Black Moon Rising

by Ann Simas

  Luca really didn’t want to get into describing Sunny’s vision. Hell, he didn’t even know the particulars of it, just the end result. “No. She says she saw her kids being kidnapped.”

  Madani and Fenton shared a startled look.

  “I suppose she could be having remnant bad dreams or possibly hallucinations from the flunitrazepam,” Dr. Fenton said, her tone reflecting doubt, even if her words didn’t. “She’s at the tail end of the forty-eight-hour period when the side effects are still at work in the body.”

  Considering Dr. Fenton’s dubious response, something else slammed into Luca’s memory. Sunny hadn’t been injected with a roofie before she stopped to help Della, and she claimed to have had visions of that happening, too.

  Madani said, “It’s not the bromide–albuterol. It could be that Dr. Fenton is correct. The flunitrazepam might be responsible.”

  Frustrated, Luca thanked them and turned away. He was about to push open the door to Sunny’s room when Madani’s final words stopped him cold. “Open your mind to other possibilities, Detective.”

  When he swung back to face the doctors, he found them both considering him with angelic expressions. As much as he wanted to pursue Madani’s last statement, he resisted.

  The last thing he needed on his plate right now was an in-depth discussion about some whacked-out psychic shit.

  . . .

  Sunny awoke with a start, surprised to find strips of sunlight peeking through the slats of the window blinds. She stretched gingerly and moaned, drawing attention from the two men conversing quietly in the corner. Detective Amorosi and his partner. Troy? No, Trey. Trey Stevens.

  Luca rose and came to stand beside the bed. “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m breathing easier.”

  “Good. How about elsewhere?”

  She took inventory of her parts, starting with the top of her head. “Still sore, but I’m sure I’ll live.”

  One corner of his mouth quirked up at her self-prognosis. “Thank God for that.”

  Sunny closed her eyes. On a normal day, she might have encouraged, maybe even welcomed, a discussion about how God entered into her current situation, but not today. Today, she felt like God had abandoned her and damned if she could figure out why he would.

  “Sunny?”

  She feigned a drowse, but something must have given her away.

  “Sunny, open your eyes. I need to ask you some questions.”

  “Go away,” she mumbled.

  “I want you to tell me about this vision you had about your children being kidnapped.”

  Her eyes flew open. How could she have forgotten?

  Detective Stevens left his chair and stood on the opposite side of the bed, facing his partner.

  “Tell me about it,” Luca said again, his tone insistent.

  Sunny struggled to remove the oxygen nasal prongs.

  “Maybe you should leave that in place,” Stevens suggested. “We can understand you just fine.”

  Sunny, who didn’t like anything up her nose, acquiesced. “Do you see the bed remote?”

  Luca retrieved it from somewhere above her. “Want me to raise your head up?”

  “Yes, please. Just a bit.”

  He took it slow and stopped when she grimaced.

  “A broken rib is a pain in the ass,” she said, trying to get comfortable.

  Once she stopped squirming, he gave her a not-so-subtle reminder. “The vision.”

  He certainly had a one-track mind. “I didn’t imagine it and it wasn’t a dream,” she said as a precursor. “Carson and Maisie were playing in my folks’ back yard. Two people dressed all in black, including the masks over their faces, snuck up on Mom and Dad and injected them with something. Then they grabbed my kids, who were playing on the swing set. Carson and Maisie were screaming and fighting the abductors, trying to get away, and then the vision vanished.”

  She reached out and grasped Luca’s hand. Her nails had to be pressing painfully into his skin, but he didn’t so much as wince. “Please check on my children,” she pleaded.

  “They’re fine. I contacted your parents yesterday, after you told me about the…vision. They said they’d keep the kids indoors.”

  “Thank God they took you seriously,” she said with relief, then realized what that meant. “You told them about the vision?”

  “No, I phrased it as you being concerned because you’d dreamed it.”

