Her Shadow

by Aimée Thurlo

  “His parents agree. Send him through. Two additional supports are in place.”

  Marlee watched Eric crawl and drag his way through the narrow opening in the rocks with the agility only children possessed, despite his injuries.

  It wasn’t long before she heard the happy shouts of Eric’s mother as she was reunited with her son. A tear streamed down her face. Today she’d helped make a miracle unfold. She felt filled with a wonderful sense of accomplishment and wonder, something she hadn’t felt in a very long time.

  “Okay,” Lucas’s voice came over the two-way. “It’s up to you now to clear your own path. We’ve got this side covered for you. But work slowly and carefully, and check before you start to shift things around.”

  Marlee crawled on her side, reaching ahead to find the large rocks in her way. Moving them one at a time, she inched forward. It was backbreaking work, far more difficult than she’d anticipated. She’d shredded her gloves long before she was halfway done. Finally, close to the outside, she radioed Lucas that she was moving the final big rock blocking her way.

  “We’ll be waiting. Watch yourself.”

  His voice, so filled with tenderness, gave her courage. She reached her hand around the boulder, pulling it along past her face and neck. The cold, crisp air brushed her face like a lover’s caress, and she could suddenly see a lot more light ahead. She was only inches from emerging when she heard a loud creak directly above her.

  She glanced up and saw that the support beam overhead was bending, and would snap any second. Marlee tried not to think about it. She looked up and saw Lucas ahead, right outside the entrance. One of the support beams above the opening had sagged, and Lucas was jamming a post beneath it, preventing the support from collapsing farther and closing up the mine.

  “Lucas, no!” He couldn’t let go now, or he could be crushed by the beam. He was trapped.

  As she began to move toward Lucas, Josiah’s arms clamped around her and pulled her clear of the entrance.

  Marlee struggled to get free. As they tumbled out onto the snow, the entire structure collapsed behind them. Mar-lee screamed and tried to run back, but granite arms held her, making it impossible.

  Choking back a sob, she stared at the dust that trailed upward in spiralling clouds, and the mountain of rubble that now covered the area where Lucas had stood only a few seconds ago.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Despair swept over Marlee until she couldn’t even draw breath. A bitterness as corrosive as the most potent acid left her aching, then numb and utterly without hope. Her fingers curled around the carving she had in her pocket until it cut into her palm. As a shape began to rise from the rubble, her heart suddenly began pounding and her knees almost buckled.

  Lucas stood up, coughing and shaking off dust and debris.

  Marlee ran to Lucas and threw her arms around him, kissing his dusty face and lips. “I thought I’d lost you,” she sobbed.

  “I rolled away and managed to avoid most of what came down,” Lucas managed to say, coughing from the dust. “Guess the ladies who’ve said I move fast were right.”

  “Not fast enough,” Marlee whispered in his ear.

  Lucas held her tightly against him. “My heart, watch what you say. I might misinterpret you, and think of all the trouble I’d be in then.”

  “Everyone needs to be a little reckless now and then. We’ve been too cautious.” She felt his body respond to her whispered words, but before he could answer, Josiah came up and Lucas reluctantly released her.

  “I won’t forget what you two did for my boy—for my wife and for me, too.” He shook Lucas’s hand, then looked at Marlee, taking her hand in a gentle but firm grip. “I’ve heard the rumors going around about you, and I want you to know that I’ll personally punch the lights out of anyone who dares say anything bad about you in my presence. Whatever you need, whatever we can do for either of you, all you have to do is name it.”

  Before Marlee or Lucas could answer, the sound of a siren echoed up the narrow valley. “Better late than never,” he said, smiling ruefully.

  IT WAS ANOTHER five minutes before the emergency airlift helicopter was dispatched, and another twenty before the boy was airlifted with his mother.

  They said goodbye to Josiah, and filled Gabriel in on what had happened.

