Dancing on the Wind (43 page)

“I am not so sure,” Roland disagreed. “I saw the hunger in her eyes as she healed

those who came to her.”

“It was simply a desire to help, not a true calling,” Matty reiterated. “Besides, her

mother isn’t about to allow her to continue making a spectacle of herself.”

Roland laid the atlas in his lap. “No, she would keep her daughter locked in a

prison for the remainder of her days. What a waste.”

“A very expensive, lush prison,” Matty said. “I, for one, won’t mind living in such a

place.”

“Where you will have the research laboratory promised you,” Roland accused.

“Don’t forget the bankrolling,” Matty said with a grin. “A well-equipped lab and all

the personnel I’ll ever need. What more could I ask for?”

“Spoken like a man who has never had his freedom curtailed,” Roland replied.

“Being permanently confined to the island may prove to be more than you bargained

for, Matty.” He plucked at the iron collar. “Not to mention having to wear these.”

Matty threw out a dismissive hand. “A small price to pay, and I intend to come up

with a better solution than these cumbersome collars. When Keenan arrives, I don’t

want her to be bothered by this uncomfortable clunker.”

Roland laid aside the atlas, seemingly no longer interested in knowing where he

would be hiding from the prying eye of the Exchange.

“I hope things work as you wish for them to, my friend,” Roland told Matty.

“They will,” Matty said. “Trust me, they will.”

* * * * *

Dr. Fitzroy came out of Fallon’s room and informed the women they could go back

in. “I want him to rest though. I gave him a shot of tenerse so he is fairly relaxed. Make

him understand the less he tries to speak, the better.”

“Easier said than done,” Keenan stated.

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“May I have a few moments alone with him, Keenan?” Fallon’s mother asked.

“Then I must leave. I know he will be in good hands here.”

“Sure, go ahead,” Keenan said.

“I know from a long association with him that he is a stubborn man,” the surgeon

said wryly. “His convalescence is not going to be an easy one.”

“You think he’ll be all right down on the Island?” she asked.

“We’ve done all we can for him,” Dr. Fitzroy said. “The rest is up to his hellion.” He

put a hand on her shoulder. “The catheter and feeding tube can come out tomorrow,

and I’ll take the bandage off his eyes then as well. The IV will remain in for a few more

days. He can take Sustenance through a straw.”

“But he’s going to heal as good as new?” she asked.

“Oh yes. It will take awhile for all the broken bones to knit properly—the leg will be

the last to heal since the bones in it were shattered and the kneecap destroyed—but I’d

say in six to eight more weeks for his leg. We will need to keep him in a wheelchair for

at least two weeks then on crutches for two more then a cane should suffice until the

healing is done.”

“He’s not going to be happy about being in a wheelchair,” she said.

“He doesn’t have any choice. If he tries to put weight on that leg, he’ll realize the

truth of the matter soon enough.”

Madame Gregorovich came out of Fallon’s room, wiping a tear from her eye. She

gave Keenan a wavering smile, a quick hug, then all but ran down the corridor.

“Make him understand that he needs to rest,” the surgeon said. “He’s going to want

to get up and flit about, but be stern with him.”

“Yes sir,” Keenan said, bracing herself for the battle of wills to come.

“Good girl,” Dr. Fitzroy said then ambled away.

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Keenan put her hands on the heavy hospital room

door and pushed it open.

He did not turn his face toward her as she came to his bed. He lay so still that had

she not known he was awake, she would have believed him unconscious again. His

hands were clenched tightly into the sheet covering him. She pulled the chair up to his

bedside and sat, reaching through the slats of the safety rail to hold his hand.

“I was so worried about you,” she said.

He didn’t move, didn’t acknowledge that she was in the room with him.

“You’re going to be just fine, lineman,” she said, running her thumb over the

knuckles of his hand.

Still he made no effort to let her know he understood what she was telling him.

She stared at his rigid profile, at the way his finely chiseled lips were locked tight

together. She had come to know this man well and she could sense the anger, the

irritation. She could sense the seething turmoil sizzling in his brain even if the power to

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express those mental thoughts had yet to return. The irrational, jumbled thought

patterns were lashing out at her, but just as he was unable to send them coherently to

her, she could not intercept them in an orderly way so they made sense to her. One

thing though did come across loud and clear—the unrestrained fear he had for

something dark and menacing hovering over him.

“It can’t reach you here, Fallon,” she said, knowing it was the creature—Martiya—

that made him uneasy. “It can’t touch you here.”

A hard shudder ran through him, but when it subsided, he was again as still as

death. She stood to lean over him, putting her free hand to his forehead.

“You are safe,” she said. “Nothing can get to you here. You…”

He turned his face from her and that one simple action was like a slap in the face.

She blinked against the sudden tears that formed in her eyes.

“You want me to go?” she asked, hurt by his turning away.

He did not make a sound, but by his very silence, his pulling back from her, she

knew he wanted her to leave.

She drew in a shaky breath, hurt driving deep into her heart. “All right,” she said,

and could not stop herself from bending over to kiss his forehead.

She felt him stiffen and that hurt her even more. Without wasting another second,

she spun around and rushed from the room with her fist pressed to her mouth to keep

from sobbing aloud.

* * * * *

Fallon lay perfectly still with his face turned toward a window he could not see.

Pain engulfed him in punishing waves, but it was a pain to which he had grown

accustomed and it was receding slowly but surely. It bothered him that he could not

see, would not speak unless he could do so clearly. His right leg was an agony unto

itself, yet he knew the hellion would work ceaselessly until it was once more useful to

him. He could feel her and her hatchlings scurrying around beneath the flesh of his

back, and while it hurt, he could deal with that pain knowing it had a purpose.