  “Dreamed it,” Sunny repeated with some bitterness. “If only it had been that simple. At least you didn’t tell them I had a vision, I guess. They’d be even more worried than they are already.”

  “That’s a conversation you need to have with them, not me.”

  “Yet you want me to talk to you about it,” she said, her tone mocking.

  “No, but I do want to talk about the visions you say you had before Della got hit on her bike.”

  It irked her that he seemed to minimize the danger to her children, but since she had the power to do something about that herself, she followed his lead. “I didn’t just say I had them,” she shot back, peeved. “I did have them.” One by one, she explained each one in detail. When she’d finished, the two detectives stared at each other, exchanging some silent communication only two men who had obviously partnered for a while could understand.

  Luca cocked his head at Trey. “So,” Detective Stevens said, “if I understand correctly, the visions presented five alternatives to you, and when the event actually happened, you chose the one that let you walk away alive.”

  “I chose the one that let me and Della walk away alive.” Her gaze went from Detective Stevens to his partner. “You don’t believe me.”

  “It’s not every day someone tells us that their actions resulted from something they saw in…visions.”

  Growing angrier by the second, she said, “That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

  “Were you under any undue stress when these so-called visions occurred?” Detective Amorosi asked. “Or taking any medications?”

  “I was in New York. My publisher kicked off a big promotion for a new series I’m doing for middle-grade children. I did a few booksignings, and it was a whirlwind of activity the entire week, so yes, that’s stressful, but it’s still nothing compared to taking care of a two- and four-year-old every day.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “And for your information, they were not ‘so-called visions.’”

  “My apologies.” He stared at her without blinking and with no remorse in his tone whatsoever.

  She glared back. “Screw you, Detective.”

  “It’s Luca,” he said. “Might as well be on a first-name basis, since we’re going to be living together for a while.”

  She shot him an incredulous glance that bounced immediately to Detective Stevens, who was grinning at his partner. Great. The were doing the good cop/bad cop thing and she wasn’t even a criminal! “I most certainly will not be living with you, or anyone else, for that matter, except my children.”

  “We have a plan—” Luca began.

  “You have a plan. I didn’t agree to it.”

  “Look, I don’t want to argue with you about it,” he said impatiently.

  “Lucky for you. It’s an argument you won’t win.”

  Her rebuttal seemed to have the effect of stiffening his resolve. “Listen, Sunny, if I have to put you in protective custody, I will. That will mean you won’t see your kids at all. Is that what you really want?”

  Protective custody? Really? “Listen, Detective Amorosi,” she shot back, parroting him just to piss him off, “if I have to ask my dad to contact his good friend, Judge Andrew Pike, I will. That will mean I won’t have to put up with anymore of your BS. Period. I’ll have my kids, at home, with me.”

  Trey coughed to cover up what sounded like a strangled laugh.

  Luca’s face reddened, not from embarrassment, she suspected, but from temper. “I guess you forgot some dickwad tried to kill you a couple of nights ago. Who do you suppo
se is going to keep one of his cronies from entering your home to try again? What’ll happen to your kids then, when they don’t have a mom anymore?”

  His harsh statement had the effect of stunning her into silence. Sunny leveled a glare at him, or at least she hoped she did. Since she’d been assaulted by Cop One, she wasn’t exactly sure what her face was doing.

  Dammit all to hell, why did Luca Amorosi have to play the kids-with-no-mom card, anyway?

  Chapter 15

  . . .

  Luca didn’t like verbally sparring with a woman who’d been beat to shit, but Sunshine Fyfe had forced his hand. She probably would have argued with him until she was blue in the face, but sucker that he was, he caved in long before that because she was already black-and-blue all over.

  What would his parents say when they found out two young children now had the run of their house? Spacious though it was, and as badly as they craved grandchildren, their home hadn’t been kid-proof for a while now.

