Second Nature (When Seconds Count)

by D. L. Roan

  “I don’t know where she is.” Daniel hung his head, turning away from the window. He paced to the large desk that dominated the room and opened a folder lying on top. “I get a postcard from her about once a week. Sometimes twice. They’re from places all over the map. Chile, Nicaragua, Spain, Australia.” He pulled out one in particular, studying it for a moment before he handed it to Grant. “They stopped about two weeks ago with this one. I haven’t tried to find her. She needs to find her own way back.”

  A painful knot formed in the back of Grant’s throat when he looked at the picture on the card. A sandy, white beach surrounded by calm turquoise water. The face of the most annoying monkey he’d ever known smiled back at him. He flipped the card over, feeling his heart beat against his chest for the first time since that day in Navi as he read the words written on the back.

  It’s not the same without you.

  “I take it you know where that was taken.”

  Grant looked up through a stream of tears and nodded, unable to hold back the smile that pulled at his lips despite them. “Uh…” He cleared his throat and wiped the back of his hand over his eyes, a little shocked when more tears took their place. “Yeah…uh, I do, actually.”

  His feet were in motion before his brain had reengaged. The sound of Daniel’s voice was the only thing that could have stopped his run for the door. “Try to bring her home in time for Christmas.”

  He turned and nodded to his friend. He wasn’t sure how things would turn out but he would do everything he could to honor his request. “I’ll do my best.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “Ouch!” Thalia stuck the tip of her finger in her mouth and sucked away the drop of blood that bubbled from the tiny wound. Who knew that palm fronds had thorns? She grabbed the next one and peeled back the dead leaves, throwing it into the pile at the end of the ramp. It wasn’t shack de Grant, but she was proud of the progress she’d made on her little hut. In only a couple of weeks she’d managed to construct a raised floor from some of the unused timber Grant had left behind. The framing for the roof was up, and she only had a few feet of open space to cover before she and Winston would have a somewhat dry place to sleep.

  She had nearly shot the damn primate when she first arrived on the beach. She wasn’t entirely sure she’d found the right island when she anchored offshore and waded up. Exploring the tree line for signs of life, she heard a rustle in the bushes behind her and turned to see him barreling toward her like a crazed ape. He’d nearly knocked her over when he jumped into her arms, a chastising tone in his cries of joy.

  He was still ridiculously annoying, but to her surprise she found herself grateful for his company. The days were long and filled with hard, tedious chores. It was good to have someone, or something, to listen to her bitch and complain about the bugs while she worked. The work it had taken to make the island habitable again really wasn’t like work. In truth, deep down, she loved it. It was a welcome break from the myriad of thoughts that continually plagued her mind.

  The nights were the worst. Even before she’d decided to go back to Grant’s island, she would lie awake in a lonely bed, staring at the ceiling of whatever hotel room she happen to land in as different times of her life replayed over and over in her mind. Astonishingly enough, it wasn’t the most recent memories that occupied her thoughts. The physical wounds Jauhar had inflicted had all healed, save an irritating ache in the fingers he’d broken. As long as it wasn’t her trigger finger, she would survive. Healing the emotional and psychological damage was still a work in process, but she had already made tremendous strides, or so the doctor in Billings had told her.

  With Rebecca Danes and the doctor’s help she had been able piece together enough information about Issa to at least begin to understand why he’d lied to her. She was astounded at how closely she resembled the daughter he’d lost. The pictures they had found of her still haunted her dreams. He’d even given her the same birthday. It explained why he doted on her and treated her so much like his own family. It was a world apart from what the other children had endured at his and Jauhar’s hands.

  Her stomach still curdled at the mere thought of the monster he really was. It was like looking into the lives of two completely different people. Issa may not have participated in any of the physical torture of the thousands of children he had transported for Jauhar, but that didn’t make him a lesser evil. As far as she knew he had never owned a sex slave, or any other slave, but technically he had still purchased her. He had still robbed her of her life. In the end he had paid dearly.

  Apparently the single lump sum he and Jauhar had agreed to at the time of Issa’s purchase of her hadn’t been enough to satisfy Jauhar. She had spent countless tedious hours combing through Issa’s hidden financials and discovered he had paid Jauhar millions for her over the years, well beyond her adolescence. It was a win-win for Jauhar. He basically got his cargo shipped for free by the time Issa paid his latest demand to keep him from retrieving his property. When Issa began to refuse payment and Jauhar’s threats became benign, Jauhar had him eliminated through his connections with the Senator, using Grant to unwittingly do his bidding.

  In the beginning it was nearly impossible to get a grasp on her feelings for Issa and what he’d done to her. How could she have feelings of love and adoration for a man who was so clearly a monster? How could she hate a monster that spent the last years of his life protecting her from a bigger monster like Jauhar? It wasn’t until her doctor pointed out that it was okay to feel both love and hatred for him that she could begin to process the other facets of her recovery.

