He didn’t hear Katie.
Maybe Katie had gotten away. Maybe Katie was hiding somewhere in the night. He forced his eyes open.
Please God.
Let that be the reason he didn’t hear his daughter speaking.
Sucking in oxygen to fuel his brain and his muscles, he focused his will on the image of Katie, curled up in a hiding place, and the pounding in his chest eased.
She’s safe.
Reaching high, he found purchase in the irregular adobe bricks. Hoisting himself up, he began to climb.
“Please say you forgive me.” The desperate, pleading undertone in Garth’s voice surprised Danny.
Such an unexpected request from a man who cared for no one.
Another foothold.
More scrambling.
Once he’d scaled the second story wall, he hefted his body into the remains of an unroofed room, walled in only on three sides. Time and the elements had long since destroyed the roof and back wall of the structure. Hundreds of years old, the apartment floor might not be in the best condition, but he had few options. The element of surprise was worth the risk of crossing the un-buttressed floor, which served as a ceiling to the apartment below. And the floor had survived all this time, hopefully it could bear up under one man’s weight.
A few years back, he’d been called to assist in the rescue of a boy who’d fallen through thin ice. Recalling how a ladder had been laid across the ice to help distribute the weight of the rescuers, he carefully lowered himself onto his belly to lessen the impact of his bulk on the unsupported floor. Traversing the rungs of an imaginary ladder, he dragged himself toward the voices, at the open side of the pueblo.
He reached the edge.
Hands curled around the shallow ledge of the floor, he hung his head over the side of the apartment. Neither Garth nor Sky looked up. For now, he was invisible. Danny had a plain view of the pair, but there was one problem with his plan. He’d have to point and shoot while hanging his head and upper body upside down over the ledge.
Balancing precariously, he locked his elbows and maneuvered his body into position. Garth was crouching a few yards away, his back toward Danny. Sky, trembling, and bloodied, faced Garth.
“I forgive you,” she said.
Danny dropped his head and shoulders further off the ledge. Blood rushed to his face, and his temples pounded from the pressure. He’d never fired his weapon from this position, but the same principles applied.
He locked his elbows.
Gripped his pistol tight.
Pointed dead-center-motherfucker.
Danny squeezed the trigger, and as the ledge gave way beneath him, dirt and debris rained down into the room below. The wind picked up the debris, stirred it with snow and moonlight, turned the cloud of dust into a virtual tornado. When the floor dropped out from under him, his pistol flew from his hand.
A gunshot rent the air. A muzzle flashed.
Sky fell to the ground.
Danny landed on Garth’s back. Threw his knees around Garth’s sides, his elbow across Garth’s windpipe. Squeezed. Crushed. Yelled. Garth let out a fierce growl. Bent. Bucked. Galloped toward the wall. Danny hung on. His head hit the wall. Garth reared back and ran forward again and again, using Danny’s skull as a battering ram.
Exploding, thundering pain.
Sandstone missiles peppered the air and pelted him in the face. He squeezed his legs around Garth’s waist, and Garth rammed him against the wall again. Danny’s vision blurred. His neck snapped back. His muscles went slack, and he slid off Garth’s back onto the ground.
Garth jumped on top of him, his left hand around Danny’s throat, choking him with a strength beyond his size. Managing a thumbless grip, Danny wrenched Garth’s wrist backwards. Then Garth kneed him in the chest. Danny felt the air leave his lungs in a whoosh. His biceps collapsed. Garth tugged his arm, and like a soapy ring sliding from a fat finger, Danny lost his grip on Garth’s wrist.
He got it back again.
Garth’s pistol wobbled to and fro as the men struggled for dominance. Danny squeezed Garth’s wrist with all his might, and the Glock spun across the dirt floor of the apartment. Garth jumped off him.
Danny was still flat on his back.
He could breathe again, but his troubles were far from over.
Garth had chased down the gun.
His heart slowed, thudded in his ears.
NO!
He tried to sit, but the aching muscles in his back collapsed from the effort. His nerves buzzed under his skin. He couldn’t leave Katie without a mother or a father.