  Sunny’s sister Liberty, or Libby, as she preferred to be called, seemed to have the youngsters under control though. For a week, under Sunny’s watchful eye, she’d played with them, fed them, bathed them, and put them to bed at night. At that point, Sunny swallowed her pain and snuggled them while she read them a goodnight story.

  In his book, that was the definition of a good mom. No matter how much she hurt, she’d do it, by God, even if it killed her.

  By the end of the second week, the Amorosis and Fyfes roaming the halls of his parents’ home were like a little family. Nico and Tony watched over Sunny and Libby as if they were their sisters, just like Della and Maria. Their cousins did the same.

  Luca had to elbow Trey more than once when he caught his partner mooning over Libby, but really, what wasn’t to like? A beauty like her famous mother, she had the same honey-blonde hair and blue eyes, a wicked smile, and an even more wicked sense of humor. She reminded him of her sister, which made him look Sunny’s way.

  Her long hair was gathered in a loose ponytail, he supposed in deference to what remained of the lump on the back of her head. The lustrous chestnut color, shades darker than her sister’s hair, seemed to enhance the blue of her eyes. God, he got lost in them every time he looked at her. He wondered what that silky-looking hair would feel like, running his fingers through it, feeling it brush against his chest while they….

  Whoa, buddy, brakes on!

  Luca forcibly tamped down thoughts of having sex with Sunny, but he didn’t see the need to deprive himself the pleasure of watching her. While she didn’t have her mother’s lighter coloring, the captivating beauty was still there, and man, when she smiled, he got all kinds of weird inside.

  Sunny’s bruises had slowly morphed into a yellowish tinge and her face had lost most of its swelling. Luca was no doctor, but to him, she still seemed pale. He surveyed her from head-to-toe and decided she’d lost weight since the first time he’d laid eyes on her, too.

  His gaze traveled back to her face. She had a haunted look about her that spoke loud and clear of her inability to shake off the after-effects of her self-proclaimed vision.

  Days of arguing with him over where her children would be safest had taken a toll on both of them, because Sunny was nothing if not persistent. She’d held fast to her stance—either let the kids stay with her, or she’d go it alone in her own home.

  Ultimately, he’d had to relent. His repeated warnings that he’d take her into protective custody had been nothing but an empty threat. He not only had no grounds to do so, but where the hell would he put her, anyway?

  It was only after several restless nights that he’d come to understand why he’d been so insistent with her about doing things his way. He wanted to be under the same roof with her, plain and simple. Not just to watch over her, but to get to know her. To find out what made Sunny Fyfe tick.

  After two weeks, he knew she was a good mom, she relied on humor to make it through adversity, she was smart, and she was talented, as evidenced by the quality of the books she’d written and illustrated for children. He wouldn’t admit it to her, but he now owned a copy of everything she’d ever published.

  He felt a poke on his arm, which jerked him out of his daydream. “What?”

  “I said, when can we go home?” Sunny asked.

  “What’s the big hurry?”

  “Tomorrow will be day one of week three.”

  “And?”

  “And nothing untoward has happened.”

  “You don’t like it here?” God, he was babbling, trying to figure out how to get her mind off of leaving. Talk about acting like an idiot!

  “What’s not to like?” she said, looking around. “Your parents have a beautiful home, and it’s like a mini vacation being here, but we need to get back to our own home.”

  Even though Luca hadn’t been in the house twenty-four/seven, he still liked coming home at night, knowing Sunny would be there. He hadn’t examined his feelings about that too closely, but the thought of her going to her house, and him going to his, didn’t set well with him. A pall of loneliness settled over him, which gave him more new emotions to contemplate. “Let’s give it a few more days, okay?”

  Sunny crossed her arms over her middle and assumed a stance that informed him she was readying herself for another battle. “I don’t see what difference three or four more days will make.” She blinked at him. “Give me one good reason, and maybe I’ll consider it.”

  Taking hope, Luca searched his suddenly feeble brain for a good excuse to keep her close by. Nothing he came up with was plausible, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to bring up her so-called vision, which was a bunch of malarkey as far as he was concerned.

