Even In Darkness (Between) (4 page)

“Lindsey?” Aiden’s voice floated down to me from the small balcony overlooking the room. Relief surged in my chest at seeing him, knowing I had found him and would have the chance to tell him how I felt. But I didn’t need to. Our eyes locked and everything I needed to say was already there
: grief, fear, guilt, forgiveness. We didn’t say a word—out loud or in our minds—and a sense of peace settled deep in my soul.

He turned and descended the stairs while I got to my feet and moved toward the corner where I knew he’d emerge. I didn’t need to say “I’m sorry” but I did it anyway.

“I am as well. I love you,” he said before he pulled me into his arms. His heart beat fast against my cheek. The gaping wound in my heart that had separated us since the night before quietly mended while I took deep breaths, filling my senses with the warm scent that was so Aiden. When we pulled away to look at each other, instead of talking, he lowered his mouth to mine and we kissed in the great hall.

Nothing else matter
s. Only this.

Afterward, we wandered through the castle, stopping to look at tapestries and artwork on the walls
, Aiden commenting here and there how things differed from his childhood memories.

“Mrs. Fitzgibbons, the cook, would smack my knuckles with her wooden spoon whenever I tried to sneak a bit of bread before supper,” he said with a soft smile as we headed into the kitchen.

“Have you had any lunch?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Nae, I hadn’t the appetite for it earlier.
You?”

I told him about the pub where Mom and I had stopped to eat,
then mentioned the newscast we’d seen. “It was weird. When the guy mentioned that his mom had met a transporter before she was brought back to life, I wondered if maybe you’d met her,” I said, trying to keep my voice light.

Aiden got a strange, intense look on his face. “Ye said that others have been taken suddenly, without warning?”

“Yeah, they think it might be a virus or something. Why?” The way he straightened up and dropped my hand was starting to freak me out. “What’s the matter?”

“Did they say when the deaths started?”

I shook my head, running back through the newscast in my mind. “Um, I don’t know… I think she said earlier this morning.”

Aiden squeezed his eyes shut tight like he’d hit his thumb with a hammer and was straining to keep from swearing.
It was only after I heard his whispered “Amen” that I realized he was praying.

“Aiden?”
I asked, trying to keep the panic that was starting to swirl inside me from taking hold.

He moved to close the door to the kitchen and leaned against it with a heavy sigh.

“Don’t you see? I was afraid this might happen,” he said.

“See what? What are you talking about?”

“The hell transporter. She got what she came for. A child.”

“What? How do you know that? And besides, even if she did…” The words ‘get pregnant’ stuck in my throat, so I skipped over them. “It would be nine months before the baby was even born. It just happened last night, for crying out loud! And how could the baby have anything to do with these deaths?
You’re not making any sense. They can’t be related.”

“When you died and met me in B
etween, how long were you there? How many days?”

I shrugged, feeling defensive. “I don’t know.
Five days, a week, something like that.”

“Right.
And when you came back, how long had you been gone?”

We both knew the answer to that question. I was revived at the scene of the accident. It was as if I’d never died at all, as though hardly any time had passed.

“So what? That doesn’t prove anything.” I was being belligerent, I knew, but I didn’t like where this was going and denial seemed the safest route.

“Time is not the same
there as it is here,” he said. “A day can be like a thousand years, and a thousand years like a day. The child could be fully grown this very moment.”

The fish and chips I’d eaten earlier congealed into a hard lump in my
belly.

“But even if that were true,” I held up one hand to ward off his protest, “I don’t see how that has anything to do with the newscast, with the deaths.”

“When Mona held us at gunpoint in that warehouse, she said that the offspring of a heaven transporter and a hell transporter would rule the realm in Between and that the master of hell had already laid claim to the child. What do you suppose she meant by that?”

Mention of that
horrific day when I thought we were both going to die brought a flurry of emotions to the surface. I stuffed them down as best I could, but my voice wobbled when I answered. “I don’t know.”

“Nor do
I. But I’ve a sense that none of it is for the good. If my suspicions are correct and the babe was indeed born, he’ll be naught but a pawn in the devil’s plan to wreak havoc on Earth and the Between realm as well.”