  She still had no memory of Daniel or her life before she woke up in Issa’s house. Rebecca had suggested hypnotherapy, but her doctor didn’t seem hopeful it would help. Thalia had told her she would think about it, but it truly wasn’t an option. The more she thought about it the more she knew she didn’t really want to remember. Maybe one day. Maybe never. Definitely not now. Whatever happened to her during what she now called the missing year, the year Jauhar held her captive before Issa bought her, would remain buried with the memories of her childhood. Knowing what she knew now, there was nothing good to be found in those memories. Nothing that would help her now. Jauhar was dead, and she had killed him. She hadn’t let him defeat her. Now it was time to move on with her life.

  She had tried to do just that in Montana. Despite the appreciated efforts of everyone in Daniel’s family and their friends, there was always an emptiness inside her that would never ease. She loved Gabby and her husbands. The twins were a little much to take at times, but she still found them adorable. It certainly wasn’t Daniel’s fault. Over the weeks and months she’d spent with him she’d grown to love him, but she didn’t think he could ever fill the hole Issa had left in her heart. He and his friend Cade had been nothing but kind and understanding, never hovering or pressuring her. After months of trying, she found herself growing more restless and agitated. The panic attacks and nightmares resurfaced and were getting worse instead of better. It was difficult to explain, even to herself, but when Gabby had suggested that maybe she was feeling trapped, something clicked. It was as if she was again being forced to live a life that was not her own. She was more than welcomed there, but she didn’t belong.

  She felt like an ungrateful bitch the night she slipped a note beneath Daniel’s door and snuck out of the house on foot. She had spent the next month moving from town to town, wherever her thoughts took her. Money was of no concern. She had inherited Issa entire estate. It had dwindled toward the end of his life, but there was still enough for her to live ten lifetimes. She had thought long and hard about donating it all to a small, private foundation she discovered that fought real, on-the-ground battles against human trafficking. It was literally blood money and it felt wrong to keep it. In the end she had decided some of that blood was hers and kept enough to be able to do what she wanted with the rest of her life, donating the rest to the foundation.

  It wasn’t u
ntil she was strolling through a zoo in Spain and saw a group of Macaque monkeys perched in a clump of palm trees that she began to accept what had been nagging at her soul for months. Standing there in the atrium, the empty feeling inside her chest rapidly expanded to an endless abyss creating a physical ache that wouldn’t go away. It was her thoughts of Grant that plagued her with sleepless nights.

  He had killed Issa in cold blood. Her feelings and thoughts about that were just as jumbled as they were about Issa. How can she love a man who murdered someone else she loved? How could she hate a man who was only obeying orders to destroy the monster that had stolen her life and the lives of so many others? She knew with certainty he hadn’t betrayed her as Jauhar had manipulated her into believing. She also understood why he didn’t regret killing Issa even though he, too, had been manipulated into doing it. In the end, after all the soul searching and endless lists of impossible questions of how she could love such a man, there was only one answer. It didn’t matter how.

  She loved him. She loved him beyond any doubts or circumstances that separated them now. She loved his goofy smile, and piercing golden eyes. She loved his confidence and strength and the awkward way he looked at the world. In most ways, to Grant, the world was black or white, good or evil. Yet he walked a razor-thin line with no hesitation between the two worlds that most would call a gray area. He was a complex man and a simple man all wrapped into an enigma. Yet there was one thing in Thalia’s mind that defined him; he was the very essence of truth.

  No matter how wicked or outrageous the truth was, he faced it head on. He wouldn’t lie to her or betray her like so many others had. He would never placate her with false promises and pretty words. If there was one thing she deserved in her life, it was the truth, even from herself. And the truth was she loved him.

  There was no way to know if he still loved her. Her clouded memories of his confession of love that night in Navi afforded her little certainty. There were so many things that had been left unsaid. Lying awake at night she would list all the things she wanted to tell him. Imagine all the things he would say to her. In truth, none of them would matter if she had him in her arms. That was all she truly needed. She had to face the probability she may never know for certain how he felt.

  She knew better than to search for him. A few months after Navi, Daniel had told her Don Lalia had been found floating dead in a pool at his beach house in Spain. There was no doubt in her mind Grant had killed him. Looking back now, knowing he’d been there was what had drawn her to Spain in the first place. She had learned through Rebecca he had officially retired, but only a select few within the intelligence community knew where he was now. Much to her dismay, Rebecca Danes was no longer one of those people.

  She had been suspended from the bureau for a month after the investigation had concluded she acted recklessly by disobeying direct orders and endangered the lives of both a civilian, Daniel, and two others on Keller’s team. Once her suspension was over, her request to remain at the bureau headquarters in D.C. was granted, but she had been transferred to another division. Thalia was relieved Rebecca hadn’t lost her job because of her, but it made getting information about Grant next to impossible since she was apparently no longer on speaking terms with Deputy Director Keller. Her only hope was that Grant would one day decide to come back to the island on his own, or that Daniel would do as she requested if he ever called or visited and show him the postcard. There was nothing left to do but wait.

  “Shit!” A bubble of red oozed from yet another puncture wound to her poor tortured fingers. Wiping her arm across her forehead, she tossed the frond into the done pile and kicked off her sandals. “Let’s go for a swim, Winston.” It was the cool season in that part of the world and the water was a bit chilly. Still, a nice cold dunk would wake her up and give her just enough energy to put the final fronds in place before the sun set.

