Page 90 of Darkness Bound (Night Prowler 5)
He winked, and Zaca breathed a sigh of relief. “Yeah. I guess so. I’ll be more careful.”
“Any idea why he wants to see me?”
“He’s called an emergency meeting of the Assembly. It’s about the girl.”
His nerves immediately stood on end like a thousand exclamation points. Hawk studied Zaca’s face. “What about her?”
Zaca hunched his shoulders up to his ears, spreading his hands open.
Right. As if Alejandro would ever tip his hand. Hawk decided his visit to kalum could wait a few more minutes.
“All right. Thanks for the heads-up. And remember what I told you.” He gave Zaca a friendly shove, which Zaca returned, dancing on his toes with boxing fists, taking jabs. Hawk pulled him into a headlock just to show him who was boss.
“I give!” Zaca shouted to the ground. “I give!”
Hawk released him, and gave him a slap on the back of his head for good measure. Zaca loped away, smiling, but turned after a few paces. “I totally had you, old man. I just let you think you won because I feel sorry for how feeble you are.”
“Old man! Feeble!” Hawk lunged forward, and Zaca darted off, laughing.
“Punk!” Hawk shouted after him. The smile he’d repressed before spread over his face as he watched Zaca run. Good kid. His father must be proud of him.
That errant thought momentarily paralyzed him, as did the ache that blossomed in his chest when he imagined having a son of his own, a son who smiled and made friends and breezed through life as if it were an all-you-can-eat buffet and he was the only one in line.
Real life sidled up beside him, sucker punching him right in the gut. Family? Future? Peace? Those things were for other people, better people. For the infamous Bastard there could be one thing only, and that was disgrace.
By the time Hawk arrived at the Assembly meeting place, his mood had sunk a shade below black.
Unlike his own home, the meeting place was easily accessible by ladders, and was linked to the rest of the colony by the network of suspension bridges through the trees. When he entered the room, Alejandro looked up at him over the rim of an overfull wineglass. Perched on his elaborate chair, he was flanked on both sides by the members of the Assembly, who were seated at the curved tables. The atmosphere in the room felt as warm as a morgue.
“You wanted to see me?”
Alejandro looked irritated by Hawk’s abrupt greeting. “I see a few days alone with the human hasn’t improved your manners.”
“It hasn’t been easy,” he said, jaw tight.
“Understandable. You must be finding it excessively hard to have someone invading your privacy, having to actually hold conversations.”
“We’re not doing much talking.” Hawk willed his face to show nothing, aware he was treading on thin ice. From the corner of his eye, he saw Alejandro’s brows rise, and he thought a bit of obfuscation was in order. “She’s still healing.”
“Ah yes. I understand kalum gave you something for her pain?”
Hawk’s gaze snapped back to Alejandro’s face. He wore a tiny smile, the meaning of which Hawk couldn’t guess.
How much did Alejandro know? Was he being played?
“Yes,” he agreed carefully. “She’s been sleeping a lot.”
“Sleeping,” Alejandro repeated tonelessly. Only his smile was wry.
“She’s recovering from being beaten with a cane,” Hawk snarled, unable to keep the anger from his voice. “So yes, she’s been doing a lot of sleeping. She needs to heal!”
Alejandro swallowed a long draught from his glass, then lowered it and stared at Hawk with penetrating intensity. “As you can imagine, I’m anxious to get to know our new friend a little better. She’s so . . .” He paused to lick his lips. “Interesting. Don’t you agree?”
The words, the tone, and the lip smacking were all designed to nettle him . . . and they did. Hawk enjoyed a vivid vision of Alejandro on the floor beneath him, eyes popped wide, face red, thrashing and gagging as Hawk strangled him with his bare hands.
When he didn’t react, Alejandro asked, “How long do you suppose this ‘healing’ will take?”
Hawk controlled his breathing. As best he could, he kept his posture relaxed, though a vein began to throb in his temple. “I can’t be expected to know how long it takes a human to heal.”
