Muddled
“You sure you’re all right?” Charlie kept asking.
“No.”
Her answer hadn’t changed in the last ten minutes. Lilah almost always, under any circumstance, would have said she was fine or okay, but she was hurting physically and maybe emotionally. She was still bleeding from a cut on her forehead, the back of one hand showed a deep scrape, and her jacket was torn at the shoulder. Still, she wouldn’t say what had happened. Obviously not self-inflicted.
She seemed suddenly as fragile as she’d been after she’d realized how badly Jakin had been treating her. That had been right before Charlie had begged her to let him be the champion she’d never had. Last time he’d been her hero, but this time, he was no hero at all.
She was so wrong about the kind of man he was, and he could hardly stand the guilt. She’d wanted a giver after a relationship with a taker, and he’d been proud that he was as opposite to Jakin Crutchfield as a woman could find. The last thing he wanted to admit to himself was that he was a coward. Someone had hurt her with him close by and he’d not been there for her. He hadn’t been any help since he got to the scene, either.
“If the person who attacked you hurt you—”
“Yes, Charlie. I’m hurt.”
“If he hurt you, I’ll—”
“Charlie.” She turned to glare at him as they stepped out of the taxi onto the streets of Dublin near the River Liffey. She didn’t have to say it again—she was bruised, bleeding, and limping slightly. Lilah was also not in the mood to offer false reassurances. Even with his longer legs, he had to half-run to keep up with her. Her backpack bounced on her shoulders.
“Where are we going?”
“I’ll tell you when we get there.”
Why was she suddenly keeping secrets? He’d asked several times in the hallway outside her room, at the front desk, in the taxi. She’d told him only that she’d been attacked and that she’d tell him more when they were closer to their destination.
“For your own good,” she’d said, “and definitely for mine.”
Maybe, after months of him putting up walls to keep her out, she’d decided to turn the tables on him. Then again, maybe she was just pissed that he hadn’t come back to her room or answered her messages all night. He hadn’t even been able to pretend the breakfast buffet pastries were an apology gift for her, since Lilah hated butterscotch with a passion. They were for Rune, at Rune’s request to wait for and fetch the butterscotch delicacies that were freshest and hottest, even if it took him a while.
Lilah had been offended by his weak-ass excuses and insisted on stepping back inside the room—alone—to grab her backpack and make a quick phone call. That had left him only seconds to update Rune and hand off the pastries before Lilah could catch him. Except that Rune hadn’t been there, so he’d left a note with the breakfast pastries and hurried back out. She’d left him a useless note and hadn’t waited for him, and he had no idea why or if there was a new problem with Marco.
Sure, Lilah had a right to be offended by his duplicity, but it wasn’t something she typically saw from him. Well, he was a little offended, too, that she didn’t trust him enough to tell him their destination.
Or maybe the truth of the matter went deeper than that. Maybe their relationship had run its course. He was fed up with her, and she was fed up with him. It had been so much easier when she had needed him, but she didn’t need saving in the same way she had when he’d first met her. Something between them had tarnished, and the stronger she was, the more his attention darted elsewhere.
Lilah walked faster, turning a corner, away from the Liffey. Even though she was the one limping, Charlie could barely keep up. He studied the distant light at each end of the street, which was so narrow that the morning sun did not yet light it fully.
“Are we there yet?” He cringed at his own whiny impatience.
“Close. Raven said to look for—”
“Raven!” The name came out garbled, disgusted. Such familiarity so quickly. For a second, Charlie’s memory flashed back to the librarian at the Scholar’s Library. The guy with long, dark hair in a bun and a little bit too much of an interest in Lilah to suit Charlie. The same guy who had grabbed his wrist when he had brought out his phone to take pictures of the stacks. “You were with him, weren’t you?”
He grabbed the hood of Lilah’s jacket to turn her around, but she shrugged out of his grasp, ripping the tear at the shoulder even deeper. She kept walking. He followed close behind, wanting to grab her by the arm and pull her back around to him, but he didn’t dare. He hated the sound of jealousy in his voice. After what he’d done with Rune, he didn’t have any right to be jealous, but he didn’t let that stop him from saying anything.