  They entered the living room of Marlee’s boardinghouse and stood inches away from each other, neither one breaking the silence. Marlee’s gaze was filled with a gentleness that swept over him, stealing a piece of his heart. He felt her desire. Knowing she needed him made him ache. Soft and beautiful, Marlee stood close enough for him to feel the sweet warmth of her body.

  “We came too close today,” she managed to say in a strangled voice.

  “I kept thinking that all our efforts to protect ourselves had come down to being nothing more than a waste.” He reached for her hand and pressed a kiss to the hollow of her palm.

  She drew in her breath as he traced a tiny circle on its center with the tip of his tongue.

  The soft sound she made almost broke him. Desire clawed into him fiercely and suddenly. Tonight they’d know fires so hot that neither would ever be the same again. But he wanted all of her, not just her body. He cared too much to have it be otherwise.

  “Can you finally bring yourself to trust me completely? Will you stop holding back those secrets that keep you locked away from me even while you’re in my arms?”

  “What you ask…”

  “Shouldn’t frighten you, my heart.”

  Lucas could have made love to her, fast and mindless, but he wanted so much more than that. He was offering her his love, but he would make no attempt to seduce her into overcoming any reluctance she might harbor. It had to be her choice. Then, when he slid- into her sweet body and felt her encase him, he’d know that they were truly one.

  “Everyone has a past, but some pasts hide more ugliness than others.” Marlee stepped back, then faced him. “You want all of me, and that’s what you’ll get tonight, though you may regret it.”

  “Never,” he said in a fierce whisper.

  “Everything about you stands for life, but my past is marred by a death that should have never happened.” She dropped down onto the sofa cushions, then took a deep breath. “Before I came to Four Winds, I was a licensed midwife. I’d been attending a young mother-to-be. She was having a very difficult time with her husband, who had a tendency to be nothing short of dictatorial. I suggested she get away for a week and go someplace where she could relax, because she really needed to bring her blood pressure down. When the woman’s husband found out, he called me up, fired me, then threatened to call the police if I ever came into their home again. He said I was trying to ruin his marriage by turning his wife against him.”

  Marlee’s voice was strangled as she continued. “She was only a few weeks from delivering her baby. I told the husband right then that they’d need to make arrangements for some kind of medical care, and I even offered to make those arrangements for them. Her husband was indignant, saying he’d take care of it himself. This was to be their first child, and he seemed very excited about it, so I never dreamed he wouldn’t do as he said.”

  Marlee took several deep breaths, then continued. “She ended up having her baby at home, with the help of a neighbor who had no training. A week later, she called me. She was terrified because she couldn’t breathe. I called an ambulance for her and rushed to her home.” Marlee took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “She died of a pulmonary embolism before we could get her to the hospital.”

  “You weren’t to blame for that,” Lucas said quietly. “You had no way of knowing that the husband wouldn’t do as he said. The mother wasn’t blameless, either. She could have called you at any time and told you she needed help.”

  Marlee shook her head. “I knew this woman would never go against her husband. He was a real control freak. I just never dreamed that he’d risk her health and that of the child in that way. I only met him once,
when I first started caring for Ruthie. Yet from the way she spoke of him and their relationship, I really believed he loved her. What I didn’t realize was that there’s a big difference between love and possessiveness.”

  “What about the child?”

  “The baby survived the delivery without complications, but that young woman died needlessly. Had I been less trusting and more alert, Ruthie might still be alive. Maybe that’s why fate punished me.” She ran a finger over her scar. It didn’t hurt anymore. She kept one hand in her pocket, encircling the carving of the raven. “I had my car accident the same night she died.”

  “What happened was beyond your control. No amount of medical training will ever give you the ability to read minds.”

  “But there is something to intuition. We both know that I shouldn’t have ignored mine. I was uneasy about that situation, but because I had nothing to go on, I ignored it.” She stopped and faced him. “When I got out of the hospital after my accident, I walked away from midwifery. I traveled for a while, and made a living at whatever odd jobs I could find. Finally I ended up in Four Winds.”

