Bishop,_Carly_-_The_Soul_Mate.txt

by The Soul Mate

  planting in her mind the notion that it was she who chose to end the

  possibility of that kiss.

  She swallowed and straightened. Disappointment sparked in her heart,

  then guilt. A year had passed. She missed Keller so much, craved his

  touch and his warmth and his love so badly, that she had tumbled to a

  total stranger and pretended it was Keller.

  And as if that weren't enough, no matter how disloyal and wicked she

  ought to feel, her eyes still fixed greedily on the bronzed hairs at

  Kiel's throat. She admitted to herself that she had wanted that

  kiss.

  She took a deep breath, reassuring herself that it didn't make her a

  despicable person, and that she still controlled her destiny. Whatever

  attraction she felt to this man, this... angel, she could handle. She

  look ex up at him. "What now?"

  "Let me help you, Robyn. I promise you we will get to the bottom of

  Keller's death."

  "I make the calls?"

  "So long as I'm with you," he agreed, an unruly lock of bronze hair

  falling over his brow, "you make the calls ." '

  "Good." She angled her head toward the open door and the invisible

  barrier that blocked out the weather and shut her in. "You can start

  by opening the cage door."

  Without the least outward sign that he was banishing the force field,

  he did so. When she could smell the snow and feel the cold, Robyn

  accepted the absurd. Kiel had supernatural powers.

  Devil or angel?

  She had no basis for a decision other than his word, which even with

  her deeply ingrained 'skepticism, she somehow, finally, believed.

  Kiel must be an angel.

  She could trust him. Together, they would avenge both Keller's death

  and that of Spyder Nielsen's, the man whose murder remained unsolved

  and unpunished because Keller had died before his time.

  SHE WANTED TO DO THINGS the ordinary way. No angel tricks, and she

  made that clear. He donned shoes and socks and put the small piece of

  ivory carving in his sheepskin coat pocket. His boots, the Sorels, one

  of the true trademarks of a native of the Rockies, looked broken in,

  another trademark.

  "Your ear," he said, "is on the other side of that ridge. Am you sure

  you want to hike out of here?"

  "I'm sure." The snow had stopped and the clouds parted. Sunlight

  glittered on the blanket of white snow, reducing it to drifts and

  patches where the late summer alpine flowers peeked through. Bedraggled

  as they were, the pretty blue wood asters, columbines and alpine

  gentian weren't ready to give up the ghost for winter.

  Robyn took heart from their example and went through the door. "I

  could use the exercise. Besides--" she shot Kiel a look "--you can't

  be popping up with golden steeds and mountain hideaways all the time.

  Not if you're sticking with me."

  "No more wish fulfillment?"

  "None. Mitts off my fantasies, Kiel." She glared at him. "They're

  mine, and they're secret, and they won't be fantasies anymore if you

  make them come true. I'm

  SeriOUS." '

  His look said it was her seriousness that was the problem. "You've

  heard why angels can fly, haven't you?"

  "Because they take themselves so. lightly She rolled her eyes. Every

  angel book in a decidedly flooded angel-book market contained some

  variation on the theme. "Silly me. I thought it was the wings."

  But without any wings of her own she was feeling incredibly light on

  her feet, and stronger than she had been even before the rotting mine

  shaft timbers had crushed her legs. Toting her own suitcase on

  principle, Robyn struck out in the direction Kiel had indicated.

  He caught up with her, matching his much longer stride to hers. Dressed

  in jeans and the plaid flannel shirt, he let the gorgeous shin-length

  sheepskin coat flap open. They went along for several moments in

  silence. Robyn spent the time thinking about how striking the deal

  with Kiel had changed her own plans to confront Stuart Willetts and

  Trudi Candelaria.

  After a while she also unzipped her parka--the one she hadn't packed,

  either--and put back the rabbit-fur-lined hood. The sun warmed

  everything in Colorado, melting off snowfall in a few hours everywhere

  but atop the fourteen-thousand-foot mountain peaks.

  Rugged granite dominated the landscape. She picked her way across the

  rocky ground, choosing a path over damp layers of pine needles. It was

  easy to believe in back country like this that you might never find

  your way out. She should be thanking Kiel--without him she would have

  had no idea which way to go to get back to the road. On the other

  hand, she wouldn't he where she didn't know where she was if it weren't

  for him.

  She spotted two squirrels chasing each other over a boulder jutting out

  of the ground. The bushy-tailed little guy in the lead must once have

  put up a hell of a fight--he had a raggedy ear and only one front leg.

  Kiel stopped and knelt to watch the pair of squirrels. Robyn finally

  asked herself the obvious question... why wasn't her own leg' actively

  protesting the strenuous hike?

  She gave Kiel a sideways glance. "Are you going to fix the squirrel's

  leg, too?"

  "No leg to fix." He kept watching the pair of squirrels. "I didn't

  fix your leg, either. I just speeded up the progress you would have

  made yourself."

