Strong Enough

by M. Leighton

  “You’re dismantling everything I’ve worked for. You’re ripping open old wounds, making me feel things I don’t want to feel. Making me think things I’ve got no business thinking.”

  I don’t know whether to be insulted or flattered. I’m uncertain, unsteady as always. With Jasper, there is no steady ground. There is no predictability. Just when I think I’ve got him figured out, he throws me a curve ball.

  “What the hell is going on, Jasper?”

  “I didn’t want you. I didn’t ask for you.” Bitterness. I can almost taste it. I wish that it didn’t hurt me to hear it.

  “I know you didn’t.”

  “Then why the hell couldn’t you just leave me alone?”

  “If that’s what you want, I’m sure I could find a way back to Atlanta.” My heart is aching.

  His eyes search mine, furiously, frantically. “No! Absolutely not! Don’t you see?”

  “Jasper, I don’t understand. What do you want me to do?”

  “I want you to stay. I want you to stay and never leave.”

  My shivering heart warms, heating the blood in every artery and vein throughout my body. “You do?”

  “Yes, damn you! You’re the only thing I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember. And the one thing I can’t have.”

  “But you can, Jasper,” I say, moving closer to him and setting my hands at his firm waist. “You can have me. I’m right here.”

  The fire dies in his eyes, leaving them cool and defeated. His voice is low, sullen. “But you shouldn’t be. And you won’t be for long.”

  There’s no talking him out of this, obviously, so the only thing I know to do is work around it. “Then love me while I’m here. Love me for all the tomorrows that we won’t have.”

  Jasper raises his hands, running his fingers around my neck and into the hair at my nape. “I’ll love you for today. That’s all I can give you.”

  “Then love me for today.”

  When his lips take mine, they’re gentler than they’ve ever been, but also more fierce. The rage, the roughness is still there, but it’s tightly controlled. Like he doesn’t want to hurt me.

  It only makes me wonder if he’s certain that he’s going to. And what that might mean for me.

  —

  The phone ringing stirs me from my drowsy rest on Jasper’s chest. We are in the spacious master bedroom, in a bed that’s hard as a rock, but I couldn’t care less. My bones are like butter and my brain like mush.

  Jasper shifts me enough that he can stretch for his phone. I can tell by the muffled chirp that it’s probably still in the pocket of his pants, which are now in a heap on the floor. Where he left them when he tore out of them to get to me.

  I smile just thinking about it. He’s as fierce in his lovemaking as he is in every other area of life. I didn’t see it before. I saw this calm, cool, collected, even aloof man who showed no emotion. He still doesn’t show very much, but I’ve learned where to look for it. It’s there. He burns as hot on the inside as I do, just in a different way.

  “What is it?” he says as he rolls back into bed.

  I watch his face as he listens. It shows nothing. But I notice that when I scrape my fingernails up his stomach, his nipples pucker and chills spread over his chest. When I bend to lave one with my tongue, I feel his hand at the back of my head, urging my face up to his. His pupils are so big his eyes look black. He’s turned on, but he doesn’t want to be right now, hence the single shake of his dark head.

  I stick my tongue out at him pluckily and I squeak when he grabs it between his thumb and forefinger.

  “Uh-huh,” he says into the phone, still holding my tongue. Just to be obtuse, rather than trying to free it, I move toward him, taking his fingers into my mouth and sucking on them. His eyes are locked on my lips, ever darkening in his increasing desire. I love that look. I love his chameleon eyes that tell me so much of what he’s feeling even when he doesn’t want me to know.

  Finally he releases my tongue and slowly withdraws his fingers. His gaze is still on my mouth as he rubs his thumb back and forth over my wet bottom lip, slowly, sweetly. Almost sadly, I see, when his eyes flip up to mine.

  What is he hearing that would make him sad all of a sudden?

  “Fine. I’ll be in touch. Give me until tomorrow.”

  When Jasper hangs up, he tosses the phone aside, but remains stretched slightly away from me.

