Twilight Hunger Part 24

She started, surprised to hear a voice on the line. For just an instant she thought-but no, it was Stormy's mother. "Hi, Jane. How is she? Is there any change?"

There was a long pause. Then, "She's no worse."

But no better, Max inferred. "Do you think she's hearing me?"

"I know she is, Maxine."

"Really? Was there any sign while I was talking to her?"

"I don't need any signs. I'm her mother. I know. You mean the world to her, and I know she's hearing everything you say."

Max nodded, sniffed, rubbed her cheek with the back of one hand. "I won't be here much longer. A day or two at the most."

"You do what you need to. I... I heard what you told Tempest-about finding your sister. That's the hand of G.o.d, young lady, that led you up there. Don't you doubt it. And don't take it for granted."

"I'm not."

Jane sighed. "We play the tapes you made for her, your voice reading to her. And the music you sent over, we play that, too."

"It's Tuesday, you know," Max said. "Her favorite show's on tonight."

"I know. There's a TV in the room. I won't forget. Goodbye, dear. Call again when you can."

"I will." Max lowered the phone slowly to the cradle, missed it somehow. Lou took it from her and put it in place.

"How's she doing?" he asked.

"No change." She turned slowly, slid her arms around his waist, let her head rest on his chest. He hugged her, rocked her back and forth a little.

"It's only been a day."

"Every day it's less likely she'll ever come out of it." She spoke against the fabric of his shirt but trusted that he heard and understood. "I'm losing two sisters at once, Lou. I'm not sure I can take this."

"You're tough, Max. Toughest kid I know. And I'm here for you, you know that, right?"

She nodded.

"Lydia's got a nice hot bath all run for you, and a cup of that herbal tea she picked up when she was out exploring today. I want you to go soak and drink that tea, and then I want you to take a nap."

She lifted her head, felt her eyes burning and wondered just how h.e.l.lish she looked right now. "When it gets dark-"

"We're going back to Morgan's place to stake it out," he said. "Even though she and David both told us not to."

Max nodded. "You think you know me pretty well, don't you?"

"Am I right?"

"Yeah."

"So that's why you need to rest a while now. You're all in." He ran a palm from the top of her head down over her hair, until it cupped her cheek. "I don't like seeing you like mis, Maxie. I don't like it at all."

She smiled tiredly. "That's 'cause you're nuts about me, just too dense to know it." She leaned up and kissed him on the mouth, softly, briefly. Then she turned away and headed into the bathroom.

Lou sighed as he walked back into the sitting area of the suite and sank into a plush chair. Lydia was sipping tea, tapping one foot, nervous.

"She needs you, you know," he said.

Lydia shot him a worried look. "I'm right here."

"She's hurting bad. She doesn't deserve that. She's a good girl."

"I know she is."

He stared hard into her eyes. "You've got to tell her."

"And what good do you suppose it would do her to learn that her mother was a wh.o.r.e? Hmm?"

"Come on, Lydia, that's not even close to what you are."

"It's what I was."

"You were a kid. Alone and clueless. Now you're a freaking hero."

She rolled her eyes.

"You think you're not? You got out of the slime alive. Barely. So what do you do? Get as far from it as you can, the way most people would? No. No, you lie on the G.o.dd.a.m.n ground and reach back down into the thick of it to pull kids out. One after the other, you haul their a.s.ses out of the muck, hose 'em off, tuck 'em away someplace safe. A place you made safe for them. Then you turn around and go back for more. You get dirty, you get splashed with that s.h.i.t all the time. Doesn't bother you. You keep on going."

She faced him, and he saw that her eyes were damp. "That's the way Kimbra used to talk about our work. Like it was something n.o.ble. Some kind of divine calling."

"It is."

She lowered her eyes.

"You do all that for those kids. Those kids you don't know. Now you have a chance to do something for your own. Your own kids, Lydia."

"They're hardly kids, Lou." She set her teacup down on the coffee table.

He shrugged. "They need their mother. Max feels like she's losing everyone she cares about. And Morgan-G.o.d, that girl has no one, other than Sumner. You don't connect with her now, you may never get the chance."

She averted her eyes, maybe to hide a rush of wetness, he thought. "She wouldn't even embrace her twin sister. What makes you think she'd give a d.a.m.n about me?"

"You won't know unless you try, Lyd."

"They've managed without me this long... "

"And they're both falling apart."

She bit her lip. He felt sorry for pushing her so hard and decided to back off. "At least I've maybe given you something to think about."

"You have."

"Okay. We'll drop it. You better get some rest. Maxie's gonna want to sit up all night watching her sister's place, and I know d.a.m.n well you won't stay behind."

"No more than you would," she said.

"Of course not." He got to his feet and headed for the coffeepot in the tiny alcove at the far end of the room.

"She loves you, you know."

Lydia's words stopped him in his tracks. He thought maybe his heart might have ground to a halt, too, but no, that was wrong. It was pounding hard enough to pump hot blood into his face. He said, "She thinks she does. But that'll only last until some young buck her own age comes along and sweeps her off her feet. Till then, I pretend not to see it."

"For her own good?"

"And mine."

"Because you'll both get hurt in the end?" she asked.

He didn't answer, but he did find it in him to get moving toward the coffeepot again. Found a cup, filled it.

"You know, sometimes I think that if only I could have seen into the future, if only I could have known that loving Kimbra would lead me to this horrible, gut-wrenching grief of losing her, maybe I would have turned away from her the day we met. Maybe I wouldn't have taken that risk."

