Her cheeks paled. “You want the truth?”
“It would be a nice change of pace.”
She leaned back in her chair. “I found out by accident, you have to believe that. Otherwise, Harper never would have told me. He never meant for either of us to know.”
“Okay.” I could extend that much faith.
“I saw Clayton for the first time when you were young, around eleven or twelve and taken with a fever. You were inconsolable wanting your demon, so I went to find Harper.”
“I remember.” The fever had almost succeeded in killing me where Archer had failed. “I was bed-bound for a week.” I did the math in my head. “That means you were fifteen and he was sixteen.”
She nodded absently. “I discovered Harper meeting with Clayton in the courtyard. I didn’t recognize him, so I hid and eavesdropped on their conversation. They argued because Harper wanted to stay inside the Askaran royal house to gather intelligence for the Evanti resistance. Clayton tried to talk him out of it, saying there were enough informants already, but Harper wouldn’t listen.”
Dull, throbbing pain filled my head. I rubbed my temples in deep circles but got no relief. “You’re telling me Harper was a spy for the freeborn legion?”
It made a perfect kind of sense. I’d had the puzzle pieces, but they never clicked into place. That explained his flippant remark that he’d only stayed in Askara for me. He’d had a choice, a life, and a family outside of what we’d shared, but I hadn’t realized it until he’d brought me to this realm.
I hadn’t thought about the hows or whys of Harper’s relationship with the colony since I’d lost him. If someone talked about him, I walked away. If they asked about him, I didn’t answer. I had been so intent, so focused on surviving, I hadn’t looked beyond the end of my own nose.
Emma had been right. Denial was a river and I had been drowning in it.
“Yes, he was.”
“And you never told me?” I kicked her desk as hurt and anger mingled into a volatile cocktail within me. She frowned, so I kicked it again. “I could have helped. I could have done something to make a difference.”
“No, you couldn’t have. Harper risked enough for us all.” What little color she’d had left faded. “If you had been caught aiding the cause, then your punishment would have fallen to me, Maddie. Me. Not them. I couldn’t keep hurting you. Something in me died more every time I broke you. Harper knew that, and he wanted to spare us both.”
I let the horror of the past wash over me. Trying to stop the memories never worked, it only made the next time that much worse. I centered my attention on the present, on this conversation, and the answers I had to have.
“Did Harper love me at all? Was that part truth?” I had to know. “Or did he just use me to get information on my family?”
Emma’s face tightened as she tried for a smile that fell short of the mark. “He loved you very much. You have to remember he was raised alongside us before he even knew about his father or Clayton.” Her voice quieted. “You thought his wings made him an angel, but he wasn’t, not even close. You were a sister to him. He would have given his life for you, but even if things hadn’t deteriorated, he still couldn’t have taken you to mate and wouldn’t have taken you as a lover.”
There had been a time not long ago when I would have argued the point with her. I had planned a life with Harper and I thought he’d wanted the same with me.
It hadn’t been until meeting Clayton that I realized what that relationship would have lacked. Heat, desire and passion—all things Clayton brought out in me. Things I hadn’t been aware of to notice their absence between Harper and me.
I might be able to agree with Emma now, but I needed to hear her explanation since I would never know his. “But all this time you let me believe he and I would have been together here, in this new realm.”
Her mouth opened and then closed on what she would have said. “We would have told you. After lying for so long, there wasn’t an easy way out. Then he didn’t come home and I didn’t know what to do.” She stared into her hands as if they held the answers. “He was gone. And we were alone.” She wiped her down-turned cheek. When she looked up, her face was dry, but no less mottled.
I wanted to forgive her. I knew she had suffered, but so had I. “Do you know how much it would have meant to me these past few years? To know Harper had kin?”
Her runes snapped into evidence, pale purple and darkening. “Don’t play the martyr. Not with me. You would have fallen into Clayton’s arms and you know it. I couldn’t let you do that to yourself.” She pushed back in her chair. “Even Clayton deserved better. He deserved knowing you saw him and not a replacement for his brother.” Just as quickly, her own unique glamour covered the evidence of her emotions. “When I saw you two together that first night, I knew we had all made mistakes too big to take back.”