  “Who was that?” I ask, only half expecting an answer.

  “The Colonel.”

  I lever myself up off his chest. “What did he say?”

  “He got what I needed.”

  “So what does that mean?”

  He doesn’t really have to answer me. I can see it all over his face that it’s nothing I want to hear.

  “It means that I’ll take you to him tomorrow. It means that this will all be over soon.”

  TWENTY-SIX

  Jasper

  I left Muse to shower. I wanted to be in there with her, but I can’t think as clearly when she’s around, much less when she’s wet and naked. That’s why I’m in the front yard, keeping a distance from her.

  The time is at hand and for the first time since I left home all those years ago, I’m pausing. Hesitating. Considering not doing my job, not doing what I’m told. I let someone get too close. I got too close. Too familiar. I let myself feel and now it’s come to this. She doesn’t know it yet, but the day I walked into the little shop where she works, Muse’s life changed forever. It was never going to be the same from that day on. She just didn’t know it.

  In my gut . . . even though my head is still trying to work out options and plans . . . I know I can’t complete my assignment. I could never hurt her that way. For any job or assignment or greater good. But if I don’t, someone will. I’m not so worried about the Colonel. He can take care of himself, but Muse . . . she’s a different story.

  It will be up to me to make sure she’s safe. To hide her well enough that no one will ever be able to find her. Maybe not even me.

  It’s that thought that’s bouncing around in my head when I hear the explosion. Reflexively, I duck, reaching for the gun that isn’t at the back of my waistband. I curse under my breath, curse how lax I’ve become in such a short period of time.

  The ground beneath my feet trembles with the impact and a bright flash of yellow-orange lightens the sky to the west, over the treetops. That’s when my heart comes to a complete stop in my chest. I know what lies in that direction. Who lies in that direction. She’s the only thing on my mind as I race toward the house, my heart now pounding at a speed that’s almost painful.

  I jerk open the screen door and nearly topple a partially dressed Muse as she heads for the porch.

  “What the hell was that?” she asks, her eyes round and frightened.

  “I have a feeling it was somebody’s death wish,” I respond grimly, moving past her to grab my keys. “Stay here. Lock yourself in the bedroom. There’s a sawed-off shotgun under the bed. It’s loaded. Keep that in there with you. If anyone other than me comes through that door, aim and fire.”

  “What? You’re crazy! I’m coming with you,” she says frantically, pulling the shirt she’s carrying over her wet head.

  “No, you’re not. It’s hard to tell what I could be walking into and I don’t want you—”

  “Where you are is the safest place I could be. I’m not letting you go without me.”

  I don’t even stop to ask her what she thinks she could do to stop me. I just move toward the door. “Fine, but you’ll do exactly as I say. No questions asked. Even if I tell you to get in the car and drive away, you do it. Got it?”

  I know my tone and my expression are harsh, but she needs to know how serious I am. I don’t have time to argue with her and I don’t want to have to worry about her doing something stupid.

  “Okay, okay. I will.”

  Together, we hurry out to the car. Once inside, I fire up the engine and tear out of the driveway, flying
off down the gravel road. I know the path well. I grew up on these roads. I just never thought I’d be traveling them again like this. I thought I’d done everything I could to keep her safe.

  My fingers ache from gripping the steering wheel so tightly. I’m already thinking through possible scenarios and possible outcomes, preparing myself, expecting the unexpected.

  “Reach in the glove box and hand me the gun in there,” I bite off to Muse. She quickly and quietly does as I ask.

  “Jasper, what’s going on? What do you think has happened?”

  I grind my back teeth together, praying that I’m wrong about what my gut is telling me, what my heart is telling me. The thing is, neither one has ever been wrong before.

  I take a deep breath, reaching for the level head, the eerie calm that has helped make me so good at what I do. I need my skill. I need my sharp senses.

  “There was an explosion to the west. My childhood home . . . my mother is still there. A little house, west of my cabin.”