“So what does that mean? Is he going to open up some kind of portal and send leagues of demons
out here to kill us all? Would a transporter baby even give him that kind of power?” My mind whirled with possibilities of what that could entail.

“I don’t know. She said the babe would rule the realm in
Between, not this one.”

“But you think he’s killing
people here on Earth. How could he do that?”

“Perhaps
his power extends only those who bear the stamp of the other world, those who’ve been before.”

I gasped out loud as his prediction became clear. “Like us, you mean?”

“Aye. Like us.”

Chapter 5

The mood back at the MacKinnons’ house was festive and joyful, in stark contrast to the worry buzzing around my skull. Relatives were arriving in a steady stream, bring
ing with them shouts of greetings, hugs, and gifts by the crate-load. I remembered seeing some of them at the wedding, but as Ian introduced me and we shook hands, I knew there was no way I would remember all of their names. One little girl seemed fascinated with me. She looked to be about three years old, with pig tails, a round face and huge brown eyes.

“I’m Celia,” she announced, blinking up at me through thick lashes.

I squatted down to her level. “Hi, Celia. I’m Lindsey.” Being a single child and not having spent much time around kids, I wasn’t sure what the correct protocol was from here. Do we shake hands? Hug? Just smile at each other? I waited for her cue.

Celia pointed
to Aiden, who was standing beside me, a sweet smile touching his lips. “Did you really marry him?”

Laughing, I assured her that I had.

“Why?” she pushed.

Her question caught me off guard. Were kids always this forward? She was too funny. Of course, the answer was simple.
“Because I love him.”

She nodded thoughtfully,
then brightened. “Would you sit next to me at dinner?”

Apparently, we were BFFs now. The grin on my face was starting to ache. “I’d love to
.”

“She’s not bothering you, I hope.” A woman I could only assume was Celia’s mom came over and put
an arm on her shoulder.

I stood up from my crouched position. “No, no. She’s adorable.”
The woman introduced herself as Helen and we shook hands.

“We’re gonna sit together at dinner,” Celia announced proudly.

“Oh, you are, are you?” her mom replied. “Well, we’d better get you washed up and ready then.” With an apologetic smile to me, Helen took the little girl’s hand and turned away. Celia waved to me frantically as if somehow I’d forget our date.

I waved back.

Aiden’s hand slid down my other arm until his fingers intertwined with mine. The worry and stress that had been weighing me down lifted just enough that I could release the tension in my shoulders. I still had no idea what we were going to do—if there was anything we could do—but at least Celia had taken my mind off our discovery for a minute.

When it came time for dinner later that evening, I tracked down Joanne MacKinnon to let her know of my promise to sit next to Celia. I was afraid that there with this many people, we’d have assigned seating and I didn’t want to break the little girl’s heart.

“Celia is
Mark’s niece. Isn’t she a sweetheart?” Joanne said with a glowing expression. As I nodded, she said, “Here’s what we’ll do. You and Aiden can sit next to me and Mark, then I’ll put Celia and the rest of her family down that side.” When I thanked her, she looked me over with motherly concern. “Are you feeling better now?”

I had to rack my brain for a moment to figure out what she meant. She couldn’t know about the fight I’d had with Aiden or the hell transporter, could she? Am I that
easy to read?

“You said you weren’t feeling well at breakfast,” she supplied.

Relief coursed through me. “Right. Yes, I’m feeling better, thanks. Must have been something I ate last night.” When her face creased in a frown, I quickly added, “At the bar. Bar food. Not your food. Your food’s great.” Okay, I felt like the world’s biggest dork.

She touched me on the arm. “Well, I’m glad to hear you’re better now, no matter the cause.” With a gentle squeeze of her fingers, she left to take care of the dinner preparations.

Christmas back home had always been a pretty small event, since I didn’t have any siblings or a large extended family. We usually went to my grandparents’ house and they all sat around watching me open gifts. It was the Lindsey Show from sun up to whenever I finished. The floor would be covered in crumpled wrapping paper and ribbons and everyone would be exhausted from doing nothing but smiling and talking.

