Flights of Angels (Exit Unicorns Series Book 3)

by Cindy Brandner

  “Oh God, Pamela, I’m sorry, but I cannot seem to shut it out. Every time ye lie with me—I see his hands on ye—touching ye. I put my hand to yer breast an’ I swear I can see the marks of his fingers there still.”

  It was what she had feared, that despite the fact that Love Hagerty was no longer alive, the ghost of what she had done with him would linger about their bed, that the mere knowledge of it would rip Casey apart and never cease tormenting him. He was a strong man, and secure in the fact of her love. But he was also a man who needed to possess his woman, just as she herself needed to know her hold on him was stronger than any other force in the world.

  She had racked her brain for months now, trying to think of a way to bring him back to her as they had been before he knew about Love. She could only think of one way.

  She unbuttoned her nightgown and shrugged her shoulders, the fragile white cotton puddling around her hips, leaving her bare in the firelight. Casey lifted his head, feeling the faint breeze of the falling cloth.

  “What are ye doin’, woman?”

  She put a hand to the tight line of his jaw, forcing him to meet her eyes.

  “You could do anything to me,” she said, pulse hammering in her neck. “Do you know that? I would let you do anything to me if I thought it would heal this between us. I never was this way for him. I need you to know that. I always kept as many clothes on as I could manage. I closed my mind and my heart to him. I could never give him the vulnerability of my naked body. I’ve only ever given those things to you. I would let you beat me if I thought it would take this away from us. I would even step aside and let you go to the bed of another woman. The beating,” she said, and the words came out half-choked, “would have to wait until well after the baby is born, obviously.”

  Casey swallowed, his fingers biting into her thighs, eyes so dark with pain that she could barely discern pupil from iris.

  “Jaysus, Pamela—beat ye? Pregnant or not, I could never raise a hand to ye in violence, an’ I think ye know that well enough. An’ be honest, could ye really countenance me bein’ with another woman?” His gaze was as merciless as the fingers that gripped her flesh.

  “I could if it meant you’d come back to me whole afterward.”

  “Could ye? Could ye live with the thought of it, of me touching another woman the way I do you? Of me lyin’ naked an’ aroused in her arms?”

  It was her turn to swallow. She could not dislodge the acid taste that flooded her mouth at the thought of him with another woman. And suddenly she could see it all too clearly—the long line of him, the dark hair of his chest and groin against the pale body of another woman, his mouth on her fine skin. She knew what it was to have that strength brought to her service, while at the same time being completely at its mercy. She gave a small cry of pain at the image, but Casey wasn’t about to let her turn away from the mirrored vision of his own agony.

  “What about the thought of me findin’ release, of maybe findin’ her touch an’ taste to my liking? No, Jewel, look at me. Of me inside another woman, making love to her. Maybe feeling love for her.”

  “Is that what you think? That I enjoyed it? That I felt something for him? I hated every minute of being in his bed. Hated it, do you understand? His touch made me sick to my stomach. I threw up the first time, right after. I took showers so hot my skin was raw and I couldn’t even look at myself in a mirror.”

  “An’ how did ye feel about me when ye were there with him?”

  “In the bed, I couldn’t think about you. I would have killed him then and there if I had. Or I’d have gone mad. But after—later—” she looked into his eyes, her own dry and burning, “I hated and loved you in equal measure,” she said. “Every time you were home, I wanted to keep you in bed the entire time. I wanted you to exorcise his touch somehow—burn it off me. I wanted you to be rough so I would feel you in me after you were gone. I wanted him to see your marks on my body when I had to go back to him.”

  “Aye, I remember,” he said, “I did think somethin’ wasn’t quite right. But I wasn’t likely to look too closely at it, was I?” He smiled but the expression didn’t quite come off.

  “I’d had sex with different women before ye came along, Jewel. Ye know that well enough, and I always enjoyed it, and liked to believe the woman in question was left satisfied as well. From the first with you, though, it was different. It was makin’ love, an’ it was sacred, an act of consecration in the dark or light. No one knows me like ye do, Pamela. There were doors I opened for ye that I never thought I could. The trust that lay between us—for me—was absolute. And to know that ye couldn’t trust me when that man came between us…” his grip on her thighs was bruising but she welcomed the pain. “That ye didn’t come to me and tell me what was going on—I—” his voice failed, the tears that stood in his eyes bright in the half-light. “Well, then I realized ye’d never trusted me in the way I thought ye had, and it like to killed me to know it.”

  She swallowed convulsively, wanting to break the lock his eyes held her in but knew she owed him this small thing, to feel the pain for a moment even as he did.

  “What we have when we lie together, it’s something rare. And I don’t just mean the passion, though that’s rare enough in itself. But that somehow I am both stronger and weaker in yer arms, that you gave me such trust even after ye’d been raped.”

  He closed his eyes for a second, breathing in deeply through his nose, in an effort to quell the emotion that had overtaken him. When he opened his eyes again, she saw that rather than mastering his feelings he had laid himself bare to her and for the first time in months, she felt as though she were looking directly through to the core of the man.