Her fingers crept across the desktop, reaching for mine. I stood and paced. Two steps forward, two steps back. I needed more room, more air.
I struggled to hold on to my waning rage. I couldn’t blame her for loving me more than anyone else ever had. My weakness had forced her into the role of protector, and she took it seriously. But I needed all the cards on the table before I could put this behind us.
“What about Clayton?” I eyed her sheepish expression. “You wanted me to think the worst of him. Why?”
Her open palms slammed against the desktop. “That arrogant bastard could have saved you. He could have made Harper stop playing hero. He could have taken you away and given you a better life somewhere far away from Askara and Archer, but he didn’t. He wouldn’t save you.” Another tear tracked down her cheek. “I begged him, but he refused to endanger the lives of his precious colonists.”
Everything was always so clear cut to Emma. She felt emotion so deeply, so absolutely, nothing else mattered when those she loved were hurting.
“Clayton was right to leave me, to leave us as we were. Harper gave his life to help his people earn the beginnings of freedom. I know it hurts, but you can’t cheapen his sacrifice by making his actions sound impetuous.” I sighed, facing another harsh truth. “You and I would have endured as well, as countless generations of Askaran females had before us. There was nothing so special about us that we should have been saved—except for the worth Harper placed on us.” I looked at her. “He was so much more than I ever realized.”
I’d had another revelation as well. “That’s why you hate Clayton so much,” I surmised, feeling the rest of my anger fall away. “He knew firsthand the risks Harper and others legionaries had undertaken. Because of that, he understood the life of one princess wasn’t worth the risk to hundreds of freed Evanti and their families.”
Emma offered six words in her defense. “You were worth it to me.”
Of course her reason would have been me. She never thought of herself. I didn’t think she knew how. I sat on the edge of her desk and reached out to her.
“You did what you thought was right. We all did.” I took her damp hand in mine. “And I couldn’t have asked for a better big sister.”
I squeezed her fingers. She squeezed back. Forgiven and forgotten.
Her brow creased. “What will you do now? I mean, about this thing between you and Clayton?”
“I don’t know. I care about him, a lot, but so much has happened so fast. I don’t know where my head is.” Or my heart, but neither of us were ready to hear that said aloud.
“He won’t pressure you to decide.” This time her voice held grudging respect.
I laughed, breaking the tension just enough for us both to smile and really mean it. “I know. He said he doesn’t want to see me until I’m…” My cheeks heated. “Well, not for two more days.”
“I think you’re making the right choice. Both of you have a lot to think about.”
Behind me, the doorknob rattled. A few sharp raps of knuckle on hollow core door ended our impromptu meeting. I turned the deadbolt and found Marci poised w
ith her fist raised to knock again.
“What do you need?” I wedged a stopper beneath the open door.
Her gaze darted across the hall towards the kitchen. She didn’t get a chance to speak before the scent of char filled the small office. I coughed and fanned my face. “What is that smell?”
“I had just finished my rounds up front when a customer commented on the stink. A couple even left before I could find the problem.” She pointed to her nose. “I would have said something sooner, but my allergies are acting up and I can’t smell a damn thing.”
“Lynn.” Emma shoved us aside, mumbling. “What is that girl up to now? Can’t turn my back for a minute…”
I followed Emma’s bouncing gait into the kitchen. Rounding the corner, we walked into a disaster. Lynn hunched over the telephone, curling the cord around her finger while ignoring the Dutch oven left bubbling too high on the stovetop. My eyes watered even from the doorway.
A resigned sigh shifted Emma from unburdened sister back into business owner. “Lynn.” The woman spun around and hung up guiltily. “You know we have a policy against making personal phone calls while on the clock.”
