The Heart Beneath

by McKenna, Lindsay

  He tried to come home for lunch every day to be with her and the children. Their oldest, Jason, was now at Annapolis, the U.S. Naval Academy. Katy was seventeen and getting ready to leave for college next year. The fraternal twins, Peter and Kelly were now twelve, a wonderful age, and Morgan was trying to be home with them more often.

  He frowned, knowing he’d been working too much. Jason and Katherine especially had grown up without him being there much of the time. He’d been a shadow father in their lives. Because of the mounting problems with Jason, who didn’t have an easy time of it at school, and Katherine’s distance from him, Morgan was trying to correct that problem. Laura was much happier that he was taking weekends off, and sending his second-in-command, Mike Houston, around the world on many Perseus missions in his place. The twins, at least, were much happier and well adjusted as a result.

  Guilt ate at Morgan as he stood there sipping champagne with Laura. Nothing mattered more to him than his family. They were a close, tight-knit family. Silently, he promised Laura that he would continue to be there for their children and for her. His life wasn’t all about military objectives and missions. He realized now it was about being around for his family, supporting Laura and helping her to raise their kids.

  Laura eased her sensible black shoes off her feet and dug her nylon-clad toes into the plush carpet. Turning, she walked back to the window. The sun was setting.

  “Look at the strange color of this sunset, Morgan. Have you ever seen anything like it?” she asked, turning as he came up behind her.

  Morgan stared out the huge window toward central Los Angeles, at the needlelike buildings that seemed to be clawing the sky. “Hmm. No, it looks yellow-green, or a dirty yellow color. It is unusual…”

  Wrinkling her nose as she sipped the wine, Laura leaned once more against Morgan’s tall, steady frame. His arm came around her waist to keep her solidly in place. “Dirty yellow is a good description. It really is a strange, rather ugly color. We’ve been out to California many times in the past and I can never remember the sky looking like this.” A chill went through her. She felt Morgan’s arm tighten around her reassuringly.

  “Cold?” he murmured near her ear.

  Shaking her head, she said, “No…just, well, a strange chill just shot through me.” Twisting to look up at him, she said, “Isn’t that odd? Here we are at the top of the world, literally speaking, in a terribly expensive penthouse suite, drinking some of the best champagne on the face of the earth, and I get this awful feeling….”

  “About what?” Morgan knew Laura was highly intuitive. With the children, she’d often get a premonition when one of them was in some kind of danger, and it always turned out that she was correct. Morgan didn’t take Laura’s intuition lightly. Frowning, he pressed a kiss to the top of her head.

  “I…don’t know, Morgan. Boy, this is strange, you know?” She forced a smile she didn’t feel. “Maybe we should call home and check with the baby-sitter to see if the twins are okay.”

  Releasing her, he nodded. “Sure, go ahead….” And he stepped aside so she could go to the flowery couch and sit down near the ornate, antique-style phone there.

  Turning to gaze out at the lurid yellow sunset, he listened as Laura dialed home. The cloud of pollution hung like a dirty brown ribbon across the sky. Stretching for a good fifty miles from north to south and roughly thirty miles from east to west, the Los Angeles basin contained millions of people. This was one of the most congested, overpopulated spots in the U.S.A. Everyone wanted California sunshine, the good life, and perfect weather conditions without snow or ice. Morgan couldn’t blame any of them for moving out here, for the Los Angeles area was a powerful draw. And having Hollywood here was just another plus. Disneyland was nearby, and so was Knotsberry Farm. Los Angeles, the City of Angels, had many attractions that drew families.

  As he listened to Laura talking to their baby-sitter, Julie Kingston, he didn’t hear any consternation or worry in her voice. Sipping the champagne as he stood there, Morgan slid his free hand into the pocket of his chinos. The sky was a deepening yellow now, one of the oddest colors he’d ever seen. Searching his memory, he could not find a clue to this unusual meteorological event.

  “Well,” Laura sighed as she came back to stand with him, “everyone’s okay, thank goodness. Julie said the twins are fine.”

  Morgan glanced at her and saw the relief in her eyes. Laura loved her children with the fierceness of a lioness and she was a wonderful mother to them.

