Reckless Road

by Feehan, Christine

  “No, I think this is entirely separate. I’d be surprised if he knows about the robberies or attempted kidnapping. He wants the bomb.”

  “I just don’t understand how he got into the bedroom.” She forced herself to look at the drawing again. She didn’t want to touch it. Nothing about the entire matter made any sense to her. She knew about psychic gifts. She believed in them. She had experienced evidence of them. She’d even seen what the repercussions of talents going wrong could do just in Player with his brain injury and migraines. This was an entirely different level of psychic phenomenon, and it creeped her out.

  Player was silent. She could tell he was studying the drawing carefully, his eyes moving over it line by line, quadrant by quadrant. There was no hurry. He did the same with the frame. “I would like to ask your grandmother if we could show this to Czar.”

  Zyah turned her face up to his, completely horrified. “You cannot take this drawing over to Czar’s house, where Blythe and those children are. I was considering burning it.”

  Player’s blue eyes warmed, crinkled around the edges. “Babe. Really? You’re going to burn our mystery? I thought the clubhouse or my house, where no one is. Czar might be able to identify him. I caught a few more details than you did. You didn’t read all of my notes. I also want to ask your grandmother a few questions. I think your grandfather had an item that was used to view the drawing through that would show the schematics of the bomb. It’s far too intricate for anyone to just take a chance for someone like me to come along.”

  “I doubt there are very many people like you, Player.” Zyah didn’t think there was anyone like him. If that drawing really did have the plans for making a bomb, she doubted if anyone else ever would have seen it. “I’m not sleeping in here.”

  “We’ll go in the guest room. Tomorrow, let’s take your grandmother out. She’s really tired of being cooped up. I can ask her if we can take the drawing to show Czar and the others and see if she’ll talk about it. She’d like the Floating Hat. I’d also like to take her to Crow 287. She’s so much stronger now, and if she stays inside much longer, she’ll get depressed. You could call a few of her friends to meet us at the restaurant. Let’s make this happen for her, Zyah.”

  There was an odd melting sensation in the region of her heart. He was making it impossible not to fall harder for him. He had been very caring of her grandmother even when his brain injury was at its most severe. Now he was so thoughtful in the midst of some man staring at them malevolently right in the room he’d been sleeping in.

  “Let’s take the picture off the wall, cover it and put it in the garage until we can get it out of here,” Zyah decided. “We’ll go to sleep in the guest room and figure the rest out in the morning. I’m so tired I can hardly stand up.”

  “I’ll take care of the picture, baby. You crawl into bed. I’ll be right back up.”

  That was Player. Always thinking about her. She was gratified he was no longer pushing her away. She didn’t know why he’d suddenly made the decision to let her all the way in, but when she needed him the most, he was there for her. Still, she wanted to be a little cautious. Just a little, in case at the end of all of this he pulled back, or worse, he wanted her more for the wrong reasons than the right ones. She sighed. She was tired and she was overthinking. She did that and she had to stop.

  SIXTEEN

  Player settled Anat’s wheelchair right up to the table close to the window so she could look out onto the street of Sea Haven yet see everything taking place in the Floating Hat. She nearly glowed, her dark eyes bright. He knew Zyah would be like her as she aged. A woman always positive, always bringing the sun with her everywhere she went.

  He recognized Sabelia, the clerk, immediately when she came to take their order. She was extremely sweet to Anat and Zyah, engaging them in conversation about various teas and scones. He realized, as he inhaled the fragrance in the shop, that he’d been looking forward to bringing the two women there, not dreading it.

  Blythe was meeting them, which would make it easier for him to fade into the background and just enjoy watching Zyah make new friends. That was what he wanted for her. She hadn’t had the time since she’d been back to connect with other women. Anat told him Zyah stayed very close to her, rarely leaving her those first few days, and then she was working. Player wanted her to have her own circle of women friends and feel comfortable reaching out to them if she needed to. He knew he wasn’t going to always be the easiest man to live with.