Pushing against the ground with his elbows, he used the strength in his arms to heft his upper body halfway off the dirt.
“Freeze!” Garth yelled from across the room. “Isn’t that what you law enforcement types always say right before you pull the trigger?” A sneer curled into his voice. “Now it’s my turn. You should have left well enough alone, Benson. And you sure as hell should have stayed away from my sister.”
“Drop the gun!”
It was Sky.
Garth’s aim must have been deflected when Danny fell on him. Sky’s voice sounded strong and brave. And Danny could see her stance: Feet shoulder width apart, no more than that; a little bit crouched, elbows locked…gripping his pistol…
Pointing dead-center-mother-fucker.
Just like he’d taught her.
Sky didn’t want to do this. Didn’t know if she could do this.
She pointed Danny’s pistol at the center of Garth’s back. “Drop your gun!”
Without turning, Garth replied calmly, “You won’t shoot me.”
He was her brother.
“Drop! The gun!” she ordered.
“You won’t shoot me.”
Her eyes fell on Danny. “Last warning! Drop your gun!”
“Sorry, little sister, but I know you too well. You won’t shoot me, because you haven’t got it in you.” Keeping his weapon aimed at Danny, Garth turned his head toward her. His eyes gleamed with some unholy fire. “Watch this.”
A flash of motion from his wrist.
Her hand didn’t even tremble.
As she squeezed the trigger and emptied the Glock, muzzle flashes sprayed the night like reflections from a mirrored ball.
Garth reeled backwards, landing against the decayed wall of the pueblo.
Scarlet blooms crept over the bricks like climbing roses.
Garth’s body sagged, and then crumpled to the earth.
“Isabella,” he gasped.
Tears streaming down her cheeks, Sky lifted her face to heaven. Above her, stars saturated the night. A wolf moon glowed. Her chest heaved a silent sob, and a white light streaked across the darkness: a shooting star.
“Daddy. Daddy. Daddy,” cried the wind.
Dropping her gaze, she turned her head just in time to see a fluffy pink parka dart across the night and run straight into Danny’s open arms.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Two weeks had passed since Garth had abducted Katie and Sky. Two weeks since she had been forced to shoot and kill her own brother. Two weeks since a thirteen-year-old girl had survived the ordeal of a lifetime… As far as Sky was concerned, two weeks was fourteen days too many for Katie to wait to resume living.
Sky had spent fifteen heart-wrenching years recovering from her father’s murder, and she wasn’t about to let Katie lose a chunk of her life like that. The child needed time to heal, but she also needed to take the first step toward recovery, to make a beginning—now—before rigor mortis set in.
Sky didn’t bother to knock a third time on the door. Katie clearly wasn’t going to invite her into her darkened cave of a room. Tough. She pushed the door open with her foot and swept into the bedroom with a laden tea tray. “I made sandwiches and sugar cookies and strawberry milk. Well, your dad actually made the milk, so I shouldn’t take credit.”
“I’m not a baby.”
“Sorry, we’re all out of sushi. Besides
your dad says strawberry milk is your favorite, which is kind of cute, because I know it’s his favorite too.” After setting the tray on a nightstand, Sky brisked over to the window and unapologetically flung open the drapes. Sunlight flooded in, and a rosy glow scrubbed the dim walls, but the air remained stained with a musty, closed-off smell. She opened the window just enough to admit a hint of freshening breeze and motioned for Katie to eat up.
Katie sat on the edge of her bed, spine iron-rod straight, arms closed across her chest. “I’m not hungry.”
“I get that. But you need to eat something anyway.”
“You’re not my mother, you know. In case you didn’t get the memo, my mother killed herself.”
Without hesitation, Sky sat down on the bed and pulled Katie into a relentless hug, expecting Katie to fight the embrace. But Katie didn’t resist. Instead she collapsed into Sky’s arms, and her shoulders began to shake.
“It’s okay to be mad, Katie. And it’s okay to cry.” She heard the crack in her own voice and felt her own body shiver.
“I haven’t seen you cry.”
Her throat burned and tears pricked at her eyes. She blinked them back.