  “Good,” he murmured. “Because I want you to enjoy the vacation.” Pulling his hand from his pocket, he slid his arm across Laura’s slim, proud shoulders and drew her close. She came without resistance, that soft look in her blue eyes once again, replacing the worry.

  “Oh, you know me, Morgan. I’m such a worrywart when it comes to the kids. That’s part of being a parent. You and I both know that.”

  Nodding, he stood with his wife in his arms, enjoying the warmth of her body against his. “I know,” he whispered huskily, and placed a kiss on her silky hair. “Maybe when we go to dinner tonight, our waitress might know what this dirty yellow sky means.”

  Laughter burbled up in Laura’s throat. “Oh, let’s not ask! She’ll probably think we’re backwoods hicks from Montana, and get a good laugh out of it. Let’s not embarrass ourselves that way, okay?”

  Smiling good-naturedly, Morgan murmured, “Fair enough, woman of my heart. Now, let’s enjoy the rest of this bottle, laze around a little and enjoy life one minute at a time with one another.”

  A glint came to Laura’s eyes as she met her husband’s warm gray gaze, which burned with desire for her. Her lips parted in an elfin smile. “I’d love to take that champagne bottle over to the huge, four-poster Louis XIV bed, lie beneath that incredible burgundy-and-gold canopy, and enjoy it with you.”

  Morgan raised an eyebrow. “I like your idea, Mrs. Trayhern. You’re forever creative about such things…”

  Giggling, Laura felt the chill and worry leave her. Slipping out from beneath Morgan’s arm, she skipped across the room and slid the champagne from the silver bucket. Bottle in hand, she moved to the king-size bed and leaped onto it like a gleeful child, her laughter tinkling.

  “I have a few more creative ideas we can explore together,” she challenged wickedly.

  Chapter One

  December 31: 2150

  “That sunset was an ugly yellow, wasn’t it, Dusty? I always wonder what’s going to happen when it’s that color. It’s so unusual…” Lieutenant Callie Evans squatted down in front of the cyclone-fenced kennel that housed her golden retriever, a dog specially trained for rescue missions. There were twenty-two such animals in the facility. Overhead, the pale amber glare of a sodium lamp cast deep, running shadows across the enclosed area that housed dogs of various breeds.

  The U.S. Marine Corps General Rescue Unit sat a quarter of a mile away from a small lake where marines liked to fish when off-duty. The main building of the unit was on top of a knoll, sitting among rocks, dirt and cactus. The kennel area was at one side of the dark-brown stucco, single-story building. Callie spent three-fourths of her life here, and loved every moment of it. The men and women handlers were like a large, extended family to her.

  Even though she was the executive officer of the unit, she considered the enlisted people family, too. In their kind of work, the walls between officers and enlisted personnel dissolved to a great degree, and Callie liked it that way. She might be a Marine Corps officer, but in her book, enlisted Marines deserved every bit as much respect. So often, out at some disaster site, rank distinctions disappeared completely. During those times, they were all just people on a mission to save whoever was trapped or endangered. Finding survivors was the sole focus for both officers and enlisted alike in this rescue unit. Whether she was searching for victims in a skyscraper fire, or after an earthquake, a tidal wave or any other type of trauma that might involve trying to find life in so much death, Callie loved her job wi
th her whole heart and soul.

  Dusty whined, his huge, golden-brown eyes looking up at her with unabashed adoration as she stuck her small fingers through the wire to pet his cold nose. Wagging his tail, he whined again plaintively.

  Frowning, Callie remained hunched over, one hand on the gate and the other stroking Dusty’s muzzle. For the last three days all the dogs were restless. Some whined. Others barked in a way that usually signalled danger. Danger? What kind? And where was it coming from? She shifted her worried gaze to her five-year-old friend. Giving Dusty a soft smile, she whispered, “Wish I could understand dog language better. I gotta get going, Dust, but I just wanted to stop by one more time before I left to do my rounds of this place. You’ve seemed so upset. What is it, boy? What’s got you and everyone else spooked around here?”

