Deadly Expectations (77 page)

I pulled in a lung full of air and let it out in a shaky sigh.

“I thought so.”

His hand came up behind my head and pulled it to his shoulder.
 
I let him as his other hand rubbed my back.
 
It had been so long.
 
I was starved for Paul.
 
Even in pain from throwing the chairs there was nothing I wanted more than one last night with him.

Anna …
Andre warned.

I reached one arm around him then the other.
 
Then I charged my right with just a bit of blue light and rested it on his back.
 
He relaxed as I let the light explore the connections in his spinal cord.
 
I was going to short circuit the ones to move his muscles.
 
Not his heart and lungs.
 
Just everything else.
 
Just for fifteen minutes.
 
I hoped what I was about to do wouldn’t break our bond.

“I’m not sharing you Paul,” I whispered.
 
“I won’t stand for you being with anyone else.”

“There’s nobody but you Anna,” he whispered back.

“Bullshit,” I said as the light entered him.
 
He collapsed hard on the floor so I got down and made sure he was breathing.

“There never will be anyone but me.
 
I’m going to make sure of it.
 
I’m going to start with Marie.
 
I’m going to kill her.
 
Then I’m going to hunt down the others … as many as I can while I can still get them out of my way for good.

“She’ll be dead before you can get there to stop me.
 
I can dodge Patrick.
 
He’s good but his blind spots are a mile wide.
 
She’ll be in a pool of blood and I’ll be on my way to number two before anyone even knows I’ve been there.

“All you men found
was
me and Marie.
 
Your damn harem.
 
All I have to do is get in a car and
wish … get
close enough to pick them up like a bad smell.
 
In ten minutes I’ll be within a block of Marie … in an hour I’ll be slipping my knife into the next one.
 
You won’t know where to begin looking for me.

“Maybe I’ll save Marie for last …” I said thoughtfully.

“Then it will just be us,” I kissed his paralyzed lips, letting my tongue run along his lower one as I tasted his skin.
“Mmm.”

“You won’t be tempted again.”

I got up and quietly opened the door and tossed my bag behind the garage.
 
Then I went back in and closed it again.

“Ray!”
 
I screamed, “Help!
 
Ray!”

I was suddenly terrified.
 
I’d be on the run now.
 
I’d attacked Paul and tears of guilt came quickly but I was past the point of no return.
 
If he could move that would be it for me.

“Ray!”
 
I cried and pulled the door open hard so it hit the wall.
 
As I stepped out he was running past the garage with Denis close behind.

“It’s Paul,” I sobbed and pulled him in.
 
Ray got down next to him.

“What happened?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I was shaking, Denis holding on to me.
 
“We were fighting, he … he’d gotten so mad, then he started rubbing his arm and he wasn’t making sense … his legs gave out and he fell down.”

“I … I … Paul,” I cried.

“Denis, help me get him on his side.”

Denis let me go and they rolled Paul over.
 
Their backs were to the door, focused on him.
 
I took a couple of deep breaths like I was trying to get it together then slipped out and opened the side gate.
 
I hid behind the garage beside the fence and ducked down out of sight.

“He’s breathing fine … get the big bag Denis.”

Denis’ boots ran up the gravel and a minute later came back.

“I don’t know where the hell it is.
 
You got your phone?
 
He’s stable but I might need an ambulance.
 
Paul?
 
Paul?”

Then after another minute I could hear Paul mumbling.

“He’s moving,” Ray said.

“Anna,” Paul said.
 

“She was just here.”

“Sit me up Ray,” Paul said, “Anna’s going after Marie … I think she attacked me.
 
I just went limp.
 
I could see and hear everything but I couldn’t move.

“She’s going to kill Marie; she says she won’t share me.
 
Keith told her how we get our second mates … he said he wanted me to ask for Marie.
 
Anna said she’s going to hunt them all down … you know if she kills them it’s permanent.

“Get me on my feet.”

There was shuffling and footsteps.

“Denis, stay here.
 
Ray, you’re taking me to the airport then go home.
 
I’ll warn Keith and get the first flight I can to
Edmonton
.”

“I’m sorry Paul,” Ray said.
 
“I really hope we’re wrong.”

“I don’t think we are … attacking me and threatening the others is taking it way too far for just getting me out of the way to protect me.
 
If she wanted to go after him alone she would have just left.”

Yeah, I thought, but you would try and track me down.
 
