by Tara Brown
“I know,” I repeat and shake my head. “I don’t have anyone else on my list.”
“The fact you have a bloody list is insane. You sound crazy.” He sighs as we walk out to where Nichols is waiting.
“Mrs. Townshend, how are you?”
“I am well, Nichols. How are you?” I hug him, it’s my new thing. I am the queen of awkwardly hugging the staff, as Dash’s mom calls them. I don’t melt into people but I am trying.
He chuckles and pats my back like a grandfather might do. “I am well.” We get in and butterflies dance in my stomach.
Dash leans in, kissing me again and breathing in a deep breath of me. “My cousin asked Angie to marry him today.”
“Why did you tell me?” I gasp. “She’s going to kill you.” My phone buzzes seconds later. I lift it so he can see it’s Angie calling, almost as if she heard him tell me. “Hello?” I stare into the screen as I answer the FaceTime.
“Jane! He popped the question!”
“Oh my God, what?” I try very hard to be surprised, but she knows straightaway.
“Did Dash tell you? What a fucker.”
I snort and ogle the ring. “Congratulations.” She wiggles her fingers on the screen, hardly even showing me the massive rock because she’s moving so much. It’s so big I catch glimpses of it anyway. “It’s beautiful, Ang. I love it.”
“I am getting married, Janey!” She sings it, but I don’t roll my eyes.
She blathers on for a few minutes before hanging up. I give Dash a look. “You ruined her surprise.”
He looks apathetic. “I honestly didn’t think you would care.”
“I don’t. But she does. She really cares.”
“I gathered.” He places his hand over mine.
When Nichols is in the driver’s seat and Dash and I are alone at the back, I mutter, “I retired. For real.”
“What?” He sounds surprised and dubious. “Really?”
“Really. It was too much. The president wanted me to be some poster girl for the military and I was pretty much finished with training Cami to take over for me, so I just said I was done. She’s trained. The rest is going to come with experience. Antoine and her are quite the pair. She’s all balls and he’s all tech.”
He snorts.
“Sorry. Anyway, I’m done. I am officially honorably discharged.”
He leans in, kissing my cheek. “Congratulations, my darling. That is wonderful news.”
“You know you can just start using your accent again for regular conversation, not just when you’re drunk and angry. I don’t mind, I promise.”
“I think my American is quite good.”
“Right, but you still speak like a Brit so it comes across as fairly girlie with all those ‘my loves’ and ‘darlings’ and ‘lovely.’”
“Girlie?” He cocks an eyebrow and furrows his brow. I sense I might have ventured into dangerous waters.
“Not like girlie, but like sort of a—oh, what do you British people call them? I know I heard Nichols call the gardener that word. Nancy! A nancy!”
He looks aghast as he glances over my shoulder at Nichols. “Do you think I’m girlie?”
“Hardly!” Nichols scoffs in the rearview mirror. “No, sir. You are anything but.”
Dash sniffs and nods, puffing his chest out a little bit.
I roll my eyes. “Fine, keep saying ‘darling’ and ‘wonderful’ and ‘fabulous’ with your little English affect but not in an accent. Dudes must hit on you when I’m not there.”
He lifts one brow, pursing his lips. “I mean, not a lot, but it happens. I assumed it was because I am always dressed sharply.”
I laugh and kiss his cheek. “I love you.”
“No, you don’t.” He smiles.
I close my eyes and lean against him, enjoying the scent of deodorant and soap and him. It’s the best smell in the world. I toy with the cat necklace on my neck and enjoy the peace of the drive home.
26. AM I WRONG?
The next day brings a new drive—the last one, I hope. I can barely breathe, I am so nervous. When we arrive, Nichols parks and I jump from the car, running up the hill. It’s sunny and windy, a perfect day for what’s about to happen.
I don’t bother with the blanket I know Dash is going to want down. He hates lying on the grass without one.
I dive onto the grass and lie on my belly, pulling out the scope I used to kill a man from half a mile away. I point it in the direction of the group of kids standing in a circle. I look for the girl with the chestnut hair spilling down her back. She is stretching and getting ready to do group yoga. Her Facebook status had mentioned this.
She is fine.
I watch her face as she turns. She has two dark-blue eyes and the chestnut hair. She has a subtle look of ethnicity and puffy lips. She is beautiful. Tears threaten my eyes as I stare at the girl. I point. “The brunette with the navy-blue shirt on. Man, look how tall she is. That’s not even fair. She must get that from the other half, not me. Lord knows it wasn’t me.”
He takes the scope as he settles next to me. A slow smile crosses his lips. “She looks healthy and happy, Jane.” I nod, swallowing the lump in my throat. He offers me a look. “She looks like her life is pretty good.”
