“I thought you were going to die.” She choked back a sob.
“Not from this, I won’t.” He glanced down at his side.
She flung her arms around his neck, hugging him as she had never hugged anyone before. It wasn’t like her to be emotional with anyone other than her sister.
“Easy, girl.” He pushed her back. “I heal way slower than you do.”
“Let me see it. I can help.” Rye pushed his shirt open and stared at the ripple of his stomach muscles.
“How?” he asked, wincing from her touch too close to the wound.
“My spit.” She drew her hand back. “Have you never licked a cut?”
His brow rose. “Not on purpose.”
“You should try it sometime. Lamian saliva has the same curative properties as our blood.” She continued to wrap her mind around the fact Sevrin was like her, part human, part lamian. Was that part of the intrigue, the attraction, the riveting lust she hadn’t been able to explain?
“I’ll just let it heal the old-fashioned way—over time,” he told her.
“Have it your way.” She concealed her sudden bout of happiness behind a straight face and followed him toward the collapsed netting.
He pulled it aside.
With a groan of pain, Sevrin dragged one of the heavy metal boxes out into the open. He rummaged through the contents in an apparent hurry to find something. Clothes, weapons, things she didn’t know what to call, he tossed aside. He grumbled a few words under his breath and moved to another box.
“What are you looking for?” she asked, curious to know why he appeared so serious. Did he hide treasures in the boxes? It would explain his outrage over her bringing Levor to his lair.
“Supplies to take with me.” He held up a funny mask with some sort of a long tubular snout and hazy glass eye pieces.
“What’s that?” She moved closer.
“Filtration mask. It’s from the Great Wars, maybe after.” He held it up toward her face. “Artifacts hold up for centuries when left in the mines.”
She stepped back, not trusting the contraption.
“It won’t hurt you.” He dared her with his grin.
She let him fit it against her cheeks and forehead and chin. When the dusty smell made her cough, he pulled it off and tossed it back in the box.
“It’s probably clogged,” he said, irritably.
She understood how he might not be in the best mood, so she steered clear of questions about the other strange gadgets. “You said you were gathering supplies to take with you. Where are you going?”
“To get my damn steam-trekker back. Vehicles aren’t easy to come by, as you may well know.” He glanced away from his box to another and walked in that direction.
Impossible in the mountains, she thought. The narrow twisting paths, steep slopes and trees got in the way of even the smallest of wooden handcarts. She’d never seen anything quite like the steam-trekker, a piece of machinery larger than some mine shacks. As for other vehicles, she’d only been in three or four in her lifetime.
“Levor said he was going to Old Louis Ruins,” she commented, not letting her tone put too much importance in the fact.
“Yup, and that makes it quite convenient since I was thinking on heading up there anyway.”
Levor had mentioned scientists and the Wickstrom Group, the same as Hamner had. If Sevrin was heading that way, then she had to go with him. She hadn’t wanted to get him tangled up in her mess but everything had changed. He wasn’t human, he was capable of taking care of himself and he was aimed for the same place she was—Old Louis Ruins. That she had a growing fondness for Sevrin sweetened the idea of traveling with him.
Still, in the back of her thoughts, she couldn’t help but wonder about the Wickstrom Group. Was it a coincidence that she, Hamner, Levor and Sevrin all had Old Louis Ruins as their destination? The last thing she needed was to let her infatuation with Sevrin get her into trouble.
“What should I carry?” she asked, determined to make the journey with him.
He looked up from his kneeling position over a crate. “You are not going with me.”
“Why not? I’m headed east,” she explained in as brief a statement as possible.
“Then head east, just not with me.”
“Is it because I stole your steam-trekker?”
Sevrin got up and his expression lightened with the upward curving of his lips. Did he find her thievery amusing?
“No,” he answered. “However, you’ve yet to explain why you took it when I said I’d take you wherever you needed to go. I meant that, you know. It wasn’t something I said to…” His hesitation mid-sentence suggested he wanted to say something else. But what?
“Take advantage of me?” She filled in his sentence with her best guess.
“There was no reason for you to run off,” he said, avoiding talk of their night together.
Did he think if he didn’t mention their night of sex, she’d forget it happened? He had refused her several times, so it wasn’t as if he had been desperate.
“Sometimes I have trust issues. More so, as of late,” she confessed. “We met under a stressful circumstance for me. I didn’t know you to the point I thought you were human. I’ve not had many good interactions with that species.”
He nodded, showing he understood.
It seemed to be the right time to ask again, “So, can I travel with you…please?”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“Why not? I said I was sorry for taking your steam-trekker.”
“Actually, you didn’t say anything like that.”
“Then I’m sorry. I apologize for taking your damn vehicle. I did brink it back.”
He glanced back at her. “Only because it fit in with your plans to get rid of Levor. Here.” He tossed her a knapsack of empty flasks. “Go fill them from the rain barrel.”
She looked around and he pointed out the direction.
“And then what?” she asked, watching the mangled netting ripple in the breeze.