  Memories of Grant had plagued her thoughts throughout the rest of the day. The sun had set. Dinner had been prepared and consumed. Winston had settled into his little hammock she’d hung between the corner posts of the hut. And still no sign of Grant. One more day. It’s what she told herself each night before closing her eyes to go to sleep. One more day and he’d come.

  One more day turned into three and still she carried on without him. This last day had been particularly grueling. Where normally her work distracted her from her thoughts of Grant, today’s task had brought back a tide of memories she could not ignore. Today she had cleared away the charred remains of Grant’s old cabin. She salvaged what she could and set the rest adrift, but at every turn she would see him; standing in the doorway, his eagle eyes cutting to the core of her very soul as he sized her up. Sitting on that dreadful cot, assessing her injuries with that annoying sarcasm he wore so well. Laughing at her frantic reactions to Winston the first time she’d seen him. Feeding her the soup he’d made for her. Brooding over her lack of enthusiasm for his freshman efforts at being nice. Grumbling incessantly at poor Winston.

  She remembered every moment she’d spent there with him, some of them not so good, but all of them things she never wanted to forget. She’d laughed and even cried, the task itself having an unexpected cleansing effect on her soul. At the end of the day she was completely exhausted. Her eyes were closed before her head hit the pillow. It was the first time she’d fallen to sleep without the spoken promise of one more day.

  ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

  The first golden rays of the sun were only beginning to peek through the thick trees. Sweet scents of night jasmine and dianthus still lingered in the air. The birds had started singing nearly an hour before and Winston had long since left for his morning forage, completely oblivious to Grant’s presence. For once he had to hand it to the guy. He’d scampered off without waking Thalia, allowing him time to watch her sleep. There is a God.

  She couldn’t have been more breathtaking. Literally, his chest heaved with the effort it took to breathe as he absorbed the sight of her for what felt like the first time. The thin, cotton t-shirt she wore hid little. Her slender arms were stretched out above her head showcasing her lush breasts beneath it. He could almost feel the fabric graze his tongue as he imagined himself hovering above her, sucking her ripe nipple deep into his mouth through the material. His cock swelled in his shorts. His hand, twitching to feel her smooth skin against his palm, moved to ease the ache in his groin instead.

  His hand froze, his body going completely still when she shifted in her sleep, her legs tangling in the simple white sheet, dragging it further down her perfectly toned form. Her legs. Christ, she had the sexiest legs. His favorite spot was showing, peeking just above the hem of the sheet. That supple, tender crease at the top of her hip. His mouth watered at the memory of the purred little moan she made when he’d trace that spot with his tongue. That sound had haunted his dreams for the last six months. He couldn’t wait to hear it again, but first they had to talk.

  There were too many things left unresolved between them. First and foremost, he wanted her to know he loved her, and that she had a choice. He loved her enough to walk away if that’s what she wanted. After coming this far it would kill him, but he would leave. He was prepared to give her anything she wanted, any answer to every question, no matter what it cost him or how long it took. Whatever it took.

  In a single silent step, he hopped from his perch in the trees to the raised platform she had constructed. He had been more than impressed when he’d first snuck onto the beach, the more than ample moonlight and still-glowing embers from her fire showing him the way to her little hut. He had debated waking her, but the moment he saw her peaceful form curled up on the thick mattress she’d made, he’d been too mesmerized to disturb her.

  Slowly he sank to his knees and relaxed into the mattress beside her, gently pulling up the sheet to cover her exposed skin. The morning air had a bit of a nip, but he wasn’t bullshitting himself. It was going to be hard as hell as it was to keep his hands to himself whil
e they talked things out. He didn’t need any more distraction than he already had.

  “Grant?”

  A tight knot formed in his chest when he glanced up to see her sleepy, silver eyes staring back at him through her long black-as-coal eyelashes. Christ, she was beautiful. A sudden moment of panic blindsided his thoughts, sending him into a complete tailspin. He shouldn’t be here. He was never going to earn her trust and love. How could he? He was just as big a monster as those who had tried to destroy her. He couldn’t fool himself. No matter where he went or what identity he wore, he would never be more than a killer. Even though he’d retired, that part of him still existed. Still lurked just under the surface. How could he expect her to love that? He had no right to even ask it of her.

  “Please tell me I’m not dreaming.” A firestorm of need and hope burned through his veins when her fingers grazed his jaw, that simple touch like no dream he’d ever had. Against his will his eyes closed, his lungs pumping hard to supply enough oxygen to feed the demands of his racing heart. He swallowed against the growing knot in his throat, nearly choking on all the things he’d wanted to say, but could no longer find the words to say them.

  When the soft silk of her lips touched his, the tight-fisted grip he’d thought he had on his control slipped away, sending him over some invisible cliff. Her mouth opened on a sigh, her desperate breaths mingling with his as his tongue stroked deep inside, her familiar taste fueling the blazing fire deep within his bones. This is where I belong. An unquenchable thirst raged inside him, forcing him take more. His fists clenched the back of her shirt, the flimsy material offering no resistance as he tore it from her body, exposing her fevered skin to his touch.