Blind Trust (29 page)

Aeron started up the path but kept talking. “What would my mother
think?” she asked over her shoulder. “What would Renee think if they knew what
you just did?”

“I am doing it for their own good,” Ursula said. “Whatever happens
to me, I am doing it for them.”

“If the authorities find out, you’ll be the one on trial. What
happens if they trace it back to you?”

“I weighed the risks. I need to protect Renee.”

The sound of voices ignited her instincts and she dropped her hand
to her gun. She relaxed when she saw Martha and Lilia heading in the direction
of the cabin from the yard. Lilia had a large suitcase with her. Ursula wasn’t
surprised that she’d come straight to see how Aeron and Renee were before going
to her own accommodation.

“What will she do if she finds out?” Aeron asked.

“Lilia?”

Aeron nodded.

“Report me.” At the very least.

Aeron glanced at Lilia and back at Ursula. “She trusts you.”

“She should,” Ursula answered, praying that Aeron would see it in
her eyes. “I’d give anything for every one of you.”

Aeron stared at her for long seconds. Lilia walked up to them and
Ursula prepared herself.

“Everything okay?” Lilia asked as she came up the steps.

Aeron kept her eyes locked with Ursula’s. Eyes so much like her
mother’s. “We just want Renee to get fixed up.”

Lilia looked at Ursula. Aeron trusted her, for now. “Yes, if we
can.”

The faith made Ursula’s relief blurt out. She trusted her.

Aeron’s eyes twinkled and she gave a curt nod.

She
trusted
her. How had that happened?

“Good,” Lilia said, drawing Ursula’s gaze back to her. The light
shone through her eyes much the same as it did Aeron’s. “Because I have a
plan.”

I HAD TROUBLE following my mother as she explained how she felt
Renee could be reached. My head was swirling with what Ursula had said. Thing
was, when we got Renee back, how was I gonna keep that from her? I couldn’t
lie. I was the worst liar that I knew.

The other swirling thought was that my mother, Lilia, was just
breezing in all over again. One half of me wanted to ask what she was doing
here. The other was so relieved at the sight of her that I could barely stop
myself from running to her like a child would. She was my mother and mothers
fixed stuff. At least they were supposed to. It felt like such a dumb reason to
want her around.

“ . . . so, I think the only conceivable option is to reach her
through this.” Lilia unzipped the large suitcase she’d brought with her and
pulled out my violin case. She held it out to me. “I believe you once played
her something?”

“Not when I started but then she was there, watching in the
doorway.”

“I didn’t know it had been done on violin.”

I shrugged. She’d hurt me pretty bad. I weren’t sure how to communicate
with her. It hurt just hearing her voice. “I liked the music, so I adapted it.”

Renee walked into the cell and stood looking at the music
notation. She cocked her head, running her finger down the notes I’d written.

“It’s just for me,” I said, the pain of her being so mean still
echoed through me. Still I could see her envisioning me performing in some
fancy place. “I ain’t playing to a theatre full of people . . . even if they
are ten feet away.”

I knew she was looking at me. I tried to block out how much it
meant that she enjoyed it so much. I could feel her gaze on my cheek burning,
urging me to give her a way back in. “Have I hurt you that badly?”

I met her eyes for the briefest of moments. Yes, she had. I had
been wounded by her. I had put my trust in her and it had been shattered. It
was too hard to care. It hurt too much.

“It’s too late to apologize to you, the damage is done,” she said,
placing the score back on top of the tiny dresser. “But, for what it’s worth, I
am truly sorry.”

I nodded but kept my eyes fixed on the wall, the same as when
Yasmin died. I couldn’t let her in. It didn’t matter how moved she’d been by
the music. I couldn’t.

She stood in front of me so I had no choice but to look at her.
Her grey eyes locked onto mine with such intensity that I couldn’t block her
out. They warmed, her aura filled with pink. I’d never seen anything as
vibrant. It was memerizing.

“I believe you.” Truth glittered from her lips, the pink swirled
from her and wrapped itself around me like a warm hug. She did, she really did
believe me.

I laid the case on the arms of a chair and opened it. I stared at
the violin and ran my hand over it. It was my trusty friend and I hadn’t seen
it since going to boot camp. Now it was in front of me, and I ached to play it,
but how the heck was that going to help anybody?

“
Moonlight Sonata
,” Ursula answered for me. “She didn’t
shut up about it.”

That made me smile. Renee had liked it that much? “I think I
remember it.” Understatement of the year. I relived the memory once more, her
standing in the doorway to my cell. It was such a strange moment, like the
music somehow transcended all the barriers, the pain, the fear and forged a
connection between us.

Lilia walked to the dormant grand piano and sat down. “You get your
musical skills from me. I’ll accompany you.”

I did? Ursula and I exchanged glances. She looked as shocked as I
was.

“A woman can have many strings to her bow,” Lilia said. “Have you
ever heard the phrase, ‘I have many skills’?” 

Ursula and I exchanged glances again.

“No, should we?” I asked.

Lilia sighed. “Violin?”

I took out the cake of rosin and rosined the bow and then tuned
the violin to the “A” Lilia played for me. Any worries I had about remembering
to play vanished the second I ran through a warm-up exercise. As I let myself
relax, the piano began to accompany me. I narrowed my eyes. Let’s see if she
could keep up.

I moved through a medley of pieces in different keys, different
speeds. My mother effortlessly followed like she knew my every move. I slowed,
she slowed, I paused, she added a flourish. I was having so much fun playing
with my mother that in any other circumstance, I would have been filled up to
the brim by it.

And boy, could she play.

“Ready?” she asked, a smile filling her every pore.

I looked at Renee and nodded. “Ready.”

