Heart Search (5 page)

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Authors: Robin D Owens

Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Paranormal

BOOK: Heart Search
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The cat lifted its nose, sat like a proud cat statue
No. But I will be pleased to see D’Ash. She will recognize My worth
.
“Of course she will,” Jasmine said cheerfully. “Mother loves all cats.”
The tom inclined his head and his tail gave another swish.
“I’ll scry her now.” Jasmine went to the wall and touched the screen. “The cat needs a name.”
Laev and the cat stared at each other. The young tom’s eyes were a light green. Nice.
The cat glanced aside, lifted a forepaw, and licked it.
You have nice eyes, too.
Laev figured the compliment was progress. Maybe he could live with it.
Maybe
I
can live with
you
,
the tom replied.
All right, the cat was very telepathic.
The tom stood and stretched, his back arching in that sinuous way that amazed.
Being telepathic is one of My best qualities.
Laev shielded his thoughts. The cat narrowed his eyes, hissed, batted another piece of papyrus off the desk, followed it down to pounce on it and shred it.
I think I will like living here.
“I think the garden shed would suit you better,” Laev said. “I don’t want a biting cat.”
The cat looked around and smiled ingratiatingly.
No biting.
“Mother says you should bring—” Jasmine hinted heavily.
“Brazos,” Laev said.
Brazos. I like that name.
The cat gave the papyrus one last slice of claws, sat proudly.
“—you should bring Brazos around MidAfternoonBell. She will be squeezing you in as it is.”
For a moment Laev’s pride was ruffled. He was T’Hawthorn!
Brazos sneezed.
“We’ll be there,” Laev said.
Jasmine relayed that to her mother and the scry screen went dark. The girl beamed at them, nodded. “Great. You can meet with my father before the appointment and convince him to give me gilt to invest. I’ll get my report right to you.” She hurried back to her office and closed the door.
The tom stalked through the room, tail switching.
There is a smell I do not like.
He reached a bookcase, stretched tall to insert paws in the dimness of a shelf and yank something from the shadows to fall on the floor. The glass bottle rolled awkwardly and the stopper came off, decanting a puddle of perfume.
A thick, musky odor filled the room. Nivea’s scent. Laev’s pulse pounded and a headache exploded. He rubbed his temples, staring at the tom, whose eyes were wide.
Laev and the tom stared at each other before choking. Jasmine bulleted into the room. “What a stink. Smells like that disgusting scent that your wife liked.” She stopped for breath and began coughing.
“Win—windows
open
!” Laev snapped.
The glass of the windows thinned and a brisk spring breeze wafted around the room. Laev circled his desk to stare at the pool that was staining the rug he loved. Brazos shot to a far corner of the room, hissing.
Don’t like, don’t like, don’t LIKE.
“Uh-oh,” Jasmine said thickly, holding her nose.
“Residence?”
“Yes, T’Hawthorn.”
“Please send the housekeeper here to clean up this mess with the proper spells.”
“Yes, T’Hawthorn. She is on her way.”
Breathing shallowly, Laev said, “I didn’t know that bottle was there.” He hated the stench, too. The odor of the past, of failure. He’d moved beyond that, but here it was again, clinging like the perfume, reminding him of past mistakes.
He’d—they’d—ritually cleansed the Residence after Nivea’s death, annually since then. There should have been no more scent of her.
But he knew in his bones that she must have left other reminders of herself throughout the house. She didn’t like him, but she wouldn’t let herself be forgotten—even if her soul was long gone to circle on the wheel of stars until her next life.
He gritted his teeth. He wouldn’t let her haunt him.
 
 
C
amellia shifted from foot to foot in a pretty little pastel vet examination
room with a high counter that held a bedsponge. The odor of animals pervaded the office suite. She was alone in the room.
Danith D’Ash had appeared briefly to welcome them, laughing at the curious gleam in Glyssa’s eyes. But before D’Ash brought out the cat who was supposed to be Camellia’s Fam, a horrible emergency alarm pulsed and D’Ash ran.
Glyssa had stayed in the room for about three minutes, then mentioned something about “taking a peek around, maybe at D’Ash’s famous Fam Adoption Room” and slipped out the door.
Camellia glanced at her timer, wondered whether she should wait, but she didn’t want to alienate a FirstFamily lady. Nor did she want to return another time.
When she couldn’t stand it any longer, she opened the door, glancing down the short hallway for Glyssa. She didn’t see her friend and tentatively walked to the mainspace. The room was empty. Apparently the teenaged boy who’d been at the desk was helping his mother. A reddish light still pulsed in an alcove that held the huge teleportation pad. The indicator showed it was in use. Camellia touched the button to clear the pad in case it was needed for another emergency.
There were four large doors. Which one would Glyssa have gone through?
Camellia opened one and passed through. Her feet sank into thick carpet. An atmosphere of wealth and luxury—peace—enveloped her. Her nose wrinkled. The air
smelled
rich. Furniture oils and unique incense or perfume—maybe even spells. Expensive spells that would cost the amount she’d make in a month.
Or maybe it was just the knowledge that she was in a true, intelligent Residence, a FirstFamily home, even if it had been rebuilt—or the aura of such a being. Camellia shivered and turned back.
A door opened a long way toward her right. “Thank you for your kind words about my daughter,” T’Ash’s deep voice rumbled.
Another man answered, “Not kind, though you should be proud. I’m factual. Give her the gilt to work with, T’Ash, she’ll double or triple it, I assure you.”
Something about that man’s voice hit her like a blow, disorienting her. Wrenched something open inside her that she never wanted open, had suppressed until she’d forgotten about it.
She knew that voice.
No, she didn’t! Remembering that voice would be hurtful to her heart. Threaten her present life with one she couldn’t have. No.
She turned and ran, stumbling, back to the examination room, shut that door.
Dizzying darkness pressed on her and she folded over, bracing her hands against her legs, panting, forcing back unconsciousness. Her skin was clammy.
No. She wouldn’t let a past realization emerge that would shatter the life she’d crafted.
No.
The door opened and D’Ash and Glyssa were there. The lady was splattered with blood. The men stopped outside the door.
Camellia’s breathing hadn’t steadied before Glyssa and D’Ash entered together.
“That was just amazing!” Glyssa enthused. “You saved that horse’s life.”
Camellia stared. The emergency had been a horse?
“Thank you.” D’Ash was beaming. She shook her head and went to a hook to pull down a pale blue over-tunic. Sickness washed over Camellia as she saw D’Ash’s pastel green sleeves showed streaks of the deep and gleaming red of blood.
Turning her head, she sagged against the counter with the bedsponge, heard small noises as the GreatLady stripped away the old over-tunic and donned the new.
“Uh-oh.” Glyssa was there, putting an arm around Camellia, stroking her back, helping her to a bench. “It’s all right. The horse is fine.” Then Glyssa tsked. “She doesn’t do well with blood.”
Yes, that had to be the reason Camellia felt so bad. Not the shadows of the men near the door. One of the men.
She would ignore them. Had to.
Camellia dropped her face in her hands, hiding from the sight. Hiding from her friend and the GreatLady, hiding from the men.
Hiding from herself.
“Give us a few minutes,” D’Ash said to the men.
“We’ll wait right here,” her husband said.
The lady shut the door gently. Camellia lifted her arm and wiped her forehead with her sleeve.
D’Ash gestured and a spell whisked through the small room, leaving the scent of fresh and soothing herbs, banishing the faint tang of blood that had layered on Camellia’s tongue.
“Cat,” Camellia said.
“Yes, of course. Your Fam will be quite helpful in calming you, Camellia,” D’Ash said.
Maybe, maybe not. Camellia just wanted everything done and to be out of here.
Three
 