“That’s why you didn’t come back until late last night, isn’t it? Because you were with that hulking asshole?”
Charlie was uncomfortably aware of how jealous he sounded. He also didn’t use a lot of profanity in Lilah’s presence but somehow, when he was under pressure, it rose to the top more easily.
She stopped at last and turned abruptly to glare at Charlie. He almost bumped into her. “How would you know when I came back? You were out all night.” She jerked her jacket out of his hand.
“I… It’s….” He couldn’t look into her eyes. He stared off at the shadows across the street. “It’s complicated, Lilah.”
“No, it’s not complicated. It’s very simple. You’re the one who’s making it complicated. How could you be interested where I am when you’re staying out all night and posting on Fourth World that you’re engaged? For your information, it was a very long and miserable drive back from Tara, and you could’ve been there with me instead of God knows what. You have no idea what you missed out on.”
Engaged? Charlie’s jaw dropped, and he didn’t hear anything else she said. He blinked at her. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said slowly. “I’m not engaged.”
“Your relationship status on Fourth World. Oh, God, I sound so petty, don’t I? You changed your relationship status to ‘engaged,’ and then you stayed out all night. And you weren’t with me. I’m not stupid, Charlie. Or if I am stupid, it’s because I’ve trusted you without reservation. You’ve gone out of your way to win my trust, and now this?”
“Oh.” He vaguely remembered somewhere in the throes of sleep Rune touching his fingertips, kissing them, pressing them to something hard and glass. “Ohh.”
His phone was rigged for fingerprint identification. Rune must have used his fingertip while he slept to gain access to his phone, maybe even add her own fingerprints for easy access. In any case, she had been able to get into his apps, including Fourth World, maybe others.
Holy fuck, it was almost as if she wanted people to know about her. As hard as he had tried to keep their involvement a secret, Rune seemed determined to tell the world, and telling the world meant Lilah finding out.
Fuckfuckfuck. Why did he have to walk a tightwire? He’d done everything with the best of intentions. He didn’t deserve this kind of stress.
Charlie coughed and looked away. “I… I got hacked.”
Lilah winced. “You’re hiding something. I can tell it. Everything you say feels like bullshit to me.”
“Please stop empathing me.” God, he hated it when she did that.
“I can tell you’re hiding something.” Not anger in her voice. Hurt. Such deep hurt. “I just can’t tell what you’re hiding though. I’m not psychic, I’m empathic. I get the feeling but not the knowing.”
Something inside him snapped. They’d never fought before. When they’d come close, Lilah had always blamed herself and acquiesced. Not this time. He couldn’t blame Rune for her situation and if Lilah insisted on unmasking his inadequacies, who could blame him for losing his temper?
“I am fucking allowed to hide things. I’m allowed to have a fucking private life. What the fuck, Lilah? You peeking into my head and heart all the fucking time!”
She took a step backward, then another. She’d never heard his anger.
“I’m not peeking, Charlie. You’re broadcasting. I can stand anywhere on this planet and feel what you’re putting out, and what you’re putting out is deceit.”
Calm. Controlled. As if she had the answer she was looking for. She’d had such a hard time trusting again after Jakin Crutchfield, and Charlie had just proven her suspicion that men were generally not true to their word. He could see it on her face. She equated him to Crutchfield. Worse, because he’d worked so hard to win her heart.
She turned and started to walk again, this time heading back toward the Liffey.
A nervous snicker erupted from his throat, even as he tried to hold it in. “What exactly do you think I’m hiding?” If he knew, he could counter with a better argument, even if it bordered on gaslighting.
“You’re only asking questions because you’ve been caught, and you’re scared. I can feel that, you know?” She slowed. “I told you, I’m not psychic, so I’m not sure of the details, but I know you’re hiding something because I can feel it. And the fact that someone broke into our room and attacked me and ransacked our room with—”
“What?” He’d thought something had happened downstairs. Not in the room they shared. Maybe he needed to warn Rune, too, if someone was still lurking on their floor back at the hotel. “Lilah, why didn’t you tell me?”
