Untraceable (6 page)

His head wobbled slightly, “True, but
I don’t know how bad the mosquitoes are tonight and I don’t want
you getting bitten.”

“
If it was dusk, I’d
agree, but I think it’s late enough that they shouldn’t be too bad.
We could sit out by the pool for a little while and enjoy the
evening. If they aren’t biting, we’ll build a fire.”

He gave me a smile, “I should get it
caged like your mom’s.”

“
No, don’t do that. It’s
perfect and I love the view of the stars out here without the cage
and the city lights. Come on,” I begged, tugging his hand toward
the door. “Let’s sit outside.”

It was nearly black on the pool deck.
His outside light wasn’t on and neither were the pool lights, but
the moon and the stars were stunning in the darkness so I begged
him to leave everything off.

“
But you might trip; it’s
too dark, baby.”

“
You know if you keep this
up, I’m going to call you Ryan.”

He paused in the moonlight as I
watched one eyebrow slowly rise to punctuate the question I could
see on his face.

“
You’re starting to do his
mother-hen routine,” I laughed as I settled onto a
lounger.

“
He’s this protective over
you?” The surprise was clear in his voice.

“
Well, after you… I was so
depressed, and he—he came in and… Never mind—yes, he is this
protective over me.” I wanted total honesty with Micah, but there
were some things I’d rather not discuss. Unfortunately, he had a
way of getting that first tiny string out of me and then he would
pull it until I unraveled.

“
I get the ‘after’ part,
Leese, but what’s the rest? He came in on what?”

“
I had out my bottle of
Amytal and wasn’t in a good frame of mind—I’ve never seen anything
freak him out so badly. He made me realize that no matter how bad
things get, ending it all is never a solution because you hurt so
many people that love you in the process. After that, I could
barely use the bathroom without him checking on me to make sure I
was okay.”

“
You know I’m really glad
he didn’t start attending school in Pensacola before I got
there.”

I gave a small laugh, glad that my
deep dark reveal wasn’t going to be dissected further. “He and I
discussed that once. By the time you showed, there would have been
no way I could have changed my devotion, and you and I never would
have happened.”

“
I hate to tell you this,
baby, but you would have been in my arms regardless.”

I didn’t see where he was going with
this. I just couldn’t believe that he thought I would have been
Ryan’s and then simply changed my mind. Didn’t he realize how
strongly I believed in commitment? “No, that would be like
saying—”

“
I would have killed him,
Leese.”

That shut me up.

“
I had to make you mine
for this to work. I’d already planned to get rid of any boyfriend
you had when I got there, and then I would have been your crying
shoulder. You would have never known what happened to him and I
would have stepped in. I hate to be this blunt about it, but that
was my job and I was very good at what I did. Looking back now, I
know that would have been one of the worst murders I could have
committed because he is like the male version of you—he’s an
honest-to-God good person.”

“
It’s going to take a
while for me to get used to you being so—so open about things,” I
stammered. “I’m glad that you are, it’s just you might find me
speechless sometimes.”

“
Honesty comes with the
new me. I just never figured how much better it feels than
lying.”

“
Yeah, who would have
guessed a year after you brought me here as your target that we
would be sitting here tonight, expecting our first baby, and
discussing truth.”

“
Not me,” he admitted. “I
haven’t felt the first mosquito. How about a bonfire?” he asked
with a chuckle.

A little while later, I was sitting
beside a large fire and he was coming out the kitchen door with two
big boxes. His only request was that I didn’t open the
folders.

“
It’s bad enough,” he
remarked, “that their faces are etched in my memory. I don’t want
them in yours.”

He kept everything so well organized,
a series of numbers at the top of each file and each file in
numerical order that I had to ask. “You aren’t a little
anal-retentive are you?”

“
I am very
anal-retentive,” he admitted as he burned them in order.

“
Well, here is to change,”
I stated softly, taking the lid off the second box and pulling out
a handful.

“
Wait!” he said grabbing
the stack before I could get it close to the fire. “I want
something out of one of those.”

“
What?” I couldn’t imagine
that he’d want a memento.

He opened a thin folder and reached
inside, unstapled a photo and promptly placed it in his pocket. “I
can’t let her picture burn,” he said with a small choke.

“
Whose?” I asked,
wondering if it was the boss’s young wife. “Let me see,” I
begged.

“
You don’t have to know
everything, Annalisa.”

“
Ah… What happened to
honesty?”

“
I’m not being dishonest.
It’s just special, that’s all.”

“
Why can’t I see it?” I
whined.

“
At the end, baby. Let’s
empty these boxes.”

I didn’t consider myself as spoiled,
but at that moment I wanted to see the picture in his pocket so
badly I could have tossed a tantrum. I bit my pouty, protruding lip
and continued to put files on the fire. The only thing that paused
my aggravation over not seeing the picture was that I suddenly
realized how many files we were burning. Micah had been the
instrument to end the lives of these people and there were
hundreds. I thought about the fact that his eyes had watched each
of these draw their last breaths on this earth, and, for the first
time in a very long time, I felt a shiver of fear to be in his
presence.

We finally reached the bottom of the
boxes and he tore the cardboard into sections and burned it as
well. “I don’t want anything left,” he stated.

My hand reached up to his shirt
pocket, “But something is left.”

His eyes filled with tears, “But she
started it all.”

I had my answer; it was the first one.
I took my hand away from his pocket. As much as I wanted to see her
face, I couldn’t press him simply over my curiosity.

He was reaching into his pocket, but I
placed my hand on his and told him it was okay. “I don’t have to
see it.”

