“Where is Sera?” Danbur demanded. “Where is she?”
Opal shook her head, mute, incapable of forcing a single word from her throat.
Danbur set her on her feet, gripping her upper arms. “I can sense her emotions. Yesterday was difficult to bear. But right now she is terrified.”
The cab driver rolled down his window. “Everything all right, ma’am?”
She nodded.
“Okay, then. If you’re sure.” After she nodded again he roared off down the street.
Danbur loosed a groan. “It feels as though someone is stabbing my gut with a blunt blade. He has Sera, doesn’t he? The man who raped you.”
Her expression must have said it all for Danbur wrapped her tightly in his arms. And only when she’d stopped shaking did he ease her from his embrace. “Listen to me, Opal. I can sense where Sera is—a general direction only for now. But I know from past experience that I will be able to find her. Please believe me. I would not tell you pretty tales at a time like this.”
“I… b-b-believe you.” It was a partial truth because with all her heart she wanted to believe him. Anything was better than the alternative—that Rick was even now on his way to the airport with Sera. Possession would be nine tenths the law. Rick would only need to threaten to harm Sera and Opal would be putty in his hands.
“Good. Then let us find Pieter and beg his assistance.” With one arm slung around her waist, Danbur hurried her up the path to Peter’s house, yelling for Peter as he went.
No reply. Danbur left her in the entranceway as he raced upstairs. But it was soon evident Peter wasn’t at home. They were on their own.
Danbur’s growl raised the hairs on Opal’s nape. “Damn that old man. What game is he playing this time?”
She glanced outside. And jerked with shock when she spotted the white sedan parked by the curb. Not that she’d been in any fit state to notice it before. And then it was like some large invisible hand shoved her forward, and she was running toward the car. She reached for the driver’s-side door. It was unlocked. Another impulse prodded her to check the windshield visor. A key was tucked inside the band.
She climbed into the driver’s seat and stabbed the key at the ignition. It fit. She didn’t question the weirdness. She turned the key and revved the car’s engine, and thanked God it was an automatic.
Danbur slid into the passenger side seat. “Head that way.” He pointed straight ahead.
As if sensing Opal needed an explanation of how this was going to work, he said, “The farther Sera ventures from my side, the more intense the pain in my gut. Right now it is bad—the worst I have felt—but as we close the distance, the pain will ease. I believe he has her in a moving vehicle. I feel a tug in my mind that is telling me which direction to head. So if you wish to recover your daughter before I am in too much pain to be of use to you, drive.”
And she did, all the while trying not to freak out and keep a clear head. Rick had at least an hour and a half start on them. A man and a child could travel a fair distance in that time. Especially if they boarded a train or a plane.
She couldn’t think that way. She had to trust Danbur and his strange connection to her daughter.
They’d been driving for around three quarters of an hour when Danbur shifted in his seat and let out a long sigh. “The pain has been easing for some time now. I sense they have stopped somewhere, and we are drawing closer by the minute. However Sera is still… agitated.”
Opal shot him a glance. From the set of his jaw she could substitute “scared out of her mind” or worse, “on the brink of an asthma attack”, for agitated.
“Keep heading in this direction,” he said.
She grit her teeth. She had to focus on the positives or she’d be too much of a mess to drive and end up wrecking the car. The good news was they had a chance to catch up a bit. Plus, it looked like she could stay on the interstate for the moment.
She flexed her cramped aching fingers and did some mental calculations. Danbur would surely be almost insensible from the pain if Rick and Sera had taken a train. Or, God forbid, a plane back to Dallas. But then, Rick had to figure his home town was the first place Opal would have the authorities look for Sera—which it would have been if she hadn’t had a secret weapon in Danbur.
No. They had to be traveling by car. And she couldn’t imagine Sera making life easy for Rick—not when she’d taken an instant dislike to him. Opal recalled a sign for Wilmington a few minutes back. She did some sums in her head, trying to factor in Rick’s head start. If he’d stayed on the I-95 heading south along the East Coast, he could have been headed for…. Baltimore?