Now you’re committed to staying in
Edmonton
.
 
Hopefully it will take you a long time to figure out my bluff.

It took a bit for Paul and Ray to leave.
 
Paul was on the phone to Keith as he ran back in my door for a few things then they drove off in the truck.
 
I closed my eyes to search for Denis.
 
He was in the alley by the gate and I waited a long time for him to go back in the house.
 
Then I waited more before I quietly slipped away.

“Come on Andre,” I whispered as we neared the convenience store.
 
“Let’s get you a smoke.”

About fucking time.

He’d had three before we found an unlocked car with sufficient cover.
 
In a couple of minutes we were driving up to the highway.
 
I jumped us to
Redding
, near the gas station we had filled up at on the way to
Reno
and drove around until I found an older RV covered in a tarp.
 
I dumped the car several blocks away and walked back and broke in.
 
It was stocked with a few things so I ate and curled up on the small bed inside to wait for Paul or Damian or Lord knew who else to find me.

Chapter 56

The last time I visited Alina was different from the others.
 
It started the same.
 
The hall, the ambulance, the neurologist.
 
But this visit was missing Alina’s talk of an abortion.
 
She kept her good hand on her stomach in her hospital bed and seemed comforted by his small presence.
 
Her wounds were just as bad and her nightmares would be just as horrible but the little light she carried with her gave her strength.

She let James and his brother come in on his day off to take out her blood covered sofa and bring in a new one she’d picked out online.
 
She wouldn’t leave her room while they were in the apartment but she called him the next day to thank him.

I was huge.
 
The pregnancy was only a couple of weeks from being over and I pictured having to finish Damian off in Alina’s little apartment.
 
I spent my nights sitting on her new sofa when the heartburn was worse than the back ache and Alina’s bed with her when the back ache was winning.
 
She did as much for me as she could but her anguish filled whatever room she was in so I kept my needs as small as possible.
 
I told her Paul would be back any day.
 
I told her I was only thirty-four weeks so she didn’t have to worry too much about him flying me home.

Andre stayed with us.
 
He was quieter now.
 
He could see the end coming; his and possibly mine.
 
He would whisper to me to keep focused.
 
It wouldn’t be long.
 
He said when the time came to let him work he would use everything we had together to finish Damian.
 
He could rest and I could start down the long road to peace with Paul.

Andre didn’t touch me any more.
 
There was no need to distract me from Paul.
 
I didn’t miss the torment.
 
The shame I felt from letting him treat me like that was only a taste of what Alina had gone though and more than enough for me to understand her humiliation and how much of her Damian had taken.

I realized after a week with Alina what the purpose of my disturbing and repetitive visits was.
 
Damian’s child had to grow up.
 
And without giving her my speech over and over again he wouldn’t.
 
If I hadn’t reminded her repeatedly how much she loved him she would have had the abortion.
 
On my last night with her she curled up behind me, her fractured arm resting on my side.
 
She confessed to me how much she loved her baby already; how she had from the moment she thought he could be there.
 
How she had protected her stomach from every blow.
 
It was a pretty good version of the talk I’d been giving her.

She thought people would think badly of her, loving that monster’s son.
 
I told her they wouldn’t; she was brave and generous and her love was unconditional.
 
There wasn’t a better woman anywhere to be that child’s mother than Alina.
 
She sighed and kissed my back through my hair.
 
I knew I could wake up somewhere else now that part of my task was finished and she would be ready for hers.

Alina lifted her arm off me so I could get the light and we sighed together as she put it back down.
 
I fell asleep expecting to wake up in the back of whatever stolen car I had been in before I came here again but I woke up in my basement bed clutching my bag to my chest.

Andre stood in the doorway lit from behind by the light bulb in my stove fan down the hall in the kitchen.
 
I pushed my pack off the bed and on to the floor and when I looked up again he was standing over me.

Rest now Anna,
he said.
 
Your traveling is over.
 
Our day is coming soon.
 
The big man upstairs will take care of you until then.
 
I’ll be with you.
 
I won’t see you again until the time comes to go to work.

He sat on the bed and lay down with me then he pushed himself back into my body and faded until we were one again.

Next thing I knew I heard the key in my door.
 
It snapped open on the first try so it must be Denis.
 
Mrs. Desmond hadn’t been down here since the day in October when I brought Paul to her and she never got the hang of the fussy lock.

“Denis?”
 
I called.
 
“That you?”