by Kat Mizera
Casey
Dad’s recording studio was busy that summer, and even in my grief, I found myself spending as much time there as possible. He’d had one client in January, kind of a test run, then we’d done Jayson’s band, and from that point on it had been nonstop. I’d lost track when Luke was born, but now I was anxious to get out of the penthouse and escape my own thoughts. I didn’t want to be away from Luke too long, though, and usually brought him with me. That meant I couldn’t stay as long, but spending time with him was the one thing that truly brought me joy.
Sandor came with us each day, either hanging out in the studio listening to whoever was recording or sitting up front reading. Today was quiet and I’d brought the guitar I’d officially named the Pink Dragon with me, doodling out a melody that had been on my mind. It was the first time I’d picked it up in months because it always made me cry. At some point, I had to stop crying. I’d never stop loving him, and would probably always miss him, but the tears, well, they had to stop. For my sanity, if nothing else. So I sat there with my beautiful pink guitar and kept a stranglehold on my emotions as I worked on a song that hadn’t left me alone, my son in his car seat at my feet.
I’d been thinking about this melody and these lyrics nonstop since Erik had died, because they forced their way to the surface every chance they got. They were heartbreaking, reflective of the tattered pieces of my heart, and so very personal I hadn’t let anyone hear or read them:
I close my eyes at night
Can’t wait to see you
‘Cause in my dreams
You’re still here
The stars are up above
in the velvet Sky
They’re shining there for us
For you and I
But then I awake and I’m alone
‘Cause a night can only last
For so long
For so long
My heart’s in pieces on the ground
I want to shout
But I cannot make a sound
When I lost you
I lost it all
Now there’s nowhere left to fall
Nowhere left to fall
I know I must move on
There’s so much to live for
He has your eyes- how can I forget
The stars are up above in the velvet sky
They’re shining there for us
For you and I
My heart’s in pieces on the ground
I want to shout, but can’t make a sound
When I lost you
I lost it all
Now there’s nowhere left to fall
Nowhere left to fall
Nowhere left to fall
Nowhere left to fall
Today I played the melody for the first time and the passion poured from my fingertips. I finished the lyrics in less than an hour and then went back to finish the melody. I’d written a lot of songs over the last five years, but never anything this quickly. I didn’t know where it had come from, but I was incapable of slowing down or stopping until it was finished.
“Damn, that’s beautiful.” Sandor was standing in the doorway.
I looked up, blinking in surprise. “Oh, hi. I didn’t realize you were listening.”
“I came to tell you I’m starving and we should order food, but I got so caught up in the song I couldn’t help myself from eavesdropping. I may not be a musician, but I know a hit song when I hear one. That’s something you need to release sooner rather than later. That song will become a household favorite.”
I shook my head. “Thank you, but this one is…personal. I don’t think I’m ever going to release it. Besides, I don’t have a band, so it’s kind of moot.”
“You can find a new band.”
“Chinese food is fine,” I said, changing the subject.
He took the hint and disappeared down the hall while I started to play again. Holding the Pink Dragon calmed me in ways almost nothing else could. I had half a dozen fantastic guitars, and I liked them all, but I hadn’t found the one that would be my special baby until now. How Erik had managed it I’d never know, but it gave me a strange sense of comfort knowing he’d chosen it for me. It was stunning, just like the ring I no longer wore with the same name. The guitar, however, would be with me when I felt the most alive—on stage and in the studio—which made me happier than I’d been since I lost him.
“You okay?” Dad had come in and I looked up in confusion.
“Huh?”
“Whatcha doin’?”
“Just thinking.”
“About?”
“Nothing. Everything. The meaning of life.”
He grimaced. “Don’t do that. You’ll short-circuit something. Trust me.”
“I know.”
“So, I heard from a couple of record labels. They all passed.”
“On Folklore Funk?” I couldn’t help a smirk.
He nodded.
“Have you told Jayson?”
“Yeah. He wasn’t happy, but he also wasn’t surprised.”
“Jayson is special. His voice is incredible, and he’s got a stage presence I love…a little metal, a little blues, and a lot of rock and roll. He’s got it all, but not with a mediocre, overconfident prick like Remi on guitar.”
“I know.”
“Have you told him that?”
“I was thinking maybe you could.”
“Me? Why me?”
“Because you’re Casey fucking Hart and he thinks you’re the shit.”
I made a face. “Yeah, whatever.”
“No, I mean it. I think you should fly out to New York. They have a gig in a couple of weeks. Spend some time with him and make him see that we can make him a star, if he’ll just listen to us. Hell, he can keep the bass player and drummer, but he needs magic on guitar and that’s not Remi.”
“Dad, I just had a baby and my life imploded. I don’t have the time to go to New York.” I picked up my guitar again. “But listen to this… What do you think?” I played “Nowhere Left to Fall” start to finish and looked up.