  When Blythe walked in, she wasn’t alone. Anya, Reaper’s woman, was with her. Anya had long wavy dark hair and emerald-green eyes. She was tall like Blythe, and worked as a bartender with Preacher in Caspar at their very popular bar. No one knew how she’d managed to tame Reaper, but she had. She was definitely the center of Reaper’s world.

  Player made the introductions. “Anat, these are two of the women I consider family: Blythe, Czar’s wife, and Anya, Reaper’s woman. This is Anat and Zyah.” Where Anya was tall and dark, Blythe was tall and blond.

  “I know Blythe,” Anat said. “Inez introduced us.”

  Blythe nodded. “We did meet. It was quite a while ago. You have a good memory, Anat. You came to one of the classes I was teaching on spinning yarn. And, of course, Zyah and I met the other night. It’s so nice to see you again.”

  “Lovely to meet you, Anya,” Zyah greeted. “Have you been here before?”

  “I haven’t,” Anya admitted. “Blythe told us about it. I wanted to meet you, so I thought this was the perfect opportunity to get to do both.”

  The women at once began to talk, laughing together as if they were good friends. Player found himself watching Zyah’s face, the way her eyes lit up. He enjoyed hearing her genuine laughter. After the fear in her from the night before, he was grateful that he’d thought to bring them to Hannah’s tea shop. There was something very magical about her shop. He couldn’t say what it was, but he felt it and knew the women did as well.

  “Before I leave you to it, ladies, I want to ask Blythe a quick question,” he interrupted. “You know quite a bit about physical therapy, don’t you? At least Czar told me you do.”

  She nodded. “I’m certified as a therapist. Hopefully, I can answer your question if you have one for me.”

  “Anat has been doing therapy on her arm, and she’s been doing quite well. Before, she’d been doing therapy on her leg and it became very painful. When Zyah took her back in for more X-rays, they had to reset her leg. She’ll have to start over again and is about to do so. When she’d told the therapist that it was hurting her to do the exercises, the therapist dismissed her concerns and told her a little pain was necessary. She’s been going along all this time, doing great with her arm. I’ve stayed in the room with her. Lately, the therapist has been trying to get me to leave. She insisted yesterday, and I finally did, but then Anat told me the exercises were very painful and the therapist said the same thing to her—that pain was necessary for improvement. I didn’t like that she insisted I leave the room. Why would that be necessary when Anat always did the work with me there? And why is pain so necessary?”

  Zyah leaned toward her grandmother. “You didn’t tell me about this.”

  “I didn’t want to worry you.”

  Zyah sighed. “You should have told me immediately. You should have called me when I was at work. And, Player, that therapist can’t order you out of the room. If you feel something’s wrong, don’t leave her. The therapist can leave. We’ll find someone else.”

  “Actually, Zyah’s right, Player,” Blythe agreed. “There is no need for Anat to hurt when she’s doing her exercises. And certainly no reason for you to be out of the room, especially when you’ve been there all along and she’s worked without a problem. I don’t ever want to say anything against another therapist, but she doesn’t seem the right fit for Anat.”

  “I have to agree with that,” Player said. He smiled at the older woman. “You’re always so sweet to everyone, Anat. It isn’t t
hat she’d get fired. She just wouldn’t work for you specifically. There are a lot of other patients for her to work with. She travels, remember? The clinic hired her to work with their overflow of patients. We’ll find someone much more suited to you, especially now that you’re going to start work on your leg again. Zyah can call your doctor for another reference.”

  “I really don’t want that poor girl to lose her job, Player. She’s very nice. She just gets so rough at times,” Anat said. “She tells the most interesting stories. I really like her.”

  “You like everyone, Mama Anat,” Zyah pointed out. “That’s why everyone loves you so much.” She covered her grandmother’s hand with her own. “My grandfather was so crazy in love with her, he spent months drawing her a picture for their anniversary. Months. It was done in charcoal. When she left everything behind and came to the United States, she brought me and the picture.”

  Anat’s laughter floated through the shop, tinkling gently like the bells at the door. Player loved the carefree sound.