  “I know what men see when they look at ye, Jewel. I understand that they lust after ye. But it never mattered because I never felt they knew the half of ye. They didn’t really know what it was to love ye. Only I had the keys to that kingdom. Then Love Hagerty,” he ground the name out between gritted teeth, “he more than lusted for ye, he loved ye. And I felt somehow that he desecrated what we had, as though he’d brought violence into the church we’d built together. And I am afraid,” he bowed his head down to her knees again, “so afraid that if I let myself go entirely with ye again, I’ll find out he desecrated it permanently.”

  She took a deep breath, knowing there was only one last thing she could offer him, and knowing it would kill her to do it. Still she could not continue to receive a love that was compromised. Compromised through her own actions, and she knew neither of them could go on much longer in this manner, not when they knew better.

  “I would want to die if you left me,” she said quietly. “I wouldn’t know who I was if you didn’t love me anymore, Casey. I wouldn’t want to wake up another day. But I would let you go if it meant you could find happiness elsewhere—if you—you,” her voice shook, but she knew it had to be said, “cannot find fulfillment with me anymore.”

  Casey’s head snapped up, his face white with shock. “Oh Lord, woman, ye kill me, do ye know that?” He raised a hand from her thigh, the print of his fingers a shadow against the milky skin. He cradled her jaw, his thumb stroking the line of her cheek. “The way ye look there with the moonlight on ye, offerin’ me everything that ye are.” He shook his head sadly. “I could never love another woman, Pamela. I thought ye understood at least that much about me.”

  He stood and took off his shirt. It fell to the floor to join her nightgown. Then he unzipped his pants and stepped out of them.

  He stood naked before her and she caught her breath at the sheer beauty of him. He seemed carved from the night, both silver and shadow, both man and animal, against the tamped glow of the fire.

  He held out a hand to her. “Come to bed, my wife, my woman. Come with me. And I will go with you.”

  Chapter Seven

  The Night Walker

  It was one of th
ose nights when everything was so still, it felt as though something momentous was about to happen and Nature was holding her breath in anticipation.

  It had become routine, this wandering byways and streets at night, walking and walking until he was so exhausted he couldn’t put one foot in front of the other. He knew the area here well enough to walk through the woods and leave the roads to their quiet slumber. The woods held their own charm at night, the trees keeping counsel with something ancient that hung in the air between their boughs, sighing and murmuring softly under the stars. This night he had come down to stay with Casey and Pamela, a thing he did from time to time when he could not stand to stare at his own four walls anymore, nor tolerate the silence that lingered there in the wake of her voice.

  He was relieved to see the intimacy had returned to Pamela and Casey’s marriage. They seemed happy together once more, and had taken up the rhythm of their life again, in tune with each other, speaking volumes across the room without saying a word. It gave bittersweet pause to him, the small intimate touches as one passed the other, the smiles, the little jokes that belonged solely to a couple. The way Casey watched her with pride in his face and a lessening of fear as each month of the pregnancy passed in good health and a growing belly.

  He paused in the lee of an oak, putting a hand to a rough-barked branch, and took a deep breath. Sometimes he walked so long and so fast that he forgot to breathe and only stopped when his chest got so tight that he felt he was in danger of choking. In the wake of Sylvie’s death, he had become unaware of his body. It became an enemy in some senses, one that he abused, overworked and forgot to feed until he collapsed from pure exhaustion. It seemed a limited thing, a boundary that he could not cross, a thing keeping him from what he truly wanted. There were solutions, he knew, to such difficulties, but something in him had shied away from such a definite answer.

  And yet here he was, star stuff contemplating star stuff, able to look at the heavens once again, even if barely. It took courage to look up into the night sky. For so long he had kept his head down, his thoughts on a narrow track, not allowing the pain to swamp him, knowing if he did he was lost. For so many years, the stars had been his consolation and in another life, in another country, he might have become an astronomer. After Sylvie’s death, he had not looked up for months. He had watched the ground burn beneath his feet as he walked endless miles at night, never once looking up. It had seemed grotesque that the stars were still there, forming constellations, that they didn’t simply fall from the sky for the grief of losing her. He did not want to know if he could still feel beauty, if anything had the power to touch him.

  Then one morning, he had started out early for work, the sky just beginning to lighten along the horizon and the trees sleepy smudges. And there it was—Vega, his father’s star, so blue and bright, pulsing against the fleeing of night. He had stood transfixed, watching the sky band itself into a softer and brighter blue, and still that star had stood out like something alive against an unconscious world. He couldn’t breathe, and though he might well melt into a panic, he could not look away from that star.

  Finally, when Vega had all but disappeared, he had found himself moving again, placing one foot after the other, and he had known then, whether he liked it or not, he was going to survive Sylvie’s death.

  He looked up now, the night a perfect one for stars—frosted, clear and empty of other human beings. Intact if not whole, he stood there on a small island of terra firma with an illimitable ocean stretching out toward all horizons. Within that ocean, he knew, there were vast, dark spaces, bodies that moved in all directions at speeds that inspired terror. There was also beauty that stole a man’s breath, and moments of awe and wonder that were like an oasis where a weary pilgrim might rest long enough to regain the strength to take that next burning step, and the one after that.

