Olivia wasn't just good, Bron decided within a minute. She was phenomenal—too good to be hiding her gift out here in the woods. He'd thought that she was exaggerating when she said that she'd once given a lesson to Joe Satriani. Now he realized that she had probably told the truth.
Yet if she was one of the best guitarists in the world, Bron wondered, what was she doing hiding up here in the mountains, in the middle of nowhere, wasting her time teaching kids? She should be working in music studios. She could be playing guest leads for major vocal talent. She could be making millions!
As he frowned at these thoughts, he glanced up into Olivia's eyes. She wasn't even watching her hands! She was staring right into Bron's face, as if daring him to ask her,
"Why?"
Yet he knew from her expression that she wouldn't answer.
She played a couple of songs, then Mike began to sing, and she accompanied. Bron suspected that they did this every night.
But on the third song, Olivia asked Bron, "Why don't you get out your guitar? I'll be happy to teach you a few tricks, maybe even a few that Joe Satriani doesn't know."
Bron ducked his head shyly. Olivia was so much better than him. It would be like a concert pianist playing chopsticks with a six year old.
"I've never played in front of other people," he apologized.
"At least you could sing with us," Olivia suggested, but Bron shook his head. His singing was even worse. A knot of alarm coiled in his stomach.
"You don't sing or play in front of others?"
He shook his head. "At my last home, I wasn't allowed to do it in the house."
"No one's that bad," Olivia said.
"Mr. Stillman worked as a trucker," Bron explained. "When he got home, he needed to sleep. Melvina, his wife, had a touch of tinnitus. She didn't want me making noise in the house."
"Music is never 'noise,'" Olivia said. "Even when it isn't played well. There's more going on here than it seems. This Melvina sounds as if she has a cruel streak."
Bron shrugged. "I've known worse."
"You're starting in a school for the performing arts on Monday," Olivia said in exasperation, "and you don't perform?"
"Not in public," Bron said.
Mike teased, "Dude, you got to grow a set on you, and fast!"
Bron fell silent, thoughtful, and got his guitar. He picked one of his favorites, Green Day's "Boulevard of Broken Dreams," and for the first time ever, he dared sing the lyrics in front of others.
It wasn't great. He wasn't used to singing and playing at the same time, and he fumbled in a couple of places. When he finished, he felt queasy.
Mike didn't say anything, simply smiled, but Olivia offered, "Good job, Bron. Tomorrow we'll start practice."
Bron fell silent, thoughtful. "Olivia, can you show me my room now?" he asked. He felt wearier than he'd imagined. It was as if he'd been running on adrenaline all day, and now he just wanted to collapse.
She and Mike took him to a large room at the back of the house. It had once been a woodshed, in the old days when the house was heated by the fireplace, but now it was insulated and boarded in. A single window with no curtains let in the starlight. The bulb, a 40-watt, hardly chased back the shadows. There was a dresser in the room, and a closet, but the whole place smelled of dust.
A back door to the house was at the far end of the room, locked with an ancient-looking deadbolt.
"We'll have to clean up in here tomorrow," Olivia apologized. "We hardly ever use the guest room. We could try opening the window to let in some fresh air, if you like?"
She went to open the window, but Mike stopped her. "Wait until we're gone, and turn out the lights first. There's no screen in that window, and the light will attract moths."
Mike said goodnight, and Bron sat on the bed for a moment. Olivia just stood, staring at him, as if she wanted to speak but didn't dare.
He felt that she was on the verge of opening up, so he asked, "What is it that you're hiding from, Olivia?" She paused in thought. "Is it just those people who chased us?" Bron suggested. "Or are you afraid of the cops, too?"
Olivia smiled sadly. "Not now. Not so close to sleep."
To his surprise, she grabbed him by the shoulders, leaned down and kissed him on the cheek. "My mother kissed me goodnight when I was young," she explained, "every single night. Even the last night that I saw her in the hospital, dying from cancer, she did it. It was comforting. I miss my goodnight kisses."