  The evening coolness here in the desert always surprised Callie. Camp Reed, a hundred-thousand acre Marine Corps reservation, sat on some of the most expensive real estate in Southern California. It was literally a back door to the Los Angeles basin, about twenty miles to the west. And even though Camp Reed was arid desert, with cactus, and Joshua trees dotting its rocky hills and deep, narrow valleys of ocher-colored soil and sand, it still got cold at night. Because the reservation wasn’t right on the coast, it didn’t benefit from the warm, humid Pacific. Consequently, Camp Reed was either broiling hot, with temperatures soaring to over a hundred degrees in summer, or marine sentries found their teeth chattering as they walked their posts during winter. No snow fell, but it might as well as far as Callie was concerned.

  “Of course,” she told Dusty in a conspiratorial tone, “it is late December, and even here in good ole California, it gets close to freezing at night.” She smiled affectionately at her rescue partner and slowly rose to her full five-foot-five-inch height. Pulling her camouflage jacket more tightly around her thin frame, Callie stood on the concrete and looked around.

  The dogs were really upset. As she stood there, her hands deep in the pockets of her Marine Corps cammos jacket, the cap drawn down on her head and the bill low enough to stop the glare of the lights overhead from reaching her eyes, she wondered why they were so wound up.

  She’d just gotten back from Turkey a week ago. She and Dusty were still recovering from that grueling two weeks of climbing over rubble caused by a devastating earthquake in that country. Pulling her hand out of her pocket, she held up a doggy biscuit, one of Dusty’s favorite treats.

  “Hey…look what I got for you.” She leaned down and slipped it between the wires.

  Dusty quickly gobbled it up, licked his mouth with his large pink tongue and gave her a beseeching look for another one.

  Callie chuckled indulgently. “Don’t look at me like that. You talk with your eyes, guy.” And she grinned and tucked her hands back into her pockets. Looking to the right, she saw that Sergeant Irene Anson had desk duty. The sergeant was thirty years old, married, with a little girl. Callie doted on Annie, who, at age five, just loved to come out to the kennels and pet all her “doggies.” It was a time Callie always looked forward to, for she loved little kids. Irene’s husband, Brad, was a Recon Marine, one of the corps elite.

  Camp Reed had its own rescue dog unit, teams of which were utilized around the world in major catastrophes of any kind. Callie had been in many countries during her last two years with the rescue unit. When called to those countries for earthquake duty, it didn’t hurt that she knew Spanish, plus some Turkish and Greek. Callie had taken courses in those languages because many times, earthquakes occurred in countries where those languages were spoken, and she wanted to be able to converse not only with the local authorities, but with survivors they found in the rubble, as well. One of her least-favorite duties was going to South America for the many killer mudslides that occurred during the rainy season. It wasn’t something she looked forward to at all.

  Dusty whined, wanting another treat.

  “You are a glutton for more goodies,” she told the retriever wryly. “And it isn’t like this hasn’t been a great day for you. We went to the beach today and we played and celebrated New Year’s Eve early. You got to swim in the ocean, go after the sticks I threw, and roll in the sand while I roasted hot dogs over a fire. And then you came back and shook yourself, spraying water all over me and the food. That’s how you got your fair share of the hot dogs. You ain’t no dummy, are you, guy?” Callie laughed under her breath. It had been a good day, one they’d both needed. But she had no one to share this evening with, to welcome in the New Year. Even as Callie held her dog’s worshipful stare, loneliness ate at her.

  “Don’t go there,” she told herself in warning. “Don’t do this to yourself, Callie….”

  Dusty whined.

  “I know, I know,” she said aloud to the golden retriever. “Why do I do this to myself, Dusty? Why can’t I just be fine with how I look? You are. Of course, you’re drop-dead handsome. I mean, what lady dog wouldn’t do a double take, seeing you?” Her mouth curled, but with pain, not humor. Callie hurt inside. She was twenty-five years old and single, and she knew why.

  Dusty sat down and thumped his tail eagerly on his concrete slab. Callie had bought a flannel pillow filled with cedar shavings for him to lie on in the kennel. Concrete couldn’t be comfortable in her opinion. Dusty dearly loved his “blankie” and joyfully slept on it every chance he got. Now he tilted his head, his intelligent eyes shining with happiness that she was still there with him.