Then he groaned to himself, suddenly knowing exactly what had happened. Rune had gotten into his phone, had changed his relationship status—a petty, but ridiculously proprietary thing to do. Almost immature, in fact, because it signaled to all other women, Lilah included, that he was already taken, even if she had not been able to say who he was in a relationship with. The status was still there for the whole world to see. She must also have checked his voicemail, listening to the one from Emry and then deleting it. Obviously, Rune had relayed to her brother the information that the book was to be in Lilah’s hands before it returned to Dr. St. Augustine back in the States, and her brother had ransacked Lilah’s room, bruising her in the process.
He swallowed hard. What a close call! He wasn’t entirely happy with Lilah at the moment, but he would never wish her harm. Marco was downright treacherous.
“Good God, Lilah! You could have been killed! There are some really dangerous people out there. I don’t think you understand how dangerous.”
She laughed but didn’t look at him. She kept walking ahead, her limp a little worse than earlier.
“Lilah, I’m serious. If he had done anything to hurt you, I would have—”
“He?” She whirled on him. “What would you have done? Really? And it was a woman.”
“A woman?”
Who? If Marco was out of the question, and Lovey was dead… ?
Lilah turned another corner, now one street over from where they’d begun. He followed, and then they were back out on a wider street full of people and green tourist buses.
“You’re sure it was a woman?”
Lilah laughed again but without humor. “Oh, very.”
Whatever that means.
He hated the sinking feeling in his stomach. “You got a good look at her?”
“Not her face. But let’s just say she’s a blonde and loves piercings.”
He was confused but said nothing. It’s not Rune, he told himself. It can’t be Rune. She’s too sweet ever to be caught up in a fight, except as a victim. Even if she was a natural blonde with piercings. He refused to believe it could’ve been his sweet damsel in distress.
Then again, he had no idea where Rune was. She had left a note that she would find him later, but he didn’t know where she had gone. The doors to the patio were ajar, and yet there was nobody on the shared balcony that was connected to the updated section of the hotel. She hadn’t sent him any more messages. Was she in trouble with Marco? Had the person who had gone after Lilah gone after Rune as well? Was Rune safe? And why did she keep disappearing?
Lilah stood for a minute, studying the landscape ahead as if she wasn’t quite certain if she was lost, and alternating looking behind her, past Charlie, to make sure they hadn’t been followed. Maybe the extra steps to find their destination had been intentional.
“Look,” he said, “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“I don’t want you to say anything. I’m not sure there’s anything you can say.”
“Maybe I can write you a letter explaining—”
“Not interested. Here.” She dug deep into her pocket, extracted a hotel card key, and thrust it at him. “This is yours.”
“Mine? I don’t understand.”
“The woman who attacked me dropped this. I didn’t know how she could have gotten a key to our room to get in when I had one and you had the other. So I checked it out with the front desk when I asked them to call me a taxi, and you know what they said? They said this one was yours. The person who attacked me, the person who ransacked our room, undoubtedly looking for The Lost Teachings, had your card key. How did that happen, Charlie? You tell me. And please don’t say it’s complicated.”
He couldn’t look at her. He focused instead on a green tour bus across the street and tried to shrug nonchalantly. “I must have dropped it somewhere in the hotel.”
He knew precisely where he had left it: the credenza next to the bed he had shared last night with Rune. He guiltily pushed that memory out of his head. He had drunk too much last night, somehow thinking it would be an excuse later if he needed one for his actions. The truth was, he had done exactly what he wanted to do, excuse or not.
Lilah squinted at him as if she could look right through him. He imagined a force field around him and wondered if that would do any good, or could she read his emotions and his deep desire for secrecy in spite of himself? She looked like she wanted to cry and at the same time break a chair over his head.