  “He did. He was such a brilliant man, and yet at his heart, he was a poet. An artist.” There was such love in Anat’s voice.

  “Did he work for the government?” Player asked. “Zyah tells me he was a renowned physicist.”

  “He worked for them at first, but then he had a fallingout with them and quit his job. I was a little scared. In those days, it could get frightening to oppose the government, particularly if you were in the kind of position he was in. Thankfully, we were left alone. They came around occasionally to ask him back to work, but he always refused. He had friends who thought as he did, that the president was moving too far away from the needs of all the people. It was a time of conflict in my country, and he didn’t want me involved. It was one of the few times when we didn’t share everything.”

  Player didn’t look at Zyah. Anat’s husband had wanted to protect her—at least he hoped that was what he was doing. Player didn’t want Horus’s silence to be a betrayal.

  “How wonderful that he gave you a charcoal drawing for your anniversary,” Anya said. “That he even remembered you had an anniversary.”

  The women laughed, and Player made a mental note to remember the date he’d first laid eyes on Zyah. Anniversaries were important to women. If that was the case, he would have to get good at remembering them. He’d pass that information on to Reaper as well. Anya had laughed, but there was a little note in her voice that suggested she needed a little more care now and then. This shop was a gold mine for his Torpedo Ink brethren, whether they knew it or not. Preacher had recognized the genuine wisdom in Hannah.

  A couple of years back, Torpedo Ink had worked with the Drake sisters and the women on the farm to end the stranglehold the Swords’ international president had on human trafficking. The man was a billionaire and had a few very lethal psychic gifts of his own. With a club as big as the Swords at his disposal, he hadn’t been easy to defeat, but with the combined efforts of the Drakes, Torpedo Ink and the women living on the farm with Blythe, and their psychic gifts, they had done it. Player had a great deal of respect for all of them. He knew the others in his club did as well. He hoped, like Preacher, they might avail themselves of some of Hannah’s wisdom.

  “Horus—that was my husband’s name—always remembered every anniversary. He made me things.” Anat’s voice was soft with love.

  “Was there something he had to look through to view the drawing?” Zyah asked casually. “Player says when he looks at it from different angles, he sees different things.” She frowned. “What kind of drawing did you call it?”

  “Anamorphic,” he replied just as casually. Sabelia put a mug of coffee in front of him, and he looked up at her and smiled his thanks. “If you look at the picture through a special device, you see something different in the picture that no one can see just viewing it through the naked eye. Only a very brilliant artist could draw that kind of art.”

  “I’ve heard of that,” Blythe said. “It isn’t exactly the same as the 3D images, is it?”

  “Not exactly.”

  Anat shook her head. “Horus didn’t ever have me look through anything to view the picture. I could see it just fine, but he had to. His eyesight wasn’t the best. He had to wear his monocle.” She laughed merrily, that soft little trilling sound at the end. Her hands went around the hat teacup, warming themselves.

  “You still have his monocle, don’t you, Mama Anat?” Zyah asked. “It’s one of your treasures, like mama’s shawl.”

  Anat nodded. “I thought he looked so handsome whenever he would put that monocle on his eye. He always had it on a fine gold chain. I teased him about it all the time. Ken, Zyah’s father, got him that chain. Ken was a marvelous man.” She smiled at her granddaughter. “Quite brilliant as well. A renowned astronomer. They got on quite well. The two of them were always together. Ken made the frame for my Horus’s anniversary gift to me, so of course, it means all the more.”

  Player’s gut tightened. He couldn’t look at Zyah. He knew Anat’s sweet, guileless chatter about her beloved Horus and Zyah’s father, Ken, would be heartbreaking to her. No doubt that monocle was the device needed to display the bomb. And her father with his background in astronomy . . . Player hadn’t told Zyah his theory on how the man had entered their bedroom. He didn’t want to tell her.

  The small bells in the shapes of hats tinkled merrily, inviting others inside. He looked up to see Breezy, wife of the vice president of Torpedo Ink, entering along with Soleil, Ice’s wife, and Scarlet, Absinthe’s wife. They came straight over to the table. No hesitation. He stood, making the introductions, knowing Anat was in her element. He wanted this for Zyah, but being surrounded by that many women was just a bit too much for him.

