by Nora Roberts
“Did you? I’m sure that was enjoyable.”
“I know there are things you can’t tell me, but I’m going to ask anyway. It’s not for me that I’m asking. I’m not afraid to take my lumps.”
“No, I don’t imagine you are. You’ve had plenty of them.”
“No more than my share. I agreed to do this thing, just like Malory and Dana did. But Bradley didn’t sign on. I want to know if something’s making him have feelings for me, feelings I’m supposed to use to find the key.”
Rowena stopped at a mirror, fussed with her hair in a timeless female gesture. “Why would you think that?”
“Because he’s infatuated, with the painting, with Kyna’s face in his painting, and I just happen to look like her.”
Rowena plucked a bottle of shampoo from a carton, examined it. “Do you think so little of yourself?”
“No. I’m not saying he couldn’t be, that he isn’t, interested in me. In who I am. But the painting was the start of it for him.”
“And he bought the painting, chose his path. The path led to you.” She replaced the bottle. “Interesting, isn’t it?”
“I need to know if the choice was his.”
“I’m not the one to ask. And you’re not ready to believe him, should he answer.” She took out another bottle, opened it to sniff. “You want me to promise you he won’t be hurt. I can’t do that. And I believe he would be insulted if he knew you asked such a thing.”
“Then he’ll have to be insulted, because I had to ask.” Zoe lifted her hands, let them fall. “It probably doesn’t matter. Kane’s hardly bothered with me. We thought he would come out, guns blazing, but he’s barely flicked at me, like he would a fly. He doesn’t seem to be very concerned that I’ll find the key.”
“And so by ignoring you, he erodes your self-confidence. You make it easy for him.”
Zoe was surprised by Rowena’s dismissive tone. “I didn’t say I was giving up,” she began, then stopped, let out a breath. “Jesus, he’s got a better handle on me than I realized. He’s playing me. Most of my life people either ignored me or told me I couldn’t do what I wanted to do most.”
“You’ve proved them wrong, haven’t you? Now prove him wrong.”
A few miles away, at the Main Street Diner, Brad shifted so Flynn could slide into the booth beside him. Across the table, Jordan had his long legs stretched out and was already studying the two-sided laminated menu.
“That menu hasn’t changed in about sixty years, pal,” Flynn pointed out. “You ought to have it down by now. Got held up,” he added and since Brad’s coffee was already there, helped himself to it.
“How come you always sit beside me and drink my coffee? Why don’t you ever sit over there and drink his?”
“I’m a sucker for tradition.” He smiled up at the waitress as she sidled over with a mug and the coffeepot. “Hi, Luce, I’m going to have the meat loaf sandwich.”
She nodded, noted it down. “Heard you were down at the council meeting this morning. Anything up?”
“Just the usual hot air.”
She snickered, glanced at Jordan. “How about you, big boy?”
When she walked off with their orders, Flynn settled back, twitched his head toward Brad. “So, did you hear that Mr. Bigshot Vane here sent a mile-long limo to pick up his date for dinner last night?”
“No shit? Show-off.”
“It was only half a mile long, and how the hell do you know?”
“Nose for news.” Flynn tapped a finger on the side of his nose. “My sources, however, were unable to confirm if said show-off scored.”
“I took the kid in Smackdown, but he whipped my ass in Grand Theft Auto.”
“Struck out with the mother,” Jordan concluded. “I bet the kid got one large charge out of riding in that limo.”
“He did. So did Zoe. Did you hear what she said the other day? She’s never lain in a hammock?” His face clouded as he took his coffee back from Flynn. “How can somebody go their whole life and never lie in a hammock?”
“And now you want to buy her one so she can lie in it,” Flynn decided.
“I guess I do.”
“Which makes you, let’s see”—Jordan stared at the ceiling—“oh, yes, that would be toast.” Then he sobered. “She’s a terrific woman. She deserves a break, somebody to take some of the weight.”
