HeroRising

by Anna Alexander

  “Why not?”

  He shrugged. “This one suits my purpose.”

  And what purpose was that? “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in anything but a black shirt and jeans. Do you own any item of clothing in a color other than black?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I like black.”

  “Oh.” Great. Okay, so just because he had a penchant for dark clothes that did not mean he was the Claymore. “Let’s go.”

  Bale followed her through the kitchen to the parking lot behind the restaurant. The back-of-the-house staff quieted and gave them a wide berth as they passed.

  “It seems you have gotten quite the reputation around here,” she said.

  A soft grunt was his reply.

  Outside heavy rainclouds darkened the night sky to an inky black that seemed to suck all light into its depths. Rain fell in big, fat droplets that hit the ground so hard, they popped back up to soak you again. It was a mad dash to her car to avoid becoming drenched.

  “And you walked in this?” She wiped at her forehead with her coat sleeve once she settled into the driver’s seat. “Bale, you really don’t have to put yourself out like that.”

  “Seeing to your safety is not putting myself out. I do it with pleasure. If it makes you feel better, the rain wasn’t that bad earlier this evening.” He chuckled. “You’re a Northwesterner now. You better start getting used to the rain.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “It does beat tornados.”

  “I saw one once, a tornado, several months ago when I was traveling through Nebraska. Where I am from, we have tremendous windstorms, but nothing even close to resembling that cyclone. It was a stark reminder of just how fragile humans are and their resiliency to survive.”

  “Well, there’s not a whole lot that can withstand a good F4 or F5 tornado. Did you get caught up in it at all?”

  “I rolled up behind it and was witness to the aftermath. Fortunately the injuries were minor and only a few homes sustained damage…” He trailed off and when she glanced his way, he was staring out the windshield with a faraway look in his eyes.

  “Was it bad?” she whispered, unsure if her question could be heard over the sound of the wipers and rain, but she was afraid to raise her voice any louder.

  He blinked and looked in her direction. “The situation could have been worse.”

  “You were there again, weren’t you? Just now.”

  He nodded. “There was a child. A female with long dark hair. She was trapped inside her home on one side and her parents were trapped on the other. I could not see her, but I could hear her breathing, feel her. She didn’t make a sound even though she was conscious the entire time. She just waited patiently to be rescued as I dug through the rubble. So much courage in a tiny body. She amazed me.”

  “She was lucky you were there to save her.”

  He said nothing, and as her words hung in the air, she felt the truth strike her in the heart that Bale was the Claymore. He saved that little girl, just like he saved her from those two creeps. And if the news stories were true, he saved others as well.

  Again came the question of why, and what was she supposed to do with this information, not to mention the biggest question of all, was he ever going to trust her with this secret?

  As she pulled into the parking garage under The Cavern, her hands shook as she turned off the ignition and climbed out of the car. A confrontation was brewing. It was inevitable. And she had no idea how to proceed.

  Bale was at her side, trapping her against the door with his strong arms. “You were very quiet on the way home.”

  “So were you.”

  “I’m always quiet.”

  “True.” She chuckled, but her smile faded quickly.

  Their breathing was loud in the silent garage as they stood looking into each other’s eyes. Uncertainty flashed behind his dark irises and crinkled his brow, as if he picked up on her nervousness. He probably could for all she knew. She was never very good at hiding her emotions.

  Slowly, ever so slowly, he leaned closer, as if expecting her to bolt or push him away. Both completely sound ideas. Until she heard him confirm that he was the Claymore, it was prudent to keep some sort of distance between them. But the emotion in his gaze unknotted the tie around her convictions. Whatever Bale couldn’t say was in those dark eyes, and it took her breath away.

  She felt like a young schoolgirl caught under the mistletoe for the first time as she waited for his kiss with her heart ready to beat out of her chest.

  The first brush of his lips was butterfly soft. The second pass, a firm press that allowed her to detect the slightest hint of chocolate on his breath. Her eyes fluttered shut as she melted in his embrace, enjoying this moment of closeness before all hell broke loose. Who knew what the next five, ten, thirty minutes might bring, and it killed her to think of never experiencing his touch again if he became angry enough to leave. But there was no way she could carry on without voicing her suspicions.

  Through his rain-dampened clothing she felt the flex of his pectoral muscles under her palms as he wrapped his arms around her waist. She smoothed the fabric over his shoulder then reached up to trail her fingers through his silky hair.

  “Sweet Ariel,” he sighed against her mouth then trailed kisses across her cheek. “Why do I sense so much turmoil within you?”

  “Because I’m a complex woman.” Her grip tightened on his hair, hesitant to part from him for even a second. Reluctantly she let go and took him by the hand. “Can you come up to my place for a minute?”

  “A minute? I was planning on staying most of the night.”

  Most of the night? What else did he have planned for the evening? Walk the streets and look for criminals?

  The ride up in the elevator was silent, as was the walk down the hall.

  “So,” she began as she led them into her apartment, making sure she kept him in her view. “I overheard some customers talking today about that superhero with the big sword.”