  I hear her gasp. I smell the fear. I suck it in like cocaine. It burns through my blood, triggers a rush of adrenaline that pushes me into a razor-sharp focus.

  Minutes tick by like centuries, but I finally turn onto the old, dusty road that leads to the place I grew up, the place I spent a thousand sleepless nights and cried what few tears I’ve ever shed.

  The glow is getting brighter. The acrid tang of smoke and things burning that shouldn’t be burning fills the interior of the car. I steel myself for what I know I’ll find, for what I did everything in my power to prevent. I faked my death so my mother would be safe, so she could finally live a happy life. Free. But someone knows. Someone found her. Like someone found one of my friends.

  Before the familiar busted-cement driveway appears, I see bits of smoldering debris littering the street. Some shingles scattered across the drive, a piece of guttering, a couple of smoking two-by-fours, still nailed together and now lying in the middle of the road in the shape of a cross. I weave around it all.

  And then I see the flames.

  They lick up at the trees like the tongues of a dozen snakes, flickering sharply against the night sky. It’s when I make the turn that I finally see it—the house. I see the house that I was born in, the house that my brother died behind, the house that held so much good and bad, all but destroyed. Half of it has been blown out and the other half is engulfed in a writhing blaze.

  I ease to a stop, taking in the dead space that was once the living room and, beyond it, the master bedroom. They’re gone now and the emptiness inside me tells me that the woman who lived there is gone, too. A strange numbness emanates from my chest.

  I look into the darkness where my mother used to park her car at the back edge of the house, nearest the kitchen door. I see one taillight and the corner of a pale blue hatchback peeking out from behind the ruin.

  She was here.

  Was.

  A piece of wood burns on the trunk lid of Mom’s car. It makes the whole scene even more surreal, unbelievable.

  I shift into park and get out to walk slowly across the yard, picking through small fires scattered around the grass as I approach the front door. I feel the heat of the flames, but it doesn’t penetrate the cold that’s seeped into my skin. I feel it burn my eyes and throat and nostrils, but I don’t veer from my path. It never occurs to me that I should. I’m not afraid of dying.

  As I take in the wreckage, I feel detached, robotic, like I’m watching a bad movie through a crystal-clear camera lens. It isn’t until I stop at the closed front door that I start to feel the cold recede, and then I almost wish it hadn’t.

  I reach for the knob, wrapping my fingers around the scorching metal to test it. It’s locked.

  Pain threatens to explode from my chest, to shred muscle and bone. If my mother had been able to escape, she wouldn’t have turned and locked the door behind her. She’d have run. But this door is locked. That means my mother is dead.

  My boot against the front door is like a shotgun blast in the night. It gives easily and I walk over it as though a violent fire isn’t raging all around me. I scan the mostly intact dining room. Empty. I walk toward what’s left of the kitchen. Empty. No sign of my mother, dead or alive. She must’ve been in one of the obliterated rooms. And now she’s obliterated, too.

  With the crackle of support beams giving way overhead, I head toward the bedroom I slept in as a child. Even filled with smoke I can see that she hadn’t changed a thing since I was here last. She preserved it for her dead youngest son just like she’d done for her dead oldest.

  Despite the suffocating air, it still feels like home, like all the memories I left behind are housed in the wood and the plaster, in the grass and the leaves and the trees outside. They were all I had left. Them and the tiny woman who lived here.

  I feel all the angst I lived with as a child. I feel all the desperation and anger. But I also feel a bone-deep sadness, a sense of loss that comes from the death of the only person on the planet I’ve ever loved.

  Like battery acid leaking out of a weakness in the casing, barely controlled fury starts to eat away at the sadness. It gnaws at my gut, burns through my insides until soon it’s a raging inferno that threatens a far worse destruction than the explosive that went off in my mother’s home.

  I fist and unfist my fingers. Fist and unfist. Like a pump, each squeeze seems to force more pressure into my chest, into the space where a primal growl, where the pained yet vengeful howl of a wolf grows. I push it down, keep it locked behind clenched teeth and tight lips, promising myself that I will make this right. That I will find the person responsible for this.