“Working on it. With your mother, if somebody had come along who was serious about her, would that have bothered you?”
“I don’t know. Nobody ever did—or she didn’t let anybody. I can’t say for sure. I guess it would have depended on who it was, and how he treated her. You that serious?”
“It’s heading that way, for me.”
“That brings us back around,” Flynn commented. “The three of us, the three of them. Pretty damn tidy.”
“Maybe sometimes things are meant to be tidy.”
“I know all about that. I happen to be engaged to the queen of neat. But I think it’s something we have to think about. What part you’re meant to play in this production we’re in,” Flynn stated matter-of-factly.
He let that stew while their sandwiches were served.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” Brad said. “It seems to me most of the clue deals with things that happened to her, or things she did before she met me. But those things brought her here. Then if we assume I’m part of it, those same clues could apply to things that happened to me, or things I did, before I met her. Those things brought me back here.”
“Different paths, same destiny.” Jordan nodded. “It’s a theory. Now your paths have crossed.”
“What you do now, that’s a question,” Flynn put in. “But also where. The goddess with a sword indicates a battle.”
“She won’t be fighting it alone,” Brad promised. “The sword’s sheathed in the paintings. In mine it’s sheathed and placed with her in the coffin, and in the one at the Peak it’s sheathed and at her hip.”
“It’s sheathed in the stone in the portrait Rowena did of Arthur, too. The one I bought,” Jordan added.
“She never had a chance to draw it.” Brad brought the image of the still, white face in the painting into his mind. “Maybe we’re supposed to give her that chance.”
“Maybe Malory should take another look at the paintings,” Flynn suggested. “See if she missed anything. I don’t—”
“Hold that thought,” Jordan told him as his cell phone beeped. He flipped it out, smiled at the number on his read-out. “Hey, Stretch.” He lifted his coffee. “Uh-huh. It so happens my associates are with me in my office at the moment. I can do that,” he said after a minute, then tipped the phone away from his ear.
“Meeting, six o’clock, Flynn’s place. I have nods of assent,” he said into the phone. “That works for me. Zoe’s making chili,” he told his friends.
“Tell Dana to tell Zoe I’ll pick her up.”
“Brad says to tell Zoe he’ll pick her up. We were going to swing by and give you guys a hand this afternoon . . . Okay, I’ll just see you at home, then. Oh, hey, Dane? So, what are you wearing?”
He grinned, then shoved the phone back in his pocket. “Must’ve gotten disconnected.”
WHILE the chili was simmering, Zoe spread her notes and papers over the kitchen table. The house was quiet for a change. It was time to take advantage of it.
Maybe she’d tried to be too organized, mimicking Malory’s style. Or she’d depended too much on books, trying to follow Dana’s lead. Why not try impulse and instinct with this task as she did with other projects?
What did she do when she wanted to pick new paint for the walls, or new fabric for curtains? She spread out a bunch of samples and flipped through them until something popped out at her.
And then she knew.
Here she had her own carefully written notes, copies of Malory’s, of Dana’s. She had Jordan’s detailed flow of events, and the photographs Malory had taken of the paintings.
She picked up
the notebook she’d bought the day after her first visit to Warrior’s Peak. It didn’t look so shiny and new now, she thought. It looked used. And maybe that was better.
There was a lot of work inside this notebook, she reminded herself as she flipped pages. A lot of hours, a lot of effort. And that work, those hours, that effort, had helped both Malory and Dana complete their parts of the quest.
Something in here was going to help her complete her part, and finish it.
She opened the notebook at random, and began to read.
Kyna, the warrior, she’d written. Why is she mine? I see Venora, the artist, in Malory, and Niniane, the scribe, in Dana. But how am I a warrior?
I’m a hairdresser. No, hair and skin specialist—must remember to pump that up. I worked for it. I’m a good worker, but that’s not the same as fighting.
Beauty for Malory, knowledge for Dana. Courage for me. Where does the courage come in?
Is it just living? That doesn’t seem like enough.