The closeness, the tenderness that she showed, had an effect on Bron. It was warm and comforting, and he wanted to try it again. She turned out the light, then went to the window and opened it a crack, and he could not help but notice how shapely she was in the starlight. She had a dancer's figure. She probably had to do a lot of dancing if she taught musical theater. He felt creepy being attracted to her.
He'd never loved any of his foster parents. He knew the danger of getting too close. He suspected that she sensed that, and so she was working to break through his barriers.
He blinked away his thoughts.
She left the room, and Bron lay wide awake. A mosquito entered through the open window and buzzed around his head. Bron didn't kill it. For some reason, mosquitoes never bit him.
He wondered if Olivia's kiss was more than a kiss. Was Olivia flirting with him? He'd heard of women like that. A teacher in Highland, a town near his old home, had just been sentenced for abusing a boy.
How old is Olivia? he wondered. Mr. Bell had said that she was in her early thirties. But she could have been in her late twenties.
No, he decided, she wasn't flirting. But there was something going on here.
There was something odd about Olivia. She looked a lot like Bron did, at least in the strange color of their skin, and the slightly off shapes of their heads. Her eyes were more hazel, where his were gray.
They looked so much alike that he could almost imagine that she was his mother. He got an odd notion: what if she'd had a child when she was young, and had abandoned it?
Mr. Bell had said that she had applied to become a foster parent three years back. Could she have just been waiting for him, hoping to reunite?
It sounded crazy, but this woman with her touchy-feely attitude, her instant bonding, her fear of... something—Bron had never met anyone like her.
He wondered about his real parents. He wondered if they ever lay awake at night like this, speculating on what had become of him.
So he lay on his bed, in utter turmoil, wonders whirling like autumn leaves caught in a dust devil, until he finally settled down to sleep.
Chapter 6
Evil Never Sleeps
"With cunning comes the prize."
— Lucius Chenzhenko
Blair Kardashian stalked into a seedy motel on Saint George Boulevard, one that advertised rates at $24.95 Per night. The sharp odor of Lysol permeated the floor tiles, covering the scent of dust and decay. An outdated television played a Spanish soap opera. No one bothered to sit at the front desk. It was too late at night. Blair punched a call button on the counter, and heard a buzz in a back room.
Sixty years ago, this would have been a decent motel. Millions of tourists passed through Saint George each year on their way to some of the bigger parks—Zion, Bryce, Arches. The hotel had been built to service such tourists.
A dull twinge struck his stomach, and Blair wondered at it. The pains had eased. Blair had purchased a stethoscope a few hours earlier. A quick check showed that his heartbeat was strong and regular. After years of running marathons, it was as strong as a teen's. So he had to ascribe these phantom pains to a pulled muscle, or perhaps a deep bruise to the sternum. He had hit the steering wheel hard when the Mercedes rolled.
The memory filled him with rage. He had a dead acolyte, and no clues. His superiors had run the plates on the Honda CRV. Someone had reported them stolen eighteen months ago.
The Ael frequently drove cars with stolen plates.
An elderly Mestizo woman came from
the back, walking carefully, as if to make sure that her considerable bulk did not accidentally knock over the office chair. "Hello?'' she asked with a thick accent.
Blair immediately launched into Spanish, which he spoke with a distinguished, Castilian accent. "I am looking for a woman and a young man. They may be visitors to the area."
He pulled out his cell phone and showed the picture that his acolyte had taken of the boy they called "Bron." The night manager squinted as she studied the image.
Blair waited for her answer.
After the crash, he had told the police that a car had scraped his in the parking lot. He'd claimed that he'd tried to exchange insurance information, but the female driver had fled. He hadn't thought to get her license number. "She sped away too quickly," he told them, "and when we tried to follow, she threw tire spikes out the window."