  “People tell me that I’m an excellent diagnostician, and I do rely on my instincts to help my patients. But that’s a gift that only goes so far,” Lucas explained. “You can’t blame yourself for something you couldn’t have known about.”

  He made no attempt to hold her, though the need to do so drummed through him with each beat of his heart. He was certain she’d see it as a form of pity, or worse, consolation. Guilt was a powerful emotion. He knew from experience that she would have to deal with it in her own way. Yet unless he allowed her to see the darkness in his own past, she would slowly draw away from him until he lost her forever.

  “You said you see me as a man who stands for life. If by that you mean that I’ll do my best for my patients, you’re right. But if you think I haven’t made mistakes, costly ones, you’re very wrong.” Lucas stood by the window, then turned to face her. “I served during the Gulf War. I was a Navy corpsman attached to a Marine recon unit. During a mission we got turned around, and my team walked right into an unmarked mine field. It took just a few unknowing steps to decimate our unit. I had my hands full. There were badly injured men that I couldn’t get to right away without risking triggering another mine. Everyone was calling out to me for help, but I had to probe the sand with a bayonet, checking every step of the way to get to each one.”

  His body began to shake as he remembered, but he allowed her to see the way the memories still knifed at him. It was suddenly very important to him that she see him just as he was. When he made love to her, he wanted her to know that he was a man with a past, but one who would treasure all she had to give.

  “One of the Marines with me was a Navajo who was a close friend. We’d even enlisted together. He stayed right by my side, helping me get to the injured men as quickly as possible, marking each mine he found. While I was working on the last wounded Marine, he tried to mark a lane out of the mine field so we could get everyone to safe ground. He brushed a trip wire. An antipersonnel mine went off right in front of him, and he and another Marine were hit by shrapnel. He called out to me, and I got to him as quickly as I could, but by then it was a triage situation. The other Marine hit would make it if I got the bleeding stopped right away, but my friend was already too far gone to save.” Lucas turned away from Marlee for a moment, trying to get himself back under control. He didn’t want to remember. It was like pouring salt into wounds that had never truly healed.

  “You don’t have to—”

  He raised one hand. “Let me finish. I need to do this—for me—for you.” He took a long, deep breath, then continued. “My friend needed something for the pain and needed it badly, but I couldn’t seem to get the bleeding stopped on the man I knew had a chance. It seemed to take forever before I finally succeeded.” He met her gaze, letting her see him for the flawed man he was. “My friend died in agony that day. I will never forget the way he kept calling out to me, pleading, begging me to help him, and how his voice eventually grew weaker, then stopped.”

  Marlee walked over and hugged him hard. “We’re two of a kind, you and I. We care too much. Somehow we both missed the part of our training that teaches us to distance ourselves from the pain.”

  “We are two of a kind, two imperfect beings who have made mistakes. Yet in your eyes, I still see myself as the man I’ve always wanted to be.”

  “What you see reflected in my eyes is the man you are,” she murmured, burying her head against him.

  “If you understand that, then why don’t you believe how beautiful you are to me?” He bent down and touched his lips to hers, then brushed a kiss against the scar on her cheek. He heard her gasp, but this time he knew she would not pull away. “Two people who need and care for each other more than they have a right to, that’s what we are.”

  As Marlee’s lips parted, Lucas savored the taste of her. Her body flowed into his, fitting into him as if they’d been created for each other. His tongue penetrated her lips, and stroked her mouth until it was more a possession than a kiss.

  “Lucas,” she sighed.

  The way she called out his name made him reckless. He’d wanted it to be slow tonight, but he wasn’t sure things would go that way now.

  Marlee’s hair was like silk in against his palm. He buried his hands in it, wanting to memorize the feel of this woman until it became a part of him forever. Emotions turned to substance as he felt her rubbing her hips against him, cradling his hardness.