Turned out her guess was correct. A few overshot roads and a bit of back-tracking later, Danbur directed her to a fancy Inner Harbor hotel within walking distance to the National Aquarium and a bunch of other touristy attractions. Rick probably envisioned bribing Sera into compliance, and hoped traipsing all over the place would wear her out and leave him free to make plans.
“Sera is somewhere in this building,” Danbur said as she pulled up to the entrance.
Thankfully, he had enough sense to wait for her to get out of the car. And he didn’t protest when she linked her arm through his and waited for the doorman to approach. He trusted her to handle this. She only hoped she could pull it off.
Please, please, please let me not stutter!
“Can I help you, ma’am?” The doorman was polite enough, but sounded wary. Obviously they looked a little rumpled. This was one of those times Opal wished she’d taken up her stylist’s offer to borrow an outfit so she looked the part.
“Jordan Cast,” she said. “And… friend.” She made goo-goo eyes at Danbur and rubbed herself against his arm before slanting a coy smile at the doorman. “I’m traveling incognito. You know how it is when you can’t sneeze for paparazzi.” Cue breathy sigh. “I’d like to leave my car here for a minute while I see if my agent has checked in.” She batted her eyelashes at him. “I’ll be back in a jiffy.”
“Certainly, Ms Cast. Just leave the keys in the ignition in case I have to move it before you get back.”
“You’re a sweetheart. Thank you so much.” So far so good.
She dragged Danbur into the lobby. Now for the tricky part. “Don’t suppose you can sense what room they’re in so we can kick down the door?”
He frowned, giving serious consideration to her question.
“Never mind. Let’s try the easy way, first.” The easy way being sashaying up to the reception desk and coaxing Rick’s room number from the star-struck young woman manning the desk. Not that much coaxing was needed. She’d only had to mention “model” and “agent” in the same sentence. Though, from the glances the young woman kept shooting at Danbur it was him she believed was the incognito model. Fine by Opal. Whatever worked.
“Mr. Windsor booked one of our specialty suites,” the young woman gushed. “He has his daughter with him. Poor little thing. She was so exhausted from the trip he had to carry her up.”
Opal’s heart clenched. Panic swirled in her veins. That didn’t sound good.
“Shall I ring him and let him know you’re on your way up, Ms Cast?”
Opal shook her head. “Oh no. I’d feel dreadful if the call woke his little girl. Best if we head on up.” She quickly turned to lead Danbur to the elevators before her composure cracked and the stress that was making her heart race brought on her stutter.
Danbur’s expression blanked for a moment as she hustled him into the elevator car. And then he said, “We must hurry.”
Opal pushed her fear aside. She couldn’t risk giving in to it. She needed a clear head. She wouldn’t be use to anyone if she panicked.
Rick had taken a suite on the third floor. Opal halted Danbur a little way from the door. Deep breath. You can do this.
“Rick doesn’t know who you are,” she said to Danbur. At least, she hoped his spies weren’t that good. “Knock and say ‘I have a complimentary gift basket for you and you
r daughter, Mr. Windsor.’ And when he opens the door, just do what comes naturally.”
Danbur eyed her. “Pummel him to within an inch of his wretched life?”
“Works for me.”
“It will be my pleasure.”
Opal was banking on Rick’s greed and inflated sense of his own importance to overcome caution. And it was a pleasure indeed, she thought, to watch Danbur grab Rick by the throat, back him into the suite and thrust him against a wall. Hard. She followed them in, shut the suite door quietly behind her and flicked the security latch.
Rick’s hands scrabbled at his throat. His face was turning a gorgeous shade of purple. Not that she cared… unless Sera wasn’t here and they needed him capable of speech.
“Where’s my daughter?” she asked, her gaze raking the large sitting room.
Bedroom. She headed for the door and peered inside. Both beds were empty.
Bathroom.
“Sera?” She burst through the door. And, when she saw the pale, still figure lying curled in the corner by the bath, she fell to her knees and crawled over to her daughter. “Sera!”