“We head toward Old Louis Ruins.” Sevrin opened a small case, plucked out something and stuck it in his pocket.
The open lid barred her from seeing what it was. Not that it could be too important since the object was no bigger than his palm.
She hurried away, delighted by the prospect of spending time with Sevrin. Distrust still hovered in the back of her mind, but getting to know him would surely rid her of that.
“Have you been to Old Louis Ruins before?” he asked when she returned with all the water flasks filled.
“No.”
“Never?” He gave her a look of disbelief.
She thought her father had taken her but the way her recollections mixed with the stories of him being there rather than her, she wasn’t sure it was important to say she had been there. “Maybe my father took me once when I was small. Why?”
“When Levor mentioned taking you there, you looked as if you knew the place.”
“You asked if I’ve been there, not if I’d heard about it. I can’t imagine anyone not being familiar with one of the largest ruins along the Mississippi Canyon. My father used to travel and he told us stories.”
“And the Wickstrom Group? How much do you know about them?”
“I heard mention of the company, not much more.”
“They’re more than a company. When the restructuring of the world government didn’t work eighty years ago, a group of scientists broke off on their own to find ways to rejuvenate the earth in whatever way they could develop. They were the start of the Wickstrom Group. That steam-trekker was a souvenir my grandfather kept.”
“Your grandfather worked for Wickstrom?”
“No. He was more the mechanical type. He liked machinery. However, he had friends who worked for Wickstrom. He and my grandmother introduced their one child, my mother, to a scientist friend’s son and my parents fell in love. My father said my mother was the prettiest thing he’d ever seen.”
>
Rye smiled, enjoying Sevrin’s talk about his family. She missed the days of her childhood. Both of her parents died at an early age. Her lamian mother should have outlived her half-human father if not for a strange illness. Rye always believed heartbreak had been the reason for her father’s death.
“And then they had you?” Rye asked, wanting to hear more.
“First they had my brother, Zandt,” Sevrin said with a prideful tone. “He followed in our father’s footsteps—a brilliant mind for working things out logically. He knew how to mix simple ingredients to make medicines.”
“You said your grandfather was into mechanics. Is that something that passed to your mother and you?”
Sadness washed away the happy expression from Sevrin’s face. “I don’t know a lot about her. She died when I was young but she too was a scientist,” he explained. “Some sickness my father couldn’t cure took her. I think it’s what drives my brother’s obsession with science. He left home to work for the Wickstrom Group.”
Sevrin’s mother, her mother, the two dead young females made for another heartrending tether for Rye. Along with her ingestion of Sevrin’s blood and their half-breed makeup, an ancient idea surfaced. Was it possible he was her soul mate?
Then a sudden, ominous thought pushed away her reveries.
Sevrin’s brother works for Wickstrom?
She hated that her emotions had led her astray. If the Wickstrom Group was behind her sister’s kidnapping and possibly her mother’s death, how involved would Sevrin’s brother be, or Sevrin, for that matter?
Rye tucked away her suspicions about the Renault brothers. It served no purpose to presume the worst or act upon it. She needed more information and that meant keeping things pleasant between them. At least she didn’t need to put on a show of liking him. That came with surprising ease even with her doubts about his character.
“Wait here while I go get a few things from the mineshaft and secure the trapdoor,” he said, walking off.
She glanced at the netting. The least she could do was cover up the mess she’d made of Sevrin’s toppled and crushed government storage boxes. By the time she had everything somewhat concealed, Sevrin emerged from the building wearing the long lizard-skinned coat he had used to cover her in the ditch.
“Ready?” he asked.
She nodded and followed him away from the one-shack camp.
Several times, she glanced back. Unlike the first time she left, she had more in her head than thoughts of finding Shay. Sevrin had secured a spot. It left her with the task of how to find her sister and worrying about the possibly of a mistake she was making by tagging along with a man she didn’t know. The nicest of people could still be cold-blooded killers. Insanity wasn’t a detectable characteristic until it was sometimes too late.
“What do you do with your days, Sevrin Renault?” she asked, hoping that by learning more about him, she’d quash her nagging misgivings that she should have stayed on her own.
“I hire out to those who can pay. If someone wants to get somewhere, if something requires moved or if anything needs destroyed I’m the one they look for. I find most people too demanding, so the more solitary the job, the better I like it.”
“Hmmm, a wasteland rogue, how interesting. Doesn’t sound as if there’s much future in it,” she commented.
Although the adventurous part of Sevrin’s life had more appeal than being a scavenging salvager did. She already knew that kind of life firsthand.
“Not much future for anyone the way the world is now,” he commented.
“Life is what we make of it,” she replied, remembering her home and how peacefully she and her sister had lived in the mountains.
“And what is it you do with your days, Mariah Sanborn?” Sevrin bent down and fastened the straps on his boots.
She wondered if he had put them on fast when he had found her gone. How quickly had he rushed up the ladder? She pictured him shirtless, racing out of the shack to see the tail of dust behind the steam-trekker she had stolen. He had let out a few mild swear words around her before. Did he have a wider selection saved for bigger problems?
