CHAPTER 34 #2
Brenna swooped him down the hallway like an airplane.
Walking behind her to the nursery, restored by the near-hysteria of their crazy game, Grace slid her gaze down the smooth curve of Brenna’s hips.
Hovering over her in that narrow bed had made her acutely aware of how much she wanted her.
She wanted to kiss Brenna’s soft mouth, cup her breasts, stroke her hips. She wanted to touch her soul.
Brenna lifted Mr. Fierce over the crib rails and lay him on the mattress.
Leaning over him, she brushed his sweaty forelock to one side, exposing his bruised forehead.
Mr. Fierce allowed her to rake her fingers through his scruffy hair.
His eyelids drooped, then popped open again as if he didn’t want to miss the tenderness that had appeared in the fog of misery enveloping the nursery.
A long slow wave of pleasure and sexual desire rolled through Grace.
She tipped her face to see Brenna better.
She had done well with Mr. Fierce—the child who might hurt her—but been tentative with Squeak, who couldn’t.
Why? Because you couldn’t break what was already damaged?
Because she didn’t know what to do when her heart opened?
And it had with Squeak—she’d watched her fall in love with that baby, watched her eyes return to Squeak time and again as she helped with the care of the others.
Brenna gave comfort but shied from receiving it.
Why? Because receiving comfort laid her open to feeling the love implicit in the gesture?
Love, after all, had nearly killed her. She was a solitary woman, with a single extraordinary link to the outside world—her ability to see into the human soul.
Maybe the gift was a burden. Maybe an emotional fortress was her only safe choice.
Mr. Fierce closed his eyes and surrendered to Brenna’s caresses.
Calm, Brenna thought, pulling Mr. Fierce’s knit shirt down so it covered his belly as much as possible.
Silence. The room felt tranquil. She felt content, caring for children with Grace at her side.
Makeshift as it was, this had felt like family life, a single footprint on a path that always eluded her.
Grace had conjured it from the simple act of sharing her heart.
Tiptoeing to the corner crib, Grace reached in for Dying Boy. “It won’t hurt if I hold him,” she said. “Maybe he can still feel some comfort from it.”
Attachment to mortals carried a heavy penalty, and Brenna wanted to warn her: He’s all but dead. Don’t forge a link with no future—you’ll only get hurt.
But Grace pulled the infant into her arms and took the baby with the death sentence to the rocking chair.
Settling the boy on her chest, Grace rubbed his back and hummed.
Grace was everything Brenna longed for. She was light in a world of darkness, steadfast as the lighthouses along the coast of Maine that stood firm through pitch-black nights and howling gales.
Brenna thought about last night at the hotel, how she had turned Grace down when she so clearly wanted to stay and make love.
She’d thought only of her own potential loss—that Grace could die—but not of the emotional risk Grace would also be taking, of linking herself to Brenna, who could just as easily die.
She shook her head, abashed. Grace’s moral courage put her to shame.
Turning abruptly, Brenna picked up the camera.
“Where are you going?” Grace asked softly over the baby’s head.
“I’m going to get some shots of Roza.”
She walked into the fetid miasma of Roza’s decomposing body and busied herself setting up the camera. She felt uneasy, ill-at-ease in her own skin. An indefinable truth hung at the periphery of her vision but every time she turned and tried to see it, it moved too.
She began from afar, getting a long shot of the rubble-strewn room with Roza’s body in the foreground.
She crouched, carefully framing the image so it both protected her dignity and revealed the shadowed corridor beyond her.
She had fallen face-forward in the direction of the hallway that led to the nursery.
Roza must have been headed one last time to the children in her care. What had she planned to do with her last minutes of life? Tuck them in? Feed them? Say goodbye? Maybe she had just wanted the comfort of not dying alone.
A puff of breeze fluttered the hem of Roza’s skirt, a movement that gave the impression of life where there was none.
Brenna shot a close-up of the bloody fabric then rack-focused to her lifeless hand resting on the concrete floor. She held the shot steady for five seconds—enough time for a contemplative moment on-screen, or a slow fade.
She shifted her weight, still crouched, thumb poised over the record button in the handgrip. She needed a close-up of Roza’s face. But her body moved one way, and her emotions the other. She overbalanced and sank to the floor on her hip.
She couldn’t look Roza in the eye.
Not even through the distance of the viewfinder.
Her heart thumping, she scrambled backwards, as scared as if Roza had suddenly risen from death and turned on her.
Her back hit the side wall, but her boots kept pumping, sliding across the floor.
She released the camera, pulled her knees up to her chest and circled them with her arms.
She rested her chin atop her knees and rocked, staring at Roza.
She had taken on six children, without water, food, heat, or medical care.
Like Grace, Roza dared to love in the face of calamity.
She, too, put Brenna to shame.
Today, Brenna had stood in the clearing, longing for the rifle shot that would free her from struggle. And in so doing, she’d nearly abandoned Grace.
A soundless sob punched her horrified breast. She dropped her face into her hands. She was a coward.
Not afraid of dying.
Afraid of living. Afraid of loving.