Tom Dowd - Burning Bright

"John Mikayama's office. Elizabeth Breman speaking." Her voice was airy and almost breathless.

"Hoi," Kyle said.

She paused. "Kyle?'

"Yeah, it's me."

"Are you all right?" Sometimes, it seemed she always asked him that.

"Uh-huh," he said. "Mostly tired."

"Where are you? There's so much noise…"

"I'm on the street. Nothing to worry about."

"Sure…"

He coughed. "Look, I called to tell you to stop over at your sister's on your way home if you can."

Her voice rose excitedly. "Is she there?"

"No." He heard her exhale sharply. "At least she wasn't earlier, before lunch. You have keys, right?"

"Yes, I do. Is something wrong?"

"Truthfully," he said, "I don't know. She's not there, but her cat is. You might want to pick him up."

"Oh my god."

"I don't know if anything's wrong. She's just not there. That's all I'm saying."

"Please tell me."

"Beth, there's nothing to tell you," Kyle said, letting himself squint against the sun. "I don't know anything more than that."

"Please tell me."

He dipped his head forward away from the light.

He shouldn't have called. "You're going to be home tonight, yes?"

"Yes, I'll be home."

"Good. I'll try and stop by. Maybe help Natalie with her homework or something."

"She won't be here. She's staying at her friend Pammy's with some of the other girls from the computer club. They're finishing off a class presentation on Pammy's father's system. He's a media programmer."

“Then maybe tomorrow."

"Come by anyway. Let me know if you'll make it for dinner. If you do, I'll cook again."

He smiled. "Such treatment."

"Yeah, well," she said, "I've been practicing."

"I'll call and let you know."

"Please call, will you?"

"Yes," he said. "Bye."

"Bye."

He disconnected and folded the phone shut, slipping it back into his pocket.

Back inside, Kyle walked slowly through the rooms. The gunfire had stopped, but there was no sign of Woodhouse. A few officers were making their way carefully down the stairs. Then Woodhouse came up, blank-faced. He looked at Kyle and walked toward the rear door. Kyle let him go.

The detectives were searching every corner, examining every scrap of paper or file they could find. Kyle watched them and listened. The papers said nothing. The files were innocuous, revealing nothing. There was information on bill payment, and one of the detectives thought they might be able to find out more by tracing the bank accounts. Kyle doubted it. This had been a Universal Brotherhood storefront, apparently keeping up some level of operation despite the official government shutdown months ago. There would no traces to anything.

Kyle shuddered and wondered if all the Universal Brotherhood sites had been like this. Was this what had prompted the government crackdown? Was this the drek Strevich had tried to warn him away from? Part of him wished he'd listened.

After speaking briefly with Chief Lekas, he walked back outside to return the body armor to the officer watching over the command van. They arranged for a police car to drive him back to his hotel.

Ignoring the odd, almost frightened looks of hotel security and other patrons, Kyle went up to his suite, stripped off his clothing and foci, and sat in the shower under the water running as hot as he could stand for as long as he dared. He didn't even think that Linda Hayward might come back. He thought about sleeping, but knew he couldn't do that yet.

He used his shaving gel to remove the day's growth of stubble on his face, then put on a pair of jeans and the old pullover sweatshirt he reserved for the rare times he bothered to jog. He almost walked out without his foci, but remembered them at the last minute.

Kyle couldn't remember where his car was, and checked with the hotel valet. No, they told him, it wasn't there. They called him a cab instead.

Two and half hours later, when Elizabeth Breman finally came home carrying her sister's cat Grendel in her arms, she found Kyle sitting on the front porch in the same FBI pullover he'd been wearing on the day she'd first met him. He was fast asleep. She took the cat inside and then came back. After a moment's thought, she led Kyle half-awake up the stairs to the second floor and the master bedroom. He didn't notice as she gently pulled off his shoes, followed by his pants and sweatshirt. He didn't even notice when she removed his foci and placed them carefully on the nightstand, just within reach, and then draped a blanket over him. He didn't even notice when she leaned in and kissed him softly on the temple, next to the long, dark scratch that only now seemed to be closing over. He was fast asleep, safe among the fluffy quilts and pillows that smelled faintly of flowers and leaves.

When a chill breeze slipping in through the partially open; bedroom window woke him sometime in the middle of the night, she was curled against him, her new short haircut pushed askew by his shoulder. Though covered by the blanket, she seemed cold, wearing only one of the long nightshirts she favored. As he pulled her closer, she opened her eyes. She said nothing for a long moment, then clung to him and he felt her body begin to shudder as she choked backed the tears she'd never wanted him to see.

She was cold, and he held her tighter against both the night and the sadness. His own emotions of the last days came rushing up on him, and he felt her sadness, almost undeniable, flow over him. But then she moved against him, and suddenly in the near darkness their lips met, carefully, and he tasted them washed in her tears.

They turned slightly and sat up, her legs spreading around him, nightshirt pushed high up on her hips. She gasped, and he wanted the feel of all of her body beneath his hands, the smell of her hair, the brush of her warming skin, and the rush of their mingled breath as he entered her roughly. He wanted it all. Then. Now. Immediately. But as she closed her eyes and arced her body away from him, he pulled her shirt off slowly, forcing himself to linger over every curve, every revealed shadow.

Calmly, slowly, he turned them both, letting her lie on her back. He lowered himself to where their bodies nearly touched and kissed her gently high on the forehead. He moved down from there, against the soft curve of her ear, across the strong line of her jaw, beneath her chin, and lower, below her breasts, and then carefully around and back up again to their hard, dark tips. And he did this slowly, deliberately, thinking only of her and her body. Every inch. Ignoring everything else. Forgetting everything else. For as could.

He awoke again toward morning, he and Beth safely beneath the covers, protected from the surprising morning chill that had crept in. The light outside, slipping in through the partially open window, was a brightening blue-gray, tinged with the promise of another day of bright sun. He breathed in heavily and squinted against that unexpected glare. Bern moved too, pushing away from him slightly, and making an unintelligible noise. He shifted his arm into a more comfortable position across her back. For a long, strange moment, he was caught in a physical and emotional limbo where three years had vanished and foolish mistakes were forgiven. It was familiar territory, someplace safe, where he'd least expected to be-

Familiar territory. Someplace safe. Last place you expected to be.

Kyle knew then where to look for Beth's sister, and for Mitch Truman.

He carefully untangled his arms and legs from Beth's, trying not to wake her. She slept on, hearing nothing as he pulled on his pants and walked silently downstairs. Grendel regarded him from a strategic position near the front windows, but did nothing except watch with wide, unblinking eyes.