Had his eyes gotten misty? It was so unlike my dad I was momentarily confused. “Dad?”
“That’s the most beautiful, touching thing you’ve ever written. It would be a damn shame if you didn’t share it with the whole world.”
“I don’t have a band anymore, Dad.” Why did everyone make me repeat this over and over?
He shook his head. “It won’t be hard to find one, and honestly, if you played that for Nick and Jade, they’d be all in for recording it.”
I shook my head. “I can’t. It’s special. I wrote it for Erik. It’s not for anyone else’s ears… I just wanted you to hear it.”
“You’re one of the most talented musicians I’ve ever known—everything you touch is magic.”
“That’s not true, and you know it. I’m not half the guitarist you are.”
“You’re ten times the musician I am, though. Trust me on that.” He reached out and ruffled my hair, something he hadn’t done in a long time.
“Daddy?” I turned sad, confused eyes to his.
“Yeah, baby?”
“I’m so lost.”
“I know.” He reached out to hug me. “Go to New York, Casey. Lose yourself in something you know, something you can sink your teeth into. Jayson has the talent to be a superstar, just like you, and the two of you could do something incredible together.”
“I can’t…” I cut off, pulled away slightly, and paused. “I just…I’m not ready. I’m so raw on the inside I sometimes worry that I’m not really alive anymore. I need more time. I need to cuddle with my baby and write music and hide away from the world because it feels so scary out there.”
He gently pushed a strand of hair behind my ear. “Okay, honey. You take all the time you need. New York will be there when you’re ready.”
He squeezed my shoulder and left the room.
Luke was the best baby ever. I didn’t have a ton of experience with them, but my friends d
id and they all said I was lucky because he was a great sleeper and an even better eater. He almost never cried, and though I rocked him to sleep every night, I put him down without having to worry that he would wake up any time soon. He tended to sleep for twelve hours at night, from eight to eight, but he occasionally woke around five or six, looking for a bottle. Nick and I had our routine down before fall, since we would both be taking classes. I could sneak away to the studio for a few hours during the day and then he worked at the hotel most nights, though he took time to study since he was intent on getting his degree.
My mother came to visit on a sunny day in early September, carrying a shopping bag with a strange box in it. I eyed it warily as she set it down and snatched Luke from my arms.
“What’s in the box?” I asked, arching a brow.
She made a face. “I’ve had it for months now, and I wasn’t sure what to do with it, so I thought I would ask you.”
“Okay.”
She met my eyes almost guiltily. “It’s the formal engagement photos you and Erik had taken, along with the wedding party pictures.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know what to say but my heart clenched painfully. Did I want to look at those?
“If you want me to keep them for a later date, when you’re feeling stronger, I can put them away. I can also get rid of them, though Kari said she’d like to have them if you don’t want them.”
“I…” I blinked away a tear and swallowed. “No, I…I want them.” I reached out a shaky hand and lifted the box out.
“I had the photographer put them both in one album since there aren’t that many from the wedding.”
“That’s okay.” I set the box on my lap and stared at it.
“Are you sure, honey? You just got really pale.”
“I don’t want to avoid thinking about him. I need to work it out in my head so I can move on. I just don’t know if I’m prepared.”
“I can take them home and—”
“No. I need to see them.” I slowly opened the top of the box and took out the album. It was beautiful, with our names etched in gold over the photo I’d chosen as my favorite from the proofs. The photographer had made that photo into the whole cover and it was stunning. We were stunning. Dear god, we’d been so in love. Just the cover photo sent me spiraling down memory lane, my vision blurring with tears as I thought back to that day.
It had been a beautiful fall day and we’d gotten special permission to do the photo shoot at the Grand Canyon since that’s where we’d gotten engaged. It had been so much fun and the visitors there that day had a lot of fun with us too. We’d gotten strangers in our pictures as well because we were that happy, that relaxed, that convinced our love was invincible. People we didn’t know did staged photo bombs and it was hysterical. There were plenty of serious, romantic photos too, but those weren’t the ones I focused on because they hurt too much. The others made me smile, and Mom laughed out loud a few times as I turned the pages.
We’d done a few pictures using inexpensive rings we’d bought at a toy store, pretending that I’d just dropped my ring into the canyon, with me posing in an “oops” position and Erik staring over the ledge in faux shock. The photographer had done a series of shots so there were pictures of the ring slowly disappearing over the side and Mom and I giggled as we thumbed through the series.
“She did a wonderful job,” she said softly, bouncing Luke on her knee.
“She did.”
“Kari wants a copy of one to put on the mantel of the fireplace. She said just because Erik is gone doesn’t mean he should be forgotten.”
“She can have as many as she wants,” I replied automatically.
“I want to put one on my dresser,” Mom said. “Is that okay?”
“Of course. Losing him can’t possibly hurt more than it already does.”
“My sweet girl.” She hugged me with one arm. “I would do anything to ease your pain.”