Before she could gather a response, Katie added, “Maybe you shouldn’t have saved me. Maybe I’m not really supposed to be here.”
Maybe I’m not really supposed to be here. Like a bell rung too close, Katie’s words echoed in her ears and reverberated through her chest. Giving in to a hard wave of grief, she felt tears flood her eyes and stream down her cheeks. She loosened her hold on Katie and leaned back. “Look at me, sweetheart. I’m crying now, and I’m not a bit sorry for it. Of course you’re supposed to be here.”
“But how do you know? How do you really know? Maybe Garth was supposed to kill me. Maybe I’m supposed to be with my mom. Why is she gone, and I’m still here?”
Why is she gone, and I’m still here? “Katie, what happened to your mom—it’s not your fault. She didn’t kill herself because of you.”
“I know it’s not my fault. Dad and Aunt Faith always say that. Like I’m stupid or something. I understand I didn’t do anything bad to make my mom depressed. I was just a baby, and Aunt Faith says Mom had a chemical imbalance. But somehow, it still feels like I don’t deserve to be here. Why doesn’t anybody understand that?”
She understood so well her throat closed. Smoothing Katie’s hair and pressing a waterlogged kiss on her forehead, she said, “Listen to me. Every breath any of us takes is a gift. You absolutely deserve to be here, and more than that you deserve a full, wonderful life.”
Katie shook her head hard. “I don’t feel like that. My mom wasn’t happy. That sheriff got killed helping us. Why should I be the one who gets to be happy?”
Katie’s question started that too-close bell pealing loudly in Sky’s ear again, set her whole body trembling. “Why shouldn’t you get to be happy, Katie? How does it help your mother or the sheriff or anyone at all for you to be miserable? I wish I could wipe away everything that’s happened to you, but I can’t.” Her hands grew steady and her thoughts grew clear. There was one thing she could do for Katie. “Promise me you’ll trust me about one thing though.”
“What?” A faint undertone of hope wormed its way into Katie’s voice.
“I’m asking you to trust in the fact that I love you.”
Swiping tears from her cheeks, Katie bravely met Sky’s eyes and reached for her hand. “I love you too, Sky.”
Swallowing hard, she managed, “You will get through this, honey, and your dad and I are going to be there for you every step of the way.”
“Do you really mean that, Sky?” The masculine timbre saturated the air with warmth, seeped through her skin and penetrated her bones. As if it were a fire blazing in the hearth, she basked in the glow of her name wafting from Danny’s lips.
“Yes, but…” She inclined her head toward Katie’s half open door. “Let’s talk somewhere else.” Tiptoeing up to peck his lips, she pulled Katie’s door closed behind her, then led Danny downstairs and into his room where she shut his door tight to be sure Katie wouldn’t overhear their discussion in the unlikely event she ventured downstairs. “Of course I mean it. I love Katie very much.”
Danny’s Adam’s apple bobbed heavily. Closing the distance between them, he slid his big hands around her waist, and his voice turned gruff with the emotion of a father. “Thank you for loving my child. But that wasn’t the question I was asking.” He dipped his head and grazed her hair with his lips. “I know you well enough by now to know you meant it when you said you’d be there for Katie every step of the way. What I want to know, however, is do you believe what you said about every breath being a gift?”
“You think I don’t?” Her back stiffened, and yet, when she looked up at him, his face was so open, so accepting, she couldn’t maintain her defenses, and besides, she didn’t want to shut this man out anymore. Her posture softened. “Fair enough. I won’t pretend I haven’t struggled with the question of whether or not life is good, and I’m sad to say I found out when I was just a few years older than Katie is now, that my life wasn’t going to turn out the way I’d planned. Since the night my father was killed…”
No. That wasn’t quite right—no more hiding from the awful truth—no matter how much the words tasted like poison on her tongue. Now that she knew the truth, it was time to speak it. “Since the night Garth had my father killed, I’ve felt unsure that I deserved to be alive, much less that I had any right to happiness. What your thirteen-year-old daughter just did was screw up the courage to voice words I’ve been afraid to speak for years. It seemed derelict to be happy when my mother and father had suffered so, and even though I knew that feeling was irrational, I just couldn’t shake it.”