  Bale froze. It was a tiny pause so slight she would have missed it if she hadn’t been focused on every aspect of his body language. Although he raised a half-interested eyebrow, she swore she felt his heart kick in his chest.

  “Have you heard or read any of the stories?” she asked when he remained silent.

  “I might have heard something. I don’t pay much interest to local gossip.”

  She shrugged and went to hang up her coat in the closet, trying to play it cool. “Well, it makes a person think, you know? What’s their motivation? If they wanted to stop crime, why not become a cop?”

  “Those are interesting questions.” He stepped closer and pulled her against his body, his head lowering for a kiss.

  “Bale.” She drew far enough away to look him in the eye. “What would make you do something like that?”

  His eyes narrowed, the black slits of his irises glittered with danger. “I don’t understand.”

  “I think you do.”

  “What are you saying, Ari?”

  “I’ve seen the pictures, Bale.” She drew a breath. “I know you’re the Claymore.”

  “Pictures? What pictures?”

  “The ones that are online. The ones that show a man with a sweatshirt and a jacket that looks just like yours. The ones that show a man who looks exactly the way you did the day you stopped those men from jumping me.”

  His fingers dug into the sides of her waist and his eyes opened wide in disbelief. “Where did you see these photos?”

  “I told you, online,” she stammered. For the first time she feared his size as he backed her against the wall.

  “Where online? Why? What were you looking for?” The rapid-fire questions made her flinch with their intensity.

  “I don’t know where. There was a man at work who showed me them on his phone.”

  “What man?”

  “A man. A customer. He asked if I had read the stories.”

  “Why? W
hy would he ask you this?” he shouted. “What exactly did he say to you?”

  “He—” She choked on a cough as her throat constricted. “He asked me if I’d heard the stories or if I’d seen anyone who looked like the man.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I said I work in a bar and see all sorts of people.”

  “And that’s all?”

  “Yes. Now let me go. Please.”

  He gasped and let her go as if she had burst into flame and burned his hands. “I am sorry, Ariel. I didn’t mean to frighten you.” He scrubbed at his face. “I need you to tell me who this man was. What did he look like? Did he give his name?”

  “Marco. He said his name was Marco. Oh my goodness. Is he a bad guy?” The thought never occurred to her that Bale may have a nemesis. Maybe the customer at the bar was a villain the Claymore had been hunting. “Do you have enemies?”

  “Marco?” Bale turned away from her and plunged his fingers through his hair, pulling at the strands with a frustrated growl. “DeWinter. I should have known.”

  He prowled within the confined space of the living room as if she weren’t there, wiping at his face again and emitting sounds of frustration until he bent double and stared at his boots. She held her breath and watched him with eyes so wide, she felt the orbs begin to dry out, but no way was she going to blink and miss his next move. What was going to happen now that he knew she was aware of his secret?

  Just when she thought her heart was going to burst with anticipation, Bale began to laugh, a deep self-deprecating chuckle that was in no way jovial. He shook his head and straightened with a weary sigh.

  “The arrogance of man will always be his downfall,” he said then speared her with a hard look. “And here I foolishly believed I could tell you on my own terms.”

  At least he wasn’t going to insult her by saying she was crazy and deny everything. “I just want to understand why, Bale. Why with the hood and freaky-long sword and the nickname?”

  “I never intended for this.” He circled his arms around in a great arc. “For you, the media, that stupid nickname. None of it.”

  The thought chilled her to the bone, but she had to ask. “Are we through? Now that I know your secret, are we done?”

  “You don’t know,” he whispered, closing his eyes and shaking his head. With a clenched fist, he tapped at his sternum, right over the starburst-shaped tattoo. “You don’t know it all. You don’t know anything. You don’t know about them. Here. Natalia and Emmaline. My wife and child.”

  Wife. Wife? “Oh my God. You’re married?” she shrieked.

  She knew it! She knew everything between them was too good to be true. How could this be happening again? Had she offended God somehow and was doomed to always fall for married men? And a child too? How many lives was she destined to ruin?

  Now she was the one pacing the room with her arms wrapped around her middle and plaintive groans spewing from her mouth.

  “Ari.”

  “Oh God, I’m cursed. I have to be. Why? Why me?”

  “Ari.”

  “How could you?” she shouted. “How could you do that to your family?”

  “Ari, it’s not—”

  “Don’t touch me.” She jumped away from his outstretched hand, but he was faster and caught her around the arms.

  “They’re dead, Ari. They are dead.”

  As his words finally registered her brain stopped with all the subtlety of a car smashing into a brick wall at seventy miles an hour.

  “Oh, Bale.” Heat ignited across her face. “I am so sorry. I-I didn’t know.”

  “I know.” Right before her eyes, the Bale she knew aged. Across his forehead and around his mouth, lines of remembered grief carved into his skin. “I know.”

  Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. This entire day was just one fucking fubar mess. And it seemed as if every time she breathed, she just kept making things worse. She clenched her hands at her sides and pinched her lips together. Maybe if she pretended she were a statue, she could avoid making a bigger ass out of herself.

  “Ah, Ari. I promised myself I wouldn’t make the same mistakes with you as I did with Natalia, yet it seems as if I cannot break the pattern. Please, sit down.” He guided her to the nearest barstool. Once she was perched on the edge, he backed away and ran his hands through his hair.