Two years ago, all of that changed when my parents got divorced. The first Christmas after they split, my dad tried to plaster on a fake smile and make like everything was fine. It was a miserable failure. He bought me an obscene amount of gifts to try and compensate, but I didn’t care about any of them. All I wanted was everything to be back the way it was before. I didn’t even go to my mom’s place that year. She wanted me to, but I refused. I know it hurt her, but she hurt me. No, she hurt us. Me and Dad both. Grandma and Grandpa, too. All of us. She deserted us and that was something I couldn’t forgive. She said it wasn’t about me, that it was between her and my dad, that she’d always love me, but I didn’t care. She wouldn’t have done it if she really loved me. She wouldn’t have cheated on him with Nick.

I hadn’t been in love before and it all seemed pretty black and white to me at the time. Mom was the bad guy; Dad was the good guy. Nick…ugh, Nick. He was the even worse guy. I hated him. It was really all his fault. My mom would never have left us if it hadn’t been for him. He stole her. That’s what I thought, and putting everyone in these boxes helped me cope with the disaster that had become my home life.

But then there was the car accident when I died and met Aiden in the realm in between Earth and heaven. I fell for him hard. Like I-would-give-up-heaven-for-you hard. I’d had a boyfriend before the accident, but I wasn’t in love with him. I’d never been in love with anyone until I met Aiden. And I would do whatever it took to be with him. When I was brought back to life, I was shattered. Nothing mattered without Aiden. School, friends, music—I didn’t care about anything anymore.

Last Christmas, I was in a hospital bed after the accident. My parents screamed at each other
right in front of me, calling each other names. I couldn’t believe it. I’d just lost Aiden and had been brought back for that? To hear them hating on each other on Christmas Day in the hospital? It was the start of the blackest time of my life, but it gave me a better understanding of what my mom sacrificed to go after the man she wanted and why. Of course, Nick didn’t turn out to be what she thought and I could see now that she regretted her choice. She thought it was too late to fix what she had broken.

A quick glance across the
dinner table made it clear she was so wrong about that. My dad was hanging on her every word, looking happier than I’d seen him in years. He’d take her back in a heartbeat. And even though she left us, even though she threw a grenade into my childhood memories of a happy family, I wanted her back, too. I loved her. And if it would make Dad keep smiling like that, I’d do whatever she asked.

“But I don’t like peas!” Celia exclaimed beside me,
poking a hole in my thoughts. Her mom put a scoop on her plate anyway and I could see Celia was half a second from melting down.

“Helen, I’d love some peas,” I said, making sure Celia could hear me. I held out my plate
. Helen dished out a grateful smile along with my veggies.

Celia’s
budding tantrum dwindled to a sniffle as she watched me, those brown eyes taking in my every move.

I scooped a spoonful into my mouth and made a blissful sound, careful not to look directly at Celia. “These are delicious.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Celia pick up a pea with pinched fingers like it was a bug on her plate. With a suspicious glare at me, she popped the evil green orb into her mouth and made a slow, exaggerated chewing motion. I fought to suppress a grin. Score one for me! Helen’s eyes locked with mine in triumph for a moment before a disruption at the door made me turn.

The MacKinnons’ head footman—I think his name was
Gerald—was standing ramrod stiff, his lips pressed tight together in barely restrained anger. Two uniformed policemen stood next to him. One of them looked strangely familiar to me, though I couldn’t imagine why. His clothes hung on his bony frame like he had no more muscle than a hanger, and his beady eyes scanned the room before stopping to rest on Aiden. He tilted his head toward his partner and whispered something out of the side of his mouth that was obviously about Aiden. The other officer, whose shirt barely covered the round expanse of his stomach, nodded and began to move forward.

Mark MacKinnon stood up sharply, his chair scraping against the floor.
“And what is the meaning of this?” The authority in his voice made no mistake who was the head of this house.

The fat one replied,
“My apologies to you, sir, but Officer Campbell and I have orders to take one Aiden MacRae in for questioning, and I understand him to be staying at your house.”

