He's A Magic Man (The Children of Merlin) (43 page)

They got to LAX before sunrise. Kemble had a limo waiting. The drive out to the Breakers was silent, as Brina fidgeted and Tris started to look like the Grim Reaper. Brian told the driver to push the speed limit at least three times. Drew sat on the side with her parents, trying to avoid the reaction she always had when she was next to Michael. When they got to the gates, everything seemed quiet, but no one in the limo relaxed. It was only when Jane opened the door, dressed in a demure flannel nightgown and chenille robe and slippers, anxiously surveying the group, that Drew felt better. Jane was here.

“Everything okay?” Brian asked.

Jane nodded. Mr. Nakamura appeared behind her in a kimono-style robe and flip-flops.

“So sorry to get you up, Mr. Nakamura,” Brina said as she entered. They trudged in after her. “Is the guest bedroom in any shape to have a guest?”

“Always, Mrs. Tremaine.” He and Brina went off to confer.

“Uh, I’ll be off,” Tris said. Drew saw a light in his eyes that she wished she could see again in Michael’s expression. He backed out the door and took off for the apartment over the garages at a lope. The door at the top of the passageway along the outside opened, and Maggie stood at the railing, grinning. Drew knew exactly what they’d be doing shortly. Her body, betrayer that it was, wished she could be doing the same thing with Michael.

“You all look bushed,” Jane said. “Is everything okay?” This she asked of Kemble.

“Yes. Fairly okay,” he amended. “I mean, we’re all okay for now.”

“And this is?” Jane asked gently, nodding to Michael, who was hovering near the door.

“Oh, I forgot. This is Drew’s Destiny.” He glanced to Drew absently. “Uh, I mean Michelangelo Redmond. He likes to be called Dowser.”

Drew wanted to die. She shook her head at Jane, trying to forestall the curiosity she saw in Jane’s expression. If Drew was alive in the morning, it was time enough to tell Jane exactly how this hadn’t worked out. Now, she just couldn’t face the pain.

“Call me Michael,” her Destiny said, and stepped forward to shake Jane’s hand. “You all can call me Michael.”

“I was wondering how long that would take,” her father muttered.

“Jane Walker. I’m a friend of Drew’s.” Jane smiled at Michael.

“Since we were ten,” Drew added. Brian wandered into the kitchen. “We’re pretty beat. Kemble, could you find Michael some clothes for tomorrow, and show him the guest room. I’m going to bed.”

And with that she trudged up the stairs. Jane came after her. “Not now, Jane,” she said as she turned at the door.

“I won’t ask you anything. Just thought you might need someone to unbutton you.”

The zillion tiny buttons.
“Thanks. I’m too tired even to rip them open.”

True to her word, Jane was silent. She pulled the drapes together against the lightening sky. Then she unbuttoned the dress, pulled it off, and pulled back the bedcover, while Drew just stood there like a little child. Jane left to turn on the shower in the bathroom. That’s when it happened. The room went funny around the edges. Drew saw a wall of water fifty feet high sweeping down a canyon on an ornate old house. She gasped. As quickly as it had come it was gone. Drew looked around, confused. There hadn’t been any water to trigger the vision. Come to think of it, there hadn’t been any water when she’d seen herself wielding the sword either. What was going on here? Jane had left. Drew trudged into the bathroom and got in the shower. First she couldn’t get a vision when she needed one, and now they seemed to descend without notice. She didn’t know when the wall of water would hit that house, or if anyone was in it, or anything. What good were visions like that? When Drew had finished washing the smoke out of her hair, she crawled into bed, hair still wet.

But she didn’t sleep. Maybe she was too tired to sleep. She felt Michael come up the stairs. She didn’t need the thud of his footsteps to know he was going past her door to the guest bedroom at the end of the hall. God, how could she be getting all hot and bothered now?
She could feel Michael moving around in his room.

She had zero future with this man. She rolled onto her back. “You can’t control this,” she whispered to herself. “You can’t make people love you.”