  “That’s what I thought,” Sunny said. “Tomorrow, the kids and Libby and I pack up to go home.” She spun on her heel and marched off to the kitchen, like she was some freaking general or something, giving orders to the troops that she expected to be obeyed.

  Luca silently counted to ten, then followed her.

  Sunny stood in the middle of the kitchen, staring out the window, which overlooked the backyard.

  He called her name twice, but she didn’t answer. With his mind in the ozone, Luca wasn’t quite sure when he realized a trance-like change had come over her. Her eyes were focused, and yet they weren’t, at least not on the activity outside.

  He glanced out the window, but saw nothing more than laughing women and squealing children being overseen by Tony. He approached her slowly, but even though he said her name again, she didn’t acknowledge him in any way. She had that eyes-glazed expression that people got when they were off in la-la land, thinking of something else, completely disassociated from their surroundings.

  He moved behind her and peered over her shoulder, wondering what the hell had her undivided attention.

  What she should have been seeing through the window was her kids playing tag with Libby and Della in the back yard. He should have seen that, too.

  Instead, a great heavy fog engulfed him and all sound diminished. Carson and Maisie were there, but they were playing on a slide, in a yard he didn’t recognize, and watching them from beneath the shade of a tree, sitting on a bench, were Bebe and Harry. Two people dressed entirely in black snuck up on them from behind and injected them with something that caused their immediate collapse. The next thing he knew, Sunny’s children were being taken from the yard, kicking and flailing, and obviously screaming, even though he could not hear them…and then the scene dissolved. Just like that.

  “Jesus H,” Luca muttered, stunned as he took several awkward steps backward and bumped into the island. “What the hell was that?”

  Sunny turned toward him slowly, her eyes wide with apprehension and…was that fear? “You saw?” she whispered. “You saw my children being taken?”

  Luca almost denied it. Shit, the kids were out playing with their aunt and his sisters, just as sure as the sun was shining. That momentary aberration had been a trick of the light, or some kind of delusion
due to lack of sleep, or something else that had a logical explanation. It sure as hell couldn’t have been him being tuned into Sunny’s damned vision.

  And yet….

  “How the hell did that happen?” he demanded, instead of answering her question.

  “So, you did see it!”

  Luca raked a hand through his hair, wishing himself anywhere but where he was. People did not have visions. At least, not if they were of sound mind, which he was, or at least, he had been five minutes earlier. “It’s not possible.”

  Sunny unexpectedly grabbed the front of his shirt with both hands. “You saw it! Ohmygod, I thought I was losing my mind.”

  She dropped her head against the hands still clutching his shirt. By the subtle heave of her shoulders, he knew she was either crying or shaking uncontrollably. Either reaction would have been warranted, considering.

  “Sunny,” he began helplessly. God, he hated to see a woman cry, especially when her tears were wrought from true emotion. Confounding his response was the fact that Sunny was an exceptionally strong woman. He’d only known her for a couple of weeks, but everything about her screamed determination, tenacity, and courage. The only thing that seemed to have the power to break her was a threat against her children.

  Luca didn’t have kids of his own, so he couldn’t put himself in her shoes, but he could still understand her fear. Crimes against children were the worst.

  And he’d be damned if he was going to let anyone harm the kids who belonged to Sunny.

  He put his arms around her, trying to comfort her. When she finally looked up at him, he eased her away and said, “Let’s sit down and talk about this. See if we can figure it out.”

  He mentally kicked himself. How the hell was he supposed to figure out the inexplicable? The impossible?

  She stared up at him with wide eyes. He associated the color of those eyes with the color of the Mediterranean Sea in so many of the pictures his folks had sent via email from Italy. A guy could drown in eyes like that if he wasn’t careful. She blinked, releasing a single tear down her cheek.

  Luca used the pad of his thumb to wipe it away. Just like that, he could see her clarity and determination return.