“Antoine checked for me. She’s healthy and happy. No therapy and she has a brother. He’s adopted too. They don’t know they’re adopted. The mom and dad are hardworking people. They think they adopted legally. It’s a normal life, I think. It appears to be. Her room is cute and her journal is clean of anything horrid.”
He gives me a different look. “What the hell do you and Antoine do in your spare time?”
“Important stuff.” I snatch the scope back so I can continue to stare at the girl who lived. Of all the things I have ever made happen, she is the best. She gets into position and starts her sun salutations.
“She is perfect.” I turn and look at Dash. “Okay.”
He cocks an eyebrow. I don’t even have to explain; he knows what I mean. “Really?”
“Let’s do it. If my eggs are normal and your sperm is normal, we can use a surrogate, right?”
He nods, fighting a huge grin. “Only if you’re sure.” He doesn’t sound sure.
“I can’t be sure about anything. But I don’t want to be sure. I want to live and experience. I’m tired of being scared and planning everything and worrying and wondering. I’m tired of survival mode.” I don’t bother trying to convince either of us I can be a mother. I am counting on the fact he can be a father and help me along.
“You killed a man only a few days ago—you don’t want to think about it a little longer?”
I laugh. It’s probably the wrong response. “No. I am not like you. I can kill a man and not even bat an eyelash at it. If he deserved it. That man deserved the end he got. In fact, I spared him the end he deserved. The only reason he didn’t die horribly is because his terrible actions saved me and her. She was adopted by good people and I—well. You found me.”
“That’s very sweet. In a serial killer sort of way.” Dash gives me a look. “But you can’t kill people when you’re a mom.”
“I retired.”
“Before or after you killed that man?”
“Both. I sent the final e-mail on the plane ride from Seattle, Washington.”
“Where is the gun you shot the man with?”
“Montana. I met Antoine’s friend, who is going to machine the barrel so it’s never recognized as a murder weapon.”
He lifts a hand. “I don’t want to know any more.”
I lean in and kiss his cheek. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we should think about it a little longer. I mean, Sirius is still pretty young and Binx is pretty old and sort of mean.”
He kisses me back. “Sounds good.”
We get up and I walk away from the girl. I do
n’t take another look.
She isn’t mine. I might have made her, but she has been formed by someone else. Her thoughts and feelings and likes and dislikes are all part of the environment she has been raised in.
I can only be grateful that she has had the chance to become that happy girl I saw down there.
We walk to the car, in the sunshine and soft breeze, and I can’t help but be grateful for every second of it all.
Had I woken up on a bed missing a baby and craving drugs, I might not have had the remarkable life I have had thus far.
The depression he saved me from is massive.
The life he gave is unfathomable.
But the life I made for myself, figuring out who I was, is the greatest gift I ever got and I gave it to myself.
And yes, I have had to make peace with who Dash is to the world and whom that makes me. I am the girl who has tried not to be noticed. But I have to adapt to be with him.
The same way he once had to make peace with a cat that stole the bed and my heart long before any man might have.
The same way he has to make peace with the leftovers from the mind runs and distrust for the lies.
We are finding our way, and while it’s not easy, it’s worth it.
It is a fabulous end and beginning.
As I get into the car, Nichols hands me an envelope. He smiles and closes the door.
Antoine’s writing sprawls across the front. I open it, pulling a single picture from it. It’s of a handsome man with a nice smile. The picture is old and faded. But there is one distinct feature I cannot help but stare at. The man has a dark-blue eye and a pale-blue one.
I bite my lip, staring at the words scrawled along the bottom: Master Sergeant Phillip Bergamot. 1935–1962. Died Honorably fighting for his country and freedom.
“I have his eyes,” I whisper as Dash kisses my cheek.
“That’s not all you have from him.”
My lip lifts as I let it sink in.
My past is what I choose it to be.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you so much to the team at Montlake, who have helped me in every way. I have grown as an author and as a self-editor. Working with you on this trilogy has been amazing. Thank you to my agent, Natalie Lakosil, at the Laura Bradford Literary Agency. You are the very best and always patient with me and my bizarre ability to hide under a rock for great lengths of time. Thank you to my husband and my children for allowing me to sink into a dark place while I wrote this. I needed to disgust myself and creep out everyone around me just a little to get there. Thank you to my loyal readers—you are the reason.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tara Brown writes in a variety of genres. In addition to her futuristic Born Trilogy stories and her nine-part Devil’s Roses fantasy series, she has also published a number of popular contemporary and paranormal romances, science fiction novels, thrillers, and romantic comedies. She enjoys writing dark and moody tales involving strong, often female, lead characters who are more prone to vanquishing evil than perpetrating it. She shares her home with her husband, two daughters, two cats, and a wolfhound.
