Possessed by An Immortal

by Sharon Ashwood

  Bree watched the two males, one tiny and vulnerable, the other anything but. Mark stood at the edge of the road, one hand on his hip, his shoulders tensed as if he wasn’t pleased with the conversation. She wouldn’t have wanted to be whoever was at the other end of the line. She couldn’t make out the words, but she heard the gruff tone of his voice.

  He turned the phone off and stalked toward her, his mouth a grim line.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  He gave a quick shake of his head and pulled open the car door. “We’re going to have to change rides farther on. There’s no place here with anything besides tractors for rent.”

  His disgust was almost comical. She buckled her son into the backseat. “Doesn’t your secret spy agency or whatever it is you work for have vehicles stashed all over the place?”

  “Yes. In Paris. Toronto. St. Petersburg. Places bigger than your average flyspeck.” He started the engine. “James Bond wasn’t forced to buy ham sandwiches at a Dodgymart in the back of beyond.”

  “And Ursula Andress didn’t have to live on ham sandwiches and animal crackers.” Bree dragged the shopping bag out of the backseat and rummaged inside. “Or cheese twirls or cola. I thought doctors were into nutrition.”

  “There’s milk and yogurt,” he said, still sounding grumpy.

  She pulled out one of the yogurts. Coffee-flavored. Jonathan would never touch it, so she peeled off the foil and found a plastic spoon. The stuff tasted like something she’d use to clean the sink, but she wasn’t going to whine. “Thank you.”

  “You’ve got to eat.”

  And she was just about out of ready cash, and that slim wad of bills was all that was left of her savings. Sure, her parents had money, but she’d learned the hard way that she couldn’t trust their staff. They’d give her away to whoever offered them the next promotion, the phone number of an agent—heck, the latest in handbags. There was no looking to home for help. The thought disappointed her, but she was used to it. She’d never really gotten help there.

  “It’s more than just feeding us,” Bree said, wanting to show her gratitude and yet afraid of ruining their tenuous alliance by saying too much. “You’re going above and beyond.”

  He gave her one of his inscrutable glances. The dark glasses hid his eyes, but not the tension of his sharply angled jaw. “I’ll be frank. I will protect you, but I’ve been in this position before. These are very, very bad men.”

  “So I’ve noticed.” He’s afraid of screwing up. No wonder he was in such a bad mood.

  “If you’re so bent on thanking me, then how about some payback. Tell me how you got into this mess.”

  She tensed, sitting up in the seat so that her back barely touched the upholstery. “Um.”

  “Surely you trust me by now?” Mark said, sounding resigned.

  Without thinking, she put her hand on his arm again. This time, though, he didn’t pull away. The car didn’t leave room for that. “These aren’t all my secrets. Some of what happened isn’t mine to share.”

  “At least tell me what you think won’t make a difference.”

  “Like what?”

  The corners of his mouth turned down as he thought. Her lips twitched, tempted to brush away that frown.

  He had kissed her, and it had been wild and hungry. The memory of it made her ache with wanting the moment all over again. The men she knew didn’t kiss like that—as if the soul of a wild mountain cat had taken the body of a man while in search of its mate. Maybe she could tame him with sweetness, and he would hold her and make her feel safe again. Yeah, right. Like that ever really happened. She wanted to believe it so badly, her chest hurt.

  “How did you meet Kyle?” he asked.

  This time, his hand reached out, tentatively brushing her knee. She could feel his fingertips through the threadbare cloth, a hint of skin on skin. For a moment, her mind went blank. “Kyle?” she repeated numbly.

  How was he relevant? But then she realized that meeting the prince was the beginning. That was when her life had started to change.

  * * *

  About six years ago, she’d first met Kyle at one of her father’s parties. Her dad had invited the world and then some, celebrating the triumph of his studio’s latest blockbuster release. Her mom was doing her international corporate lawyer thing in The Hague. At loose ends, Bree was free to amuse herself among the rich and famous.