“I certainly don’t go by the name Mariah,” she answered.
“Why not? It’s a beautiful name.”
“It was my mother’s,” she told him, as if he’d understand how even after many years, she stilled grieved for her mother.
“And you don’t want to have a reminder of your loss. I get it.” He rose, looking prepared in his gear. “But I wouldn’t be so quick to shun everything that makes you think of her. Someday those memories you have will fade to the point you’ll be sad you didn’t try harder to keep them. Do you have other family?”
“My sister. I’ve been looking for her.”
“You two part ways?”
“Something like that,” she said, not wanting to give him details when doubts loomed greater than trust.
His brother worked for the Wickstrom Group. For all she knew, Sevrin’s mercenary activities also included luring lamians into captivity. Half-breed or not, every man had a price.
“If you’ve never been to Old Louis Ruins, you must have come from far away,” he said.
“We have a wonderful place in the mountains. It’s cleaner there, year-round stream, a good-size pond, big trees, a garden and a house. Nothing big or fancy but comfortable and safe. Once a year we come down the mountain and search for supplies, like tools and clothing, in abandoned mineshafts.”
Sevrin’s gaze swept down the front of her. “Sorry I didn’t have anything less worn out for you to wear.”
She touched one of the holes in the thigh area of the pants. “I’ve had worse.” Then she let out a short laugh.
He gave her a curious smile with the tilt of his head.
“I was thinking about how you found me, ‘the worst’?” she said.
“No clothes.” He grinned and then went straight lipped as his cheeks tinted red.
She had never known a man to blush. The unusualness of it added an endearing aspect to his character. When he rubbed his hand over his face as he glanced toward the sun, she wondered if maybe he had a touch of sunburn instead of embarrassment. It seemed more likely. It wasn’t as if he was bashful in the mineshaft cavern, standing naked by a fire.
Then he looked at her again, the memories of their lovemaking evident in his eyes. Whatever deviant things she dreamed up from his behavior in the coming days, she hoped he countered them with double the number of adorable mannerisms, including his lustful gaze.
Feeling a bit warmed by his lingering stare, she kicked at the cracked earth and tipped her head back to stare at the sky. “I wish it would rain.”
“Yeah, that might help cool us down.”
Or not, she thought when Sevrin took her by the elbow and steered her toward a dead tree.
“It doesn’t offer much shade,” she said, making light conversation in case she was wrong about what he wanted to do.
“It’s not the shade we want.” They neared the tree with the semicircle of shadowed ground.
“No?” Her breath grew heavier and her insides tingled with excitement.
“It’s what lies beyond it.” He guided her around the spiny-leafed tree.
At the base of the slight slope ran a narrow creek, no more than a few paces wide.
“Water.” She gasped, hurrying to drop the knapsack and flask on the ground.
“It’s not very deep, but it’s wet.”
Rye didn’t care if it was only a puddle of wetness lapping at her feet. She wanted to wash off the dust, drink until she was bloated and soak up the coolness until her skin wrinkled. Flopping down into the stream, she discovered it came up to her waist. Quickly, she removed the red high-heeled boots.
“We’ll rest here while waiting for the sun to go down.” Sevrin discarded his coat and sat on the bank to take off his boots.
What had they walked, a quarter of the daylight? “We’ve not gone very far,” she commented.
; “We’ll do better later without the heat sucking the energy from us.” He got back up and waded into the shin-deep stream.
“This feels so good.” Rye splashed at the water. She recalled the days at home, lazing about in their little pond, dreaming of an unlikely future. Those were the days that she allowed herself to have fantasies of being loved.
“What was your childhood like, Sevrin? Did you and your brother live in the wasteland?” she asked.
“All of our lives that I can remember. However, we were born elsewhere. My father said Zandt was born in Last of York and I came along in Sylvania.”
“I’ve heard of those places. They’re on the east side of theMississippi Canyon.”
“Quite a bit farther than just on the other side.” He walked out of the water onto the bank. “My father said work brought him to the wastelands.”
“What kind of work does anyone find in the wastelands?” Rye crawled on her hands and knees from the stream. She sat and drew her knees up to rest her chin on them.
“He helped people build communities. Showed them how to built machinery with his father to make their lives easier and taught them about medicine.”
“And what about your mother?”
“She was away for long stretches of time, to work in a place to the south called Emphis.”
“How old were you then?”
“I don’t think I was any older than one or two. Zandt a couple years older.”
“So you grew up not seeing your mother much?”
“Not in the beginning. By the time I was ten or eleven, she worked in Old Louis Ruins. We didn’t live too far from there and she came home frequently.”
“The stories I’ve heard are that life is much different in Old Louis Ruins. Bigger population. Have you ever thought of living there?”
“I don’t think I’d like it,” Sevrin answered.
“Why not?”
“I enjoy being alone.” He paced near her. His feet dried quickly. Dust puffed in spurts around his steps. Then he stopped and put his hand against his midsection and held it there.
“How’s your gunshot wound?” she asked.
“Healing.”
“Can I see?”
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