Considering, Zoe tapped her pencil on the page, then earmarked it by folding down a corner. She flipped through the section until she came to a blank sheet.
Maybe just living is enough. Didn’t Malory have to choose to live in the real world—sacrificing something of beauty, and Dana had to learn to see the truth, and live with it? Those were essential steps in their quests.
What’s mine?
She began to write quickly now, trying to see the pattern, trying to form one. As the ideas and possibilities clicked in her mind, she wore her pencil down, tossed it aside, and reached for another.
When that went dull, she pushed away from the table to take the pencils to the sharpener.
Satisfied with the points, she stuck one behind each ear and turned to the stove to stir the chili and think.
Maybe she was on the right track, maybe she wasn’t—and she sure as hell couldn’t see the end of the road. But she was moving somewhere, and that was important.
With her mind wandering, she lifted the spoon to taste, then stared at the dull reflection in the range hood.
Her hair was a long spill down her shoulders, adorned with a wide gold band with a dark center stone, diamond-shaped. Her eyes were more gold than brown. Very clear, very direct.
She could see the green of her dress—a dark forest color, and the brown leather of a strap over her shoulder. The silver glint of a sword hilt at her hip.
There were trees, misted with morning, pearly gleams from dewed leaves, wavering beams of early sunlight. And through the trees were paths.
She could feel the smooth wood of the spoon handle in her hand, smell the steam from the simmering pot.
Not a hallucination, she told herself. Not imagination.
“What are you trying to tell me? What do you want me to see?”
The image moved back, so Zoe saw the whole of her—the slim build, the booted feet. For another moment they stood, staring at each other. Then the figure turned, walked through the mist, into the forest, and with a hand on the hilt of her sword, strode down a rough path.
“I don’t know what that means. Damn it.” Frustrated, Zoe rapped a fist against the range hood. “What the hell does that mean?”
With a sharp twist of her wrist, she turned off the burner. She’d just about reached the end of her patience when it came to gods.
BRAD pulled up in Zoe’s driveway a little earlier than he needed to. He imagined men who were riding on that fast wave of love, lust, infatuation—whatever the hell he had—tended to be early to see the women with whom they were obsessed.
It didn’t surprise him to see Zoe step out of the house before he could do more than turn off the ignition. He’d been around her long enough to know she was dependable.
She was also loaded with a backpack, an enormous shoulder bag, and a huge cooking pot.
“Let me give you a hand,” he called as he climbed out of the car.
“I don’t need a hand.”
“Yes, you do, unless you’ve got an extra one stuffed in that bag.” He took the pot, mildly surprised when she tried to tug it back.
“You know, once in a while, it’d be a nice change if you actually listened to what I say.” She yanked open the back door of his big, shiny SUV and tossed the backpack inside. “Even nicer might be if you bothered to ask instead of just ordering, or assuming.”
“Why don’t I just give this back to you.”
She yanked the pot out of his hands, then bent to wedge it on the floor of the back.
“I didn’t ask you to come by here and pick me up. I don’t need to be picked up and hauled around. I have a car.”
Love, lust, infatuation, he thought, they could all be put in the backseat, just like the chili, when irritation took the driver’s seat.
“You were on the way. It didn’t make sense to take two cars. Where’s Simon?”
“He’s having dinner and staying the night with a friend. Should I have checked with you first?” She stormed around the car, then just balled her fists when he beat her there and opened the door for her. “Do I look helpless? Do I look like I can’t figure out how to open a damn door on some fancy car?”
“No.” He slammed it shut. “Go ahead,” he invited, and stalked around to the other side.
He waited until she’d whipped the seat belt across, shoved the buckle into place. “Would you like to tell me what crawled up your ass?” He spoke in the most pleasant tone, the same dangerously pleasant tone his father used when he was about to slice an opponent into small, bloody pieces.