Lynn pointed to the phone. “Sorry, but that was Andrew. He called to tell me Clayton organized a last-minute raid. They’ve just left for Askara.”
I blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “He’s not well enough to travel.”
Lynn’s stare said she felt differently. “Andrew said it was sudden. Clayton got a tip about a pocket of slaves being held under light guard in the outlands.” She sighed, clearly unhappy to be without her male. Somehow that managed to earn points with me regardless. “He said to expect him home in two days. Three days tops.”
Emma turned down the soup and gave it a quick stir. “Thanks for the update, but that’s no excuse to neglect your duties. If you can’t get your act together, then I’ll have to let you go. This place pays all of our bills. If you burn it to the ground while making goo-goo voices to your male over the phone, then we’ll all be ruined.” She lifted the spoon to taste the stew, winced, then lifted it off the stove and poured it down the drain. Hours of work, wasted.
Lynn answered quickly, rushing to grab a rag and wipe the broth drying on the stovetop. “I’m sorry. I’ll try harder, I promise. I’m just not myself when Andrew has to leave.”
“I can sympathize.” Emma filled the blackened pot with soapy water while eyeing her now-wary employee. “But Marci’s male is in rotation too. She works part time and has two little ones underfoot as well. I don’t see her setting my kitchen on fire while cooing goodbyes to Lester.”
Lynn stared at the chipped tile floor. “I’ll start the dishes.”
“No,” Emma said. “I’ll take the dishes. You finish up with the customers we have left. Go ahead and flip the sign while you’re up there. No one else will want to smell this while they’re eating anyway.”
I watched Lynn’s slumped retreat but couldn’t muster up the energy to feel sorry for her. “What about me?”
She pointed to the chair where Clayton had sat the night before. I ran my fingers across the chrome trim and faux leather piping. The seat was gutted with cotton batting fluffing out of the seams. We’d duct taped it once before relegating the chair to the kitchen where it would spend the remainder of its days as a stepping stool.
“Are you going to sit down or pet it?” Emma asked.
I stepped away from the chair and the memory of its last occupant. “I don’t feel like sitting down. How about I finish up the dishes and you handle the close-out paperwork? Crunching those little numbers gives me a migraine.”
Elbow deep in suds, she shrugged. “Yeah, I can handle that. You always forget to carry the one anyway.”
I tossed her a tattered rag from the pile, which she used to dry herself on her way past. Alone in the kitchen, it was hard not to think about Clayton. How he’d soaked his shirt and then mine. Or how I’d slipped and he carried me from the kitchen. And those kisses…
“Hey.” Emma’s head poked around the corner. “Did you see where I put that bag of receipts?”
I glanced over and had to blink a few times before I saw her clearly. “Which ones did you lose this time, the dailies or weeklies?” I asked, wiping my cheek against my forearm.
She looked at me and laughed softly. “I guess it was already too late for warnings.” She crossed the room to wrap me in exactly the kind of hug I needed. “You love him, don’t you?”
“I don’t know,” I answered her honestly. “I just…hurt. I saw him a few hours ago, and I know he’s okay, or at least he will be, but I miss him. I didn’t want to leave him, and now that he’s gone…” I paused, “…I’m afraid. What if he doesn’t come back? What if he’s wrong? What if the only thing between us is heat and pheromones?”
She pulled back to look me in the eye. “You can what-if yourself to death, but that boy has loved you for half of your life already. I used to worry what would happen if Harper’s feelings for you ever did change. Clayton would have let you have his brother.” Her fingers tightened on me. “That’s how you should measure his devotion. Not by what he wants from you, though make no mistake—he wants it all, but what he wants for you. There’s nothing within his power he wouldn’t do to make you happy. That includes giving you up.” She scrunched up her nose. “Now I’ve invested far too many years hating his guts to go all soft on him now. Don’t think just because I’m being all nice and sisterly to you that I’ll cut him any slack.” She winked and went back to search for her missing papers.
I sank my hands in the warm, foamy water and scrubbed, allowing my head time to catch up to my heart.
