Guarding Grayson (5 page)

She eyed the glass, then his beer, then began to tip the glass up the way he had the bottle.

"No!" Gray reached forward in warning. "You'll spill it all over yourself."

But E'ea used centrifugal energy to spin the water out in a slender stream, and into Brynne's waiting mouth. She swallowed several times, and then set the glass down, sighing. "Ah, that is better. Brynne's body feels satisfied for the moment."

She looked around the kitchen, scanning the equipment, storage space, available places to shelter, and the danger zones such as thin brittle windows, easily opened door and sharp objects. "Nutritional preparation requires a great deal of effort for your people, as well as storage space. Do you procure food materials daily?"

Gray set the empty enchilada container on the table and shoved back his hair, which hung to his collar in blond disarray. "Not every day. I'll need to shop tomorrow."

She nodded. "Ah, you will gather your food staples from a storage facility?"

"Grocery store." He drained his beer, and then crossed his arms and regarded her.

"I will accompany you." Numerous other humans would no doubt be present. The assassin could disguise as one of them.

Gray gave her a look. "Not unless you've got a suitcase or two out on the porch. You can't go out in public wearing just my shirts. And with your hair all..." He twirled his fingers next to his own head, grimacing at Brynne's hair, which was now cleaner, but still not in its normal state. "What happened, they toss you in the weeds, or something?"

It was true, E'ea was uncertain she would be able to cleanse the detritus from Brynne's hair, even with repeated washings.

But he was asking for more crucial information. "Grayson, are you certain you want to know the details of Brynne’s fate?"

He scowled at her. "Of course I want to know. I thought you were
dead
. Ever since that night I've believed you drove your car off the road at Dead Drop cliff and into the lake. Too deep to get down and there and pull you and your car out—but the marks were there where a car went over—not to mention your bumper laying there on the verge, so we all knew you went in there."

He closed his eyes, shaking his head, and made a visible effort to calm himself. "Just ... tell me what you did. And why you'd let me—and everyone else—believe you were dead."

"Very well. I will show you. Not here, though. Let us move to your soft-surfaced furnishings."

"You mean the sitting room? Why?"

"So that if you become faint, your skull will not strike the hard surface of your kitchen floor. That might cause an injury to you, and I am already quite occupied healing Brynne's body. I do not wish to add healing you to my task. It may consume more energy than I can spare." Especially with a battle coming.

Gray shook his head. “I’m not gonna faint. Not some fragile emo dude.”

“Nevertheless.”

He followed her into the sitting room, and sat where she gestured, on his Gran's sofa, a faded, burgundy apparatus that sagged in the middle. When E'ea perched beside him, she had to balance to keep from tipping into his lap. Gray leaned back and waited, his cynical look saying he expected her to speak again, and that he would not believe her.

Thus, she must do more than speak. She tucked her rapidly drying hair behind one delicate ear and looked him in the eyes. "Gray-son, Brynne is resting. She will remain so until I have ascertained she is healed enough to wake. But I have accessed all her memories. Now, instead of attempting to convince you any longer, I will take you into her memories of the night she died."

He looked even more skeptical. "Really? And how're you gonna do that?"

"Like this, Gray-son."

Reaching out slowly, she placed one of Brynne's slim hands on his forehead, palm flat. Under the hot, silky layer of his hair and skin, his skull was hard. She sent energy deeper, opened a conduit between Brynne and herself, and then Grayson.

She couldn't convince him by speaking, so she would show him.

Brynne’s memories were like finding himself in a garden made of Chihuly glass formations—beautiful, fanciful and glittering with dangerous, breakable shards.

Through her eyes, Gray stared at himself. Is that really how she saw him?

He stood in the open front door of his house, lamplight pouring out behind him, gilding him with light until he looked like that dude who played Thor, all master of his castle. He wore dark jeans, boots and a gray dress shirt, the sleeves pushed up over his forearms. His hair was shoved behind his ears, and he wore the gray diamond ear stud he’d bought with his first commission.

His arms were crossed over his chest, and he was … hell, he was sneering at her, his eyes glittering with displeasure. ‘Not a good look, dude’, Gray wanted to tell himself, except that Brynne’s emotions were battering at him.

She was a tumult of anger and despair, swelling until she could no longer contain them. Tears were flowing, along with words she normally never allowed herself to say.

