The Angel of the Lighthouse (2 page)

The entire second floor of the house was given over to Aries bedroom, white washed walls under dark wood beams. He carefully laid the woman down on the bed. He brushed the hair back from her face, and pulled a comforter over her. She was even more perfect in the flesh than she had been in his vision. Jack took a seat in the old wicker chair by the window, and simply watched Aries in silence.

Aries moved to the window, looking out at the lighthouse.

“The storm last night wasn’t a natural one. It was demon sent and demon driven, by the feel of it,” he said, watching the clouds play through the last light in the sky. “I could have ignored that. When I lit the light though, there was a message for me.”

“A message?” Jack asked.

“Not a message in the way that you and I would leave one for each other, but still a message.” He turned, gesturing to where the woman still slept soundly on the bed. “I knew her. I knew that she was in trouble and I knew that she needed to be saved. This was my task. I’ve never felt anything more strongly in my entire life.”

Jack nodded. “I can hear it in your voice,” he said. “You almost sound... possessed?”

Aries shook his head. “I’m still me,” he said. “But in my blood and in my bone, I knew that I had to save her. I don’t know why – I don’t know anything about her. All I can do now is wait for her to wake up and hope that she knows more.”

Jack made a thoughtful noise. “So what happened? I should have a good answer, in case she asks me. Unless you want to tell her about yourself straight away, we need to get our stories straight.”

Aries considered this. He felt like he should tell her about himself as soon as he could, but he had kept his secret for so long he wasn’t sure if he could remember the right words to say.

“She looks uninjured,” Jack noted.

“Healing may not be my first skill, but I have some ability in it. When I pulled her free of the plane, I healed the most serious injures. The cuts and bruises will heal on their own.”

“So say that her plane landed in the water, miraculously she escaped injury, you brought her to shore and that was that,” Jack said. “Keep it simple.”

“Makes sense.” Aries nodded agreement.

“You do tend to overcomplicate things, Aries,” Jack observed with a wry smile.

“And at least I have you to keep me straight.”

This was an exchange that the pair had had before, and with the way the conversation had fallen into easy patterns, Aries relaxed. He looked over at the sleeping figure in the bed.

“I don’t know how long she’s going to be out for,” he said thoughtfully. “Are you free to take my shifts in the lighthouse, or do you want to trade off with me here?”

“Probably be best to trade off here with you, unless you think you’ll be too distracted, knowing that she’s here?”

It was a good question, and Aries considered it. “Knowing she’s safe and in your good hands should make it okay. If anything changes, you’ll be the first to know.”

Jack nodded, and rose from the seat. “Take care,” he said, before heading back down the stairs. Aries heard the front door close with a thud; then he sank into the wicker chair.

He was close enough to see her, but not close enough to scare her if she woke suddenly. Even in sleep, she was striking. Her hair pooled around her like a halo, gleaming against the white pillow. He sat on his hands in order to resist the urge to touch and count every freckle that was scattered across her face. She lay still and quiet, her breathing deep and even.

He leaned back in his chair, and waited, as patient as a stone.

***

Skye Metcalfe woke up, feeling as if she had been drinking the night before. Her head and her body ached in tandem, fuzz scratching at her eyes as she slowly blinked. Her mouth was dry, and she tapped her tongue against the roof of her mouth in an attempt to generate some moisture.

She wasn’t sure how or even
why
she might have been drinking, since the last memories that she had were of her flying her little plane. She stretched gingerly, and realised that the bed felt subtly different from what she was used to. It was harder, the pillows fluffier, the coverlet softer. There was a musky scent on the pillow – she turned her head into it, breathing deeply. It was a smell she’d never come across before, but she already knew that she adored it. It reminded her of home, of comfort, of safety. As if she was recalling something from her childhood. Cat-like, she rubbed her cheek against the pillow, before wincing at the incautious motion.