The police had been mortified. They would make eager allies. The caltrops were obviously home-made. This implied forethought on the part of those who threw them. The fact that Blair's vehicle had rolled, and that someone had died, elevated the charges: fleeing the scene of an accident. Battery. Homicide.
The police would have a field day.
"Such a handsome boy," the woman said in an atrocious Mexican accent. She leaned forward, resting her bulk against the counter. "What do you want him for?"
Immediately Blair sensed that she was evasive. She was the kind who helped her friends hide from the immigration police, and rented rooms to hookers by the hour.
"He threw some tire spikes out the window of a car earlier tonight," Blair said. "My son was killed."
"Oh, I heard about that on the news!" she said. She shook her head. "I haven't seen him."
Blair didn't trust her to tell the truth. He had little use for humans. They were inferior creatures. He had even less respect for this woman.
"Thank you," Blair said, reaching casually for the phone. Just as he nearly had it, he raised his hand and grasped the right hemisphere of her cranium. The sizraels on his fingers extended. His sizraels had extremely long, articulated ridges, when compared to those on others of his species. They would have looked fake, like plastic suction cups, except that they stretched out eagerly when he attacked.
With a single touch, electricity arced down his arm and shot pale blue-white faerie lights. The woman spasmed and fell forward. He gripped her, his fingers probing her greasy hair. He reached out with his other hand, grasped her firmly, and peered into her mind.
He did not fear getting caught. It was late enough that most of the humans slept. The few people cruising the strip would not be able to see into this dim office.
Her name was Imelda, a vile woman, a murderess who had crossed the border years ago to escape prosecution for killing a marijuana farmer and stealing his crop. The fruits of her theft had purchased this seedy motel, which grew more worthless by the minute.
But that did not interest him.
He looked for an image of Bron in her mind. The woman had six runaways living in one of her rooms, teens who barely scraped enough money together to pay for their rent and their drug habits, but otherwise the hotel did not harbor any teens.
Blair growled in consternation, then ripped the memories of his visit from Imelda's mind, every trace, so there would be no record. The hotel office had a security camera, but he learned by peeking into Imelda's memory that it did not work. She only used it to keep would-be robbers at bay.
He let Imelda go, and the woman sagged against the counter for a moment, then dropped to the floor with a whuff. When she woke in a few minutes, she would remember nothing, and Blair would be gone.
He went into the parking lot and got into his rental, confident that all over town, his acolytes would be doing the same. They'd scour the city tonight, checking every hotel within miles. But his gut told him that they lived in the area. The best way to find them would be to check the schools.
That would have to wait until Monday.
Chapter 7
The Laying on of Hands
"Beware of those who wish to improve you. Too often, they have their own best interests at heart."
— Bron Jones
Late that night, Olivia watched Mike go out on his "evening rounds" of the ranch. He pampered his prize cattle as if they were children. Olivia wanted a real family, but sometimes felt as if Mike already had his own "youngsters."
Mike didn't like crowds, Olivia knew. He was so large that he'd had a hard time growing up. Kids at school had made fun of him, calling him Monster Mike. Most people were afraid of him. They couldn't see his gentle nature.
Animals seemed to recognize his goodness, though.
Olivia had never seen Mike hurt a living creature. Earlier in the spring, when a pair of barn swallows had disappeared, Mike had gotten so worried about their young that he'd searched the barn and outbuildings until he found their nest, the baby birds chirping for food. He'd spent weeks nursing them to health.
But Mike's compassion didn't extend to strangers. So Olivia went out to the barn, looking for him, hoping to put him at ease about Bron.
Olivia hated that she had to lie to him so often, hide things. She was in love with the giant, but the few times when she'd tried to tell him the truth about herself, he'd grown afraid.
The barn smelled clean, of fresh alfalfa, salt licks, and only a little of steer. She crept through it quietly.
She found Mike in the corral, beneath a hanging heat lamp, scratching the head of a pregnant cow, saying good night to his animals. His Labrador retriever, Sheila, sat quietly at his side.