He nodded slowly, as if fully understanding.

"And then I realize," she went on, "that that would have been the biggest mistake of my life. G.o.d, when I think of the joy I would have missed. The days we had... the nights." She sniffed. "No. I'd suffer anything in exchange for the love we shared. Anything. I'd never trade it in. Not even if it meant my pain would vanish without a trace."

Lou sipped his coffee and pretended with everything in him that her pointed message was sailing right over his head. It wasn't, of course. But he could pretend.

Chapter 21.

*"But it's not even dark outside yet."

"I know," David said softly. "But, Morgan, you're exhausted." His tone, his eyes, everything, so concerned. Full of love and worry. And yet he was keeping something from her. She knew he was. And it was more than just the fact that he was trying to drug her so she would sleep the night through.

She would be d.a.m.ned before she would let him.

"Come on, sweetie. Drink the tea and then go on up to bed. You need your rest."

She eyed the teacup. Laced, no doubt, with the tranquilizers Dr. Hilman had given him today. G.o.d, if he only knew that her life depended on seeing Dante again, on convincing him to do whatever it took to make her immortal...

She lifted the tea to her lips, pretending to sip. Lowered the cup again and then took the napkin from the coffee table and dabbed the poisoned moisture from her lips. "I'll do as you say, David, if you'll tell me what it was you and that blond woman were discussing when I walked in on you this morning."

He glanced at her sharply. "I already told you. I was just telling her where to find her friends. Offering to drive her into town to join them."

"It looked like a bit more than that."

He shrugged carelessly, but didn't hold her probing eyes. "It wasn't easy trying to explain why you would throw your own sister out of your home, Morgan. If it seemed intense, it was because I was struggling to find a way to justify your behavior."

It was intended as a barb, and it bit home. It stung a little to have the one person who had never hurt her suddenly jabbing her that way.

He reached over, took her hand and held it gently. "I don't mean to hurt you, love. It's just so unlike you to be this unfriendly."

"It's unlike you to turn against me," she whispered.

"Oh, Morgan, no. Not against you. Never, ever against you."

"Then what were you and that woman conspiring about? You went dead silent when I walked in. You were discussing something you didn't want me to hear."

He ran his hand through her hair. "Only because I don't want anything upsetting you, as sick as you are right now. I didn't want her demanding explanations of you, and I didn't want you trying to offer them. That's all."

Tears were br.i.m.m.i.n.g in her eyes, and she blinked them away, telling herself that it didn't matter that her most beloved, most trusted friend was lying to her. She didn't need him. She only needed Dante.

"Drink your tea, darling. Come on."

He lifted the cup, held it out to her.

Taking the delicate china cup from his large hand, she nodded slowly. "I think I'll take your advice and go up to my room. I'll take it with me, sip it in bed."

"That's a good idea."

He helped her to her feet, and she carried the cup with her to the stairs, started up them. "I seem to have become an awfully light sleeper," she said as he walked beside her, one hand cradling her elbow. "Must be all this time living alone. I've become used to silence, I guess."

"I'll be quiet as a mouse, love. You need your rest." He stopped, opened her bedroom door for her. She offered him a meek and obedient smile, kissed him on the cheek and went inside.

"Good night, Morgan," David said, and he pulled the bedroom door closed.

She walked across the bedroom to the French doors, opened them up and stepped outside. Then she tipped the little teacup upside down, pouring its contents toward the ground below. The stiff sea wind scattered the tea into a thousand droplets before it ever hit the earth.

Sighing, Morgan walked back inside, glanced at the neatly made bed, at her white satin robe hanging from the bedpost and the empty teacup in her hand. She would have to make it convincing. David wasn't a fool.

She set the teacup on the bedside stand. Then she tugged the covers back, rumpled them up a little. When she rearranged them, she put pillows underneath, working them around, plumping and flattening, over and over, before tucking the covers around them. Then she stepped back toward the bedroom door to look from the same point of view David would have when he checked on her, as she knew he would.

Good. It looked good. Just as if she were lying in the bed, burrowed beneath the covers with her back to the door.

She stripped off her jeans, her sweater, dropping them on the floor in plain sight. Even her tennis shoes and white ankle socks. She pulled on the robe. Then, finally, as a last touch, she closed the French doors again and lowered the shades beneath the sheer curtains. She closed all her other bedroom shades, as well, blanketing the room in shadows. Now it would be even more difficult for anyone to tell she wasn't really in the bed, at least without turning on the lights, and she didn't think David would risk waking her to do that.

Finally she tiptoed to the closet, pulled a warm blanket-like shawl of soft black felt from its hanger and draped it over her shoulders. She slid her feet into a pair of tiny slippers, like ballet shoes, only velvet. Then she walked quietly to the bedroom door.

She had to pause there, because her breathing was out of control. Too fast and too loud to go unnoticed. Just the simple acts of the past five minutes and she was out of breath. It was getting worse. By the hour, it was getting worse.

She waited for her breathing to calm, her pulse to slow. Then, finally, she opened the bedroom door, just a crack, and peered out into the hall. It was empty. Silently, she crept out, closing the door slowly behind her. Then, step by carefully placed step, she moved toward the stairs. The living room loomed below her. empty. She started down the stairs, one hand gripping the railing in case she stumbled. So many stairs. G.o.d. Where the h.e.l.l was he? Where was David?

She listened but didn't hear him. Looked but didn't see him.