He responded simply, “I love you.”
Her brain cushioned the blow of his words by letting them through one at a time. I. Love. You. At the same moment her knees turned to water, her hands tightened into fists. Such happiness was impossible. It had to be. But then, Danny wrapped her in his arms and sat on the bed, pulling her down with him onto his lap. He lifted her fingers and brought them to his lips, and an unfamiliar peace descended upon her. Despite everything that had happened, she could never regret a life that had brought Danny to her.
She wanted to tell him so, but her jumbled thoughts kept her silent.
“And like you reminded Katie,” he said. “Life is a gift, and we are all worthy. We should be grateful for that gift. We don’t need to earn it.”
“I need my life to have purpose, Danny.”
“Then hear me loud and clear.” His eyes found hers and held. “I love you, Sky, and I need you in my life.” With a devilish grin, he added, “Isn’t that purpose enough?”
She couldn’t help but smile at his masculine reasoning that a woman needed nothing more than a man to complete her. Choosing her words carefully, she said, “It’s a pretty wonderful start.”
“Here’s to brilliant beginnings.” He winked, and she relaxed into his arms realizing he’d cleverly goaded her into seeing how full her life already was.
Settling her head against his chest, she felt the strong steady beat of his heart and drew strength from the thought that she needn’t hide from him. “What’s your secret, Danny? How did you do it?”
“Do what?”
Loving the feel of his chest rising and falling beneath her cheek, she pressed a soft kiss against a scrap of bare skin she found near his collar—a little move that drew a rough noise from his throat. Satisfied with the result, she smiled against his shirt, and the fabric muffled her words. “The first day I met you, it struck me how happy you were. I think that’s what made you so down-right irresistible.”
“And here I thought it was my animal magnetism.”
“That too. But really, I’m interested to know. How did you keep your emotional footing after you lost your wife?”
“Fake it till you make it. That’s my motto. Hell, Sky, after Grace killed herself I wan
ted to crawl into a deep dark hole and hide. But I had my daughter, and she needed me. I knew if I let the darkness swallow me up, it would come after Katie next. So I fought with everything I had in me. I’m not saying I was happy at first, because I wasn’t, not by a country mile. But for Katie’s sake, I just kept faking it, and pretty soon, I didn’t have to pretend any more.”
As he spoke, his hand coasted up and down her spine, and though she knew his intent was to comfort, her body responded to his stroking with its own, less pristine, agenda. Arching her back, she shifted her bottom and felt him growing large and hard beneath her.
“Sorry,” he said, with a guttural half-laugh. “Maybe you’d better get off before we have a situation on our hands.”
Rising up, she faced him and eased her sweater off over her head. “What kind of a situation?” Her hands slid down her thighs, over her jeans, and settled between her legs. Reveling in the way his pupils widened, she said, “You mean the kind of situation that makes me want to touch myself?” Mercilessly, she shimmied out of her jeans and kicked off her panties. “Or maybe you mean the kind of situation that makes me want to touch you.”
Pointing toward the bulge in his jeans, he said, “You’re not helping.”
She slid out of her bra and planted her hands on her hips. “You want me to stop?”
“Oh, hell no.” He motioned come hither, and she did. His face at kissing level with her chest, he covered her bare breasts with spread hands, and then, in agonizing slow motion, he drew his fingers together to tease the peaks. Quiet, usually well-behaved nerves, reserved for just such situations as these, commenced zinging, and the more attention Danny gave those nerves, the more attention they demanded. Wishing he’d lick and suck the ache away, she released an uneven breath. His mouth closed over one nipple, and he flicked his tongue over the sensitized tip. A shock of heat ripped through her and left her shaking.
Grabbing her by her waist, Danny flipped her onto her back on the bed and loomed commandingly over her. “Are we done talking about the meaning of life yet?” Somehow, he managed to squirm out of all his clothes, while still pinning her to the mattress. “Because I want to talk about how good you smell and how soft your skin is and how much I want to spread your legs open…as soon as possible without cutting off this important discourse.”
First Do No Evil: Blood Secrets, Book 1 Page 28
