Gathering Storm (20 page)

He smirked. “I didn’t bang
anybody, did I? What difference does it make?”

“The difference it makes
is that Storm is serious minded. He wasn’t into random flirting
when he was single! And that goes triple for now that he’s not!
Didn’t you notice how shocked those girls looked?”

Angel shrugged his
shoulders and rolled his eyes, which just looked ridiculous on
Storm.

“Serious minded. Didn’t flirt even when he
was single. Sounds like a douche to me.”

Before he could say, “Oops,” Angel found
himself slammed against a wall with the Lady Laiken’s one-handed
iron grip around his throat.

“You’re not even worthy of
saying his name out loud. Let me tell you something about the guy
you will never hold a candle to. I don’t think anybody else in the
history of Black Swan could have made a respectable team with an
alien woman, a hotheaded fun lover, and a berserker to work with.
He’s a great man. And you? You’re just the stuffing in an animated
Storm costume.”

Angel sneered at
that.
Ball bustin’
bitch
. But he felt something inside his
chest squirm uncomfortably and the muscles in his jaw flexed
painfully. For a split second he wondered what it would be like to
have people care that much about him, what it would be like to be
admired and respected and… loved.

She released him, looking
disgusted and like she’d rather be anywhere else.

When Angel was deposited
at the vineyard that night, Elora’s words were still eating at
him.
You’re just the stuffing in a Storm
costume.
He was tired in body and spirit
and mostly just wanted to be left alone. He took his plate to the
living room and ate watching TV instead of in the kitchen with
Litha and Rosie.

After Rosie was bathed and
ready for bed, she went into the living room to say goodnight to
the guy who looked a little like her daddy. Litha was bone tired,
but still had every day chores to do. She was busy putting laundry
away when she heard Angel yell out.

She ran down the hallway
to find him on his feet cursing a blue streak.

Litha grabbed Rosie up. “What is the matter
with you? This is a child.”

He gaped. “That is
not
a child! Children
don’t burn you when you reach out to pull their hair.” Litha
narrowed her eyes and her nostrils flared. “Playfully! Pull their
hair
playfully
!”

“I was just gonna say good
night,” Rosie said to Litha in her own defense.

“Yeah. Me, too. I reached
out to tug at the end of her hair and she burned the living
daylights out of me.”

“Let me see.” He showed it
to Litha. Rosie’s little handprint appeared in a bright red perfect
outline on his forearm. “Okay. Come with me.”

He followed them into the
kitchen. Litha pulled out a barstool and told him to sit while she
got ice and aloe out of the cabinet, but he watched Rosie the whole
time.

“What is she?” he asked.

“Special,” was all Litha said.

“Yeah. I can see that.”

“I’m sorry.” Rosie offered
Angel an olive branch, more with big eyes than words.

“You didn’t do anything
wrong, Rosie,” Litha assured her. “You should always follow your
instincts if you think someone might hurt you.”

Angel was indignant and
gaping. “What are you teaching her?!? No wonder she’s a little
demon seed!” He was looking for a fight at that point and expected
his comment to inflame, but instead, Rosie beamed at him and her
mother was unfazed.

“What I’m teaching my child is none of your
business.”

“It is when it raises
third degree welts on my skin. There
is
somebody in this room who didn’t
do anything wrong.” He looked at Rosie. “And it’s me!”

Rosie giggled at him,
which sort of felt like the last straw to a tired and distraught
accidental traveler.

“Look. I don’t want to be
here. I want to go back where I belong.” As soon as the words left
his lips he knew it was a lie, one of the biggest he’d ever
told.

That’s the last thing I
want.

“Well, you’re stuck with
us for now,” Litha said quietly as she smoothed aloe on his burn
and secured an ice pack over it.

Angel went to bed right
after, every single muscle aching, many he hadn’t known he
possessed. The big guy was merciless. Kay. Stupid name for a man.
He pushed Angel like he was training for a prize fight with billion
dollar stakes. And there was no doubt in Angel’s mind that Kay was
enjoying his pain. It might not be so bad if he didn’t know he was
going to be expected to get up the next day and do it
again.

Stuck with us for
now.
That was when, in the moments before
he was claimed by sleep, the thought occurred to Angel that maybe
he didn’t have to go back to his debts, to Baph’s knife, and the
nobody who gave a fuck if he lived or died. Correction. There
probably were some who would prefer he died.

Maybe the other Storm
wouldn’t be back and, maybe, if he actually applied himself and
acted like he gave a shit, he could step into the sweet life this
other Storm had lucked into.
And the
regard of all these people who think he shits liquid
gold.

Right after Litha put Rosie down for the
night, the doorbell rang. She looked through the glass and saw that
it was her mother-in-law. While a range of curse words had a play
day in her head, Litha called out, “Just a minute”, through the
door. She ran down the hallway to the guest room and knocked.

Angel was in bed. He was
still awake with a reading light on, bare chested, just wearing
pajama bottoms. He was also too tired to get up, so he and his
dragon tattoo stayed right where they were. “Yeah?”

She opened the door. “My mother-in-law is
here. I need you to stay quiet and stay out of sight.”

“Unless you can hear my snoring from down
the hall, that won’t be a problem.”

Litha shut the door and
ran back to let Storm’s mom in. When she opened the door, the older
woman said, “I’m sorry to come so late, but you’re never here and I
was getting worried.”

“And you haven’t seen the
baby in a while.” She got a smile and a nod in response. “Come in.
Let’s open a bottle of the good Chardonnay and have a
talk.”

Litha suggested they sit
in the living room and promised to be right back. She poured two
glasses.

As she offered her
mother-in-law one of them, Litha said, “Evangeline”.

Storm’s mother went by
Eva, but Litha thought her name was too beautiful and romantic to
abbreviate. It was also gratifying that Eva smiled just a little
whenever she heard her given name.