“I’m done, Gray,” she screamed at him from her stance in the middle of the sweep of pavement in front of his garage. “I am through, do you hear me? Through trying to please you. I’ve done everything to make us work, and you … you’ve done nothing. The great Grayson Stark, a law unto himself. Living alone because no one else is good enough to share his exalted world. You don’t need a woman, you need a—a robot.”

“Is that what you were trying to be?” Gray’s old self said. “Gotta say, you’re well on the road to success, babe. Which is why we don’t work, and never will. Christ, Brynne—no real man wants a woman who twists herself into a knot trying to be what he wants. Learn to be yourself, and then find a man who wants the real you. Maybe I would’ve liked her, if I’d ever had the chance to meet her and not a plastic facade.”

His words slashed deep, tearing like blades through the thin veneer of her self-worth, until she was reduced to the old Brynne—shy, chubby and tongue-tied. Brynne shook her head, and retreated, bumping against the side of her little Toyota sedan.

“Oh, I hope you meet your real woman,” she said, her voice thick with tears. “I hope you do. And I hope she treats you exactly the way you’ve treated me—like you’re not good enough. Like you’ll never be enough man for her. And then you’ll really be alone, Grayson Stark.”

He said something else, but she didn’t hear him through the cacophony in her head—sobbing breaths, old voices and over them all the words he’d said to her earlier that evening, after they said goodbye to the other two couples who’d been there for the dinner she’d prepared.

“Brynne, we need to talk. I can’t keep doing this with you. It’s not working for me.” That's what he'd said to her—her dream man. Her one and only.

She flung herself into her car, pressed the ignition, backed around in a screech of tires and protesting motor, and then hit the gas pedal, barreling away down his dark driveway, racing down through the trees, skidding around the twists and turns in his disgusting excuse for a driveway. Not caring for once that the pretty little Camry she’d worked so hard to buy was going to be scraped on the rocks, bumps and the tree she scraped when she hit the paved road at the bottom of the hill and accelerated out onto without even looking for other cars.

Gray’s deep voice blended with the wine she’d drunk and the other voices from her past that were always reminding her she had to be better, slimmer, prettier, happier. Her father, Gray, and too many others in between.

‘You’re not good enough, Brynne … not good enough for me to stay with you and your mom … not good enough to be my date for the prom … not good enough to be my girlfriend … … not good enough.”

She was out on the road, tears streaming down, blinding her so that the eerie glow around the bend in the road didn’t register at first, until she drove around the steep turn and the glow expanded, turned acid bright and green and so bright she was blinded, didn’t know where the road was, and her car was swerving the wrong way, thumping over something that wasn’t the road and then sailing out—too smooth and easy, this wasn’t road it was thin air—and then down, down, down and she opened her mouth on a thin wail of terror as she realized what was happening. The air bag smacked her in the face, thumping the back of her head hard against the seat and dazed, all she could do was lie there, panting shallowly as water glugged and bubbled around the car and she sank down, down into cold darkness.

“No,” she whimpered as icy water flooded in around her. “No … Gray. Gray … “

"No! Brynne, no!" Gray opened his eyes and sucked in air with a huge gasp, shoving himself off the sofa.

He was halfway across the living room before he came back to himself. He stared around him at the small, familiar room full of happy childhood memories—photos of him with his family, all of them smiling, and had to brace his hands against the wall to stay on his feet.

“Brynne,” he choked, sorrow and guilt flooding him until his chest ached with the effort of holding it in. “Oh, my God. She was so goddamn fragile … such a freaking mess.”

He shoved himself upright and turned, swiping at his wet eyes as he stared at the slender, pretty woman still perched on the sofa.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, meaning it more than he’d meant anything in a long time. He’d been a royal shit to her. Gah, so self-righteous as he told her to
be herself
, like he had any idea who she really was, or what she'd gone through to become the woman she thought she had to be to hold onto him.

And meanwhile, she’d really believed she was in love with him.

“I’m certain you are sorry,” Brynne’s inhabitant said in her flat voice. “But I am not Brynne. Perhaps you can speak with her again tomorrow, and say this to her.”

Gray dropped into the armchair across from the sofa and stared at her—them with new eyes.