  "Put it back. I'd rather do it myself."

  Squinting against the sun, he gave her a quizzical look. "You really

  want it back the way it was?"

  "No." She meant to say yes, but the truth popped out. How contrary

  would she have to be to wish her leg ached again? She had to clamp her

  jaw hard so her chin didn't start trembling. His question went to her

  heart, to the way she dealt with the world.

  She put her suitcase down on a rock and sat down on the one next to

  that folding her long legs up like a grasshopper and wrapping her arms

  around them. While everyone left in her life was busy encouraging her,

  telling her how well she was fighting back, coping and rehabilitating,

  she didn't much like herself anymore.

  She didn't even like her plan to march in and get in Stuart Willetts's

  face about his affair with Trudi. The whole idea lacked any hint of

  the finesse she had prided herself on in her career.

  "I didn't used to be like this," she said, resting her chin on her

  knees, watching a patch of snow melt away under the blazing sun. Kiel

  sat down beside her. "My dad was always making whatever happened that

  didn't suit him into this huge battle. There always had to be someone

  else at fault, something to be overcome, some evildoer to be defeated.

  You 'n' me against the world, kid, he'd say."

  She didn't want to be against the world--with or without her father,

  she. explained to Kiel. And she hadn't been, not since she'd figured

  it all out at the tender age of eight when Bobbie Cantwell stomped her

  100 percent spelling paper into the mud on the playground and she

  decked him and her third-grade teacher made her come back inside the

  school room
and write one hundred times on the blackboard Fighting is

  never the answer.

  But this past year she had let everything in her life be reduced to

  fighting. She had to fight to live after Keller had died, fight the

  dark inside and out, fight to recover, fight to perform the grueling

  physical therapy work, fight her stubborn heart, fight a mugger, and

  now, fight her leg being better even though doing so made no sense at

  all.

  Kiel cuffed her gently on the chin when she had spilled all that

  letting his fist come to rest on her shoulder. "Some things are worth

  fighting for, Robyn." Her name sounded like an endearment on his lips.

  "You just have to be a little more discriminating."

  "Tears prickled at her eyelids. She nodded. "I know." She blinked

  back the pooling tears.

  "This rule about angel tricks, for instance," he said, straight-faced,

  his smiling eyes goading her out of her pity party. He gestured toward

  the cabin, which still sat nestled at the low point of the valley. "I

  can't exactly leave a mountain hideaway where there isn't supposed to

  be one."

  Robyn looked askance. "You remind me of Keller's five-year-old nephew,

  Nicholas." "Me?" he croaked. "Is that so surprising?" "Well... I've

  never been a kid."

  "Well, you're just like him. One more angel trick is the same thing as

  one more cookie or one last glass of water before bed. In a pinch

  he'll even go for another kiss." She smiled. "Though Nicholas isn't

  real big on kisses anymore."

  Kiel laughed, but the sound faded in the thin mountain air. "Give him

  a few years."

  Robyn broke off the look Kiel gave her. "Do your angel thing, Kiel."

  He did the angel thing and made the mountain cabin where he had made

  love to her vanish into thin air. The human thing, kissing Nicholas

  Trueblood's auntie again, would have been a terrible mistake.

  DESPITE HER UNHAPPINFS with her plan to confront Stuart Willetts and

  Trudi Candelaria, she knew it had to be done. If nothing else, Robyn

  thought, the respectful, professional approach was to allow them both

  to state their side of the story.

  When Kiel led her back to her small coupe, the snow had melted, and the

  ease with which Kiel pushed her out of the mud made her shake her

  head.

  She pulled a U-turn and headed back down the mountain. She needed a

  shower and fresh clothes. She drove to The Chandler House, a

  bed-and-breakfast in Aspen proper, checked in to her small

  Victorian-style bedroom, showered and lay down for a while. Later,

  alone in the four-poster bed, Robyn woke and got up, enormously

  reenergized.

  Kiel had arranged a light supper to be brought in on trays. By seven

  that night, Robyn was prepared. Kiel stopped her only long enough to

  put around her neck the small ivory carving he had completed and strung

  on a fine strand of gold. Standing behind her at an elaborately framed

  mirror near the door, he showed her what it was.

  Robyn stared at the intricate pair of angel's wings, joined in the

  middle, resting against her flesh. The ivory seemed to take on the

  radiance and sheen and warmth of the strand of gold. Centered in the

  deep V-neck of her mauve mohair sweater, the tiny wings were more

  beautiful than those of a butterfly.

  "A reminder," he said.

  She swallowed; the wings seemed what?"

  "That an angel takes herself lightly."

  to move. "Of

  THE HOME OF THE MURDERED Spyder Nielsen sat on the most coveted piece

  of residential property in all of Pit-kin County, Colorado. The view,

  the sheer panorama, was unmatched anywhere in the Colorado Rockies.

