Together Always

by Dallas Schulze

  *'No."

  * * Are you still in danger?''

  "Yes, and that's another reason we can't be together."

  "But if you're in danger, I want to be with you." She set her hand on his sleeve and looked up at him, her eyes the deep green of a forest.

  He steeled himself against the plea he saw there and shook her hand off his arm. "I'm not going to have your death as well as Mike's on my conscience. Besides, this is all wrong. All of it. I shouldn't have made love to you. I had no business getting involved with you like that. It's wrong. All wrong."

  Lily opened her mouth to argue but the phone rang, cutting her off before she could say anything. Trace turned away, reaching for the coffeepot.

  "That's probably the hospital," he said. "You'd better get it."

  He felt the frustrated look she threw him, though his back was to her. She answered the phone while he poured another cup of coffee and gulped it down.

  "They're ready to release John as soon as we get there."

  "Good. We'd better get going. I'm sure he doesn't want to stay there any longer than he has to."

  "Trace-"

  "Lily, I don't want to talk about this anymore. I've had a rough couple of weeks. I'm tired. There's some nut out there who wants me dead and I just don't have the energy to deal with this anymore. What's between us isn't going to

  work. I know it, and if you weren't so stubborn you'd know it."

  '*No, I wouldn't, but I'll leave it alone for now. But not for good. Sooner or later you're going to see that I'm right. In the meantime you just make sure you stay alive. Trace Dushane.''

  He lifted the coffee cup in a tired salute, wiUing to take the half victory she offered rather than push for more. '*ril do my best."

  ''See that you do."

  Despite THEIR best attempts, the atmosphere between Trace and Lily was thick enough to cut with a knife. John could practically smell the tension in the car during the drive home. Lily talked cheerfully enough but Trace was silent unless asked a direct question. And all the time Lily was talking, her eyes would flick to Trace and then away.

  John limped into the house, trying to favor his leg, his ribs and his aching head all at the same time. When he closed his eyes, he could still see the mountainside coming at him, but, he told himself, he'd survived worse than this. .Once he was settled in a chair in the living room, Lily cast Trace another one of those sidelong looks and then announced that she was going upstairs to make sure John's room was ready for him.

  Maybe it was his aching head but John suddenly found himself out of patience with the two of them.

  "You know, you're a damned fool if you keep pushing her away."

  Trace threw him an enigmatic look. "Stay out of it."

  "Fine. I'll stay out of it, but I still think you're a damned fool."

  "That's your privilege." The phone rang before John could say more, though he wasn't sure he was all that inclined to add to what he'd already said. It was a brief con-

  versation and Trace's end of it seemed to consist mostly of an occasional grunt of agreement or disagreement. When he hung up, his features seemed tenser, harder. He went straight to the bar and poured himself a stiff Scotch, downing it in one gulp.

  *'It's a little early for that, isn't it?"

  *'That was Captain Jacobs. Someone set fire to my apartment last night. The smoke alarms went off and the damage isn't too severe but the place isn't going to be livable for a while."

  John watched him, his eyes narrowed. Despite the pounding in his head, his instincts were still working and they were telling him that there was more here than met the eye.

  **You don't seem all that surprised."

  **I suppose I'm not. Someone is trying to kill me. As a matter of fact, someone was trying to kill me the day your father was killed. It should have been me who died that day."

  **You want to explain that?"

  Trace told him the whole story in short terse sentences, biting the words off as if they tasted foul in his mouth. When he was done, there was a long silence. Above them they could hear the sound of Lily's footsteps. Trace finally turned to look at John, his lean body taut with rage and pain.

  "I suppose you're waiting for me to revile you, to heap loads of guilt on you. Well, you're not getting it from me. What happened, happened. It sure as hell wasn't your fault if some crazy killed Dad when they were gunning for you. Dad would have been the first to tell you that. You know it as well as I do."