Gasps across the table echoed in the stillness of the room. All eyes snapped to Aiden, who had become completely still.

“And you are?”

“Officer Murray, sir, at your service.” He straightened, making the girth of his belly even more pronounced.

“It’s Christmas Eve, gentlemen. Certainly our American guest deserves a couple days with his family to enjoy the holiday, as do we all. I can assure you that he will remain here until the day after Christmas, at which time you may return to fulfill your duties.” The finality of his statement brooked no argument. Mark nodded to the footman, who placed himself between the policeman and the table, one arm outstretched toward the door.

“Begging your pardon, but we’ve strict orders and we—” Whatever he was going to say was cut off by a piercing scream to my right. Celia was in hysterics, purple faced and screeching, waving frantically
at me. I leaned toward her to try and calm her down and heard Mark yell, “Joanne!” My head whipped around to find Joanne MacKinnon slumped in her chair, her eyes glassy and fixed at some point on the ceiling. She didn’t appear to be breathing.

The room exploded in a riot of noise as people left their seats to attend to Joanne, who was non-responsive. The policemen took advantage of the chaos and pressed past the footman. The
one called Campbell grabbed Aiden’s arm and yanked him to his feet.

Mark shot the officer a venomous glare.  “Don’t touch him. And get off my property.
Now.”

Aiden shook his head. “I’ll go. Attend to your wife.” And with that, they slipped out the door.
People were crowding around Joanne or coming to help calm Celia, trapping me in the chaos. Pushing past them with as much sensitivity as I could muster, I dragged my way toward the door where Aiden had left, feeling like I had chains on my feet. Running through the long hallway that led to the main entrance, I started to panic. Where were they taking him? Did they figure it out? Was it the passport? I shouldn’t have brought him here. Oh God, oh God, oh God.

The footman tried to stop me leaving. “You really shouldn’t…”

“Get out of my way!” I screamed at him and he hastily moved to hold the door open for me. A blast of freezing cold air knocked me back for a second, as my brain caught up with my feet. I hadn’t even thought to bring a coat and it was well below freezing outside. Adrenaline pumped through my blood, holding the worst at bay, and I ran as fast as I could toward them.

Turning the corner around the building, I
found them in the parking lot next to the fence that edged the property. Aiden wasn’t resisting, but the policeman’s fingers were clearly digging into his arm.

“Wait!”
I yelled. Aiden jerked to a stop.

“Go back to your family, miss,” the fat one said gruffly, though his face held a hint of shame.

“He is my family. I’m his wife.”
My breath came out in puffs of white smoke. The air stung my lungs and stars danced at the edge of my vision. I couldn’t take a deep breath. “What did he do? What are the charges against him?”

Officer Campbell
moved toward me and all of a sudden, it hit me where I’d seen him before. When we arrived in Edinburgh, the customs officer named Robert had leered at me, telling his partner in Gaelic that he’d like to wear my ass as a hat. It was a good thing Aiden hadn’t provided the translation until we were out of earshot, because I wanted to claw his creepy face off. And now that face was looking right at me. But we weren’t anywhere close to Edinburgh now. What was going on?

“Robert?” I asked and his eyes widened a fraction.

“My brother is Robert and aye, he’s the one who alerted us of your husband’s questionable passport.” And by the tone of his voice, ‘questionable’ clearly meant ‘fake’.

I took a step toward Aiden and Robert’s brother moved behind me, his arms snaking around my body. His breath was warm on my ear as he whispered, “He also told me what a lovely lass you are and I have to agree.”

Officer Murray had turned to place a hand on Aiden’s head to press him into the back of the car, so he didn’t see Campbell’s hand come up and squeeze my breast.

But Aiden did.

With a roar, he broke free of the policeman’s grasp and charged toward Campbell. He wrenched the man off me. “Get your hands off my wife.”

I pulled Aiden away from the policemen, back toward the fence, feeling the crunch of snow under my feet as we got close to the edge. Swinging around in front of him to break his eye contact with the asshole who’d grabbed me,
I put both hands on his cheeks and shouted his name.