The banded Galloways had a thick patch of hair on their heads, several inches long, to protect them from the cold. Their scalps looked almost human.
As Mike scratched the cow, she rolled her eyes back and laid her muzzle along his arm, then stuck out her tongue, probing for a treat. Sure enough, Mike pulled a carrot from the pocket of his jeans.
"Don't take those from my garden," Olivia said. "You promised."
Mike nearly jumped out of his shoes, surprised by her voice, made doubly afraid because he knew that he'd been caught.
"Damned store-bought carrots aren't any good," Mike said. "They've got no minerals in them. Besides, you're one to complain about waste. You want to buy that kid all new clothes? You've only known him for a couple of hours!"
Olivia had dreaded this argument. "He needed the uniforms. He can't get by without them. He's a good kid."
"He's practically grown," Mike said. "It feels like you're moving another man into our house. It's not enough that you spend all of your time with those kids at school...."
Olivia drew close to Mike, wrapped an arm around his waist, and pulled him toward her. After seven years of marriage, she didn't doubt Mike's fidelity. But their love life had grown predictable, and as he realized that all the loving in the world wouldn't give him a baby, he'd lost some interest.
"I like my kids. You like your cattle. We love each other. What's so wrong with that?"
She had imagined that Mike was half-teasing, but saw an angry curl to his lip. He stared at his cow, rubbing it on the ridge between its horns.
"I always figured that when we got a kid, we'd get a younger one—one that we could raise. This kid's almost all grown...."
"On the outside, maybe," Olivia admitted, "but on the inside he still has a lot of growing to do, and a lot of healing."
"Never figured you to be one for gathering strays," he complained. Mike turned to gaze at her. The gleam from the heat lamp just behind her back reflected in his eyes. "That boy doesn't seem to have a liking for cattle. Didn't even ask about them during dinner."
"He was just surprised to see them. He's always lived in the city. Besides, we talked about them in the car, on the way here."
Mike shook his head regretfully. "Any proper kid would be jumping out of his boots at the sight of these cattle. Little kids all want to be cowboys when they grow up."
"A lot of little kids do," Olivia agreed. "But I'm sure Bron has h
is own plans."
Mike bit his lip. "You've got that right. You know what boys are like at sixteen."
She gave him a questioning look, but knew where this was going.
Mike continued, "Their minds are swimming in hormones at that age. That kid up there in the house, he's lying in bed, dreaming about you. You've got him all worked up, and don't even know it. He's probably sweating all over his sheets, hotter than a bull after a heifer. It's not his fault, of course. He won't be able to stop where his mind goes. It's just nature."
"Not all boys are that way, I'm sure," Olivia said, trying to deflect Mike's jealousy. "Give him a chance."
Mike sighed, leaned against the fence, in resignation. "If you're going to get him a car,
make sure that it's easy on the gas."
She looked up at him and raised a brow. She hadn't even had to ask. "A car?" Olivia had been wondering how to bring up the problem.
"Well, you work all those odd hours, and I can't imagine him wanting to stay at school till midnight. I can't always take the time to drive down and pick him up."
She was an actress, of course, so now she acted. "You're right," she said as if it had just dawned on her. "We will need a car.... It would have to be pretty cheap."
"And it has to be good in the snow," Mike enthused. "Make it a front-wheel drive. And it doesn't have to be cheap—which means 'broken down' or 'likely to fall apart' in my book. It needs to be a good investment. If we have to sell it in a couple of weeks, I don't want to take a beating on the price."
"Don't worry," Olivia said. "I'll find us a bargain."
Mike grimaced, went back to scratching the head of his cow. He took a deep breath. "I think I know why you like that boy."
"Why's that?"
"He kind of looks like you—same hair, same color of skin. He looks like he could be your own blood."
"He does look like he could be our kid, doesn't he?" Olivia agreed.
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