  As much as she wanted to ask him a million questions, she held her tongue. This was Bale’s story, and she had a feeling very few heard the tale, if any.

  As was his fashion, his mouth opened and closed several times before he spoke. “I was already in the guard when I met Natalia. Her father owned a farm that was in the same colony as my family. We met when I had returned home to share the news of my assignment. As the youngest daughter, her options for marriage were limited, all her father wanted for her was security and felt I would be a good match. Natalia was delicate and sweet. Everything that I am not, and when our Emmaline came along, she was just like her mother, so fragile.”

  The language he used confused and ensnarled Ari at the same time. The way he spoke, it sounded as if he came from the medieval period and not this century. No matter the words, it was obvious by his solemn tone that even though his marriage was arranged, he cared for his wife.

  “They were my light, so bright, so pure.” His stare turned hard. “You have seen my darkness. Know my hungers. Seen my temper. I couldn’t show that around them, share that side of myself with my wife. I— I did not trust her enough to share all of me. I loved her, but was too afraid of what would happen if she knew the real me. So, I sent her and Em to live with my family, visiting when I could, but keeping them as far away from my darkness as possible. And then the revolution began.”

  Revolution? In Sweden? Weren’t they like the happiest people on Earth? “I don’t understand.”

  “Our king had lost favor with the people. First it was rioting, then it became all-out battles to dethrone him. As a member of his guard, I was often dispatched to squelch the opposition.”

  Now she was definitely confused. “Wait, wait, you lost me. How could all of that happen in Sweden and no one over here heard of this? How could that not make the news?”

  “This wasn’t in Sweden. It was in Skandavia.”

  With the way he said that with his head down, as if braced for a blow, scared her to ask, “And where is that?”

  He sighed. “It is the largest of Saturn’s moons.”

  “Saturn?”

  He nodded.

  Did she hear him correctly? “As in the planet?”

  He nodded again.

  She sucked in one breath, then another. The words stuck in her throat until she forced them out. “Are you telling me that you’re an alien from outer space?”

  “Ya.”

  “Okay. I’m not sure if I’m more upset about the fact that you were married and never told me, or that you’re claiming to be an alien.”

  Whoosh. Faster than she could blink, Bale raced around the room in a streak of movement. When he came to a stop, he lifted the couch up over his head without a breath of sound or the slightest grimace before gently setting it back down.

  “Those are some of my powers,” he mumbled.

  Breathe, Ari. Breathe.

  There had been a few times in her life when she had been struck dumb. This was a thousand times worse than all of them put together. It was as if her body were in a coma, yet her brain was wide awake and her eyes open so she could see and hear everything going on around her, yet she couldn’t move.

  “I’ll, um, get to how I came to Earth in a moment,” he said.

  Sure. Fine. Take your time. She might have said it out loud, but she was certain all she managed were a few unintelligible squeaks and a faint nod.

  “The revolutionaries did everything they could to gain the backing of the people, resorting to force if necessary. My retinue received word that several colonies were to be targeted in a massive siege by the opposition, including the castle and my home colony. I wanted
to protect my family and go with the unit that had been dispatched. The soldiers were new, young, and the people of my colony were simple farmers. They knew nothing of war and fighting. But as part of the king’s retinue, my commander forbade me to go. In my gut, I knew all was not well, so I disobeyed the general and left.”

  As his eyes watered, her stomach turned.

  “It was too late.” The catch in his voice broke her heart. “The soldiers that had been sent were all dead in the town square. Every farmhouse was burned to the ground. My father and mother, slaughtered. I found Natalia in the field, her body curled around the babe’s.”

  “Stop. Bale, stop.” She leapt from her seat and laid her hands on his cheeks. In his eyes she saw he was trapped in the past. Seeing his family where they had died all over again. “I don’t need to know the details. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine anything so horrible.”

  “That is why I fight, Ari. To protect those who cannot defend themselves. People like Natalia and my Em. I was too late for them, but I can save someone else. Someone like you.”

  “Wow. Just. Wow. Then how did you get to Earth?” She choked on the word. His story was too much to process.

  He grasped her hands, holding them tight in his. “When my family died, I went to a dark place. A place so dark, you lose your soul. Anger, devastation, nothing comes close to describe how I felt. I wanted to die, but I wanted everyone who I felt had a hand in my family’s deaths to suffer first. Every revolutionary who had remained, I killed. Every soldier who had been there, I tracked and eliminated. No man was left standing but one, my former commander who held me back.”

  “Your commander.” Chills shot down her spine and she tried to pull away, but his grip kept her at his side. “Oh my God. Lucian?”

  “Yes.”

  “You wanted to kill Lucian?” It was all too much. This was a man she thought he considered friend, practically family, and he had wanted him dead?

  “I was beyond devastated and willing to do anything to obtain my goal. When I heard there was a contract out on Lucian’s life, I took it.”

  “You took money to kill? Like a hit man?”

  “That’s what I was. That’s how I earned enough money to survive and have my revenge. I was an assassin.”