Did she still
want
Michael to love her, even after he had been the one who told Rhiannon she was a Seer? And let’s not forget the fact that he thought she was a silly coed. But he loved Alice, and he was twelve years older than Drew was. Those were two things she couldn’t fix. But she couldn’t hold against him that he had tried to get Alice back, even if it meant he’d been willing to sacrifice Drew. He loved Alice like Drew loved him, and she’d sacrifice about anything for him.

Did the fact that she couldn’t fix things mean she shouldn’t press for what she wanted at all? She had to just let things happen to her? She didn’t believe that either. She couldn’t have stood by without helping Tris by braining that guy in Chicago. She had dived for the sword. What if she hadn’t done anything? They wouldn’t have gotten out of there alive. And she wouldn’t have gotten out without Michael. He’d nearly burned to death to save her. It was probably only some warped sense of honor. He had been a soldier, after all.

But the truth was, she wanted Michael. She couldn’t make forever with him. Some things you had to accept. She couldn’t change him into not loving Alice. But maybe there was something smaller she could get.

So she reached for the robe Jane had thoughtfully laid at the foot of her bed.

The visions struck again. This time it was fire in a hotel. People were screaming. The scene flashed to a white stone public building. LA County Museum of Art? Her mother was crying. Kemble was trying to comfort her. Then she glimpsed a girl she didn’t know pushing light out of her hand. The visions started flashing by faster. She couldn’t stop them. It was like she was inside a kaleidoscope and she couldn’t get out. She gasped for breath, crying, and fell to the bed as the visions flashed and glittered at her.

“Drew, Drew, honey, what’s wrong?” Michael’s arms were around her, holding her. She couldn’t talk. She could only stare, imprisoned in a world of glimpsed scenes. They started to slow. She saw an angelic-looking young man in a long robe, like a monk. He looked serene.

“Breathe,” Michael’s voice ordered. “You’re okay. Just breathe.”

She saw Michael on a beach, laughing with a woman whose back was turned. She was silhouetted against the sun. He looked incredibly happy.

The vision faded.

Drew blinked. All she saw was Michael in the darkness of her bedroom. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she tried to push back the panic.

“What’s wrong?” he asked gently, his arm around her shoulders. He was sitting on the bed, one leg on the floor, the other drawn up. He had gathered her into his lap. She was naked. So was he. Her breasts brushed his chest. Her hip was pressed into his groin. Slowly, she realized what she felt was evidence that he wanted her too, at least physically. She laid her head on his smooth, brown chest, breathed in, sighed out. She felt his heart thump against her cheek. He smelled like soap, and underneath that, man. She remembered his scent from the last night in the Keys together. She’d know his scent anywhere until her dying day. This was the second time he’d comforted her after she’d had a vision.
Or visions in this case.
A lot of visions.

“I couldn’t control them,” she whispered. “They came faster and faster, like an attack.”

“Gone?” His voice was gruff.

“For now.”

He laid his head against her wet hair. “Good.”

“I may turn out to be a crazy person.”

She felt his chuckle in his chest. “You are the least crazy person I know.”

She sat back, putting unwanted inches between their skins. “What if I can’t control them?” She searched his face, as though he held the clue to sanity.

“You did control them just now. You’ll learn how. It’s a new thing for you.” He was smoothing a damp strand back from her face. His hair was wet too, she noticed. “You just have to give it a chance.”

Well, here was the admission. “I … I think it’s getting stronger. The magic, I mean.”

He swallowed, but he didn’t take his eyes off hers. “Mine is definitely getting stronger.”

What did that mean? Drew, always in charge of her life, didn’t have the courage to ask.

But she did muster the courage to hope. There it was, the light in his eyes Tris had had earlier. Michael might not ever love her. She had a pretty bad track record at wishful thinking. Maybe her hope was just wishful thinking. But he wanted her. Right now, that was enough.

She reached up, kissed him gently, and was rewarded with a throbbing at her hip.

