by Lena North
Then he pulled me to my feet, into boots and a jacket and out through the door, before anyone had a chance to protest.
“Thank you,” I whispered as we walked through the darkness.
We’d been silent for a long time and had walked slowly toward the village. We’d gotten all the way past the cemetery and were passing the church when I finally calmed down, so I stopped, and we started to go back home.
“It was a bit silly to get mad, wasn’t it?” I asked in a small voice.
“Yeah, babe, it was,” he replied gently, but went on, “but your da was stupid too, you know.”
My mood lightened then because he was right. Hawker had been silly.
“I think I’m a lot like him, Falk. Quite a lot, actually,” I confessed.
He laughed in my face.
“No shit?” he grinned, but when he saw that it worried me, he continued, “I keep telling you, he’s the best man I know. Stupid, stubborn and hot-headed like all hell. But also strong, compassionate, brave and determined. It isn’t so bad to be like a man who’s like that, is it?”
I got up on my toes and kissed him, and that went on until I realized that he had me pressed against the wall of the small, old church.
“Mac!” I gasped. “The church…”
“Yeah,” he grinned crookedly, but stepped back and took hold of my hand. “Been inside? It’s beautiful.”
“No. Can we take a look, you think?” I asked.
He tried the handle, and the door slid open without a sound.
“I guess we can,” he murmured.
The church was small and dark with only the street lights outside providing some guidance. I was about to turn when my heart jumped.
“Mac,” I whispered.
At the far end, close to the altar, was a large shadow that I thought was the font but that wasn’t what had caught my eye. On a stone shelf in a small alcove in the wall just above, something had glimmered, and I walked up the aisle until I was right in front of it.
“What?” Mac asked in a murmur. Then his eyes followed my gaze, and he added, “Yeah, we used to use that one for baptisms, but it’s leaking so they had a new one made a long time ago. Hundreds of years ago they said in school.”
I swallowed, and then I stretched out a shivering hand to hold the joining cup from Vilda, Sannah, and Troy’s settlement.
“We have to go back,” I whispered. “This changes everything.”
Without a word he grabbed my other hand and started walking quickly down the aisle, out through the door and back up the lane toward my house.
“You’re not going to ask? We go back, just like that?” I asked, a little breathlessly because he was walking fast and his legs were longer than mine.
“The look on your face said it’s important, Wilder, so yeah. We go back just like that,” he said calmly, but I noticed with satisfaction that he was a little short of breath too.
We got into the house, and the others were seated at the table. Hawker started to get up, but I raised my hand.
“We can discuss my living situation some other time, Dad. This is important.”
Then I threw the jacket on the couch, marched up to the table, and placed the old joining cup on my kitchen table, next to the swords.
They all saw it immediately.
The cup that Vilda had brought with her from the settlement was not a cup at all. Or at least not a cup to drink from. It had been attached to a sword, to protect a hand during a fight. I was absolutely sure that it had been the cup to protect Vildman’s hand, attached to his sword. They had sent it to the small settlement with Vilda, his daughter, for safe keeping since they knew Vildman was severely injured and could die.
With its wooden handle making it into a drinking cup it would have been hidden in plain sight, just as she had been.
“Jesus,” Hawker murmured.
We now had parts from all three swords of the fire dragons, lying on my kitchen table.
Then Kit leaned forward and picked up the sword Sloane had brought from the hotel. Kee’s sword. He fiddled with it a little, and suddenly it fell apart.
“The blade is newer, and so is the handle,” he murmured. “They have added this one but just temporarily, and quite recently.”
No one said a word, and as we stared, he grabbed the sword we got out of the ocean, turning it around and inspecting it curiously. Right then he reminded me so much of how my friend Jinx looked at things she built, or took apart, that I almost laughed.
“Aha,” he murmured and knocked the blade a few times into the wooden kitchen table.
The rusty remainders of the blade and handle fell off.
Finally, he took the cup we just got out of the church and with a rueful grin toward Byrd he snapped off the old wooden handle.
Then he set the three cups next to each other.
“Wielding the hearts of swords forged in fire... Here are the hearts,” he murmured.
Then he squinted and tilted his head to the side. He stared at them, and so did we all. No one said anything.
The cups looked similar, but when I examined them, I realized that they were slightly different. They had ridges and patterns in the surface that differed, and they were not exactly the same size. I stared at them, not knowing what to do when a thought struck me. That last boring lecture I’d been to. The last engineering class I’d taken. It had been about laser technology, and the teacher had droned on and on about the various angles of light.
Slowly I moved the widest cup, the one with the blue gems, to the center. Then I picked up the one with the yellow stones and slid it on top of the blue one.
“Yeah…” I heard Kit exhale and when I reached for the last cup, he was already holding it.
With a small snapping sound, he attached it to the top.
“Get a flashlight,” he murmured.
“Explain,” Hawker demanded, and while I checked all the drawers in the kitchen for a flashlight, I heard how Kit went into an explanation about how the angles of light would possibly form a beam of light that would be amplified compared to the original sources.
“Use my phone, it has a flashlight,” Mac said suddenly.