  Alena and Lana sauntered in moments later, and Player started sweating. He glanced around the room. Sabelia was already adding tables and chairs to accommodate everyone. He helped her and then backed off when he spotted Hannah as she came out of the back room. She sent him a cheerful smile.

  “Player. I was hoping you’d come back. I have another lotion I thought would be good for you to try.” She waved to Blythe. “Ladies. Thank you all for coming. I’ll be over in a few minutes. Is this your Zyah?”

  “Yes.” Player was pleased but not surprised that Hannah would be able to pick her out among all the women. “And this is Anat Gamal, her grandmother. This is Hannah Drake Harrington. She owns the shop.”

  “You made the lotion and cream Player brought home,” Zyah said. “I swear it was heaven after a long day on my feet. Thank you.”

  “He was the one who thought of it,” Hannah said. “I was just happy to help. I hope you don’t mind if I borrow him for a few minutes. I have something else to show him while you ladies visit. The peach scones turned out particularly excellent.”

  Zyah looked up at him, her eyes sparkling. In spite of the sadness she had to be feeling over the revelations about her grandfather, Hannah’s shop was a good place to learn the truth. There was magic there, a feeling of well-being. Combined with the company of the women extending their friendship to her and Anat, it seemed impossible to feel anything but good.

  “Thanks for the rescue,” Player whispered as they made their way to the table in the corner on the other side of the room.

  Hannah gave him her genuine smile. He knew the difference now. “You looked like you were having an excellent time, but you didn’t feel that way. Although you seem genuinely happy for Zyah.”

  “She’s new here and doesn’t know too many people. Anat was robbed and beaten very severely. At the time, Zyah was in Europe, working there. She gave up her job and came home right away to stay with her grandmother and make her home permanently here. I want her to make friends. She’s managing the store in Caspar and wants to take a second job at Crow 287.”

  “Alena’s restaurant. I hear the food is amazing. Jonas has been promising to take me there, forever. I’m going to have to twist his arm. Joley and Ilya are back, and she’ll go with me if Jon
as persists in being a stick-in-the-mud. He loves to stay home at night. He says after working all day he just likes to put his feet up. Make that he doesn’t want me to go out because I might do something rash.”

  Player tried not to laugh. “Do you do rash things?”

  “Joley does rash things. Elle does them. I, however, do not.” She handed him the bottle of lotion she’d brought out from the back room and waved her hand at the little teapot sitting on the table. At once it began to sing.

  Player tried not to notice when the teapot floated in the air and poured tea into her cup. A spoon whirled madly, stirring in honey. “You’re not just a little annoyed with him right now, are you?” He wasn’t mentioning anything at all to do with the tea.

  “Now that you mention it, I might be.” Her hair flew in every direction, blond spiral curls springing around her face.

  She waved her hand toward something behind him. Player took a whiff of the lotion to keep from turning in his chair. Had he mentioned that Zyah had such a special fragrance? Could Hannah have even managed to get that hint of cassis-raspberry facet? The blend of green floral mimosa. He was distracted until a plate of cookies floated to the table and landed beside her teacup. His coffee mug followed it.

  “Why is it that men want their own way in all things?” she asked, her tone exquisitely mild, but her blue eyes turbulently stormy.

  Player hoped this was one of those moments when a woman didn’t really want an answer. She wanted someone to listen. He did his best to look very interested in all she had to say. Any woman who floated teapots in the air commanded his respect. Jonas Harrington, whether he carried a gun or not, was crazy to annoy this woman on any level.

  The silence stretched between them until Player realized it was very possible Hannah required an answer. He cleared his throat. “You do realize I came to you because I totally fucked up my relationship with my woman, right? I don’t have a clue why men do half the bullshit things we do, Hannah. I came here to learn from you, not to advise you. I’m trying to get the brothers to ask a few questions so they don’t ruin what they have.”