  The house itself was enormous, eleven thousand square feet, Robyn knew.

  Foreign nationals, princes with fabulous wealth, had built houses in

  the area nearing fifty-thousand square feet, so this house could only

  be called pretentious in a relative way.

  As Robyn drove up the circle drive and parked near the garage, she

  thought this was the most stunning, natural use of granite and glass

  she had ever seen. The native landscaping hid the single-story house

  from the view of the road until the last possible second. Such was the

  power of very deep pockets.

  Spyder Nielsen had parlayed his ski jumping into a reputation exceeded

  only by his fortune, and Trudi Can-delaria, by escaping the conviction

  for his murder, had fallen heir to it all.

  Robyn drew a deep breath and opened her door slowly, but Kiel bolted

  from the car. Accustomed as he was to flying to the stars, traveling

  the firmament, closed-in spaces smaller than a house this size made him

  crazy. Panicked by the dark, she knew what that kind of phobia was all

  about, but she was still smiling when Kiel punched the doorbell. Angels

  with egos and phobias amused her.

  A sharp-faced middle-aged woman answered the door. "Ja?"

  This was not a surprise. Frau Kautz had returned from her holiday, but

  Robyffs curiosity rose. Elsa Kautz had been Spyder Nielsen's

  housekeeper long before he ever brought Trudi Candelaria home. Robyn

  would have expected Trudi to get rid of her, or that the woman would

  not have wanted to stay on with the woman accused of murdering Elsa's

  beloved Spyder.

  Robyn sucked in a quick breath and stepped forward. "Frau Kautz, my

  name is Robyn Delaney. This is my associate, Kiel..." She rushed on,

  not having thought to ask what he used for a last name. "We've come to

  see Ms. Trudi Candelaria, if we may, and Mr. Stuart Willetts. Are

  they--"

  "Kiel?" she interrupted, looking right through Robyn. "What kind of

  name--"

  "Ezekiel, Fran Kautz." He turned on a thousand-candle smile, glided

  forward, took the daunting woman's hand and kissed her knuckles in a

  gesture reminiscent of a European count. "Kiel Alighieri. At your

  service." In spite of herself Elsa's stern visage cracked.

  Kiel pressed his narrow advantage, "Ms. Delaney is a famous writer.

  She's considering a work on Spyder Niel It took all Robyffs mental

  resources not to go slack-jawed at Kiel's choice of a surname to use,

  or his approach. This wasn't the game plan--wasn't even close to the

  cover they had decided upon, but he was winging it blithely past a

  barrier Robyn. hadn't prepared for, deftly turning the forbidding Frau

  Kautz from a harpy at the gates into a valuable ally.

  With a few brilliantly conceived asides on how vital the old Frau would

  be to the success of the biography, Kiel had the woman leading them

  into the house, through the icy elegance of the stark and Pristine

  white living room and the superlative ambience of a dining room done in

  shades of gray and mauve.

  "Alighieri?" Robyn managed to whisper as they followed Frau Kautz.

  "Yeah," he grinned without even looking at her, talking sideways. "You

  know, Dante's surname?"

  "I know Dante," she whispered disgustedly, "I've just never seen such

  rank impudence!"

  "Me, neither," he shrugged, still grinning. "Just a lit-He spin on the

  inferno thing since I'm down--never mind. Show time."


  In the massive entertainment room where they had arrived, Trudi

  Candelaria sat curled up on a chaise longue flipping indolently through

  a recent copy of Town & Country. Dressed in gray raw silk leggings and

  a pink cashmere sweater, she had kicked off a pair of gold sandals

  Robyn had recently seen on sale in Denver for three hundred dollars.

  The room itself was enormous. Twenty-foot ceilings, three conversation

  pits, a fireplace at each end, floor-to-ceiling glass windows. A wall

  of glass, really, perfectly framing the Maroon Bells, the most famous

  and photographed mountain peaks in all of Colorado. An Enya CD played

  on a flawless acoustic system.

  Facing the double French doors into the room, Stuart Willetts sat at

  the foot of the chaise massaging Trudi Candelaria's feet.

  Robyn's anger at Willetts, at this proof that he had in truth taken up

  with Trudi Candelaria, rose like bile in her throat. She exchanged

  glances with Kiel. She felt a calming aura swathe her. She could

  almost hear Kiel's sentiment. Easy, Robyn. Frau Kautz rapped softly

  on the doorframe.

  "What is it, Elsa?" Trudi deigned to glance up from her fashion

  magazine. She seemed indifferent to visitors, and gave no hint of

  recognizing Robyn. Willetts ignored the interruption entirely 'until

  Trudi's interest sharpened when she saw Kiel.

  "A Ms. Robyn Delaney to see you, ma'am, and Mr. Kiel Alighieri. Ms.

  Delaney is a famous author interested in interviewing you for Spyder's