Page 11 of Sherwood
“Lox,” she said, in a voice that barely carried over the rain. “I’d do it for you too, you know. If you’d let me. I’d kiss your feet, I’d get on my knees for you, and it could be like it was that afternoon. Just like that.”
I swayed toward her—her wrist still in my hand, my other hand reaching up to palm that pretty little chignon—but then a growl of thunder rolled through the house and I suddenly remembered where I was.
Sherwood, where the trees met the sea.
Sherwood, where Marian needed to stay, and stay without any connection to me.
I let go of her wrist and took a few steps backward. She blinked at me, dazed and bereft.
“Lox?” she murmured.
“I have to go,” I said, fighting the urge to stalk back over to her and finish what we’d started. To sear away her memory of Rafe’s touch. “I’m sorry.”
“But—”
“I know this probably goes without saying, but it would be best if you didn’t mention to anyone that you saw me. Even Rafe.”Especially Rafe.
“Am I going to see you again?” she asked quietly, and framed in the rain like this, clad in velvet and begging to be handled, she was eerily like the dreams I used to have of her when I was still inside that NSA nightmare of a life. When I was so deep in hell that the only sleep I got were half hour snatches in broad daylight while Rafe kept watch.
“I don’t know,” I told her honestly. “I shouldn’t even be here now. It’s not a good idea for me to stay in one place long.”
“I see,” she said. She turned back to the window, wrapping her arms around herself. “Then take care, Lox. I hope the hiding goes well.”
I didn’t like hearing the bitterness in her voice, but what could I do? Implicate her in treason because I wanted to kiss her so badly it hurt?
“Goodbye, Marian,” I said, and with my jaw clenched from the effort it took, I left her alone.
Alone with the rain and the dark half-moons Rafe de Lacy had left on her wrist.
ChapterThree
RAFE
They calledit The Castle of the North Wind, but most people would call it what it was: a den of thieves.
And it was here in Sherwood. I was certain of it.
I was walking on a well-maintained but deeply soggy trail through the trees, having eschewed my usual suit for boots, jeans, and a worn flannel shirt—the uniform of someone in the area for boring ecology reasons and nothing else.
Out of the fog emerged the shape of a man bent over a paper map, and he looked up as I approached. He was also in jeans and flannel, although with his septum piercing, clear-framed glasses, and black hair tied back in a bun, he looked more PNW Hipster than Forgettable EPA Employee.
Which made sense, since today Joshua Zhang wasn’t dressed as anyone other than himself.
As I passed him, my old friend folded the map into neat rectangles and fell in step beside me. The trail was deserted, and foggy as hell besides, and so there was little need for the usual precautions that accompanied such meetings.
“Thanks for coming,” I said to Joshua, still discreetly scanning the periphery as we walked north toward the scenic overlook just a half mile or so from here. We obviously wouldn’t be able to see anything in this weather, but it was always better to have a destination during a rendezvous on foot. It lent verisimilitude to whatever pretense you were meeting under, and it kept you moving.
Always better to keep moving.
“You know us CISA types like to meet in an office, right?” Joshua asked. “Hell, even the NSA knows how to use a phone.”
“Did you really want to have a conversation about how a CIA operative is running a mission on American soil on behalf of the NSA over the phone?”
Joshua heaved a sigh. “I guess not, when you put it like that, given that it’s atadon the illegal side. Technically, at least. Also you can stop casing the literal trees. No one’s hiding in this wet-ass forest.”
I opened my mouth, but he flapped the folded map at me. “Don’t start telling me some story about the one time peoplewerehiding in a forest, because no one cares, you SOG bastard. How’s the search going?”
I glanced around the trees again. Nothing but moss and mushrooms and exposed hemlock roots like plump, raised veins. “I found the girl.”