THE MOUNTAINS GAVE a shady blue tint to the trees as the sun sunk
lower into the summer sky. Renee reclined back on the grass, the sweet smell of
flowers in the air, the gentle breeze dancing over her sun-warmed skin.

“Hey.”

Renee smiled up at Aeron as she flopped onto the grass beside her.

“Mrs. Squirrel has requested a new door. She said it was getting
all squeaky on her.”

“Ah,” Renee replied. “I wondered why you were quiet.”

Aeron looked down at a piece of grass she twirled between her
fingers.

“You have something else in that mind of yours?”

Staring down at the blade, Aeron sighed. “I wish you didn’t have
to go. This summer has been amazing, just like I always wanted.”

Renee leaned on her fist. “I don’t have to go.” A part of her had
longed for this conversation. She wanted Aeron to stop her. She wanted to stay
here in Oppidum in Nan’s cabin and never leave. Here was home in every sense of
the word.

“If you stay,” Aeron whispered, her gentle eyes catching the warm
glow, “you’ll never get to see this in real life.”

Renee winced. It hurt knowing that no matter how she hid in her
memories, in her safe world with Aeron beside the river, even in dream form,
Aeron was too honest to let it slide. “I don’t want to leave you.”

The sun set in a blaze of reds that gave way to a starlit night.
“You need to go back if that’s true.”

Renee shook her head. “Out there . . . I could
be somewhere . . . I can’t.”

Aeron wrapped strong arms around her and she calmed in the warm
embrace.

“In reality, I could watch you walk away.”

“I think you know that ain’t true,” Aeron whispered and then
hummed a slow sweet tune that was so very familiar. “Do you remember?” She got
to her feet. “Do you remember when I played this?”

Renee watched as Aeron picked up her violin and bow.

“Yes, you were in your cell . . . God, it was the most beautiful
sound I had ever heard.”

The arpeggiated notes eased out of the violin and colors oozed
from Aeron’s hands.

“On a night like this,” she said. “There is nothing more magical
than a sonata.”

“
Moonlight Sonata
,” Renee whispered back.

Aeron laughed, reaching upward to touch the night sky. The world
shifted and the stars danced, swirling as the music rose and fell. The colors
wrapped her up and twisted her around.

Aeron held out her hand. “Come back to me.”

Renee tried to reach out and felt a warm face under her
fingertips. Real warmth, no vivid dream, but warmth. She focused on brown eyes
before her. “Aeron?”

“Hey.”

The sound of a piano still carried the tune and Renee blinked,
turning her head. “Lilia?” And the familiar face of her old friend beside her.
“Urs?”

“We’re here.”

The panic shot through her system and she gripped the leather
beneath her. “He—”

“He’s gone,” Ursula said. “Aeron punched his lights out.”

Renee frowned, sure that she was in a dream still. “Sorry?”

Aeron gave her a wry smile. “I . . . he . . . well . . . yeah, I
knocked him clean on his butt.” She shrugged. “That’s what happens when people
try to hurt you.”

Renee didn’t miss the glance between Aeron and Ursula. Something
had warmed between them, and it made her smile. “He is really . . .”

“You’ll never have to worry about him again, Renee.” Ursula’s
voice was so certain that Renee’s fear faded with it.

Renee went to smile but her face stung and made her eyes water.
“What . . . what happened to me?”

Aeron put down the violin.

“Aeron . . .” Lilia sounded her warning.

“If she is gonna be up and about, I ain’t having her look at what
he did.”

Before Renee could ask, Aeron placed her hands on her face.

“Just relax, okay?” she said. “I just want to fix you up.”

Relishing the touch, Renee let Aeron’s hands soothe away her pain
and was not surprised to feel it permeate through her like liquid warmth. It
seeped into her mind and chased away her fear, her doubts. Aeron was in front
of her, she was real and she had taken away the one thing that had terrified
her into silence.

After long minutes, Aeron’s hands trembled and she dropped them
away. Stitches fell to the floor. She stood, wobbling, and staggered in the
direction of the bathroom.

Renee got up to go after her, the rush after being still for so
long making her woozy.

“It’s okay,” Lilia said, taking Aeron by the elbow. “I’ll see to
her.”

Renee nodded and Ursula came over to help.

“Did she really do that?” Renee asked, glancing at the door. “I
thought you said she wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

“If I hadn’t stopped her . . .” Ursula helped her to sit back
down. “Aeron would have pureed him up against the bars.”

“How close?”

Ursula sighed. “Let’s just say Aeron was your knight in shining
armor. I was fashionably late and Yannick won’t be a problem again.”

“How?”

“You weren’t the only one he hurt.”

Renee nodded. Part of her was relieved that he would never come
back, the other part wanted to see it with her own eyes. “Why did I have
stitches in my face?”

Ursula’s blue eyes flicked away. “It doesn’t matter now. Wonder
healer just vanquished any sign.”

“You
saw
it healing . . . in front of your eyes?”

Ursula shook her head. “I saw nothing until the stitches dropped
to the floor.” She smiled and touched warm fingertips to Renee’s cheek. “Your
skin looks rosy.” She dropped her hand away. “Thing is . . . We need to—”

“Hey, Black,” Aeron called, hurling something at them. “Go long.”

Renee reached out and caught the tension ball in her left hand,
then she turned to look at it, stunned. She saw it coming.

Ursula shook her head and muttered something under her breath, and
Aeron shrugged.

“When you helped me back in Oppidum,” Renee frowned up at Aeron.
“You couldn’t fix it then . . . ?”

Aeron smiled and Renee felt like mush. It was even more potent in
reality.

“Let’s just say I’ve got some practice in since then.”