It wasn’t that he minded Rune’s brother doing his own dirty work, but Charlie couldn’t have Lilah getting hurt because of it any more than he could have Rune taking another beating from her brother. Maybe Marco had someone else helping him now that his wife was dead, and he had to stay somewhat hidden.
Charlie wanted to sink through the Dublin street and disappear. His head was a mess with too many questions, and he refused to entertain any of the obvious answers. Sometimes he felt as if he were standing outside of his own body, watching his deserved disintegration.
“You’re sure the person who attacked you was a natural blonde?”
“I said ‘blonde,’ not ‘natural blonde.’ But yes, she’s a natural blonde. And whoever she was, she was after The Lost Teachings.”
“You’re sure of that? About the artifact, I mean.”
“I’m as sure as I need to be. They weren’t looking for money, or they would have taken the two-hundred-plus euros on the dresser. The alcohol in the mini bar wasn’t touched. Nothing in my belongings or yours had been taken. All the drawers were ransacked; the mattress had been overturned. This was somebody who was definitely looking for something. But who, Charlie? You know who it was, don’t you?”
“Of course not!”
Uh! Lilah’s a human lie detector!
“Who in Ireland knows that you and I are taking that artifact back to Dru?”
He made a list in his head. Dr. St. Augustine knew. Emry knew. Rune, if she had listened to the message from Emry, also knew. Or she might have overheard his conversation with Emry when he’d hidden in the bathroom. Either way, if Rune knew, then Marco probably knew. There was one other possibility.
“Er… Raven?”
Lilah rolled her eyes and plunged her hand into the front pocket of her jacket. She pulled out something orange-magenta in color and pressed it into his palm.
“Whoever this belongs to, that’s who.”
He closed his fist around it to keep it from blowing away, but when he opened his fingers slowly, he saw that the threads were a long shock of dyed red hair with barely detectable blonde roots.
Lilah squinted into the distance, spotted whatever she was looking for, and headed in that direction. “Follow me,” she ordered.
Charlie clenched the hair, then pressed his fist to his heart. It couldn’t be. His Rune was far too sweet to attack anyone, much less Lilah. He could imagine her attacking passively by changing her status on social media to warn off other women, but never anything physical. Lilah had been specifically trained for hand-to-hand combat. Rune was the modern-day equivalent of a governess, occasionally doing au pair work for wealthy families, but mostly being a pawn of her brother’s get-rich-quick schemes and minor crimes.
Lilah stopped in front of a pub door with brass door handles and waited for him. She looked as if she might cry at any second. Then she sniffed, stiffened her spine, and opened the door. He jammed the fistful of hair into his pocket, then followed Lilah in silence.
The pub was closed except for the downstairs gift shop on the ground floor. The shelves lining each of the walls between the wide windows that looked out on the street held mugs and glasses of all sizes, most with some copper ornament or all copper. Behind the hostess table was the bottom part of a large copper tank. The glass windows displayed the rest of the tank to anyone on the street who cared to look up. It was a well-known pub that brewed its own, according to the sign on the front of the hostess’ table. Beyond the hostess station was a sprawling dining area in front of a wide bar made of wood, copper, and brass.
They waited for an employee wearing a black ponytail and a tight, red leather dress that left little cleavage to the imagination to complete her transaction with a customer. She finished folding a green T-shirt imprinted with the Gaelic equivalent of cheers and dropped it into a stiff paper bag. She handed it to the customer, wished him well, and turned to Charlie and Lilah.
Lilah didn’t move any closer to the woman in leather. “Raven sent us.”
The woman smiled and pointed toward wooden stairs inside the darkened pub. “All the way up.” She leaned forward to emphasize all the way up.
Charlie followed Lilah to the second floor, which was a somewhat smaller version of the first, including a viewing area over the brewing tank. They were slightly out of breath by the time they reached the third floor, which had its own bar and seemed a bit more intimate than the lower floors. At the top of the next flight of stairs was a wooden door with the word OFFICE stenciled on it in both English and Gaelic. The door opened before Lilah knocked, and Charlie immediately recognized one of the two blonde patrons from the Scholar’s Library.