  Trace's mouth twisted and he stared down at the empty glass. 'T know it logically but I can't seem to shake the feeling that it's my fault somehow."

  **It's not, but you'll just have to learn that in time. Does this have anything to do with what's going on between you and Lily?"

  Trace shrugged. "More or less. It's part of it."

  **Let me give you a piece of advice. It's always a mistake to lose time with someone you love. Thinking you can make up for lost time tomorrow isn't a good idea because you don't always get a tomorrow. God knows, I can speak from experience on that. Don't let it slip away. Trace. You may not get a second chance."

  "I'm well aware of my own mortality. That's why it's more important than ever to keep Lily away. I can't risk something happening to her because of me. Until this nut is caught, she's better off at a distance."

  John leaned his head against the back of the chair and didn't argue any further.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Trace walked up to the door, reluctance and anticipation struggling for supremacy inside him. He hadn't been back here since picking up John at the hospital almost a week ago. He'd called once to see how John was getting along, and luckily John himself had picked up the phone.

  He'd kept busy. Between attempting to repair the damage the fire had done in his apartment and going through files he'd already gone through half a hundred times trying to come up with someone who might want him dead, he'd had plenty to keep him occupied. But always, in the back of his mind, his argument with Lily played over and over.

  She had sounded so sure. As if there could be no doubt that loving him was the right thing to do. He wanted to believe that she was right. He wanted to believe it so badly that he knew he couldn't trust his own judgment anymore. When you wanted something that much, you could convince yourself of almost anything.

  He slid his left hand into the pocket of his jacket and opened the front door with his right. He wouldn't be back here now if John hadn't called to tell him that the lawyer had papers they all needed to sign—something to do with Mike's estate. It was too soon. He needed more time away from Lily, time to regain his equilibrium, time for her to think

  about what he'd said. Maybe she'd see the sense in his arguments. He ignored the pain that thought brought with it.

  The house seemed to welcome him. This place was home in a way no other place had ever been. The feeling had changed with Mike's death but the welcome was still there. He shut the door quietly but apparently not quietly enough.

  "Trace?" Lily's voice preceded her by only a moment. As always, Trace felt a funny little catch in his throat when he saw her. She was wearing jeans and a loose gray sweatshirt, her hair held back from her face with combs. Nothing fancy. If she was wearing makeup, it was too subtle for him to notice. On some women, the casual attire might have looked sloppy. On Lily, it looked like... Lily. Exquisite.

  '*Hi."

  "Hi." She watched him, her eyes a little uncertain. "How are you?"

  "Fine. Just fine." He started to shrug off his jacket, then remembered his hand and left it on. "Is the lawyer here yet?"

  "No. I guess he's running a bit late."

  "Must be." He looked at her and then looked away. What was he supposed to say to her? It wasn't possible to ignore the things they'd said to each other the last time they'd talked, but that was what he had to do. "How's John?"

  "Fine. Just fine. He's in the living room."

  There was a long silence while Trace tried not to look at her—and found it impos
sible. How could he look at anything else? It took all his willpower to drag his eyes away from her.

  "I guess I'll go say hello to John."

  "Trace, I-"

  "Not now, Lily. Not now." He was unable to resist the urge to touch her, even if just for a moment, and his fingers trailed across the softness of her cheek. She closed her eyes

  as if savoring the light touch. Before she could open them again, he was gone.

  John was seated in an overstuffed chair—the one Mike had always favored—a newspaper spread across his lap. He glanced up as Trace came into the room and Trace had the uneasy feeling that John saw a lot of things that he'd just as soon have left unseen. He was immediately aware of the dark circles under his eyes and the hollows in his cheeks.

  "How's the leg?" He nodded to where John had his injured leg stretched out on a hassock.

  **Not bad. A little stiff but that's about it. How's the apartment?"

  *'What's wrong with your apartment?"

  Trace winced at Lily's question. John shrugged. "Sorry."

