightgown, her own hair curling wildly in all directions, Cassidy ate twice as much as she usually ate for breakfast. She ate it twice as fast, too. Either the healing or the scare had worked up quite an appetite!

  A small, sudden knowing robbed some of her happiness. Her da wasn’t sleeping. He hadn’t slept much at all last night...

  “I need to see Da.” Suddenly she knew he needed her. Not just as a ghostlike vision popping in to say hello, but in the flesh. He needed a hug.

  Granny shook a finger. “I’ve warned you about those visits...”

  Cassidy stood and ran toward her room. “I need to really see him. I can find my way to town,” she added in a louder voice as she began to gather her clothes. “You don’t need to come along if you don’t want to.”

  By the time Cassidy was dressed, Granny was ready to go. She wore a rather stern expression, along with her favorite walking shoes.

  “Child, what are we going to do about that father of yours?” Granny asked as they walked out the front door. That door still smelled of smoke and it hung a little crooked. It could be fixed, though. Everything that had been damaged yesterday could be fixed. Everything.

  Cassidy skipped ahead. “I haven’t decided yet,” she called. She only knew her da still needed help.

  * * *

  Echo had never been able to see her own future, and had never really cared to. If what was coming was good, it was much more fun to be surprised. If it was bad and could not be changed, why would she want to know?

  But as Gideon—garbed in a protective talisman that allowed him to drive without killing the car’s electronics—drove her rental car toward the airfield where a private jet waited, she closed her eyes and attempted to see what might lie ahead for her. Something, anything. A clue, please.

  How could she find and lose love so quickly? How could Ryder send her away? She knew he loved her, and she loved him. With or without magic. Wizard or ordinary man, he was hers.

  He’d all but kicked her out of Cloughban. He’d even officially fired her and made her return her Drunken Stone T-shirts. She’d been naked at the time. Naked and in love and so sure they would be together forever.

  Since Ryder didn’t want to see her again, he’d asked her to leave those T-shirts on the sidewalk outside the pub on her way out of town.

 
She’d kept one. It was packed in her duffel bag. A part of her hoped he’d change his mind and come after her, maybe with that missing T-shirt as an excuse, but she didn’t hold out much hope.

  Would she live the rest of her life waiting for Ryder to show up and admit that he’d made the worst mistake of his life when he’d let her go?

  Somewhere up ahead, Hope drove the rental car she and Gideon had left on the side of the road on their way into Cloughban. After a couple of days away from Gideon, it had started easily enough. Hope had volunteered to drive, saying she could use a little quiet time. Maybe she’d realized that Echo and Gideon needed to talk. Alone.

  They had been on the road almost half an hour before he spoke. Right back to business, dammit. “So, are you going back to the Sanctuary?”

  “I suppose.”

  “Don’t be so enthusiastic,” he said dryly. “You did a good job there. You’re needed and wanted. Just...don’t make it snow in July. We don’t need the attention.”

  If her heart was broken now and forever, would it snow when she thought of Ryder? Maybe. Maybe not. Away from the stones her abilities would be different. Maybe less, maybe more, but definitely different.

  “It’s just...being keeper of Sanctuary was always temporary in my mind,” she confessed. “I was a place holder for Emma. I know, she has years before it’ll be time for her to take that job, but still...it was never me. That job was never mine.” Was that what she’d always been looking for? Something that was meant to be hers?

  “What is yours?” Gideon asked, and somehow he sounded both kindly concerned and incredibly frustrated.

  She had to be honest. “I don’t know.”

  He sighed. Gideon was such a guy, not really good at the touchy-feely stuff. But he did care. She knew that. Even if he was sometimes maddening, like a big brother or overly protective father would be.

  “I use my abilities to help people,” he said. “Dead people, yeah, but the dead are people, too. Kind of.”

  “Is this supposed to be helping?” Echo asked sourly. He was trying, and she grudgingly gave him credit for that, but she was pretty frustrated herself at the moment.

  “Dammit, let me finish,” he said. “I tried to quit, after Hope and I got married, but this is what I do. I find murderers and take them off the streets. Hope misses it. When the kids are in school she’ll probably come back. They won’t allow us to partner up again. It’ll be a struggle, but we’ll make it work because it’s who we are.”

  “It’ll be a while before that happens,” Echo said absently.

  “What?” Gideon sounded confused and put out. “Madison is four and a half. She’ll be in kindergarten next year...”

  “But what about the boy?” Echo asked.

  Gideon looked at her and she looked at him. Green eyes met in silence. They were both surprised by her words.

  “Boy?” he asked after a few moments.

  There had been no vision, no crippling experience that took her elsewhere, but she knew. A boy. “In eight and a half months or so,” she said. “Yes.”

  “Hope hasn’t said a word...”

  “She doesn’t know! Jeez, Gideon, the eight and a half months should’ve been a clue.” Another Raintree baby. Maybe one with Gideon’s powers, his amazing abilities. He had never said he wanted a son. He loved his daughters, doted on them, even. But he’d be thrilled...

  “How many?” he asked in a voice filled with something much like terror. “We just planned on the two, but apparently we... I swear, we’re careful... Never mind, we don’t need to go into that.” He blushed just a little. “Okay, tell me. Lay it on the line, cuz. How many kids are Hope and I going to have?”

  Echo managed to laugh. “I don’t know. This is life, Gideon. Be surprised now and then. Have eight kids if it suits you.”