“Raven sent—”
“We know. Come in.” The blonde opened the door all the way and motioned for both of them, then she peered into the hallway behind them, closed the door, and locked it.
Charlie glanced around the room. Two daybeds, several chairs, a small kitchenette, evidence of a bathroom to the far right, and a small table for two with matching chairs in the center of the room. He’d expected to see computers, papers, ledgers, maybe some archaic file cabinets dented from use. This could have been a preferred location on a vacation rental app or any of the other quiet apartments around the world for rent. Morning sunshine, as much sunshine as there was in Dublin, lit the airy room, which was mostly windows.
“This doesn’t look like any office I’ve ever seen,” Charlie whispered to Lilah.
The blonde overheard and joined them in the center of the room, next to the table. “That is because the real office on the ground floor is disguised as the janitor’s closet. This is a safe house.” She pivoted toward Lilah. “Are you sure you will not exercise your option?”
“I’m sure,” Lilah squeaked out.
He didn’t know what option the blonde meant, but he had a weird feeling it had something to do with him. Not in a good way either.
“Who are we keeping safe in a safe house?” Charlie asked. He wasn’t sure if his brain was muddled because of the hangover or because of the chaos of the morning.
The blonde frowned. “‘We’?”
Charlie had the distinct impression that she had to fight not to roll her eyes at him. “Oh. I mean, who are you keeping safe in a safe house.”
“It is a safe house for the two of you. It is also for any of us who may need it this week.”
“Uh, safe from… ?”
Now it was Lilah’s turn to be annoyed. “In case you haven’t noticed, Charlie, our cover’s been blown. Mine, at least.” Turning her back on him, Lilah faced the blonde. “You’re… Nike Jung?”
“Illyria Persopoulos. Nike will be here soon.” The blonde paused for effect. “She is bringing the artifact.”
Charlie’s pulse quickened. This could all be over with soon. Maybe there was a snowball’s chance of undoing his sins. Saving Rune. Making things right with Lilah. Not having Drusilla St. Augustine cut off his balls for stealing from her. If he could arrange to get The Lost Teachings to Rune, was there a chance he’d be done with Marco? If he had a few minutes with the book again, now that he knew how it worked, maybe he could fix everything.
Or would he instead translate his muddled fears into something worse?
He tried to tamp down his excitement over a potentially positive resolution, but Lilah seemed to feel it. Fuck! His feelings were never his own around her, no matter how well he hid them from everyone else.
Lilah nodded grimly and plopped down on one of the chairs at the table. She looked more defeated than he’d ever seen her look, in spite of all the things they had been through together and the failures she’d suffered in the last year. She looked ten years older suddenly, maybe twenty. Her face was gray.
Trying to stand again, Lilah pushed back from the table, knocking the chair over and racing to the bathroom. She didn’t have time to close the door behind her before she fell to her knees and retched.
Illyria shrugged, walked over to the bathroom door, and closed it tightly. “Let us give her some privacy, shall we?”
Illyria’s accent was decidedly European, but Charlie still couldn’t place it. Greek, definitely, but with a hint of French countryside. She didn’t wear the classic black dress with pearls as she had at the Scholar’s Library. Today it was a black leather skirt, black boots to her mid-calf, and a black sweater. When he glanced at her right wrist, though, there was that same odd symbol that the librarian named Raven had sported. The same one that was etched into Jakin Crutchfield’s right wrist.
Charlie and Illyria stared at each other for a few moments as if sizing each other up. What if Illyria was an empath or one of those freaky psychics reading his mind?
He shook off that thought. “I should, uh, I should go see if Lilah’s okay.”
He had no idea where he stood with Lilah. He needed to sort out his feelings, and for that, he needed more time. That didn’t mean he didn’t care and care deeply. If she was hurting, if she was sick, if she was anything that he could help her with, he would be there for her. In an instant.
Except that he wasn’t. He eyed the closed bathroom door guiltily.
