“Who’s that?” I hiss.
“Not sure.” He picks up with his usual “Aiden Hale” and darts across the yard toward the house. Without a word. Without a touch.
The chills return, and tears I didn’t know I was holding spill over. Every cell misses substance. With every hour his hands are not on me, I turn ghostly. After all, isn’t this what makes ghosts, ghosts? Inability to touch them?
*
By the time Rose City Nursery has delivered Marshall’s Douglas-fir seedling and fourteen rose bushes, the tears have stopped, even if the chills haven’t. Aiden has not resurfaced from Benson’s office—he no longer uses the library, it has been sealed shut—so I stalk him there. Gardening has worked for us before. Maybe it will help now too?
I come to a skidding stop outside the closed door, ready to pound it off its hinges, but Aiden’s voice halts my fist in the air. It’s no longer even and detached. His timbre is energized, firing commands in its usual efficient hardness. Did I really find this cadence intimidating? Now, it sounds like music.
“Yes, we know about it… I’m sorry, I have another call waiting. Goodbye… Glenda, send copies to the lawyers and Congressman Kirschner. Transfer me to Sartain now. Yes, General, Aiden Hale…will this be enough?… Well, I’m calling in that favor now… That’s all I can ask. Goodbye… Benson, finish the rest as discussed… No outs.”
A slam on a desk. Then silence.
Bloody hell! I pound on the door with both my fists. “Aiden! It’s m—”
The door wrenches open. “Elisa? Are you okay?”
I open my mouth but his face mutes my words. It’s still hollowed, but for a faint flicker of light in his eyes. Like someone has lit a candle upstairs.
“Is everything okay?” I gasp. “I heard you talking to Sartain.”
He steps aside to let me in. I don’t have enough presence of mind to look around Benson’s office. I just register a dizzying number of screens, computers and furniture. Their blurry contours disappear when Aiden closes the door and takes my hand.
“Elisa, baby, take a seat.” His voice is urgent, and beautiful. He guides me to a swivel chair but I can’t breathe. He called me baby again. And he touched me. Is that a good sign? Or bad?
He takes the other swivel chair in front me. “Breathe, Elisa. It’s good news, I hope.” He blows on my face. “I think we have a witness. Someone who knows about Feign’s fraud and is willing to testify.”
His words are slow but every cell starts vibrating with life. I’m afraid to feel it. It will finish me this time if I lose it again.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“A client Feign defrauded a while ago.”
“What about Javier? The witness doesn’t know about him, does he?”
Aiden shakes his head. “He won’t implicate Javier. If anything, he’ll help him.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“Will this satisfy the DOJ? Will it make them stop before they get to me?”
Aiden’s hand squeezes mine—my skin bursts into flames. “I’ve sent the info to Bob. We’ll know more in a couple of days, love.”
His sentences are muffled by that one big word. “You called me love again.”
“You’ll always be my love.” His voice is so finite that my chest starts convulsing. This witness doesn’t change anything between us, does it?
“What about the last few days?” I breathe.
His right hand flies behind his back and his jaw flexes. “Love doesn’t change the last few days.”
I turn the words in my head. They sound backward. “You won’t kick me out?” I verify in unambiguous English.
The light dims in his eyes. “Not until you want to leave.”
“That will never happen.”
The flicker of light goes out. Abruptly, almost with an audible click. The void it leaves behind in his face is staggering. His features fold into a veil of desolation—utterly empty and barren. The change is so drastic that I gasp and cup his face like my fingers will shoot life into it.
“I will never leave you. I love you. Always,” I say with force.
He nods as, inch by inch, he brings his face back under control and tries to lighten his voice. “Did I hear a truck and some marching orders about where the roses should be delivered?”
I keep my hands on his face. “Kiss me.”
But I don’t wait. I lunge at him—fingers pulling his hair like hooks, arms vising his face, legs gripping his hips. So forceful is my attack that the chair tilts and he gasps, giving my tongue an in. Ah, his taste!
It takes a few strokes of tongue before I realize that the gentle hold on my shoulders is actually a push. I press myself into him further but he leans away, tipping up my face.
“No, love.” His voice is low.
“Please?” I whisper, trying to hold my body together. I don’t know if it’s trembles or dry sobs.
His jaw flexes in inner battle. When he speaks, his voice is back to even. “I miss it too. More than you know. But it’s no longer right.”