  Kyle Alphonse Adraio, Crown Prince of Vidon, looked more like a soap opera star than he did royalty. Breathtakingly handsome, his clothes were casual, his brown hair curled past his collar and he was always ready to laugh. According to the gossip magazines, he was an avid sportsman. However, from what she’d seen so far that night, his main hobby seemed to be women.

  “Greetings, Miss Meadows,” Kyle had said in accented but otherwise perfect English. “I am very pleased to find you here. I am hoping you will spare me a moment of your time.”

  “And what would you want with me?” she’d replied. “Your Royal Highness.” Her tone had been dry as the bartender’s best martini.

  One corner of his mouth had quirked up even as his eyes roved over the silver sequins of her dress. “You do not wish me to buy you a drink?”

  “First of all, this is my dad’s party. I can have all the alcohol I can hold and then some, except I don’t drink anymore. And second, the women here aren’t on a buy-ten-get-one-free punch card. You don’t need to pick up every girl in the room.”

  His expression had gone from offended to surprised to amused. “You’ve been watching.”

  “You’re kind of an artist. In a sleazy way.”

  “Princes aren’t sleazy.”

  “Oh, c’mon.” She’d picked up her mineral water, giving him a cool glance over the rim. “Look around the room. Everyone here is sleazy. You’re just fitting in.”

  And he’d laughed. They’d spent the rest of the night laughing, and every night after that. Kyle was good, undemanding company—not at all the spoiled princeling she’d expected. Then again, he’d been at a turning point in his life, too, moving from playboy to young statesman.

  Watching him come to terms with his own future had made her think about what she was doing with her life. She’d gone through art college, earning a diploma, a few DUIs and rehab. She was going nowhere fast.

  * * *

  “What about your parents?” Mark interrupted, nearly startling her.

  “What about them?” Bree tried not to think about her folks. “They didn’t care what I did with myself. It was my friend Adam who got me into a program when I came home drunk once too often. He made me stay sober, and I kept my promise.” It was the last promise she’d ever made to him.

  “Oh?” Mark’s tone was curious.

  She could satisfy that curiosity, or she could go on with the story. She picked door number two.

  * * *

  On a whim Bree went with Kyle to New York for the February fashion week, and there they had met Jessica Lark. Bree had taken one look at Jessica’s runway collection and been smitten.

  “I want to do exactly what she’s doing,” she declared to Kyle. The tipping point had been the green silk ensemble with the harem pants and passementerie detailing. It should have been too much, but Lark had made it look so casually elegant Bree’s mouth had actually watered.

  “Don’t you have to go to school to do that?” he asked mildly.

  Her reply was instant and passionate. “I can draw. I know clothes. I can do that.”

  “Then let’s talk to her,” he said with his characteristic shrug, and took Bree’s hand to steer her through the crush of fashionistas.

  By the time they’d walked out of the venue, Kyle had talked Lark into giving Bree a job in her atelier. Royalty had its privileges. The rest, he’d said, in the nicest way possible, was up to Br
ee. That was Kyle. He was generous to a fault, yet somehow managed to make people deserve whatever he gave them.

  * * *

  “It was the happiest time of my life,” Bree finished. “I grabbed that chance and worked like a mad fool. Jessica was strict, but for once I had something to be proud of. She taught me everything, and I was good.”

  That made what came after all the harder, when all her dreams had died on the other end of the phone.

  Bree realized she was sobbing. She looked over her shoulder, afraid Jonathan would be upset, but the boy was asleep, lulled by the motion of the car. Mark pulled over to the shoulder of the road, his face as neutral as ever. She’d never cried about any of this, not until now. She’d loved Jessica, but she’d had to be strong for Jonathan. If she’d faltered, they might have died. There had never been a safe moment to grieve. There had never been anyone like Mark.

  He turned off the motor. “Bree.”