“No, you should sit down,” Illyria told him. She pulled out the other chair at the table and pointed to it before righting the chair Lilah had left on the floor.
Why did he feel like he was sitting in the principal’s office waiting to be expelled from junior high? He was no empath, but there was definitely a vibe in the room that he was in trouble. He was bigger than Illyria, but he had no doubt she could throw him to the floor if he didn’t behave.
“I can’t stay here. I have to go back to our hotel. My backpack is there. My passport.” He suddenly felt alarmed at being stuck in Dublin while trying to get Rune to safety, trying to keep his secrets from Lilah, and no way to leave the island.
“Do not concern yourself with any of that. We will take care of it here. Nike is bringing new passports and credit cards. You will have your new covers. When you leave the country with the artifact, you will be someone else until you arrive in Florida and turn over the artifact to the Professor. In fact, as of tomorrow, you will be traveling separately. Lilah will leave tomorrow morning for the Cliffs of Moher to meet with an ally while you remain here. She will take the first flight back. You will take a later flight home. You will no longer be journeying as a couple.”
Something about Illyria’s words sounded prophetic, but what scared him more was the possibility of being left behind in Ireland without resources and with an angry Marco. He was suddenly painfully aware of how much his safe passage—and passage at all—depended on strangers who were doing Drusilla St. Augustine’s bidding. His employer looked like a mild-mannered and sophisticated medieval literature professor on the outside, but on the inside, she was a ruthless mother-figure who would do anything to protect her troubled protégé.
“Uh, someone’s bringing The Lost Teachings here? To this, um, safe house?”
“Nike is bringing the artifact. It will be wrapped properly and in a canvas carrier. She will be here soon.”
Charlie unzipped his jacket. He was getting a little too warm. Where had Rune vanished to while he was fetching her breakfast? She couldn’t have been Lilah’s attacker. The logistics didn’t favor it. Not unless she was playing him, and Charlie fancied himself a good judge of character. She couldn’t have left Lilah’s room and escaped down the hall without his seeing her, and Rune hadn’t been in her own room.
Or had she? He’d been in such a hurry to leave a note with the pastries. He’d assumed the room was empty. Maybe she’d gone out the unlocked window onto the patio? Surely, she hadn’t abandoned him. He hadn’t had time both to find Rune and to keep Lilah from seeing him breathlessly exiting the room he’d shared with Rune.
In any case, Charlie needed to contact Rune to tell her the artifact was coming, so that she could let Marco know. Then, if he could get his hands on it long enough to undo the damage he’d done through his first accidental meditation, maybe he could make everything better.
Still a chance.
According to the Law of Attraction, he needed to visualize already enjoying the thing he wanted and anchor his desire to that feeling of fulfillment. He wasn’t so sure about visualization or even what to visualize in order to create that reality. All he could see in his head was disaster.
All he had to do was believe that the Universe was conspiring in his favor. Was that even possible? He had a sinking feeling there was no way back now, no way out. He had stood in the crossroads for too long. He had made the wrong choice. There was nothing he could do now but make the best of it and hope he could find a way to make Lilah understand. He loved her, in spite of everything. He was just so confused. Confused and lonely and… He sighed, damning himself.
Illyria silently got up and walked across the room. She brought back a key—ornate, pretty even—and handed it to him.
“What’s this?” Charlie ran his fingers over the smooth edges. The fob was oval and black, with that weird Runic tattoo symbol painted onto it. Probably a 3D printed fob, he decided, turning it over and rubbing it with his thumb.
“The key to this safe house,” Illyria explained. “And to other doors that need to be opened. Keep this key with you at all times. You are welcome to explore the city and come back later this evening, but you must have a key to enter the safe house. Nike and I will be gone by half eleven. You can leave your gear here. It will be safe.”
His pulse leaped. Was his luck changing? Maybe there was something to this Law of Attraction thing, after all. He’d just manifested the answer to his prayers—a way to take back the artifact—and Illyria had handed it to him without even being asked. He pocketed the key with a smile.
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