Her terrified wail brought Danbur at a run, dragging Rick behind him.
~~~
Opal had Sera cradled in her arms and was patting her cheeks, trying to wake her.
“What did you do to her?” Danbur grabbed the piece of scum by the throat again and shook him like a ragdoll.
“Wouldn’t… shut up,” Richard Windsor wheezed. “Told her… come out when… stopped crying.”
A blood-red film hazed Danbur’s vision. “And you left her there? Like that?”
“Thought… sleeping.”
“She’s unconscious, you thick-witted bastard. She’s had an asthma attack.” He released Richard so abruptly the man staggered to maintain his balance. As good an opportunity as ever. Danbur clenched his fist and punched Richard Windsor in the face.
He went down and didn’t get up. Danbur prodded him non-too-gently with his boot. Out cold. Good.
He knelt to pluck Sera from Opal’s lap, and dragged Opal gently to her feet. “I will try to revive her but you should call a Healer. Now.”
She nodded, and her stricken, tear-streaked face tore his heart. But she was fierce and brave and determined, his Opal. And she stumbled from the bathing room to use the phone.
Danbur followed her out, pulling the bathing room door shut behind him. He headed for the large couch. He sat, cradling Sera’s limp form in his lap, her head pillowed against his chest. Gods. He could barely detect the slight rise and fall of her chest.
He placed a palm against her heart and began to rock her gently. “Breathe with me, little one. In. And out. In. And out.” As he chanted, he focused on the link between them. It was tenuous now, stretched thread-thin, but he could sense her exhaustion as her body fought to take in air and circulate it through her lungs.
Danbur pictured his strength flowing down the link to Sera, bolstering her flagging energy, sustaining her until help could arrive. He’d lost all sense of time passing when there was a commotion by the door, but he didn’t take his gaze from Sera…. Until someone tried to take her from him and he lashed out, shoving the man away.
“Easy, buddy,” the man said. “We’re here to help.”
And then came the miracle. Sera stirred. “Dan?” she whispered.
“I am here, little one.”
“You… saved me. You… helped me… breathe.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t let him… take me… away again.”
“I won’t.” A lie. Because tomorrow he would be gone, and it would be up to her mother, and an old sorcerer whose goddess might not permit him to keep his vow, to protect Sera from harm. He handed the child he loved over to strangers, watched silently while they placed her on a metal stretcher, put a strange mask over her face, and did other things he could not comprehend.
The stretcher somehow elevated and it had wheels. A clever contraption. He and Opal accompanied the Healers as they wheeled Sera into the elevator and eventually out to the front of the building, where they loaded her into the rear of a large vehicle.
He heard Opal arguing with one of the men about whether Danbur could come with them in the vehicle. But it was Sera who put a stop to the argument when she called his name and started to cry.
“M-M-My daughter and… and… D-D-Danbur are v-v-very close,” Opal told the Healer. “H-H-He c-c-calms her. P-P-Please!”
The man knew when he was fighting a losing battle, especially when his little patient was wheezing and choking and crying like the end of the world was nigh. And so it was that Danbur ended up holding tight to Sera’s hand while the vehicle he soon learned was called an ambulance hurtled through the streets.
A lifetime later, Sera was much improved and sleeping peacefully, while he and Opal slouched in chairs beside her bed, watching her breathe.
So this it what it means to be a parent, Danbur thought. To love a child so much that seeing them hurting, seeing them ill and being forced to stand helplessly by, destroys a little piece of your soul.
“Opal Stewart?”
Danbur glanced up and locked gazes with a man who immediately put him on alert. The newcomer had the bearing of a warrior and the dead eyes of a man who had seen too much death and violence.
“Y-Y-Yes,” Opal said, and Danbur knew from her sudden wariness that he had cause for alarm. That this man’s presence here spelled trouble.
“I have a BOLO out for a man matching the description of your friend, here. He’s accused of assaulting one Richard Windsor.”
Opal hissed like an enraged feline. “Th-Th-That bastard! H-H-How d-d-dare he after wh-wh-what he d-d-did to m-m-my daughter.”