  “Why can’t I just be happy like you over the simple pleasures of life, like your blankie?” Callie asked. She moved back to the kennel, rested her shoulder against it and hung her head. Staring down at her booted feet, she sighed. “Why do I always have to torture myself, Dusty? So I’m plain looking. “Board ugly,” as I heard some jerk of a jarhead say a week ago. Dude, that hurts. You know?”

  Dusty whined.

  “Darn it all…” Callie whispered achingly. “I wish I wasn’t so softhearted, Dusty. I need a thicker skin. I wish I could let those words roll off me like water off a duck’s back, but I can’t….”

  Maybe if she let her short, sandy-blond hair grow out more it would make her look more feminine. Callie had thought of that often, but in her line of work, long hair was not at all practical. She’d be filthy dirty climbing up and over buildings that had been destroyed by a killer earthquake. Or it would rain or snow and she’d be sopping wet and muddy. No, long hair was out. Well, how about some makeup? She had a square face, with wide-set eyes, a nose that was too big and a mouth that was even bigger. She looked…well, plain. Maybe even ugly…No man even gazed at her with the look. Callie had wished all her life for a man to show her some interest. She saw other women marines getting that special attention, but she never did. Sighing, Callie knew she never would.

  Her hair was straight and hung limp as a dishrag around her face, even when she wasn’t climbing around on rubble all day in all sorts of weather. Setting it to make it look halfway decent or using hair spray was out of the question. Hers was a brutal outdoor job. With people trapped and dying, as often was the case in a disaster situation, it didn’t matter whether she wore makeup or if her hair looked feminine or not. No, the victims only wanted to know that Dusty had found them and that Callie was there to help them in any way she could, to escape and live to tell about it. To them, she was an angel of mercy.

  Callie smiled a little, remembering how one man had whispered that to her as the medics had extricated him from some rubble. He’d been trapped in there for five days, and Dusty had found him. More dead than alive, the old, silver-haired man had reached out with a shaking hand and fiercely gripped hers as they carried him by on a stretcher.

  “You’re an angel,” he’d rasped, tears streaming down his face. “An angel sent by God himself. Thank you…. You’ve got the face of an angel, and I’ll never forget you…not ever….” And he’d choked and sobbed as they’d carried him away to the ambulance.

  She wouldn’t ever forget his words, either. Callie liked t
he idea of looking like an angel. God didn’t make any ugly angels. Nope, not a chance. Smiling a little, she cast a glance at Dusty, who watched her every expression.

  “Do I look like an angel to you?”

  Dusty whined and thumped his tail heartily.

  “You’d say yes to anything, guy.” And Callie laughed. “No ugly angels in heaven, Dust.” She rolled her eyes and looked up at the low ceiling of the kennel complex, made from corrugated aluminum. “Maybe that’s when I’ll feel beautiful. When I die.”

  A deep, growling roar caught Callie’s ears. The dogs started baying. Where was that horrendous sound coming from? She looked around. Eyes widening, Callie hunched slightly, feeling as if she were being attacked. By what, she had no idea. The dogs’ unified voices raised the hair on the back of her neck. Their baying was sharp and filled with terror. Feeling the earth shiver, Callie caught her breath in fear, and spread her arms outward. In a flash, she realized what was happening: an earthquake!

  Callie didn’t have time to react. One moment she was standing, the next she was knocked off her feet, slamming onto the hard concrete floor with an “oofff!” The ground bucked and heaved. As she rolled onto her back, she was thrown from one side of the kennel area to the other. The roof cracked, metal was shrieking and bending. She suddenly saw stars, like white pinpoints of lights on black velvet, where the tin had opened up.

  The dogs were crying and wailing.

  Callie gasped and tried to get to her feet. Run! She heard Sergeant Anson screaming for help. The earth still convulsed violently, its roar deafening, like a freight train bearing down on her. Callie scraped her hand badly as she tried to head for the nearest exit door. No good! A second undulating wave hit, and again Callie was knocked off her feet. She rolled heavily into the kennel’s fence. Fear vomited through her.