He closed his eyes. “I told Rhiannon about your power,” he said. “But only to make you valuable to her. She was going to kill you. I couldn’t let that happen.”

Really? Suddenly, it was she who felt guilty. “I spoiled your chance to get Alice back.”

“No.” His voice was heavy. “It wasn’t meant to happen.”

So things hadn’t changed. But then he lifted up her chin and kissed her, deep and penetrating. She didn’t care if he still loved Alice. This night might be all she had of him and she was going to take it. She kissed him back, pressing her breasts against his chest. Her need was shrieking at her. He held her as though his life depended on it. Maybe he needed an hour in which he could forget that he’d never have Alice. So she pushed him back on the bed. His expression was intense and unreadable, his erection impressive. It throbbed along his belly. She straddled his hips, leaking her juices onto his groin.

“You sure you want this?” he asked, his voice a hoarse, grating sound.

“Oh, yeah. I want this.” She lifted herself up on her knees and grabbed his cock, positioning it,
then
lowered herself down, slowly and deliberately, until she was filled with him. Nothing had ever felt so good. He groaned and took her hips with his big hands. She ground herself down onto him, getting every last bit of penetration.

Sucking in breath, she looked down at him, feeling the glow of desire in her eyes reflected in his. She put both palms on his chest and began to move. He lifted her, matching her rhythm, and arched under her to increase contact.

Words were impossible. What would they say? He was grunting and she was gasping with their passion. This wasn’t going to take long.

He tried to stretch it out for her, slowing the pace.

“Don’t you dare, Michelangelo Redmond,” she panted. She lifted, lowered, twisted. And then her orgasm overwhelmed her. Dimly she realized she’d arched her back and was giving little shrieks as the sensation ebbed and flowed over her. Michael stilled for a moment as his body arched with his own orgasm. She felt him spurt into her core. That sent her ebbing and flowing yet again. He moved inside her. Could it go on forever? She didn’t want it to stop. Because when it stopped, this moment would be over.

******

Michael lay in Drew’s bed, cradling her in his arms. She might be asleep. It didn’t matter. He just wanted to keep this moment from ending. There were no questions, no accusations, no rejections, just Drew and him, her soft, white skin on his. She was safe.

So funny.
All his confusion had drained away. He was fortunate enough, for some reason, to have been allowed to love two women in his life. He loved Drew. How had he ever doubted that? Loved her enough to try to explain
himself
, and wipe away what she must feel about him. He hadn’t bothered to explain himself since Alice died.

Alice. She hadn’t come to him in a vision since that night when he realized she didn’t want to come back to life, even if she could. She’d closed that chapter of her existence.

It occurred to him that she’d never come to him because she wanted to see him, but to urge him to move on too. They’d had wonderful, magical times together (literally, as he now knew). It was no less a tragedy that her life had been cut short. Not by him, but by that horrible disease. He’d granted her peace and since her death she’d been trying to do the same for him.

He’d never forget her. How could he? She was part of him. But life went on after someone you loved died. It had almost happened twice. He softly kissed Drew’s hair, almost dry now, an ebony fan across his shoulder and the pillow. He would keep her safe if it killed him.

It was Alice who’d saved Drew’s life last night though, not him.
One last whisper, telling him where Drew was, so he could get her out of that burning penthouse hell.
One word to let him know that in the blown out kitchen
lay
safety. Alice had made one last attempt to help him move on with his life.

Thank you,
he thought. But he didn’t expect an answer this time.

*****

Drew lay in Michael’s arms, her thoughts making lazy circles. She wanted this minute to last forever. But time was one thing she couldn’t control. One of many, as it turned out. She wanted Michael to love her. Maybe he would someday. The fact that his power was getting stronger might mean he was meant for her as much as she was meant for him. But it wasn’t something she could “fix” about him. That didn’t mean she wouldn’t do whatever she could to be with him. If that brought her pain, so be it. She chose pain with Michael over pain without Michael. So she’d face it head on.