“Hush now.” Danbur placed a cautionary hand on her arm. “You do not want to wake the little one. Let me speak to this man outside and explain what happened.”
“B-B-But—”
“Hush. All will be well.” He leaned over to drop a hard kiss on her lips, and lingered to savor her one more time, ignoring the man clearing his throat. This would be the last time he would kiss her and, gods be damned, he would not hurry it.
When he tore his lips from hers, both of them were breathing hard. He stood, staring down at her. “Kiss Sera for me when she wakes. And tell her I love her.”
“I w-w-will.”
“You are aware that I love her as I would my own daughter, yes?”
She nodded, her beautiful green eyes sparkling with tears.
“Good. But what you may not know is that I love you, too, my Opal. Deeply. With all my heart and soul. Whatever comes to pass, please remember that.”
She blinked and two fat tears tracked down her pale cheeks. And then she nodded and for Danbur, it was enough. Her expression told him everything he needed to know.
Chapter Twenty
Opal watched the hours tick by and still Danbur didn’t return. She knew something had happened to him. Something bad, she could feel it. But she had no way of contacting him. Peter wasn’t picking up, and Opal’s mobile had run out of juice in the middle of a text message to Magda. She was in a strange city. She didn’t know another soul save for the man who’d tried to steal her daughter, and she didn’t dare leave Sera’s bedside.
The nurses seemed to understand something was up—maybe it was her blindly terrorized reaction when she’d awoken after dozing off in her chair to find a male doctor examining Sera. The fact she’d screamed at “Richard” to “get the fuck away from my daughter” probably clinched it.
Regardless of what the nursing staff thought they didn’t push for explanations. One of them—an older woman with a stern but comforting manner, whose name Opal was too tired to recall—told her they’d been fielding calls asking after “Jordan Cast’s daughter”. The nurses probably thought “Richard” was a stalker and Opal was hiding under an assumed name. If so, it wasn’t far from the truth.
The night nurse had been and gone, and Opal had dozed off in the armchair—again—whe
n Sera’s scream ripped through the dark, silent room.
“Dan! Something’s happened to Dan! Mommy! You have to help him!”
“Sssshhhh, sweetheart. It’s j-j-just a n-n-nightmare.”
Sera bolted upright in the bed, and she shook her head. “No! It’s real! He’s gone, Mommy. Dan’s gone. I can’t sense him anymore. He’s gone.” Sobs wracked her little body, and Opal did her best to reassure and comfort her, but Sera wasn’t having any of it.
Opal switched on the light, hoping it would help calm Sera down.
The light had an instant effect but not one Opal could have predicted. Sera’s eyes rolled up in her head until only the whites showed. And then she toppled backward, hitting the mattress so hard she bounced.
Oh my God. “Sera!” Opal rushed toward her daughter and—
The hospital room vanished, replaced by a misty place that seemed strangely unsubstantial, like it didn’t truly exist except as some construct of Opal’s imagination.
She spotted movement and then Sera appeared, walking toward her.
There was someone else, too. A woman so beautiful that it hurt to look at her. She had impossibly green eyes and golden hair that cascaded in a shiny ripple to her ankles. She wore two barely-there swatches of silky material—one banded across her generous breasts, the other draped across her hips. She was holding Sera’s hand, and all Opal could think was that she had to be an angel. Which meant that Sera had….
Died.
No. Noooooo! “Take me instead,” she begged. “Please. She’s only nine years old. Please, take me instead and let her live!”
“Calm yourself, child,” the woman said. “Seraphine is not dead. Her soul has temporarily left its mortal shell to walk this realm. As has yours.” Her smooth brow wrinkled. “Which surprises me. Your will is stronger than I imagined, Opal Stewart.”
“Are you okay, Sera? Talk to me!”
Sera’s smile was a gift. “I’m okay, Mommy. This is Saiytada. And she’s a goddess. But she’s got an even worse name than me ’coz hers means ‘grief’!”
Opal's Wish: Book Four of The Crystal Warriors Series Page 30
