And that made her cry all the harder. "Damn you, Jess," she breathed, despising her weakness in front of the others. "I hate you."
He flashed that charming grin that was as much a part of him as his slow Southern drawl. "I know ... Me, too." He clutched her hand in his.
Don't let go of me.
"Abigail? We must go."
She wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. There was so much she wanted to say to him. So much to tell.
I love you. How could three small words like that become lodged in her throat?
Jess had been right. The hardest words to live with were the ones you didn't say that you should have.
Summoning her courage, she pulled away and went to Choo Co La Tah.
Jess couldn't breathe as he watched her vanish into the landscape. How could you let her go?
Duty. Honor. He could come up with "noble" reasons all night long. But none of them made this tolerable.
One life to save the world. It was a fair exchange. The only problem was that one life had become the entire world to him.
And he'd just sent her off to her death.
Alone.
* * *
Abigail clutched Jess's watch to her heart and held it there as she followed Choo Co La Tah into a cave that looked like something other than nature had hand-carved it out of the hills. Once the darkness had swallowed them whole, he clapped his hands together three times, and on the last one, a fire ignited between his palms. He spread his arms wide, allowing the light to arc between his hands. It grew taller, stretching for the earthen ceiling far above them. Blues, greens, reds, and oranges burned in the fire, entrancing her like a melody for the eyes.
Then it shot around the room, lighting sconces she hadn't even known were there. A living entity, the candlelight danced against the walls in a way that made it appear the myriad of petroglyphs were moving.
The one on the far west side drew her attention. It showed a man with a buffalo skin holding the hand of a woman with butterfly wings. But what kept her spellbound was the design of the wings.
She'd seen that before.
Where?
Choo Co La Tah moved to stand behind her. "Open your mind, Abigail. Don't be afraid."
Something about his voice lulled her senses. Suddenly her eyelids were heavy. So heavy, it was hard to keep them open.
Stay awake.
She couldn't. Against her will, they closed and the images continued to play behind her eyelids.
Cool wind blew on her face as she ran by a small pond, searching for something.
No, she was searching for someone.
"Where are you?" she called in a loud whisper.
When no one appeared, she became frantic with worry. Where was he? Had something happened? He was never late. Terror flooded every part of her body. What would she do if he was gone?
"I would never leave you, precious."
She laughed at the deep, resonant voice that breathed in her ear. "You know not to do that to me."
He laid his lightly whiskered cheek against her smooth one, then enveloped her in his arms. Ahh ... This was what she'd been craving all day. Smiling, she allowed him to rock her while they listened to the waves lap against the edges of the pool and the birds serenade one another.
He kissed her neck. "Have you told him yet?"
That question pierced her happiness with an arrow of sorrow. "No. I dare not."
"Then you will marry him?"
"No," she said, dipping her chin coyly. "That I cannot."
He tightened his arms around her. "Those are your only two choices."
But she knew better. There was a third option as well. "We could run away together." She pressed his hands closer to her skin. "Just the two of us. We'd be free, and no one-"
"I have responsibilities." His tone sharpened to a dagger's edge. "Would you have me turn my back on them?"
"Yes," she answered honestly.
He clenched his teeth. "No."
That word wounded her deep in the heart that beat only for him. "Don't you love me?"
"Of course I do."
She turned in his arms so that he could see her desperation for himself. "Then come away with me. Now. Today."
His eyes glowed with warmth as he watched her giddy playfulness, and that succeeded in taking the anger from his tone. "I can't." He gave her chin a gentle caress. "You have to tell him about us."
Guilt stabbed her breast as she thought about the man who loved her as much as she loved the one before her. A man who had proven exactly how much she meant to him in a way no one ever had.
Why can't I love him? It would be so much easier if she did, and she'd tried. She really had.
Unfortunately, the heart played its own tune, and it was deaf to what the head tried to tell it.
"It will crush him, and that's the last thing I want to do. He's given me so much and been so kind..."
Anger slapped at her from his dark eyes. "Then marry him."
Those words stung her like a slap. And she didn't deserve them. "You shouldn't say that if you don't mean it. What if I did what you said?"
His nostrils flared. "I would cut his heart out and feed it to him."
Now he scared her. Was this the real him that he was showing to her because her love had made him comfortable? "What's happening to you?"
"The woman I love won't come to her senses. That's all."
She shook her head as every instinct she possessed denied his words. "There's something else. You're ... different."
"I'm the same as ever."
But she knew better. This wasn't the man who'd conquered her defenses and laid siege to what no other man had ever claimed. "Is your post corrupting you?"
He scoffed. "I'm stronger than that."
Everyone had a weakness. Everyone. "Where is your arrogance coming from?" She didn't understand it.
"The truth isn't arrogance."
She gaped at him. "Who are you?"
"I'm the man you love."
And those words hurt her most of all. "Are you not the man who loves me?"
"Of course."
She shook her head in denial. "No, that's not what you said. You put the order there that matters most to you. All you care about it is you."
"I did not say that."
"You don't have to." Tears began to flood her eyes until her vision drowned in misery. "Your words betray your thoughts." She tried to leave him, but he stopped her. She tried to gain her release. "Let me go!"
"Not until you learn to be reasonable."
Learn? She was not some infant who needed lessons. She was a woman full grown. How dare he not see that. "I'm not the one who's changing. There's something dark inside you that wasn't there before."
He scoffed. "You don't know what you're talking about."
But she did, and that knowledge beat painfully inside her.
He leaned down, his eyes glacial and foreign. "If you love me, you will tell him."
Why did she have to prove her love? Was it not enough that he saw it with his own vision?
She wrested her arm from his grasp. "I must go."
He didn't speak as he watched her walk away.