Kit grabbed it and started shining the light over the cups in various angles.
Nothing happened.
“Shit,” someone murmured, but I didn’t listen.
I had been so sure we were right, and I wasn’t willing to give up just yet.
“Perhaps we haven’t put them together the right way,” I said and leaned forward to see if they could be adjusted.
We tried for a long time but nothing worked, and finally, we gave up.
“I hope I didn’t ruin old artifacts all for nothing,” Kit said, and there was despair in his voice.
“Of course not,” I said with more confidence than I felt. “We need better light or something. Perhaps they can be fitted together some other way…” I trailed off and then I added, “I have a friend who can help us.”
“Wilder!”
My eyes opened wide, and I straightened abruptly when my bird's anxious voice cut through my thoughts. She was louder than usual, and it sounded urgent. Then I noticed that all the others had moved too. Hawker was on his feet, and Byrd looked at her lap, but her eyes were narrowed. Miller and Kit looked each other. Mac had turned away.
“Bird,” I replied.
“People outside Double H. Right where you told us. Didn’t wait until tomorrow, we see well in darkness. Many men brought big things. Big black logs.”
I frowned, wondered what big logs they could have brought up the mountain, but then she interrupted my thoughts.
“Come home, Wilder. Come. Come.”
“All right, Bird. I’ll come,” I assured her.
Then I looked around and met my father’s eyes.
“We leave tonight, all of us,” he murmured.
“All of us, Bird. All of us are coming. We drive through the night,�
�� I assured her.
“Good, Wilder. Good. Be careful,” she said.
“You too,” I replied.
Then I turned around and found the others watching me with expressions that varied between astonished and expectant. That’s when I realized that, except for Mac, I hadn’t told any of them about my bird.
“Yeah. I’ve met my bird. I guess I forgot to tell you,” I said.
“That’s why you think Fratinelli knows about the birds,” Hawker said astutely. “Wondered about that, figured we’d talk about it, but with everything else, I saved it for later.”
“Bird showed me,” I said and explained about the conversation I’d heard, and partially seen.
While I talked, everyone moved around, packing up empty pizza boxes and putting cups and glasses in the sink.
“Stroke of luck that the window sills are deep enough to hide an eagle,” Hawker murmured thoughtfully.
Mac’s chest started shaking next to me, but I smiled sunnily at my father.
“Didn’t I tell you, Dad? My bird isn’t an eagle at all. It’s a small, black hawk.”
When his jaw dropped neither Mac nor I could hold our laughter back.
Chapter Twenty
Holy hotness
I’d called Mickey to let them know that we were on our way, so the lights were still on in the living room and kitchen when we drove up to Double H. I jumped out of Mac’s truck and as he drove off to put it in the huge garage, I walked quickly up the steps and straight into Mickey’s arms.
“Is everything okay?” I asked.
“Yeah. Stepped up security but they’ve found nothing,” he replied.
“That’s great. Meant with your dad, though,” I murmured.
“Oh. Yeah, dad’s fine. Incredibly pissed off and generously spreading his sour mood all over North County Hospital, mom tells me. But, he’s healing, and they’ll let him come home in a few more days. Mom stopped spending the nights at the hospital, so she’s at home now, sleeping.”
“Good,” I murmured and let go of him.
When I entered the living room, Jinx immediately got up from the couch, yawning and pulling at her long light brown hair which was pulled back in a high ponytail that had gone lopsided as she slept.
“Hey, Wilder,” she muttered. “Mary is in the kitchen making sandwiches. She figured you’d be hungry.”
Then she caught sight of the men who had walked in with me and started to move, looking at my father with a polite smile. Her welcome was interrupted when the kitchen door opened, and Mary pushed through it with her back toward us, balancing a huge plate in her hands.
“Wilder!” she shouted. “Welcome ho… ooly hotness.”
Her greeting ended in a drawn out whisper, and she froze, staring at the men who had lined up behind me.
I heard a few grunts that sounded mostly like covered up chuckles, and I had a hard time holding back my own laughter, but Mary was clearly in awe.
“Mary, get a grip,” Jinx growled.
“What?” Mary asked. “From salt and pepper hotness over there and all the way to Mickey… there’s suddenly a whole buffet of gorgeous in this room, in case you didn’t notice,” she whispered, but we all heard her, and I saw Hawker press his lips together when she made the reference to Miller’s partially gray hair.
“Jesus,” Jinx muttered and rolled her eyes.
“Everyone, this is Jinx and Mary,” I said. “Girls, come and meet my father and his friends,” I added.
Mary took a step toward us, but her foot snagged in the carpet, and the plate tilted to a point where the sandwiches started to slide. Mac had just walked in through the door, and he kept walking until he was at her side to steady both her and the food.
“Careful there,” he said with a smile in his voice. Then he winked at her.
She seemed stunned, and I felt a small but nasty pang of jealousy. I knew he got that reaction often, though, and I also knew that I either came to terms with it and trusted him, or what was growing between us would be worth absolutely nothing in the end.
“Yowza…” Mary breathed. Then she turned to me, “You’re right, Wilder. Pictures don’t do him justice.”
