I released Daniel and turned to David. “You may be too old for such things, but do you think I could get a hug from you too?" David was embarrassed—his cheeks colored with a blush, but he stepped over to me anyway. I stood up and put my arms around him. He breathed deeply against my shoulder.
"That smell. I know that smell!" he exclaimed. Tammy's head turned to us sharply, alarm on her face. "I remember you, Riley. I must've hugged you a lot when I was little, because I remember exactly how you smell." He smiled up at me with a distinctly Michael twist to his lips, and my heart stopped. I had to force my words out. My stomach twisted with every lie.
“I’m so glad to hear you remember me, David,” I whispered. I gave him a squeeze then turned away. David might start remembering more, and I didn’t want to hurt or confuse him.
“Elias, Anthony, we should be going, don’t you think?” My voice betrayed me—I never wanted to leave again. I wanted to stay locked in the beautiful mountain prison forever, if it meant I could stay with them.
Anthony nodded and came to put his hand on my shoulder. “Danyelus, we're going to use the gateway in the basement to avoid whoever is chasing us. Once we're gone, call the Junta. Tell them what I’ve told you. Leave nothing out. I haven't given you any choice in these proceedings, and I won’t leave you implicated in our decisions. I won't tell you where we're going or why, and you don’t have enough of a force here to stop us.” He walked around me and clasped Danyelus, then Tammy in a hug. They gave me one more moment with my boys while they said goodbye to their children.
“David, Daniel, I hope to see you again soon. I love you so much, and I'm glad I got to see you. Could I have one more hug?” I knelt down, and they clasped me hesitantly. I wrapped an arm around each of them and relished in the contact with my long-missing children. It took every ounce of willpower in me to let them go and walk toward the manor.
Elias took my hand, and Anthony put his arm around my waist, and we went inside. As soon as the doors shut behind us, my legs gave out. A keening sob ripped from my mouth. I was done, spent; I could handle nothing more. Anthony scooped me up in his arms, and I clung to him, my face buried in his shirt. The fabric grew damp with my tears, but I didn’t care.
All I knew was that I was walking away from my children, this time of my own volition, and it was for their own good. How much more pain could my mind and heart take? When would I break for good? “Why can’t I stay?” The question was muffled against Anthony’s chest, but he understood.
“I am sorry, but it’s the law. We are not to integrate humans into our lives. If we are caught, we will be severely punished just for telling you. If we weren’t who we are, they would kill us.”
I buried my face in Anthony’s shirt again until he jostled me, and I looked up long enough to see we were walking down a darkened stairwell. I hid my face as a fresh wave of agony washed over me and new tears fell. Elias gripped my hand at the back of Anthony's neck. He kept his hand there until we stopped at the bottom of the stairs.
I raised my head again as a strong breeze signaled a door opening. The air smelled earthy and damp through my partially clogged nose. I hiccupped as I finally got my tears under control, and my interest in our surroundings piqued.
We stood in a circular room with six doors. Anthony strode toward the second door on the left and opened it by pushing in a certain brick to the right of the frame. I knew I'd never be able to pick out exactly which brick if we ever went through there again.
A soft gasp left me as, instead of opening on a hinge, like the doorseemedlike it would, it slid into the wall. More stairs greeted us down a pitch-black passage. Elias went down first. Anthony started down the stairs, still carrying me as if I were no heavier than little Jaime. "I can walk. I’ll need to use my phone for a light, though.”
Elias's voice came out of the darkness, "Artificial light won't work in this place. It's enchanted. We can see as if we were in the noon sun, but any other creature will see black. A flame would only illuminate a few inches around itself."
Elias grabbed my leg and Anthony's arms tightened around me. I squealed and slammed my eyes shut as I was doused in water. Had we walked under an underground waterfall? When I no longer felt the cool liquid running over my face, I opened my eyes to find we stood in the finished basement of a home, no waterfall in sight. A washer and dryer sat in one corner with a drying line, and a deep freezer was in another corner. Various trunks and boxes took up one wall. It was meticulously clean and absolutely ordinary.
Anthony sat me down, and I swung my long hair around to wring the water out of it, but it was bone dry. "What the heck, guys?” I stared at my dry hair and clothes. “Did I imagine walking through water?"
Elias chuckled as Anthony walked over to the washing machine. "Sorry for the secrecy, Riley. We went through a gateway. A gateway gives the feeling of being drenched, but that’s the magic moving you to your destination. That particular gateway will take us wherever we want, so long as we're touching the first person to go through. We can’t return to the manor in the same way though.”
“Where are we?” I gaped at the two of them.A magic waterfall portal? I mean, really?
“Texas, at a safe house. Besides Michael, only we know about this place. They shouldn't be able to track us here as long as we keep ourselves out of public areas. We have a lot of planning to do and can lie low for a while.”
Anthony pulled the washing machine out from the wall and spun the dial on a hidden safe. My eyes boggled. The safe was full of cash, guns, and papers. "Michael had access to that kind of cash, and we struggled the way we did?"
I felt bitter about the long hours I worked while pregnant so we could afford our semi-nice rental house. Then guilt set in, because how could I be mad at the dead love of my life? I hung my head.
I took off my backpack and set it next to the cash and guns Anthony was piling up. Elias took my hand and led me up the basement stairs into a spacious, neat kitchen. I explored the house a little and found three small bedrooms and one bathroom upstairs. Downstairs was only the kitchen, a large living room, and a half bath. It was cozy.
A nondescript sedan and SUV were in the double garage off the kitchen. A quick peek out the front windows revealed a cul-de-sac in Anytown, USA. It was the perfect hiding place.
"Don't the neighbors wonder about why the house is always empty?" I asked Elias. He was rummaging around in the refrigerator.
"We have a cleaning lady that comes in once a week and keeps it ready for us to drop in at any time. She also keeps the food fresh and stocked. The neighbors have been introduced to Anthony and me, and they think we're a sweet gay couple who work on a cruise ship and use this house as a home base. Normally, one or two of us stops in and spends a weekend here once a month, to keep up appearances. We pop in through the gateway and then take a cab to the airport and fly home."
They really did think of everything. Except…"Eli," I began, "If you're hiding here, how are you going to eat?" I wouldn’t look at him, still uncomfortable with their dietary needs.
"That's part of the planning, actually," he replied. "We have a three-day supply in Anthony's backpack, but we'll need to replenish. If we stop in at any one of the Supay blood banks in the world, we’ll be stopped. More than likely, the banks have been instructed to detain us upon arrival." He sighed and sat down in a kitchen chair. "Being a pure Supay is a bit like being a celebrity. Most of the Unseen know who we are."
Anthony came up the stairs with our stuff and shut the basement door. Our bags bulged, and he carried a small satchel as well. "Elias, do you have any reason to think we have been compromised here?"
"No, I don't. Nobody knows we rent this house and it's paid up for years. I used a fake ID to rent the place and I'm the one that made the ID and put the credit history and whatnot online. I was cautious."
Anthony shrugged his shoulders. "I would've sworn I left ten thousand dollars in the safe and only six are there now. I can't imagine the housekeeper could’ve found that safeandcracked the combination."