“My ass is my own business, and so are my moods. I’m in a bad mood. I have them. If you think I’m sweet and accommodating and easy to manipulate, you’re mistaken. Now are you going to drive this car, or are we just going to sit here?”
He turned the car on, threw it in reverse. “If you’ve formed the impression that I believe you to be sweet, accommodating, or easy to manipulate, you’re the one who’s mistaken. What you are is prickly, stubborn, and oversensitive.”
“You would think that, wouldn’t you, just because I don’t like being told what to do, how to do it, when to do it. I’m just as capable and as smart as you are. Maybe more, since I didn’t grow up having somebody catering to my every wish and demand.”
“Now just a damn minute.”
“I’ve had to fight for everything I’ve got. Fight to get it,” she snapped out, “and fight to keep it. I don’t need somebody coming along on his white charger, or his limousine, or his big Mercedes, and rescuing me.”
“Who the hell’s trying to rescue you?”
“And I don’t need some—some Prince Charming–looking man coming around trying to get me stirred up either. If I want to sleep with you, I will.”
“Right now, honey, take my word, I’m not thinking about sex.”
She sucked in air and gritted her teeth. “And don’t call me honey. I don’t like it. I especially don’t like it in that snotty private-school tone.”
“ ‘Honey’ happens to be the most polite thing I can currently think of to call you.”
“I don’t want you to be polite. I don’t like you when you’re polite.”
“Is that so? Then you’re going to love this.”
He whipped the car to the curb, ignored the furious blast of horns behind him at the move. He hit the buckle of the seat belt with one hand, grabbed her sweater with the other. He yanked her forward, then knocked her back against the seat again with a kiss that had nothing to do with romance and everything to do with temper.
She shoved, she struggled, she steamed. In those few furious moments, it was her strength pitted against his, and the point was made, brutally, that she was outgunned.
When he released her, snapped his belt back into place, her breath was ragged.
“Fuck Prince Charming.” He swung away from the curb.
No, he didn’t look like a storybook character now, she thought. Unless it was one of those warlord figures who blazed through villages taking exactly what the
y wanted. The kind who dragged a woman up onto his horse and rode away with her while she was still screaming.
“I thought you weren’t thinking about sex.”
He spared her one hot look. “I lied.”
“I’m not going to apologize for the things I said. I’ve got a right to speak my mind. I’ve got a right to be irritable and angry.”
“Fine. I’m not going to apologize for what I just did. I’ve got the same rights.”
“I guess you do. I wasn’t really mad at you. I am now, but I wasn’t. I was just mad in general.”
“You can either tell me why, or not.” He pulled up at Flynn’s. Waited.
“Some things that have happened. I’d rather get into it all with everyone, all at once. I’m not going to apologize,” she said again. “If you keep getting in my way, you’re going to make the handiest target.”
“Same goes,” he said, and got out of the car. “I’m carrying your goddamn pot.” He yanked open the door, hauled it up. “Deal.”
She stared at him, standing there in the brisk fall evening, in his gorgeous overcoat, holding her big stewpot. And looking, she thought, as if he’d just as soon dump the contents over her head as not.
She let the laugh bubble in her throat, then let it out as she retrieved the backpack. “It’s kind of nice, when I’m being a jackass, to have somebody kick and bray right along with me. That pot’s pretty full. Mind you don’t tip it and spill chili on that lovely coat.”
She started toward the door. “Fuck Prince Charming,” she said and laughed again. “That was a good one.”
“I have my moments,” he muttered and followed her inside.
WHEN the chili was simmering on Flynn’s new stove, Zoe looked around the living room. Malory’s touch was everywhere now, she noted. The tables, the lamps, the vases and bowls. The art on the walls or set around the room. There were fabric swatches on the arm of the couch and what looked like antique fireplace tools standing by the hearth.
There was a scent of fall flowers and of female.
Zoe remembered the first time she’d come into this room. Two short months—a lifetime—before. There’d been nothing but the big, ugly couch, a couple of crates standing in for tables, and some boxes yet unpacked.