“You really aren’t Brynne,” he muttered. “You really are a—a guardian.” And she’d taken him inside Brynne’s memories, inside her heart. Her fragile, wounded heart, still so ready to give.

He gave a deep shuddering sigh and scrubbed his hands over his eyes. “So … why are you here again?”

“To save you both.”

"You saved her." He fumbled for words. "But … how did you … how did you do it?"

"Bring her back to life?"

"Yeah, that."

"I used my energy. Beings of my race are able to interface our energy with more … primitive beings and affect your life force. More than that, I will not say."

"Afraid we'll use it?" he muttered, a shaft of dark humor puncturing his gloom.

She gave him a dry look.

“No. I am not concerned about you or other humans using the method, because you do not have the capabilities, nor will you at any time in the foreseeable future. Cloning and cyborg tech, yes. Re-animation, no.”

CHAPTER SIX

Gray opened his eyes and stared blankly. Where was he? Flowered pillowcase and sheets, walls of soft apricot, and a nightstand with a clock, a small bronze of a Navaho woman and a paperback mystery. Oh, right, his Gran’s house in Magic.

He stretched and then grimaced. Man, that had been one helluva nightmare. Good to wake and realize it wasn’t real after all ... Then memory flooded back and he dropped his head face first into the pillow and groaned. Wrong—it was real, and it had happened.

But how had he gotten to bed? The last thing he remembered was sitting on the sofa in the sitting room, his mind reverberating with shock, horror and grief as Brynne’s alien took her hand away after dropping him into the deep end of Brynne’s memories of the night she died.

Brynne. She was here, in this house … unless she’d disappeared as suddenly as she came.

He sat up, tossed back the covers and bolted to his feet. At least he was still clothed in jeans and tee, and his socks. He padded into the hallway, listening carefully. Quiet.

He walked to the door of the spare room, but it was empty, then turned back toward the sitting room. She was there, on the sofa … or over it, anyway. Gray froze in mid-yawn, the hair standing up on the back of his neck.

Brynne sat cross-legged, hands on her thighs in a yoga pose, her eyes closed.
Floating, several inches above the sofa.

Okay, then. He was still in the weird zone, and it had all happened, the night before, just the way he remembered it.

“Good morning, Gray-son,” his visitor said, opening her eyes. She sank gracefully to the sofa and rose to her feet, facing him. She looked different, more rested, with more color in her complexion. Which was when Gray noticed the other thing different about her.

“Holy crap. You cut your—her hair,” he said, staring at her in disbelief.  Brynne’s silky, past-shoulder-length hair had been whacked until nothing was left but short layers around her face and head.

“Does it not appear normal?” She asked, her hands fluttering up, then back down.

It looked fine, in fact it looked kind of pretty, looping up in loose curls that revealed her dainty earlobes and the line of her throat, and emphasized her big brown eyes. Brynne had spent the better part of an hour each morning taming her hair into a silky, straight swathe. And Gray had loved messing it up, running his hands through it, especially when he—no, not going there.

“It looks … short,” he said. “Really short.”

“I was unable to free the foreign matter from the tangles,” she said. “So I thought it best to simply remove the damaged portions. I accessed a human hair fashion site for information on how to proceed. However, if Brynne is unhappy, I calculate it will return to its former length in nine or ten of your lunar months. Will that be satisfactory?”

Gray shook his head. “Oh, no. Don’t ask me. Far be it from me to predict a woman's reaction to that kind of thing. But I’m betting on very unhappy.”

Gah, he needed caffeine. He yawned and shoved his own hair back, eyeing her dubiously. “I need a shower. Think you can stay out of trouble for that long? No more major revisions to Brynne, no other kind of mayhem.”

She nodded gravely, somehow managing to impart the dignity of an ambassador in foreign environs. “I will endeavor to stay out of trouble, Gray-son. And you should definitely utilize your cleansing unit. As you humans say, ‘You stink’.”

“Touché. I’ll clean up, and then feed you—or the two of you.”

He showered in record time, shoved his hair behind his ears and pulled on a clean Henley tee of faded red and a pair of clean jeans and went back to the kitchen.

Brynne-E’ea had her head in the frig and her sexy—if currently too skinny—ass sticking out at him, her bare legs on display below the hiked up hem of his tee, and the lower curve of one ass cheek. Desire hit him low in the gut like one of her soft hands skimming down his belly and grabbing his stiffening cock.