  She couldn’t look up. Memories were pounding at her, and she could only sit still and mute, praying they didn’t crush the armor she’d built around her heart. If they did, it would end her.

  She heard the rustle of clothes as he reached over, then felt his touch, sure and firm and gentle as his arms slipped around her shoulders. There was nothing tentative now, no pulling back. He drew her close, folding her against him with rough tenderness until her tears were done.

  It made a new memory of the soft, worn leather of his coat against her cheek, and the gentle stroking of his fingers in her hair.

  Chapter 10

  Worn-out from crying, Bree let her eyes drift closed and missed the name of the next place they stopped—but it had a car dealership. When she came out of her doze, Mark was making the arrangements to rent a vehicle and to park his Lexus until someone could pick it up. From the snatches of conversation she overheard, Bree was fairly sure he was using fake ID.

  Who is he, anyway? She was still reeling from her tears and the way he’d held her. He was a doctor, yes, but there was nothing of the laboratory and white coat in that moment. Nor had that been the embrace of the man with the fake ID and cabinet of guns. For a moment, she might have glimpsed something unguarded, the real Mark behind all his carefully crafted identities. She wondered if it would ever happen again.

  She let Jonathan out of his car seat for a trip to the little boy’s room. He’d been quiet for the past hour. It had been a relief. Children his age were rarely completely silent, always squirming or singing and always at play. Or healthy children were.

  Now Jonathan was listless with dark circles that stood out like bruises under his eyes. Worry clutched her with sharp talons.

  “He’s spiked a fever,” she said anxiously, pushing the boy’s dark hair away from his flushed face.

  Mark stuffed the rental papers for their next car into his pocket and crouched beside them in that eerily graceful way he had. The grim set of his face softened, though it was still serious as he felt for a pulse.

  He rose, pulling out his phone. Bree watched his face as he continued the cursory exam one-handed, waiting for someone to pick up at the other end. His expression changed when someone answered. “Are the labs back yet?” he demanded before even saying hello. Then he listened with a crease between his eyebrows. “Are you sure about that last result? Who logged that test?”

  Bree bit her thumbnail as she waited, helpless. She could feel the pressure of tears behind her eyes as she watched her son let himself be prodded and poked with the mute acceptance of the sick. He’d been doing so well ever since the plane ride, but that boost of energy had obviously faded. Jonathan blinked wearily, the plastic dinosaur clutched in one hand. With a wrench of guilt, she thought how he had been growing sicker in the backseat while she prattled on about Kyle, reliving the glorious time before she was responsible for anything but her own future. Some mother she was.

  Mark got off the phone.

  “Is there anything we can do for him? What did the tests say?” The words came out in a panicky rush. Then came more tears, silently rolling down her cheeks. She brushed them away angrily.

  “Hey.” Mark slid back into the car. “Not all the test results are back yet. I don’t want to say too much until I have all the facts.”

  “Can you say anything at all?”

  He hesitated. “There’s anemia. We can treat that, but we can’t determine the cause until we know more.”

  “That’s it? That’s all you found out?” Bree heard her voice going shrill. Frustration clawed at her.

  Mark touched her hand, his cool fingers gentle. “I have theories. They’re useless without hard data. But so far I have no reason to believe that I can’t cure Jonathan. Okay?”

  Mark’s voice was soothing, almost hypnotic. He took off the sunglasses, squinting against the bright sun. His skin looked flushed, as if the sun bothered it, but his eyes were a lovely, liquid brown, darker than chocolate. More like the near-black of pure, strong coffee and just as much a grown-up drink. Even as he looked down at her, his expression sympathetic, her body responded in a very adult way. It brought heat to her face, half of it shame. Her boy needed help. This wasn’t the time to worry about how she felt about the doctor—or spy, or whatever he was—as a man.

