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Brendan might just be a stroke of fate sent to accomplish that. Hell, he was ready to shave his head and become a cult leader if it would work. Or worse, jump out of an airplane. The grim humor, offered to himself as if he could anticipate sharing it with her to coax out one of those smiles, gave him some hope, just as Brendan’s presence did.
“All right. ” He rose, gestured. “She’s out on the Gulf side lawn. Let’s go find her.
And Brendan?”
“Sir?” He kept the polite, formal address and Tyler didn’t disabuse him of it, though he appreciated the man’s sensitivity, underscoring his presence was not intended to usurp his host’s.
“Follow that instinct that brought you here. Don’t worry about territory and bullshit. I’ll deal with whatever I have to deal with, but she’s the most important thing. ” Brendan nodded. Cleared his throat. “She loves you, Master Tyler. It was obvious to everyone the other night. Obvious to those who know how to really see. I have no intentions of pretending otherwise. You’re right. She’s the most important thing. ” There was a hammock down near the water, strung between two of the live oaks.
Sarah had gotten Marguerite ensconced in it, a glass of tea and a book of Japanese poetry Gen had brought over close at hand should she show interest in anything other than staring or sleeping. Marguerite’s back was to them, her hair whispering back and forth over the curve of her shoulder as the breeze played off the water, rocked the hammock. Robert rose at their approach, nodded. At Tyler’s glance, he left them.
Resisting impulse, Tyler took his place in the chair, nodded at Brendan to go forward.
The man ducked under the hammock tie and knelt facing her. Taking the small duffel bag he’d brought off his shoulder, he put it on the ground next to him.
Her eyes were open and they shifted slowly to him. It startled Brendan, for he remembered the distance that had been in them when she was a teenager at the orphanage. When he’d met her again twenty years later, it had been much improved.
The reserve had still been there, which was perhaps why he’d hesitated to identify himself to her, but she’d become more present in her own life. The eyes he looked into now were the eyes of that fourteen-year-old. Once again indifferent to life, careless of death, waiting for it. Maybe not even having the energy to embrace it. But he had to believe it was surface, a haven of retreat. Twenty years did not disappear in a day.
“Mistress. ” He said it with soft reverence. “Great lady. I understand you’ve been performing great deeds of late. ”
She blinked.
“I don’t want to offend you by being here, but I felt I owe you a debt of gratitude,” he pressed on. “One I can’t ever repay, but I’m hoping you’ll allow me one gesture at least. ” He opened the bag, removed a much worn and well-loved teddy bear from it.
Around its neck was a faded ribbon that might have once been blue. Thinking of it clasped in a boy’s arms, Tyler expected it to be bigger, rather than the small toy that Brendan held easily.
“You remember this?”
He took Marguerite’s hand and laid it over the bear. When her fingers curled into it after a moment, Tyler leaned forward. She drew it out of Brendan’s grasp, brought it in to her body where he could no longer see it from the back. He wished the chair were over where he could see her face, but he didn’t want to move and interfere. From watching Brendan’s changing expressions, he sensed that it would be beneficial for him to stay quiet, unobtrusive.
“I didn’t think you remembered me. But I remembered you. I know you’re tired of all the awfulness. I don’t know why wonderful people sometimes have to deal with so much evil. But sometimes you meet a person who’s gone through so much that she never forgets what’s really important in this life. Who makes everyone around her feel privileged to know her. Who refuses to keep a little boy’s teddy bear, even though he knows now she had more need of it than he did. Who made him take it because she thought he might suffer one less pang of fear or loneliness if he had it with him.
“Do you know the lone survivor syndrome? You’re the only one who survives, so you wish you had died with your family. You know there’s nothing you could have done or will do that will make their deaths worth it, that will explain why you survived and they didn’t. As the years go on, you realize you won’t be the person who finds the cure for cancer or ends poverty. But I want you to think about what you gave me. What you’ve given to Marius, all the subs at The Zone. ” He nodded, apparently responding to something he saw in her expression. “You look doubtful. But maybe it isn’t important that you’re saving masses or even saving one person. It’s that you make the effort to save anyone, because when you reach out to save anyone, you’re saying that person is important, worthwhile, they’re needed. That they’re an intrinsic part of all of us. ”
His eyes full of open, unconditional love for her, he reached out, apparently put his hands over hers on the bear.
“I want you to have this as a reminder of how you changed my life. There are reasons to stay here. Not just because we need you, but I think because you need us. I know you’ve been thinking about having another session with me. ” His tone changed, became teasing. He actually winked, his demeanor as comfortable as if she’d been fully herself. “Or at least, I hope you have. And Master Tyler, he’s like a puppy around you.
What other woman could beat him up and have him come back for more?
“Now there’s a hint of a smile. ” Brendan glanced up, exchanged a look with Tyler.
The man reached forward, uttered a quiet murmur that came to Tyler on the breeze.
“With your permission, lady. ”
Brendan stroked her hair from her temple, laid his palm against her cheek. “We love you, Mistress. Very much. ”
It got quiet, just the wind from the water and the cry of a heron drifting to them.
Then Tyler heard Marguerite speak.
“Water. ”
Brendan leaned toward the iced tea, but he stopped as she spoke again. “Water. ” Brendan glanced behind him, at the banks of the Gulf, then over at Tyler. Her right arm lifted, pointing.
Tyler rose, his concern propelling him to his feet. “Watch her collarbone and the left arm,” he said. The other man inclined his head, put his arms into the hammock and lifted her out. Her arms were folded up against herself, her skirt fluttering over his tanned arm. Turning carefully, he moved toward the water’s edge, Tyler right behind him.