  When I walk back out to the hole that used to be the other end of the house, I realize with an unbearable anguish that my mother died with a hole something like this inside her. The explosion of my father had ripped Jeremy from her. Years later, an explosion of mercy and protectiveness had ripped me from her life. I thought I was doing what was best for her, but a monster has no control over things like that. The shadows follow a monster and no one he loves is safe. No one.

  Not even Muse.

  As I look out into the dark ring that stretches beyond the light of the fire, I see a white sliver. My guts clench. It’s a leg.

  I take off in a haphazard path through the wreckage until my foot hits solid ground then I run. It takes me seconds to reach her. It’ll take me a lifetime to forget what I find.

  My mother. Bloody, burned. Gone. One arm juts out at an unnatural angle and her dark eyes are open and staring off into nothingness. The vision of her lifeless form collides with memories of her from my childhood. Her sweet words. Her gentle soul. Too good for this world. Too good for our family.

  My eyes sting as I kneel beside her and pull her limp body into my arms. Beyond the scent of burned flesh and smoke, I smell her, my mother. The only person I’ve cared enough to leave. And even then she couldn’t escape what I’ve become. She couldn’t escape whoever is hunting our crew. She’s dead because of me.

  With a hollowness in my chest that hurts like a gunshot, I curl her toward me and I bury my nose in her hair. I inhale, drawing in one last breath of the woman who gave me life, who patched the wounds she could see and loved me for the ones she couldn’t. Part of me hoped that one day I’d be able to see her again, both of us alive. The past behind us, unable to hurt us. But that was stupid. Unrealistic. This is who I am and this is what happens to people I care about. This is what will happen to Muse if I’m with her long enough.

  As though my thoughts alone summoned her, I hear Muse’s muffled voice, yelling for me from somewhere in the distance. A pang of alarm shoots through me. Reluctantly, I return my mother to the cold ground. It kills me to think of leaving her this way, but I have no choice. Someone did this to her. And that someone is still out there. And Muse might be next.

  I turn and run back through the house, leaping over debris as I make my way toward her trembling voice. When I find Muse, she’s standing near the open f
ront door, tears streaming down her face, streaks of soot marring the cream of her cheeks.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask when I stop in front of her. Instantly on high alert, I scan the tree line at the front of the house, my eyes digging into that place between fire-bright and pitch-black, looking for the nameless, faceless enemy that always lies in wait for me.

  Muse throws her arms around my neck, smashing her body to mine, and she squeezes me until her shoulders tremble.

  “Muse, what is it? What’s wrong?”

  “Oh God, Jasper, I’m so sorry,” she wails.

  “Sorry for what?” I ask, my concern growing by the second. I’m running through scenarios again. What has she done? Who did she call? What did she see?

  She leans away long enough to look up into my eyes. The bright orange flames all around us are reflected in the glistening green pools and I think for a tenth of a second that I’d like nothing more than to lose myself in there, to just turn my back on the world and hide away with Muse somewhere. Somewhere safe.

  “Your m-mother. I’m so sorry!” Tears stream down her cheeks and her expression is one of intense agony, like it’s she who just lost a parent rather than me. Her empathy flows over me like cool, soothing water.

  “It’s okay, baby,” I tell her softly, quieting her the best that I can. “It was fast. She didn’t suffer.” She buries her face in my neck and I brush my hand over her hair, eyes trained on the darkness at her back. “Her pain is over. She’s free now. She’s finally free.”

  She’s finally free. Truly free. Free of every monster that my father created.

  The notion brings me some small bit of comfort. Muse brings me more. With her in my arms, I’m reminded that I do have something left to lose. I can grieve later if I must, but right now, I need to focus on the living, focus on getting Muse to safety before I seek my vengeance.

  “We need to go,” I whisper near her ear as I loosen her hold on me.

  She pulls her hands around to cup my face. “Are you okay, Jasper?”