He reached down to adjust himself in his suddenly too-snug jeans, wincing. Okay, remember the way she’d looked when she got here—death warmed over. Yeah, that worked, sending a shudder through him that was the opposite of sexy.

“Hungry?” he asked, reaching into the cupboard for the bag of designer roast coffee he’d been lucky enough to find in Roswell. If there was one thing North-Westerners were picky about, it was their coffee. Had to be strong and dark.

“Yes, extremely,” his guest said, straightening with a jar in her hand. “Where is an eating utensil?”

Gray grimaced as he saw what she held. “Ugh, don’t eat that. Mayonnaise is for sandwiches. We don’t eat it for breakfast, and especially not straight out of the jar—that’s disgusting.”

E’ea looked puzzled. “But it is full of calories and the nutritional content is clearly displayed.”

Gray took the jar and shoved it back in the frig. “Just take my word for it, okay? Sit down, I’ll fix you some eggs.”

“The fowl embryos? Regrettably, they have been consumed. Brynne was hungry in the night.”

Gray raised his brows at her, then looked around the clean kitchen. “Okay. How’d you cook them? You did cook them, right?”

“It was not necessary. They were quite easy to consume in their natural state.”

Gray swallowed, nearly gagging. There had been at least half a dozen eggs in the carton. The idea of Brynne slugging down that many raw eggs—he couldn’t picture it. Didn’t want to picture it.

“Yeah, well don’t eat them raw again,” he told her, moving on to fill the coffee pot under the tap. “You—I mean we humans can get sick that way. We mostly have to cook our protein.”

“Another reason this mayonnaise is a useful food. It is already chemically heat-altered.”

Gray didn’t bother to answer that. He hit start on the coffeemaker, which luckily he’d remembered to pick up at the big grocery-homewares store on the way here. Gran’s had been old the last time he visited, and he’d tossed it in the trash his first day here, along with some ancient spices and box mixes of rice and pasta.

“There is also this substance,” E’ea said, and Gray turned just in time to see the bottle of tequila he’d bought for margaritas slip from the cupboard into her hand. She opened the lid and inhaled, then closed her eyes. “Mm-mm, it smells delicious. It reminds me of … twilight on my planet. Yes, that is it.”

Gray grabbed the bottle from her just before she got the lid off. “Yeah, well, you let Brynne drink this, it’ll remind you of nightie-night time, all right. You stay out of this bottle, got it?”

She gave him a reproachful look. “But why? Your alcohol contains many calories and is responsible for much weight gain among your people. Also, I want it.” She reached for the bottle.

Gray held it out of her reach, moving away. “No. Now, listen. Tequila is a very potent alcohol. And Brynne’s slender. She can’t metabolize much of the stuff. You’ve heard of alcohol, so haven’t you heard of being drunk? Schnockered, buzzed, wasted …?”

His guest tipped her head and frowned in concentration. Then she nodded once. “Very well, I perceive you are correct. But I am sad. I did so want to taste twilight.”

“No twilight for you, not that kind.” About time he got to say no to her. “Anyway, you’re, uh, made of light, right? Why would you want to ‘taste’ twilight? That’s the dark.”

She pondered this. “How to explain to a human … it is because we are made of light. Light is energy, movement and life. But it uses our resources, which we must replenish. Twilight means a time when we can rest, sink into stasis. It is … peace. Sweet and rejuvenating. Only it smells rather like your teh-keel-ah. And like you, sometimes those of my race come to crave that peace too much. If we spend too long in the twilight, we never rise to the light again.”

“Huh. Okay.” Instead of alcoholics, they had twilight-oholics. Gray shoved the bottle in the high cupboard over the fridge, peered into the fridge itself, then moved to the cupboard for bowls, spoons and the granola. “I need groceries. Especially if you’re gonna keep feeding Brynne this way.”

“I calculate her body is under-nourished by at least ten percent for her height, age, build and genetic heritage. To recover fully from the trauma of her death, she will need high calorie, nutrition packed food items. Also, she loves cheese-burg-erzz. I do not know what that is, but you should procure her some as soon as possible.”