Chapter Thirteen
Three days later, the diner buzzed with typical Sunday morning conversation, each layered voice droning until only the collective hum remained.
“Here you go, Mr. Lawrence.” I unloaded my tray. “Grilled cheese sandwich on wheat with tomato soup.”
“Thank you, Madelyn.” His eyes squinted behind Coke-bottle lenses. “You look lovely as always.”
“Why thank you very much.”
His spoon shook in my direction. “You could stand to put on a little weight, though. Elsa always had such a nice, round figure.” He scratched his chin. “They just don’t make women like her anymore.”
I offered him condolence. “You were a lucky man to have had her all those years.”
His head wobbled in a shaky bob. “Yes, I believe I was.” He filled his spoon, and I tucked my tray against my chest, leaving him to enjoy his meal.
Past the crowded tables, I headed for the kitchen with a pocketful of fresh orders for the cook. The back of a head full of blonde curls came into view as I stepped into the galley-style kitchen. Emma glanced over her shoulder and grinned.
“Business is booming today.” She tapped her wooden spoon in time with her words. “I can almost see my new Viking range. Only seven hundred dollars left to go and it’s industrial stove, here I come.”
“If we have a few more days like today, we’ll have that sucker paid for, crated and headed this way.” I passed over the tickets covered in my very best waitress scrawl, meaning only Emma could decipher them.
The small bell hung over the diner door tinkled. I glanced towards the hall and smoothed my hands down my shirt and apron.
“Expecting someone?”
“No.” Clayton had only come to the diner once in the last five years. So, yeah, I was crazy because my pulse kicked up and my palms got sweaty just thinking about him walking through that door.
Then the bell tinkled three more times in rapid succession. This time Emma’s face lit up. She had a standing date every Sunday with three gentlemen and it sounded as if they had arrived.
She killed the flame on the stove and shifted the large pot off the burner, then cleaned her hands on the towel hanging from her apron. I pulled my pad and pen out and followed her up front, right into an ambush.
“Emma! Emma! Emma!” Eager cherub-faced triple
ts tugged at her pants and apron.
“Well, if it isn’t the three most handsome men alive.” She fanned her face with her hand. After tweaking each button nose, she gathered them in for a tight hug, which they allowed with typical male reluctance. “It’s been too long, guys. Who said you could grow up on me?”
“Emma,” Jared sighed. “We saw you…” He turned to his brother Ben for confirmation. Ben shrugged, turning to Parker instead.
“Last Wednesday!” Parker squealed.
She slapped her forehead with the heel of her palm. “Of course. What was I thinking? How’s that leg doing today, Parker?”
“Em-ma.” Parker groaned. “You sound just like Momma.”
“Sorry,” she said. “I forget how grown you are sometimes.” Then she looked up to their mother. “Hello, Dana.”
“Good afternoon. Madelyn, we’ll take our usual, please.”
Emma ruffled the hair of the nearest boy. “Follow Miss Maddie, guys, she’ll take good care of you while I go get your order ready.”
I led the trio plus mom to a booth in the rear of the restaurant and watched the boys pile in one on top of the other, elbowing for room as they leaned across the tabletop. Dana slipped onto the bench seat opposite them.
With their drink orders filled, I returned to the table. “I’ll be right back with some crayons and coloring books.” The boy’s hands slapped the table, eagerly staking claim to their section of workspace.
At the podium, I bent down and separated three thin booklets and three packets of crayons from the second-shelf basket. The last box’s bottom fell open, spilling the colors across the floor just as the tiny bell tinkled again.
“I’ll be right with you.” I gathered the rolling crayons.
“There’s no hurry.”
Fear straightened my spine, jerking me upright. I hit my head on the podium’s overhang, but ignored the dull ache and reached into the topmost bin filled with wrapped silverware. I fumbled a dull knife free of its napkin wrapper and faced my customer.
“Jacob, I’m sure you’ll understand when I say you aren’t welcome here anymore.”
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