Not so the bone-deep throbbing in his broken limbs or the burning aches in his

damaged organs. The ghoret venom still pulsed through his veins and stung like holy

hell, but there was nothing to be done about that. There were worse pains. His head felt

as though someone were driving a wood splitter through his skull and nausea lurked in

the back of this throat. He prayed that nausea would not erupt for he feared he would

drown in his own vomit. The only way he could be even minutely comfortable was to

lie perfectly still so the itching, burning, throbbing and aching would not grow out of

hand.

And over it all hung the specter of the beast that had turned him from a man into a

blob of hopeless jelly. Even there, in a place he knew he was safe from it, it loomed with

a visage so hideous, so revolting he was hard-pressed not to shiver. The thought of that

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loathsome thing laying paws to him, slobbering its vile mouth over him, twisting his

body in its repulsive grip, sent wave after wave of terror through him and he feared he

would feel that way for a long time to come.

It had crippled him, he thought. It had broken him—not only in body but in spirit.

It had done things to him there in the pitch black of that frigid hell that he would never

be able to speak about for as long as he lived. Evil such as he had never imagined had

been visited on him and it had slipped inside him to leave behind its noxious slime.

A low groan left Mikhail Fallon’s throat. It was a helpless, hopeless rendering of

acceptance against his will.

Unadulterated evil had entered the Reaper and it was still there.

* * * * *

“All right now. I want you to keep your eyes closed until I tell you to open them,”

Dr. Fitzroy said as he unwound the last inches of gauze strip from over Fallon’s eyes.

“The light is low in here but your eyes have been covered for…”

The surgeon might as well have saved his breath for as soon as the bandage came

away, Fallon opened his eyes, blinking against the dim light. He blinked again as

Fitzroy sighed with annoyance.

“How is your vision?”

From across the room Keenan watched as Fallon’s eyes tracked across the ceiling,

along the window—eyelids narrowed to the faint light coming through the slats—

across the wall and past her only to slide back and hold.

“Agent Fallon?” the surgeon prompted. “Is there any residual blurriness? Can

you…?”

Fallon nodded just once, his gaze still locked on Keenan.

“Good, then let’s see about snipping the wires and removing the bands from your

jaw.”

For nearly an hour, Keenan observed the surgeon work. She said nothing though

Fallon’s stare was riveted upon her. Now and then she saw him flinch and knew the

procedure had to be painful for they had given him an extra dose of tenerse. She could

see dilation of his pupils as the med took hold of him.

“Well, that wasn’t too bad, was it?” Fitzroy asked at last, stepping back from his

patient. “You won’t be able to eat anything solid for a few days, but I don’t imagine you

care about that right now.” He shook his finger at Fallon. “I don’t suppose it will do me

any good to tell you not to open your mouth too wide. You’ll do whatever you want.”

Fallon ignored the man and flexed his jaw—opening and closing it, moving it from

side to side—though his eyes revealed the pain that caused. After a moment, he

stopped.

“All right then,” Fitzroy said. “I’ll be back in to see you later this afternoon.” He

shot Keenan a commiserating glance then left with his assistant.

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Fallon kept his eyes on Keenan. There was deep, abiding hurt in his gaze and it cut

her to the quick.

“Do you want me to go too?” she asked softly.

He stared at her for so long without speaking she took a deep breath, let it out then

got up to leave.

“No.”

She sat back down in her chair. He was no longer looking at her but had his face

turned toward the window again.

“You want me to open the blinds?”

He nodded slowly so she stood and went to the window.

“It’s been raining almost steadily since we came back,” she said. “One hurricane

after another has been brewing in the Gulf.”

She turned to see him squinting against the harsh gray light of the storm. He

seemed to be searching the heavens for anything that might be lurking there. Though

his chest was rising slow and even, she had the impression he was agitated, nervous.

The death-grip he had on the sheets told a story of its own.

“Where’s Matty?” he asked in a low, gravelly voice.

Keenan came to stand at the foot of his bed. “We don’t know.”

He turned his face toward her, stare unwavering.

She wrapped her hands over the footboard and cleared her throat. “I was

unconscious when they brought me here from Louisiana so I don’t really know what

happened down there that last day. I do know…” She shrugged. “I’m fairly sure, at any

rate, that Mignon Bolivar and Zack Breslin are dead.”

“I know they are,” he said. “I heard their screams.”

Chills ran down Keenan’s arms when he spoke in such a matter-of-fact way. He

was looking at her as though she were his enemy, as though he hated her or was so

angry it was all he could do to speak to her.

“My mother was with us on the plane but I refused to talk to her. If she knows

anything, the Supervisor hasn’t disclosed it to me. She’s gone back to Georgia.”

He held her gaze for a moment longer then his eyes shifted downward and away.

“Fallon, we…”

“I’m tired,” he said, and closed his eyes, shutting her out.

Keenan let go of the footboard. There was so much she wanted to say, so much she

wanted to ask, but he had cut himself off from her, making it clear he wanted her to

leave.

“Can I come back later?” she asked. “After lunch maybe?”

He didn’t reply.

Tears filled Keenan’s eyes and she stepped back. Her lips trembled but she refused

to beg. If he didn’t want to see her, didn’t want her there, she’d abide by his wishes.

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“If you need me…” she said—her voice breaking—before she turned and left the

room.

The moment he knew he was alone Fallon opened his eyes. Hurt flickered in the

amber depths—a hurt so deep, so intense he didn’t know how he could survive it.

Desperately wanting to lift his hands to his face but unable to do so, he shifted with

annoyance. He felt exposed, vulnerable, defenseless, and that angered him. He wished

he could break something, destroy it, vent his rage, but the option wasn’t his. All he