“Right.” Gray poured himself a mug of coffee and took a grateful sip, then another. Ah, that was better. It was hot, dark and bitter, just the way he needed it.

He turned to the table, and found Brynne-E’ea already seated, her gaze on the granola she was pouring.

He set his mug down and snagged the box from her grasp. “Whoa,” he said, eyeing her brimming bowl. “Brynne wouldn’t eat that much—wait, never mind. Knock yourself out. You’re right, she can stand to gain a few pounds.” He handed her the milk.

He sat, glugging coffee and watching as she shoveled in granola with the determination and enthusiasm of a child. If this kept up, she was going to gain weight in no time. And add some killer curves to Brynne’s body. He imagined that, and then her reaction to that, and grinned inwardly.

Then he remembered how obsessive she was about her appearance and everything else, and his humor fled.

“So how long are you planning on sticking around?” he asked, scowling into his own bowl.

She drained the milk from the bottom of her bowl by funneling it in a tidy stream into her open mouth, then licked her lips and sighed. “I do not know. This morning I will reconnoiter the area to determine the points of greatest vulnerability and ascertain whether intrusion has already been attempted.”

“Intrusion?”

“Yes, by your intended assassin.”

Gray nearly chocked on his first mouthful of granola and milk. He managed to swallow somehow, and then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, staring at her.

“Assassin,” he repeated.

She nodded. “Yes.”

“So … whoever trashed my studio did follow me here? Shit, we need to get you—I mean, Brynne out of here, and to the sheriff’s office.”

She shoved him back into his chair with a move of her hand. “No, Gray-son. The sheriff cannot assist us in this.”

“Oh, not you too,” he said in disgust. “If we’ve got hitmen after us, I think the law is the best equipped to deal with them. You may be able to push people around with your powers, but not sure that will stop a bullet or a knife. And keep in mind you’re using my girlfriend’s body here.” His ex-girlfriend, but whatever. He just wanted Brynne safe.

“Oh, the assassin will not use one of your weapons. It would not be necessary.”

“You think I’m that big of a wimp?”

“Wimp—human slang for a weak and cowardly being. No, Gray-son, I do not believe you are a wimp. You are a strong, virile specimen of human maleness. But you are no match for a being who can do this—among other things.

She pointed at the refrigerator, and it creaked and then rose off the floor, bumping gently into the cupboard above it. As Gray stared, it settled back with a rattle of the contents.

“Now picture that, and other even larger objects flying through your air at high speeds, on command. How would you foil such an attack?"

“Think I need more coffee,” Gray muttered. He shoved his chair back, went to refill his cup and leaned against the counter as he sipped.

“Okay,” he said after he’d drunk half a cup. “Hit me—with information, I mean. Not with the toaster or something.”

She cocked her head and then made a strange sound—kind of a snorting gargle. “You have made a humorous statement, called a joke.”

Gray stared at her. That had been a laugh? He tried to imagine Brynne’s reaction if she heard herself making that sound, and chuckled behind his mug. She snorted again, looking very pleased with them both.

“You were gonna explain?” he reminded her. He was not—repeat
not
—getting sucked into any warm fuzziness here with Brynne. Option one, she was being inhabited by an alien who glowed and had kinetic powers like a giant magnet, or option two, he and she were both nuts—either way, he couldn’t see this ending well.

She nodded again. “Yes. As you know, your paintings have angered someone very dangerous.”

“Yeah, I think I got that. Ivan Bondar wants me to stop painting, Rico Fenretti wants me to stop painting, etcetera.”

“No, Gray-son. Your paintings served only as a marker, to draw attention to you. Your aggressors don’t wish you to stop painting—they wish you to stop living.”

He’d figured that, what with the speed and secrecy the FBI agents had moved him here, but hearing it again, and from her, made it more real. “Well, Fenretti can afford some top hitmen,” he muttered.

She shook her head. “I do not know of this Fenretti. The beings who want you dead, and your line ended, are Taurian.”

“What the hell’s a Tah-ree-an?”

“They are a race of intelligent, aggressive, and warlike beings who will, in your future, wish to take over a certain planet. A planet much like your Earth, which will be called Frontiera. A planet which, if all goes well, one of your great-great many times removed progeny will help to settle for the Inter-Galactic Alliance, a peaceful organization of planets engaged in trade.”