  "Sorry about what? What's wrong with your apartment?" Lily came to stand between the two men, one dark brow arched in question.

  "Nothing much. A small fire. No big deal. The damage is already pretty well cleaned up."

  "A small fire? Does this have something to do with someone trying to kill you?"

  Trace shook his head. "Not unless they're doing an incredibly clumsy job of it. I wasn't even home the night it happened." He didn't mention the fact that there'd been quite a few incidents that had stopped short of being actually life threatening. That they were connected to Mike's murder, he didn't doubt, but there was no reason to tell Lily that.

  "Then why didn't you want me to know?"

  "Because I knew you'd worry," he answered honestly.

  "You were right." To his relief, she was willing to let the subject drop. The relief dissipated with her next words. "You want me to take your coat?"

  He thought of the bandages on his left hand, considered how odd it was going to look if he kept his coat on in the comfortably warm living room, and surrendered to the inevitable.

  *'Sure/' He shrugged the coat off.

  *'Trace! What happened to your hand?" The coat was tossed in the direction of the sofa as she took his injured hand in hers, looking at the bandage that circled his palm.

  "It's no big deal. I cut myself."

  ''You don't put a bandage like this on a little cut. This looks like a professional job. What happened?"

  She looked up at him, her green eyes wide with concern, cradling his injured hand in her palms. Trace wanted to sink into her eyes and leave all his troubles behind him. Instead he pulled his hand away from her, flexing it to show how minor the injury was, trying not to wince at the protesting twinge of pain as the stitches pulled at his flesh.

  "It took a couple of stitches, that's all. I grabbed the wrong end of a knife."

  "It must have hurt a lot."

  Her words brought the pain to mind, the. instant when he'd reached into his mailbox and felt the blade bite into his palm. Instead of a handful of junk mail, he'd drawn back a bloodied pahn. It could have been worse. That's what he told himself, what he told the detectives when they came out to examine the booby trap, what he told Captain Jacobs when Jacobs wanted to put him in a safe house. It could have been worse. And if he went into a safe house, how were they going to draw this nut out?

  His eyes met John's over the top of Lily's head and he read more comprehension there than he liked.

  "Any clues as to who is trying to kill you?" John asked.

  Trace frowned. He didn't want to talk about it in front of Lily. He didn't want to worry her any more than she al-

  ready was. But the question had been asked and she was looking at him with as much interest as John.

  **No real progress. We're still going through the files. We haven't turned up much yet."

  "Well, they've got to do something. You shouldn't be walking around on the street like this. I mean, you should have a guard or something. Just what are they doing to protect you?" She looked so upset on his behalf that Trace couldn't help but take some pleasure in her concern.

  "Captain Jacobs suggested that I go to stay in a safe house, but if I do that, then this guy might just go underground until I show up again. There's the same problem with armed guards. Not to mention the fact that we don't have the manpower to do that twenty-four hours a day."

  "Well, you can't just walk around waiting to get shot." She wrapped her arms around her midriff and Trace knew she was trying to conceal her trembling. He wanted to hold her and tell her that everything was going to be all right but he couldn't do that.

  "I'm being careful and I'm wearing a bulletproof vest. It's not like I'm walking back and forth on the street like a duck in a shooting gallery. I'll be fine. Sooner or later this guy will show himself and we'll nab him and then we'll have Mike's killer."

  "Just make sure you get him before he gets you." Lily's stem words didn't match the pleading in her eyes. Trace's heart melted and he had to draw on every ounce of willpower he possessed to prevent himself from taking her in his arms and holding her close.

  "Isn't this lawyer pretty late? Has he called or anything?" Trace quickly diverted the conversation.

  John shook his head. "Nope. Not a word. He should have been here twenty minutes ago. Maybe he got caught in traffic."