  “Eight? Bite your tongue. Hope would kill me. Shit! She’s going to insist I get clipped, I just know it.”

  Echo laughed. No, Gideon would not be happy when Hope insisted that he have a vasectomy but in the end he’d do it. And he’d grumble about it. A lot.

  They were silent for a long moment. Gideon was probably thinking about the changes a new baby would bring to their lives. Maybe he was thinking about having a son. About baseball and football and fixing old cars.

  Did Ryder want a son one day? He loved Cassidy, she knew that, but...was it enough? Did he long for more?

  “Back to the matter at hand,” Gideon said, all business once again. “Who are you, dammit? Where do you belong? No one can tell you, you have to feel it.”

  Feel it. She’d been feeling all her life. Good and bad, traumatic and ecstatic. On occasion she tried to block it all out, but she did know how to feel.

  “I want to sing,” she said softly. “I want to make music.”

  Gideon nodded. “Good. That’s a start. What kind of music? Where?”

  The answer was crystal clear, but it wasn’t going to be easy. Was anything worthwhile ever easy? Wasn’t what she wanted and who she was deep inside worth fighting for?

  She turned to look at her cousin, studying his profile for a few seconds before she said, in the most commanding voice she could muster, “Turn the car around.”

  * * *

  Rye looked toward the table where he’d laid Echo down last night. He wasn’t sure he could ever allow anyone to sit at that table again. It was his. Hers. Theirs. He glanced at the stage where Echo had played and sang on so many nights. The space had never looked so empty to him before.

  He’d lied to her about never having music in the pub. There were a couple of decent local bands that performed almost every weekend. One played traditional Irish music, while the other dabbled in soft rock. He’d paid them to back off while she’d been here because he wanted to listen to her sing. He wanted to watch her light up as she sat on that stage with a guitar in her hands.

  Last night he’d been so sure he was making the right decision in sending her away, but now...he didn’t know what came next. He didn’t belong here, not when the powers he’d possessed had been stripped away. What if he made them uncomfortable, and they stopped coming to the pub altogether?

  It wasn’t as if he had many choices. He couldn’t take Cassidy out into the world, not with puberty and the chaos that would bring to someone so incredibly gifted on the horizon. Her place was here. Somehow, he’d have to make it work. For her.

  The pub remained closed. No one felt like celebrating at the moment. Even the grumpy trio of old men who were here six days a week was steering clear of the place. Nevan had called in reinforcements and rid himself of Doyle and his seven hired guns. They were all in a jail cell somewhere. Rye didn’t know where, and he didn’t care. The soldiers would receive treatment for their minor wounds and then they’d have their minds cleared of recent memories before they were dropped off in a big city somewhere in the world. Each of them in a different city, a different country.

  Doyle was another matter. His memories had been removed, as well, but he would never go free. Nevan’s word that the man who’d tried to kill Cassidy would never leave his lonely prison was good enough for Rye.

  Some of Cloughban’s own had been injured, others were shaken up by the invasion. This was supposed to be a place of safety, of isolation. Soon enough some would need to commiserate, and what better place than the village pub.

  The Drunken Stone would come to life again, but it would never be the same.

  He needed to find a new cook.

  Maybe a waitress.

  He’d get a band back for the weekend, but...no, it wouldn’t be the same.

  Cassidy, who was not allowed in the pub under normal circumstances, sat with her grandmother in the corner booth. He’d been surprised to see them, but he was also glad of the company. He didn’t need to sit here and feel sorry for himself.

 
Bryna looked tired, worn out to the bone. Cassidy had bounced back more quickly than any of the adults. Kids were like that. Rye hoped she could forget what had happened to her in the past few days, but he suspected she would not.

  “Da, I’m very disappointed in you,” Cassidy said in a put-on grown-up voice.

  There were so many reasons for her to be disappointed, but he suspected he knew what hers were. The most magically gifted being in the world, and her father was...

  “Not that,” she said with childish disdain.

  “It’s rude to read people without their permission.”

  “I can’t help it,” she said. “You’re all but shouting. I don’t mind that you don’t have powers. Inside now you’re all blues and greens and lovely yellows. Before there were black spots, but those are gone. You don’t want the black spots, Da. Besides, there are still some little powers in you, some little powers that have been with you since you were born. When you recover from the curse, they’ll come back to you.”

  Little powers. Great. His mother had not been satisfied with little powers. Would anyone else be? Would he?

  He ignored that part and said, “True, I don’t want black spots. So tell me, why are you disappointed?”

  She slipped out of the booth and headed his way. “You let Echo go.”

  He hoped with all his heart that Cassidy’s ability to see and understand didn’t apply to every aspect of his life. If she peeked into things that she did not understand, she gave no indication. She was normally not shy about asking questions, so he continued to hope.

  “What was I supposed to do?” he asked. “I know you like her, but she doesn’t belong here.”

  “She does. Echo does belong here.”

  He had thought so, at one time. “If she belonged here she’d be here. That’s the way the universe works.”

  Bryna scoffed, stood and headed for the rear door. “Poppycock,” she said in a clear, loud voice. “Do you think the universe is going to do everything for you? The Raintree girl came to you. Of all the places in the world she might’ve gone in her wanderings, she ended up here. It’s up to you to keep her.” She snorted. “I need a nice long walk and a nap. Fix it.” The door slammed behind her.