  But his face was so close to hers, she caught the scent of his skin. It was unique, musky and very male. She needed to move away before she forgot everything else. He reached up, brushing away her tears with his thumb. Then he leaned over, kissing the place where the wetness had been. Bree caught her breath, suddenly electrified, but the kiss was over before she could do more than gasp.

  “If you move our luggage to that car,” he said, nodding toward a bland-looking station wagon and handing her the keys, “I’ll head to the drugstore. I think I can come up with a mix of things that will help until we get where we’re going.”

  “Which is?”

  He dropped his voice. “I need to make one more phone call, then I’ll have a plan.”

  Bree nodded mutely, willing to put her fate in his hands, at least for another five minutes. They barely had any luggage, so moving it and the car seat was a short job.

  The wagon was one of the few cars on the lot with a tinted windshield. Still, it had been sitting in the sun, so she opened a window to let in some fresh air. The warmth made her want to lie down and sleep. Instead, she sat in the backseat, Jonathan stretched out with his head in her lap, and waited for Mark to return.

  She stroked Jonathan’s hair, her gaze lingering over his features. They were so familiar, and yet they changed almost daily as he made the inexorable march from child to man. She could see so much of his father there, in the chin and the set of his eyes. Jonathan stirred, his eyelids flickering in that twilight zone between sleep and waking. Bree wished she could curl herself around him, shelter him with her own blood and bone against every shadow.

  And the shadows had come thick and fast in his short life. The first years in New York had been good, when she had worked for Jessica and cared for her baby.

  Telling Mark about Kyle had opened a floodgate. She wanted to close it back up, push away those memories, but they were part of this terrible present. She would not be on the run if it hadn’t been for what happened back then. Jonathan wouldn’t be so far from help.

  The first signs of trouble came when they had started work on Princess Amelie’s trousseau. Jessica had told her people were watching the atelier. By then, Bree had changed her appearance and her name, vanishing from the public eye. She had assumed whoever was hanging around were just fashion hounds, trying to get the scoop on the design of the wedding dress. Annoying, but hardly life-and-death.

  Or so she’d thought. Like many designers, Jessica had kept a sketchbook of her ideas. When she’d started one for the wedding clothes, she’d begun locking it up every night in the safe. No big surprise there. The wedding was the media e
vent of the year. Whatever Amelie wore would set the trend for years to come, and the first company to manufacture look-alike garments would make a fortune.

  But then came the bad night.

  Bree’s mind veered away from it, not wanting to open that door again. Every time she did, it left her cold and shaky—and yet remembering held the key to what was happening now. She had to face it.

  No. Bree looked out the car window at the bright autumn sunshine. Mark was handing over the keys to the Lexus. As always, he was keeping to the shadows, a habit she’d noticed almost at once. He burned easily and said the sun gave him headaches, with a stabbing pain through the eyes.

  Someone else had said that—Jessica’s friend, Jack. He’d worn the exact same style of dark glasses that day in New York. The memory won’t leave me alone.

  Jessica had met with Jack Anderson that day. Unlike most of her meetings, the office door had been closed. When he’d left, the man had been upset, almost angry, though he had been scrupulously polite to the staff. Curious, Bree had cornered her boss before she’d had a chance to close her door again.

  Bree could still see her now, just as vibrant as the last time Bree saw her. Jessica Lark was a slim, elegant woman with a tumble of mahogany hair. She was sitting very upright, almost dwarfed by the antique desk. Behind her, the large windows of the old building filled the wall. The summer light was fading outside, the glittering marvel of the city skyline winking to life as Manhattan traffic rumbled and honked below.

  “What did he want?” Bree had asked.

  “Jack’s doing me a favor,” Jessica had said with a quick, bleak smile. “I’ve given him the wedding dress.”

  Thunderstruck, Bree had sat down in one of the office chairs. “Why?”

  Instead of answering, Jessica had pushed the design book across the desk. “Take that home with you tonight.”

  Bree had drawn a breath, about to ask why again, when Jessica’s look had stopped her.