“It still freezes at night sometimes. Two weeks ago we had snow.” She hadn’t meant to mention snow. It had been snowing that last night….
For an instant, he looked like he wanted to say more, but the moment passed and he remained silent. “What do you know about Bruno DeBruzkya?”
She walked to the hearth and put another log on the fire. “Why are you so interested in DeBruzkya?” she said, trying to sound nonchalant.
“I can’t tell you that.” He shot her a sober look.
Mystified by his cryptic answer, she tried to read his expression, realized she couldn’t, even though at one time she’d been very good at it.
“I think you know me well enough to know I’m one of the good guys,” he added.
That was the one thing she knew with utter certainty.
Aware that her pulse was racing, that her thoughts were keeping perfect time, Lily walked into the kitchen and knelt in the corner near the stove. Pulling up a corner of the stained linoleum, she peeled it back, revealing a secret door set into the wooden planks beneath. She extracted a small lockbox, then replaced the trap door and linoleum. “The soldiers have never been here, but I have to be prepared if they show up.”
“What’s in the box?”
“All of my notes on the freedom movement. Copies of the Rebellion. Information I’ve accumulated on DeBruzkya. Documentation on some of the things he’s done. Some of the data is handwritten. Some of it is on disk, some on videotape. I’ve even taken some photographs.”
“Stuff he wouldn’t want anyone getting their hands on,” Robert commented.
“Proof that he’s killing people and has been systematically destroying this beautiful country for nearly two years.”
“Lily, you’re playing a dangerous game.”
All she could think was that this hadn’t been a game to her for a very long time. She crossed to the hearth, set the lockbox on the floor and opened it. She handed Robert the latest copy of the Rebellion then busied herself booting up her laptop and arranging some of her handwritten notes.
“This is written in Rebelian,” he said.
“You know Rebelian.”
“Yeah, but I’m rusty.” He looked sheepish. “I don’t want to miss anything important. Do you think you could hit on some of the highlights for me?”
For a moment she wanted to tell him no. She didn’t want to work too closely with him. The less time she spent with him the better off she and Jack would be. The better off Robert would be.
She nodded. “All right.”
He skimmed the newsletter-style paper in his hand. “Do you trust the people you work with not to sell you out?”
“I’m very selective about who I deal with.”
“I’m sure DeBruzkya would pay a nice bounty for the head of the editor of an underground newspaper.”
She repressed a shiver. “None of the people I work with would sell me out.”
“Lily—” Robert’s voice was softer than before “—the cause is a good one but you’re taking a huge risk.”
She thought of everything she’d seen in the years she’d been in Rebelia. Everything that had been done to her, to the people she’d known and cared for, the children no one cared about. She shook her head. “There’s a lot at stake. An entire country. Her people, her children—”
“At what cost to you?”
That was a question she couldn’t answer. “Jack and I are fine. Nobody knows we’re here. I mean, even you were blindfolded when Jacques brought you here. We’re safe and happy—”
“If DeBruzkya captured Jacques and shoved spikes under his fingernails, he’d sell you out.”
“Stop it,” she snapped. “You’re trying to frighten me.”
“I’m trying to save your life.”
His quick anger surprised her, and for a moment she didn’t know how to respond. Her own temper stirred when she realized his anger had little to do with her newspaper and everything to do with the way they’d left things twenty-one months ago. Why couldn’t he just let the past go? He didn’t know what had happened to her. He didn’t know what could happen if she told him too much. If she let herself feel too much.
“I don’t expect you to understand,” she said.
“Good, because your staying here with that child is a little beyond my realm of understanding.”
“Don’t lecture me about Jack.”
“How does his father feel about your keeping him in the same house where you run an underground newspaper? In your fervor to save the children and keep the freedom movement alive have you even bothered to think about the safety of your own son?”
Fury swept over her with such force that the words tangled on her tongue. “How dare you imply that I’m endangering my son.”
“What would you call it?”
“I’d call it an impossible situation that I’m dealing with the best way I can.”