Reyes pulled his shirt back on and walked over to join her, his movements smooth and cat-like again. “Nope. I’ve got you covered. Unless you’re planning on escaping me?”
Lena raised her brows. “Do I need to?”
He laughed and started working the knot on the bag again as he shook his head. He didn’t actually answer her, though, which made her nervous. The non-answer that was an answer, perhaps? What had the poem said? “A Truth that’s told with bad intent/Beats all the Lies you can invent”? Her alarm grew into anxiety. She decided to push the issue.
“Reyes, do I need to?”
He looked up. The knot parted. He spread the cord apart without looking down. “No. You do not need to escape me. You don’t need to fear me. And you don’t need to be afraid of the people I represent, either. I am here to serve and protect,” he smiled as the old words rolled off his tongue. The smile dropped, and he pointed to her with both index fingers. “You. Part of my job has always been to search for you.”
“Search for me?” Her voice was sharp. “But Dad worked so hard to keep me hidden!” Her eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute. If you knew about me—”
“No, no, no. Nothing concrete.” He shrugged and raised one hand to make a back and forth motion. “We knew about the possibility of you. Or we believed it, you could say. We actually expected you to be a child. That’s what we expected to find. And if you happened, when you happened, we’d need to be ready to bring you in. Not to imprison you or use you or kill you, but to protect you from those who would do all of those things.”
She digested that in silence.
He reached into the bag and pulled out flatbread, a small, paper-wrapped package of crumbly white cheese, several apples, and a skin of water. He pushed it all to the center of the table and indicated she should help herself.
She reached out hungrily, broke off a piece of the cheese, and dropped the crumbles into a torn piece of flatbread. She’d eaten the last of the food she’d brought early that morning.
“Protect me, huh?” she said after she’d swallowed her first two bites. “What if I don’t want your protection?”
“Doesn’t matter.” Reyes produced a small folding knife and sliced an apple. He layered the thin wedges on the flatbread and then added cheese. “You need it.”
She stared at the sandwich, mouth watering, even after he caught her. He grinned and offered it to her. When she unabashedly took it, he made another.
“I need it? Reyes, I don’t need protection. All I need is for you to get me to the right place at the right time. Or have you forgotten that I pulled a building down on top of you?” The apple and cheese together was tangy, crunchy heaven.
“Yeah? Could you do it again if you needed to? On demand?”
She said nothing. She didn’t have to. They both knew the first time had been a stress response of some kind. And the second had been a Reyes response. But he’d moved on to his next point anyway.
“And have you forgotten that I got the drop on you? If I can, so can they.” He took a bite. “Might take a little longer…” He grimaced, perhaps at their chances, and chewed. “But they could. You’re not omnipotent.” He snorted. “Not yet.”
She stopped chewing. An image flashed into her mind. A smell came with the memory. Perfume. Dust. The dress. She swallowed the dry wad of food in her mouth. “I know I’m not omnipotent. Believe me, I know. I never have been. If I was—” Grief closed her throat, and she choked on her words.
Reyes shook his head. When he spoke, his face and his voice were heavy with regret. “No, that was on us.” He stopped for a moment, staring off as he gathered his thoughts. “She was sick. It was an accident. Not even Lucas, bastard that he is, intended to kill her. I promise. I promise. And I never would have stood back and watched if I had known she was that weak.”
Tears gathered in Lena’s eyes, but only for a moment. She drew in a shaky breath and straightened her spine. “I understand. I do. And I understand why you did what you did. Just—” She looked down at the floor. When she raised her face again, she could feel it was hot and flushed with hatred. “I’m going to make Lucas pay first.”
Something flickered in his eyes. Regret? Maybe disgust, but not directed at her.
“I am coming back for him,” she whispered.
Reyes shook his own head. “No coming back for Lucas.” He took the fantasy away gently. “He won’t be here. He’s being shipped home to his grandfather.”