“
Yes, you do,” he
whispered, “because without her I wouldn’t have you. Her name was,”
he took a breath as he pulled it out, but kept it shielded from my
sight, “Annalisa McKinnis,” he breathed, opening his hand to reveal
my school picture. “And if it hadn’t been for her, we never would
have met.”

“
Oh, Micah, I’m sorry—I
thought—I just assumed it was—”

“
You, Annalisa,” he
hoarsely whispered, “are the only memory out of all of this worth
keeping.” He leaned over and very slowly brought his lips to mine
as his hand came up and moved into my hair. “We smell like smoke,”
he whispered. “How about a little time in my shower and then that
French lesson I promised you?”

“
Is the pool heater
on?”

“
I think so,” he said with
a questioning look as he rose up and went to feel the water. His
back was turned to me as he put his hand in the pool. “It’s warm,
about 85, I’m guessing, but—” He turned and was silent.

I had already removed my top and bra,
and I was undoing my shorts. “You tried to get me naked outdoors
once today, that and the fact that the first time you saw me nude
was on this pool deck.”

“
Baby, you don’t know just
how beautiful you are—I’ll never forget that night when I came back
to get you. My heart
literally
skipped a beat in my chest when I saw you. And it
did the same thing just now when I turned around. I
know
we won’t get
interrupted here.”

I laughed as I stood up and let my
shorts fall to the deck. “I’m not going to believe that statement,
but I’ll risk it tonight.”

He was grinning broadly as he
unbuttoned his shirt, “This time we’ll both be naked in the pool
because I don’t like swimming with my clothes.”

“
Well, I’m really glad
when I woke that morning that you had your pants on; I freaked bad
enough over my missing clothes, but I’ll be disappointed tonight if
you keep them on.”

I’m not an exhibitionist so the
feeling was strange and yet exhilarating as we stood there in the
moonlight in front of the remnants of our fire, totally bare and
embraced. He asked me, in French, if I was ready to swim, and then
he took my hand and led me to the pool steps and we descended into
the water. It was a feast for the senses as we touched, caressed,
kissed, and enjoyed the simple sensation of being uninhibited as we
swam together.

We hadn’t been in the pool very long
when he continued, in French, to ask if I was ready for a shower.
It was a little hard to keep up with him conversationally because
he had gone completely French on me. It was like he had suddenly
become a foreigner because he never explained or switched to
English. It’s one thing to study the French language, to learn
words and simple phrases, but to be fluent took a degree of mastery
that I didn’t possess.

All the way through the shower and
onto his bed the words like poetry flowed from his lips. I had
given up trying to concentrate on the meanings, and instead
switched to the enjoyment of his lyrical voice, although some words
did capture my attention. Even his lovemaking changed tonight as he
stretched me out and began to kiss from the tops of my feet, up my
ankles and calves to places of euphoria. When his mouth wasn’t
occupied sending waves of pleasure through me, he was still
talking.

He rose above me, and I began to
discern some of what he was saying was a description of what he was
experiencing as our bodies united. He was describing to me every
aspect of the sensations that he felt inside my body, the pleasure,
the need, and the love as his voice and his rhythm became
one.

I was cresting, begging him to join
me, but tonight he was giving me another lesson in his ability to
restrain himself as he continued to refine my experience with him.
The word encore was repeated by him many times as I cried out that
I couldn’t continue, yet as I said it I could tell he was already
bringing me there again. By the third orgasm I was nearly in tears,
but this time I understood he was saying to release again and he
would join me in the pleasure. I didn’t expect the intensity to be
quite so strong, but we were in perfect sync as the sensation
locked us together in spasms of pleasure.

“
So how was the lesson?”
he breathed heavily, uttering the first English words I’d heard
come out of his mouth since the pool.

I couldn’t talk. My heart was still
racing. I couldn’t breathe properly and my legs were trembling as I
attempted to compose. I was in a state of hyperventilation and
suddenly I was afraid because I was still beyond
control.

I didn’t realize I was actually crying
until he began to wipe away my tears.

“
Are you okay? I didn’t
hurt you, did I?”

When I couldn’t answer, he understood
what was happening to me. Suddenly, his hands were cupped around my
mouth and nose as he literally breathed his sweet breath into my
lungs. He was feeding me his carbon dioxide, returning control to
me. My heart slowed and the tingling that had begun in my face and
hands ebbed, and relaxation ensued.

He moved his hands and cradled my
face, “Are you okay, now?”

“
You nearly put me in the
hospital!” I snapped.

“
That would have been a
fun one to explain in the ER,” he quipped.

“
Micah the sex was
fantastic, but, baby, the next time you do this to me should be
when I’m not pregnant. I thought I was going into
labor.”

“
I’m sorry,” he said with
a soft smile. “I got a little carried away, but you’re so wonderful
and you feel so good to me, I didn’t want to stop telling you about
the experience.”

I finally found my smile, “I thought
that was what you were saying, but I wasn’t sure. You’ll have to
explain it to me in English sometime.”

“
No,” he chuckled. “It
sounds much better in French. In English you might find it a little
on the dirty side. It’s going to be morning here in a little while,
close your eyes, baby, you need some sleep.”

I was going to rebut, but a massive
yawn stopped my argument. I wanted to ask him more about what he
had been saying to me, but he was right and I was sure he was just
as exhausted.

“
We should take another
shower,” I stated, but rolled my back to him and placed his arm
over me. He released me for a moment and pulled the soft sheet up
to my shoulder, and then kissed my neck.