Oops.
“Babe?” Mac murmured, looking at me with one eyebrow raised quizzically. “You’re sending pictures of me around?”
I thought it looked like he was on the verge of laughing, and I could hear Mickey choking behind me but I felt stupid. Of course I’d sent a picture of him to my girlfriends, but I hadn’t exactly meant for him to know that.
“Maybe?” I said vaguely.
“Just one,” Mary said hurriedly. Her brain had apparently caught up with her mouth, and she was trying to backtrack. “Don’t worry, it didn’t show much of your face. If she hadn’t mentioned your green eyes, I wouldn’t have recognized you with your clothes on.”
Hell. Apparently, her brain was still fried. There was no other explanation, and as the men burst out in loud laughter, I tried to explain.
“Your back, Mac. Sent a picture of the tat. Not… you know.”
Not that I had any pictures of him in the buff to send, but considering that my father stood next to me, I still felt a strong need to clarify.
“We’ll talk about this later,” Hawker muttered, and I stared at him.
Why on earth would I talk to him about this?
“Of course you won’t,” Sloane said calmly as she entered the room. “If a girl has a new hot man, then it’s mandatory to send pictures to her girlfriends. Everyone does that,” she added confidently.
I smiled at her. I had no clue why she was suddenly there, but I was nevertheless grateful because she seemed to be on my side.
“Everyone?” Hawker asked, looking incredulous.
“Of co –” Sloane cut herself off, and a blush crept up her neck. She looked like she wanted to slap herself in the forehead, repeatedly.
“Sloane?” Hawker asked warningly.
“Let’s sit down,” she tried to evade, and walked toward the couches, ignoring my father. When he reached out for her, she snapped, “One, okay. And you had clothes on. Now leave it.”
Okay. Apparently, Ms. Parks was now officially my dad’s girlfriend. Or something.
“It’s three in the morning,” Miller rumbled into the silence. “Don’t know about the rest of you but I’m hungry,” he added and walked over to Mary, smiling gently at her. “Feel free to keep calling me salt and pepper hotness, little girl, but I usually go by Miller, and I would love one of those sandwiches.”
Then he took the plate and carried it over to the low table by the fireplace, sat down and promptly started eating. Miller was a few years younger than my father so even though both his long hair and killer goatee was liberally stroked with gray, he wouldn’t have been in any position to call Mary a little girl if it hadn’t been for the fact that she was tiny. At least, tiny compared to everyone else in the room.
After a stunned silence, the rest of us ambled over and sat down to eat before the plate was empty. While we ate, I made introductions, and before long everyone was talking like they’d know each other forever.
I leaned back, happy to watch them all. I wasn’t shy, not in the least, but I had always liked better to remain in the background. Hawker sat next to me, and he was also silent.
Jinx kept glancing over at us, and there was a strange look in her eyes. I cocked my head to the side in a silent question, but that made her start laughing.
“What?” I asked.
“The two of you,” she replied.
I raised both of my brows then, not understanding.
“You might not have raised her, Hawker, but when I look at the two of you… Uncanny,” she said.
Hawker snorted, and perhaps he understood what she meant, but I didn’t.
“Jinx,” I barked.
“You told us you look alike, Wilder, so I was prepared, but it’s more than that. You have the same posture, mov
e the same way. And now you sit there, like two sentinels. Watching everyone and everything around us. You even move your eyes in sync,” she said.
I turned to Hawker, but his eyes were narrowed, and they were on Jinx.
“You’re Jiminella Sweetwater,” he said suddenly.
“Jesus,” Kit whispered and straightened with his brows high on his forehead.
Jinx looked at them calmly, but there was an odd tenseness in her posture as if she was bracing for what they’d say. Then she raised a brow quizzically.
“That’s me,” she said.
“We use the RX45 and the CPQ500 in some of our systems,” Miller said.
I guessed this was something Jinx had come up with, and patented, but I had absolutely no clue what it was.
“Our boy here fixed a few problems with them, though,” Miller added and tilted his head toward his nephew.
Jinx straightened, and the look she gave Kit was scorching.
“There is nothing wrong with –”
“Hot chocolate,” Hawker interrupted.
There was a stunned silence.
“What?” I whispered when everyone else said absolutely nothing.
“It’s late. I’ll go and make hot chocolate for everyone. Then we’ll go to bed,” he declared.
I looked at Mac, but he was watching Hawker.
“I’ll help,” Miller said suddenly, and then they left.
Jinx opened and closed her mouth a couple of times. She had been geared up for a good fight and the weird order from my father that we suddenly were to have hot cocoa had thrown her off track.
“I tweaked them a little to fit our needs. There wasn’t anything wrong with them,” Kit said calmly and took a huge bite out of another sandwich.
“Right,” Jinx snapped.
She turned her head to the side, and I could tell that she wanted to ask him what he’d done. Finally, she swallowed her pride, and then they started talking about details that were so above my head they could have been a different language. I leaned in on Mac, and he put an arm around me, and while we chatted with the others, Hawker and Miller came back to distribute mugs with sweet, hot chocolate.