  And maybe, just maybe, even for the walking wounded, for the terrified and the sick at heart, for star stuff with the ability to contemplate star stuff, there was still some form of life out there.

  Chapter Eight

  Should Old Acquaintance…

  It had been a very long week at the Fair Housing office and when it ended, Pat had been more than grateful to head out into the countryside to look after his brother’s stead for the weekend. He had meant to arrive before dinner but a last minute call from an utterly desperate family who had been evicted from their cold water flat had delayed him. His car had spent the week choking and coughing and finally died with a sigh two days before. He’d caught a bus out as far as Newry and then tramped the rest of the way. When he turned down the drive, the yard was dark as a nun’s habit, the moon well hid behind cloud as dense as a bramble hedge. The trees only shapeless patches of greater darkness within the swallowing whole. The dark here did not disturb him. His brother had chosen well when he bought this house for there was a peace to the wee hollow that embraced one as soon as one left the roadway and took the ambling drive down toward the house.

  He came around the corner of the house, still deep in his thoughts, to find someone standing there, face turned up to the night sky above. He startled, not expecting anyone here at this time of night. The person reached toward his waistband, a gesture so swift and automatic that Pat knew whoever he was, he carried a gun at all times.

  He reacted swiftly, throwing himself to the corner of the house and rolling into the safety of the wall. He cursed himself roundly in his head, backing along the wall and trying to hear steps approaching. He had let his guard down in a way he never did in the city and now he was going to pay for that bit of foolishness.

  He raised his head, eyes scanning the area. There was no sound of footsteps, but that could mean the bastard was circling the house in the opposite direction and coming up behind him. He doubled back, sliding along the wall, cursing Pamela’s penchant for large thorny rambler roses up against the house. This time of year they had yet to sprout new leaves and the thorns were only the more brutal for the lack of protection.

  He slid behind the largest one, which ran up the west wall to the windows of Casey and Pamela’s bedroom. From here he would have a view both ways as the person circled the house.

  He stood there for an agony of an age, slowing his breath and hoping his heart wasn’t audible on the still night. There was no sound and he wondered fleetingly if the intruder had fled? No, his senses told him someone still lurked in the shadows, that even if he could neither hear nor see him he was still nearby, and no innocuous presence either.

  The fine hairs on the back of his neck prickled suddenly, telling him someone was within feet of him. He turned his head slowly, not wanting to give his own position away.

  The dark figure slid around the corner of the house, pistol at arm’s length, silent as a snake in the grass. Something seemed familiar about the man, even through the adrenaline rush currently clouding Pat’s mind. The hedge of cloud opened a little and a rogue beam of moonlight struck the intruder for a second. It was enough to see the shape of him.

  “David?” he said blankly, his mind not quite able to fathom what a British spy might be doing in his brother’s back yard.

  “Patrick?” He stepped out into the light, tucking his gun back into his waistband as he moved.

  “Aye, it’s me,” Pat said, extricating himself from the enormous thorns of the rambler. “It’s the helluva shock to come upon yerself though, here in the middle of the night.”

  “I imagine it is,” David said. “I think it might be best to take this conversation inside though.”

  It hardly seemed likely to Pat that anyone was lurking around the sheep pen in the hope of catching their conversation but he was chilled and damp from his dive into the leaves and grass and in need of a cup of tea to steady him. He had not expected to see David in this setting. Part of him was glad to see him, the part that had found in this quiet British soldier/spy one of the best friends he had ever known. A
nother part was angry. Angry because of the man’s admittance that his feelings were more than those of simple friendship. Angry because as much as Sylvie’s death had not directly been David’s fault, it had been Pat’s relationship with him that led to that tragic Sunday.

  Once inside, Pat lit the fire while David put the kettle on.

  David was the same and yet entirely changed. His hair had grown long over his collar and was dyed almost as dark as Pat’s own, the planes of his face seeming harder and more forbidding than they had before. Well, Pat supposed, they were both changed and too much had happened, too much grief had been ladled out in over-generous portions, for them not to bear the marks of it. Some days he barely recognized the man in the mirror himself. And it was part of David’s job description to be a chameleon, not to be recognized from one day to the next, to always blend, never to be in context. Part of the scenery, yet part of nothing. A life of loneliness lived by a man whose feelings ran deep.

  “You’ve changed as well,” David said, smiling and pushing the teapot across the table toward Pat.

  “I know,” Pat smiled, realizing his thoughts had played across his face as visibly as print in a book. “Life will do that to a man.”

  “How are you then?” David asked, as Pat poured out tea into the heavy mug David had placed near his right hand.

  Pat shrugged. “As well as I can manage, I suppose.” There wasn’t any way to tell the man the truth because he didn’t know the truth himself. How does anyone survive life-altering grief? How does anyone wake up every day feeling like he has shattered glass in place of the heart that used to beat in his chest?

  David nodded, a wise enough man to know when to leave a subject lie.