Page 20 of Edge of Darkness (Night Prowler 4)
Her body said one thing, her good sense another. She stood undecided for several moments, then muttered, “Oh, screw it.” Kicking off her boots, she padded to the kitchen and turned on the little light above the stove, which gave her enough illumination to work with but left the rest of the flat in semi-darkness.
“Make yourself comfortable.” She waved a hand toward the living room and set about retrieving a mug from the cupboard in the kitchen, filling the kettle with water and setting it to boil on the stove. Which tea to serve him, she wondered, hesitating over the collection of small, colorful boxes in the spice cabinet. Ceylon? Oolong? Chamomile?
She went with Earl Grey. It just seemed to fit.
“I like your place,” he said from behind her.
She imagined him gazing around the flat, taking in the low gleam of the polished terra cotta floors, the gilt and claret velvet antique divan her father had bought for her and restored to its pre-flea-market glamour, the exposed dark wood beams that bisected the whitewashed ceiling and lent the room a stately, rustic air. And of course, the books. Acres of books lined one entire wall, and though he couldn’t see it, the bedroom sported its own wall of books, all of them snug in the custom floor-to-ceiling shelves she’d built and stained herself.
Ember acquired her artistic bent from her father, but from her mother—a woman who’d milked her own cows, made her own clothes, and knew the name of every plant, tree, and wildflower—she inherited a practical talent for making things with her hands. And a love of the natural world, and all the things in it.
“You don’t have a television.” He sounded surprised, and no wonder; what kind of weirdo didn’t have a television?
The September Jones kind, that’s what.
“I hate television. The only thing more depressing than a reality show is the news. And besides, if I had a TV, that would leave less room for my books. I’m a bit obsessed, as you can see.”
“You don’t say.” There was wry humor in his voice. She imagined that dazzling smile of his, those sculpted lips curving upward, and she had to smile, too. “There’s this newfangled technology that might help you out with your book fetish. Maybe you’ve heard of it…a Kindle?”
She shrugged. “I like the smell of books, especially old ones, and the way a book feels in my hands. And sometimes I write in the margins or underline things. It’s more…interactive. More real, in a way. I did try a Kindle once, though. Honestly I thought it was kind of freaky, all those tiny books trapped inside. Just looking at all those half-inch book covers crowded together on an eight-inch screen made me feel claustrophobic.”
“Ember, the words ‘seek therapy’ come to mind,” he said dryly.
Been there, done that. Didn’t work. She shrugged again, and he began to slowly walk through the room, his footsteps nearly inaudible.
“That’s a beautiful cello.”
Ember stilled, teabag in hand. She’d been just about to put it into the mug, but then he’d spoken. That’s a beautiful cello.
It was. Old and burnished and haunted by the ghost of her former self, it rested on a stand in one corner of the room, where she could always see it. Because she needed the daily reminder.
Nothing lasts. Impermanence is the only permanence there is.
Once you fully realize you can die at any moment, tomorrow is nothing more than wishful thinking. Today is the only reality that exists. Right now. Past and future are just figments of your imagination.
When she didn’t comment, Christian asked, “Do you play?”
She released her breath in a long, silent exhalation. “No. Not at all.”
There was a pause, but he didn’t press it, and the tension in her shoulders eased.
But when she turned back to him, the tension seized her again, only now it was in every muscle in her body. He was standing beside the low console table that flanked the divan, studying a framed picture he held in his hand. A picture he’d lifted from the table. He looked up at her and said, “Is this your family?”
Ember swallowed around the flame of agony that rose in her throat. It still hurt, after all these years, those four simple words that should have started with was instead of is.
Fighting back the sudden, horrible onslaught of tears, she swallowed and said, “Yes. That’s my mom and dad, Keely and Carter. And my…my little brother. August.”
Auggie. We called him Auggie, she thought, and bit the inside of her mouth.
“Your parents named you and your brother after months of the year?” He seemed interested, not at all critical or mocking the way the kids at school had been.
“My mom was a bit of a hippie. She grew up in a commune in Oregon and had strange ideas about a lot of things.”
That was a gross understatement. Her mother had strange ideas about everything. She was into astrology, numerology, and the Tarot, and often said she was just biding her time on Earth until the mother ship arrived to take her home. An Aquarian, the free-thinking, oddball, idealistic sign of the zodiac, Keely Carter was a natural force unto herself. She was a passionate, challenging, unconventional person, and Ember missed her, every single day.
Her mother had devoured life. She’d inhaled it. To this day, Ember had still never met another person so unafraid.
“My brother was born in August, hence the name, and I—”