  **Could be. He'll probably be here any minute now."

  But twenty minutes crept by and there was still no sign of the lawyer. The three of them sat in the living room making increasingly labored conversation. At least it seemed labored to Trace. He was painfully aware of Lily every moment. It was heaven and hell being so close to her and yet still so far apart. Lily seemed distracted, inclined to lose the thread of the conversation, her sentences trailing off into nothing.

  Only John seemed at ease, carrying the conversation practically by himself when necessary. And when a silence occurred, he seemed just as comfortable with that. Another twenty minutes crept by and it was becoming pretty clear that the lawyer wasn't going to show up.

  "Maybe his car broke down," Lily suggested.

  *'Could be. I'm going to call his office and see if they know anything." Trace crossed to the phone, checking the number in the address book written in Mike's scrawled hand. ''Did he say what he wanted?"

  John shrugged. "Just that he had some papers for us to sign, some final stuff about the estate, I guess."

  "Probably." But the lawyer's office had no idea what he was talking about. They weren't aware of Mr. Lavery's having an appointment to see them; besides, they said, he rarely called at a client's home.

  Trace set down the phone, quizzical. He told Lily and John what the secretary had told him and the three of them looked at one another, none of them willing to voice their suspicions.

  "Maybe he just forgot to tell his secretary," Lily said.

  "Maybe." Trace glanced at his watch. "One way or another, I'm not going to hang around here much longer."

  He made it sound as if he had other, far more important things to do, though the truth of the matter was that his only

  plans were to go back to the station house and sift through files for the thousandth time.

  Lily stood up abruptly. "You know, I told the other teachers I'd only be gone an hour or so and it's already been almost twice that. I think I'll go ahead and get back to work. If the lawyer shows up, tell him he can bring any papers he has down to the school and I'll sign them there." She spoke rapidly, her tone a little too clipped, a little too hurried.

  "I thought you took the afternoon off?" It was John who asked the question. Trace was busy studying the toes of his boots.

  "No." She looked at Trace, her heart in her eyes. He glanced up and then away, steeling himself. "No, I really should be getting back." Trace looked up as she left the room, her back ramrod straight, her steps brisk. But he knew it wasn't his imagination that her eyes were a httle too bright. Th
e front door shut behind her and the room was silent.

  "You're a hell of a lot stupider than I think you are if you let her go like that." John's tone held a bite.

  "It's for the best," Trace told him.

  "Like hell it is. I don't know the details of what your problems are but I know she's hurting, and if you let her walk away Hke that, you may never be able to repair the damage."

  "Mind your own damned business," Trace snarled, but he was already on his way out the door.

  Lily was just 0f)ening her car door when he stepped outside. He didn't need to see the hunched set of her shoulders to know that she was either crying or very close to it. No matter what, he couldn't let her go away in tears.

  "Lily." She looked up as he called her name. She seemed to hesitate for a moment, as if debating about ignoring him.

  and he came down off the steps, calling her name again. 'Xily."

  She turned, wiping her face on her sleeve, and Trace felt like a beast. All his talk about never wanting to hurt her and yet it seemed that was all he did. She took a few steps toward him as he strode across the lawn.

  And then the world seemed to explode around them.

  Afterward Trace could remember every second of what followed as if he'd seen it played in slow motion. There was a hollow roar and the car seemed to swell and bulge like some bizarre kind of insect shedding its skin. The roar became an ear-shattering boom and he saw Lily thrown forward, heard her scream at the same instant the ground seemed to disappear from beneath his feet.

  He hit the lawn with enough force to knock the wind out of him, but he was struggling to his feet even before he could register what had happened. His one thought was to get to Lily. His only need was to have her in his arms, to protect her, to shelter her.

  "Lily!" He wasn't aware that he screamed her name as he threw himself across the short distance that ^parated him from her still figure. The car was burning, throwing off a fierce amount of heat. Lily was sprawled facedown on the grass, her hair spread around her like a black mourning cloak. Trace caught her under the arms, aware of the heat beating against his face. He dragged her several yards away, praying that he wasn't adding to any injuries she might already have.