L
ong time and I have been VERY good, came a small mental voice.
D’Ash said, “Yes, you’ve been a very good FamCat.” D’Ash went into a back room and came back with a little calico cat who had large splotches of orange and black, not much white except on her belly.
“Oooooh!” Glyssa leaned over the exam table. “Pretty.”
“Yes. Isn’t she, Camellia?”
“Beautiful.” Her hands itched to hold the cat, young, charming, with the last hint of baby fat. Camellia rose and went to the table.
The FamCat tilted her head, opened her mouth, and used that extra sense cats had.
My FamWoman is beautiful, too. Smellstastes verrry interesting.
“Thank you,” Camellia reached out.
The cat leapt from D’Ash’s loose hold to land in Camellia’s arms.
“There!” D’Ash put her hands on her rounded hips. “A very good job.”
“D’Ash . . .” Glyssa sent the GreatLady an appeal.
“I think you’d bond best with a fox kit,” D’Ash said. “The next one I get with good intelligence is yours.”
“Thank you.” Glyssa shook her head, pulled at a rusty-colored lock of hair that had fallen from the knot at the back of her head. “We’ll match in coloring.”
The door opened. “It’s been a few minutes. T’Hawthorn is here to have his new cat checked,” T’Ash said.
Camellia didn’t want the men to come in. Too bad, they’d already crowded into the room, as well as a long-haired black cat. She didn’t look at the younger man who was as tall as T’Ash and moved with a prowling grace. Instead she smoothed out her frown, cuddled her cat closer; the soft rumble of her Fam’s purr vibrated against her arms.
She felt better holding her FamCat, a symbol of the life she had now, not teenaged dreams that she refused to remember.
It’s Black!
Camellia’s cat squealed. Wriggling away, she jumped onto the bedsponge and hopped a couple of times.
Greetyou, Black!
A young black tom stretched before Camellia in a long leap, landed several centimeters before her smaller calico.
Camellia made a noise of protest.
But the larger cat didn’t pounce, just gathered himself into an upright sitting position, leaned over, and bumped noses with the calico—who squeaked and jumped high, alighting on Camellia’s shoulder, which was just big enough for the kit to balance on.
You
smell
. Smell, smell, smell. AWFUL.
Now that the little cat mentioned it, a new odor had entered the room.
Camellia found herself stiffening, met Glyssa’s eyes. They recognized the perfume the late Nivea Hawthorn preferred—their old acquaintance, Nivea Sunflower. Who’d scorned them all. That hurt, too. This whole visit was impossible now.
Did T’Hawthorn need to have a reminder of his dead wife always close? Camellia wouldn’t have thought it, the way that woman had treated him, but men were strange. She found herself breathing too quickly and evened it out.
“The smell is a problem,” T’Hawthorn said, smoothing a stroke along his cat’s back. More heavy fragrance puffed into the air. “My office has been cleaned, and I took a waterfall and tried to—ah—banish the odor from Brazos, but it didn’t quite work.” His smile was charming. “We need an expert.”
The calico cat burrowed into Camellia’s shoulder-length hair.
Black has a name, now?
I am a FirstFamily Cat. My name is Brazos.
The calico licked Camilla’s neck. I
need a name, too.
Unlike most Families on Celta, Darjeeling wasn’t a botanically based name but some sort of ancient Earthan place-name. Camellia had run through several ideas. “Mica.”
That is a very good name.
The little cat sniffed, sneezed.
Bad smell tickles my nose. And Mica is prettier than Brazos.
Glyssa chuckled but moved around the table toward the open door. She bobbed a brief curtsey. “Greetyou, GreatLord T’Ash, GreatLord T’Hawthorn. Excuse us, we must be on our way.” She waved a hand. “Business, you know.”

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