  His blood thundered; her breath seared his skin. He was aware of everything about her, but more than anything, he knew he needed more.

  “Make love to me. Make me cry out until I beg you to stop, then just keep loving me,” she whispered.

  It was pure male instinct that drove him now. He wanted her wild in his arms, aching for him to fill her.

  “I will love you—I do love you.”

  He hadn’t meant to bind her with that admission, but the words had been said, and it was too late to take them back, even if he had wanted to.

  Clothes fell to the floor around them. She was beautiful, all silk and softness. He fell to his knees before her and ravaged her with his hands and his mouth until she cried out, begging him to stop.

  “It’s just beginning. Know me. Feel me inside you. You’re a part of me, a part of my heart”

  She whimpered with desire, unable to manage anything but another passionate kiss as he lifted her into his arms and sat with her on his lap in the chair by the window.

  A sliver of moonlight streaked through the blinds, playing over her skin. As his lips closed over her breast, she arched against him.

  He lifted her up, then lowered her onto him, filling her in one smooth stroke.

  Marlee’s passion consumed him. His body was on fire. “Say it,” he growled. “Tell me you love me.” He thrust inside her, losing himself in the moist warmth of her body.

  “I do love you,” Marlee cried out in one ragged breath, then clung to his shoulders.

  He wrapped one steadying hand around her waist, loving the way she clung to him. As she gave in to that sweet weakness of surrender, his strength enfolded her, keeping her safe.

  He trembled as he looked at her, his body sheathed by hers. The hard walls that had protected him from love crumbled before the passion he saw in her eyes.

  “No more holding back,” she begged. “Take me over the edge.”

  It was too much, more than he’d expected. His tongue danced with hers, mating, as he drove into her and shudders racked his body.

  He had no time to think, no time for anything except the raw sensations that heated his blood.

  “It is as it was meant to be,” Marlee whispered, desire burning in her eyes. She pressed down against him, meeting his thrusts.

  It was the force of her passion that shattered him. He felt her muscles around the part of him that was within her, touching him, giving him more pleasure than he’d ever dreamed p
ossible.

  It was at that moment that the man who’d held himself in perfect control all his life, who’d lived his life bounded by a code of discipline, lost the final battle. He had found the love that could sustain him, and there was no turning back.

  Lucas plunged deeper, mindless, driven by the need to give himself to her as she’d done with him. It was the only gift worthy of what she’d already given him. The night flashed with lightning and fire. Then, as a blinding flash of heat seared through his veins, he shuddered and, holding her tightly, surrendered.

  As he held her through the last of the aftershocks, he realized that the only real freedom he’d ever known had come through the power of this love.

  “This should have happened in a bed filled with rose petals, not here, not like this,” he whispered in a raw voice.

  “No, this is exactly the way it was meant to be,” Marlee sighed. “No planned rituals, just our love, as strong and as wild as the wind.”

  And that was the way she made him feel. Nothing had ever touched him so deeply, and no matter what their future held, she’d remain in his heart forever.

  HIS CELLULAR PHONE RANG early the next morning, but Marlee never even stirred. Lucas had carried her to her own bed halfway through the night. Now, with regret, he walked quietly out of her room so the call wouldn’t wake her.

  A new report had come in from the lab, but the technician there had been instructed to follow up the faxed report with a phone call.

  “The water sample has shown minute traces of corn cockle. Despite the innocent-sounding name, that’s a dangerous and poisonous herb. However, there wasn’t enough of it in the water for anyone to have experienced adverse effects, and the symptoms you’ve reported aren’t consistent with a toxic reaction caused by corn cockle. You’ve reported flulike symptoms, and corn-cockle poisoning would create nausea, severe stomach distress, sharp pains in the spine and so on.”

  “Could the herb have lost its potency after it had been in the water awhile?”

  “The contamination level was so low that we don’t believe that there’s any way it’s responsible for what you’re facing there.”