“I know.” I stared down at the pages, gently running my finger over Erik’s face in my favorite photo of us from that day. The way he looked at me broke my heart and made me fall in love with him all over again. Was this ever going to get easier? Right now, I didn’t think so.
9
Erik
With physical therapy three days a week and permission from the doctor we found here in Monte Carlo to go back to my security position part-time, I had a lot less time on my hands to think and mope. Having something specific to do every day made a difference, and with my head shaved and a beard growing nicely, no one looked twice at me when I roamed around the hotel. I kept a sharp eye out for anyone I’d known well in what I called my previous life, but so far I hadn’t run into anyone like that. Not being cooped up in hiding helped my state of mind, which was good for all of us, but I owed Liz a lot and didn’t know how to thank her.
“Hey.” She came into the office she’d given me in my new role as the head of security. I didn’t know what the hell that meant, but it was almost fun pretending to be someone else.
“Hey.” I looked up.
“How’s it going?”
“Good.” I gave her a wry grin. “Seventeen background checks done, forty-two more to go.”
“You’re kicking ass.”
“I’ve never had a job before.”
She laughed. “Well, you’re a natural at this one.”
“Thanks.”
“I’m going for a walk to get some fresh air. You want to come? It might do you some good too.”
I hesitated but then nodded. “You know what? Yeah, I’d like that.” I pulled on the baseball cap I always kept close by and pocketed the ring of keys I carried everywhere.
It was the middle of the week and though the hotel was busy, it wasn’t like a Saturday night or anything, so with Joe keeping an eye on things and Daniil on limo driver duty, we headed out of the hotel and went east towards the water.
“Have you thought about the offer?” she asked as we walked.
I glanced at her. “I’m still getting my strength back. I’m not ready to think about becoming a spy.”
“This is the perfect time to think about it.”
“I’m tired, Liz. And you might say I’m in mourning too.”
“Mourning the life you should have had.”
“You have no idea how hard this is.”
“I hate lying to her,” she admitted, staring out at the road in front of us. “I’ve known her most of my life and keeping this from her is hard. I know it’s for her own good, but she called me last night and sounded so sad. I mean, she just wanted to say hello and tell me she missed me. Believe me, it felt awful, so I do understand. I’ve been in the CIA five years and I’ve never had to keep a secret like this before.”
“It’s different when it’s people you care about,” I said quietly. “It’s the same with my parents. I know it’s driving my father crazy not to tell my mother I’m alive.”
“It’s hard to live life underground, so to speak.” She glanced at me meaningfully. “But sometimes we do what we do for the greater good.”
“The greater good feels like shit,” I muttered.
“But you’re doing it.”
“I have to,” I said, meeting her gaze. “What are you getting at?”
“If you have any chance at all of getting your life back, it will be with the CIA’s help. You found out firsthand you can’t really trust anyone, and the CIA can give you a whole new identity, at least some semblance of a life until you can go back to your old one.”
“I don’t want to be a spy.”
“I know.”
“But you think I should anyway.”
“I don’t know any other way to help you.” She paused. “What did your father say?”
“He’s torn too, but he said every time he looks at Luke he knows it’s the right thing, for me to be gone.”
“Dead.”
“Fuck.” I stared off into space. “I have to think about this some more.”
“My
handler would be your handler, so you could stay here in Monte Carlo. Continue as my head of security. My family doesn’t get here very often and we’ll make sure you never cross paths when they do. He said he’d like to meet with you.”
“Is he coming to town?”
“Yes. Tomorrow.”
“So it really doesn’t matter what I say,” I said.
“Of course it does. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. But I think it will make your life easier and give you a legitimate means of slowly building up allies within Limaj.”
“I guess I’ll see what he has to say.”
As resistant as I was to this whole idea of being a spy, part of me knew Liz was right. As usual. By the time I got around to meeting the man from the CIA, I was essentially resigned to my fate. Though I had many choices, none of them were good, and this one offered me the only sliver of a chance I’d be able to go back to who I was. To Casey. To my son. It was a long shot, but it was something.
“I know this is probably overwhelming,” Dean Schmidt told me over coffee in Liz’s office. “But with a new identity, you can go anywhere, move in circles you couldn’t before. It won’t be like being a prince, I suppose, but there was a price on his head and there won’t be on yours.”
“What do you mean?” I stared at him.
“Do you think your betrayal was a random incident? When you were discovered at the safe house? King Anwar put a price on your head—literally. Every poor farmer and skilled mercenary in the country was keeping an eye out for you. A beloved prince from the royal family was never going to stay secret for long, and that’s why this is a much better idea for you.”
“And what do you get out of it?” I asked bluntly. “I’m not a spy and I’m not sure I have the skill set to be one.”
“How many languages do you speak fluently?”
“Four.”
“How many do you have rudimentary knowledge of?”
“Another four or five.”
“When your body heals, are you skilled in the martial arts?”