“We need to have a
heart-to-heart.” Eva looked concerned, but nodded. “Storm and I
both have some secrets.” Eva grew very still. “As it happens our
secrets are related to your secrets.”

Litha watched Eva’s
reaction carefully. She broke eye contact with Litha then her eyes
wandered downward to her wine which she suddenly seemed to find
fascinating. She took a sip and waited.

“Before I go further, I
must have your promise on Storm’s life that you will never tell
what you hear tonight.”

Eva looked worried. “Yes. Of course. What’s
wrong, Litha?”

“I’m not joking. Not
anyone. Ever. For any reason.”

“I promise.”

Litha took in a deep breath. “You know that
Storm is…”

“Special,” Eva interrupted
as she stood abruptly. “He’s special. I shouldn’t have come so
late. I need to go.” She bent to set her wine glass on the table
and started to gather her purse.

“Eva. I know you don’t
want to talk about this, but you can’t see Rosie again until it’s
settled. I’m not being arbitrary or mean. There are really good
reasons.”

Storm’s mother sucked in a
ragged breath like she’d been slapped. Litha wished she could spare
the woman the conversation because she looked like a wound had just
been opened. It was clear that it was difficult, but she sat back
down and reached for the wine glass. It was clear she wanted to see
Rosie more than she wanted to keep her skeletons in the
closet.

“I’m so glad you decided
to stay. I’m not here to judge or blame. And you can feel safe
because I can’t betray your secret. Not without doing the same
thing to my family.” Eva looked curious and seemed to relax just a
little. “I know your husband isn’t Storm’s father.”

Eva blinked rapidly, but
it didn’t stop her eyes from filling to overflowing. She reached
for her purse and withdrew a delicate monogrammed white
handkerchief. That, in itself, amazed Litha because she didn’t
think those were even being made anymore. As Eva lifted the corner
of the hanky to her tear duct, she said, “Does Storm
know?”

Litha hadn’t known Storm’s
mother long enough to love her, but she certainly liked her and
wished that she could spare her that discomfort. “Yes. He does,”
she said quietly.

Eva’s face didn’t crumple. She drew her
shoulders back as if she was trying to bolster emotional strength
with physical support.

“The thing is,” Litha
continued, “my father is like Storm’s father. And that means your
granddaughter is even
more
special.”

Eva’s eyes widened a
little and Litha saw that she was starting to prepare herself for
anything. “How?”

“Birdie?” A little voice said from the
hallway.

Both women turned to see a
beautiful little girl in a white nightgown standing in the archway
that served as a living room partition. One look at Rosie answered
Eva’s question about ‘how’ special. She had Litha’s unusual eyes
and wild curly hair, but the rest of her was pure Storm. Eva saw a
feminine version of the child her son had been: his nose, his
mouth, his chin, his expression of concern. She was so overcome
with both shock and emotion that she let out a little hiccup of a
sob.

Rosie instantly trotted over and climbed
into her grandmother’s lap. “What’s wrong, Birdie?”

Eva covered fast and
brilliantly. “I’ve just missed not seeing you. That’s all.” Eva
circled her arms around Rosie and laughed through her tears. “How
did you know I wanted you to call me Birdie?”

“Because you said so when
I was a baby. You said that’s what you called your Gran and it
would be nice to be Birdie.”

Eva looked at Litha. “So where’s Storm?”

“For half his life you’ve known that there
are some questions he can’t answer.”

She smiled. “Yes. He’s special.”

Litha grinned. “He
certainly is.” She looked at Rosie. “We both think so.” She looked
back at Eva. “But now I see he didn’t get his specialness from just
his father.”

Later, when Litha opened
the door to bid her guest good night, Eva turned and said, “Did you
know that Storm is my favorite?”

“I suspected as much, but that secret is
just as safe with me.”

“Thank you, Litha. Isn’t
Elora Rose just… perfection?”

Litha laughed. “We think so.”

At noon the next day,
Angel continued his game of ordering something for lunch that he
didn’t think the kitchen would be able to produce. But when it
arrived, instead of eating, he kept falling asleep while Glen was
talking. Glen decided to let it go because he knew Kay and Elora
were being merciless in their training. He smiled to himself
suspecting that, maybe subconsciously, they needed to prove that no
clone could measure up.

After a few days he was
staying awake through lunch and seemed to be halfway interested in
Glen’s briefing on B Team and Storm’s relationships with the other
knights.

He’d also reached an accord with Rosie, who
by then resembled a nine-year-old.

Glen gave Angel a homework
assignment. He was supposed to read the account of the founding of
The Order of the Black Swan. That night after dinner, Rosie asked
Angel if he would read her a story before bedtime.

He started to say no, but
then saw an opportunity to multitask. He had to read the thing
anyway. He might as well get credit for being a syrup-hearted suck
up and read it out loud to the kid. Another upside was that, after
boring her beyond belief, she’d never ask him to read to her
again.

Litha was well aware of the
subject matter and knew the content would be highly inappropriate
for any
other
nine-year-old, but Rosie wasn’t like anybody else.

“Rosie, that story is
about vampire and part of it is very, very sad. Are you sure that’s
the kind of story you want to hear tonight?”

Her little head jerked
toward Angel. She studied his eyes like she could see right through
him, then turned back to her mother and nodded. “I do want to hear
it.”

So Angel settled on the
living room sofa and began. “In the year 1458 there was a Count who
lived happily with his wife…” As the story progressed, Rosie had
come closer and closer until she was leaning against his arm. There
was a part of him that knew he needed to shrug her off and make her
move for his own protection. There was a part of him that knew
that, if he let her stay there cuddled up against his arm, he was
going to feel something and be sorry for it.