“Take it easy.” A rich, deep voice spoke. The honeyed tones rolled over her comfortingly, and she involuntarily closed her eyes. She opened them again to find a strange figure leaning over her. He was silhouetted by the sun, a golden halo created around his head; all that she could make out of him was that he was tall and broad.

Confusion gripped her and she tried to move, only subsiding when her body complained, feeling bruised and tender. The figure knelt beside the bed, resting one hand on the covers with a calming motion.

“Take it easy,” he repeated gently.

Skye stared at him as his features came into focus. He looked like a statue come to life with his sculpted features, deep blue eyes and raven black hair. His eyes were filled with warmth and concern, and Skye found herself relaxing. Whoever this man was, it was obvious that he meant her no harm.

She ran opening sentences through her head, strangely wanting to make a good first impression on this man, whoever he was. She mustered up a smile, and his face crinkled in response. He moved his hand from the cover to rest on the back of her hand, and the warmth of his skin seeped into her like a soothing balm.

“How you’re feeling?” he asked.

Skye opened her mouth to reply, but choked suddenly on a throat gone thick and dry. The man winced, reaching over to hand her a glass of water. The condensation beading on the side of it triggered an almost paralysing thirst in her, and she reached for the glass. She was alarmed to note that her hands were shaking a little.

He gravely handed her the water, before gently assisting her to sit upright. His hands were large and capable. She could feel how warm they were, even through her clothes. Distracted by the cool water, she felt almost no pain as she was moved. The water soothed her throat, washing away the dryness and fuzziness that plagued her. She experimentally cleared her throat.

“Better,” she said, and wished that her voice didn’t sound quote so hoarse. She took another mouthful of water, and swished it around her cheeks.

“Are you in pain?”

“A little,” she admitted. He frowned, and she felt a touch guilty for bringing that expression to his face. As if he had read her mind, he placed his hand over hers again, comforting her.

“Just thinking about painkillers, and the best time to give them to you. You’ve been out for a while. I don’t want to overdose you.”

His words raised a pressing question for Skye. “Not meaning to sound clichéd, but where am I?” She asked.

“What do you remember?” he countered.

“I feel like I’ve been out drinking, but the last thing I remember clearly was flying up the coast,” she said thoughtfully. “And I think I’d remember meeting someone like you before now.”

She saw a slight flash in his eyes, as if he appreciated the compliment, before they turned more serious. “You’re right – you
were
flying up the coast, and a bad storm came up.”

Skye felt a sinking feeling in her stomach, and sipped at the water to try and soothe herself. The man continued.

“I was on duty in the lighthouse when your mayday came in. You came down just off the shore here. Thankfully you didn’t look to be badly injured when I pulled you onto the beach, but the same can’t be said for your plane. I might even go so far as to say it’s a miracle you’re as uninjured as you are.”

Skye swallowed hard at this calm recitation. Memories bloomed in her mind: black clouds and black thoughts. Rain splattering against the windshield of the plane, and pain in her wrists as she fought against the controls. The scream of the wind, and her scream of denial as the last engine had failed.

“Hey,” the man said softly, touching her hand again. “Come back. You’re safe, and mostly uninjured. It was hard, but you got through it.”

The touch of his hand sent another surge of warmth through her, and she automatically looked up. His blue eyes were wide open, bluer than the sky, and for a second, Skye felt like she was freefalling into infinity. Then he blinked and once more he was just extraordinarily ordinary, trying to offer comfort.

“Just focus on what happened, not what could have happened,” he said.

Skye could see the sense in what he was saying, but still that sense of panic clawed at her. She forced the memories back as far as she could, trying to breathe slowly and deeply.

She almost felt embarrassed to be losing it like this in front of this stranger, this man who had saved her. She wanted him to like her, perhaps even to be impress by her, and surely her breaking down wouldn’t give him a good impression,

But his eyes were non-judgemental as he watched her carefully.  His hand was still warm on the back of hers and she used that touch to get control of herself, anchoring her firmly in the here and now.

“As you said, it could have been much worse,” she admitted. “Do you have a phone I can use? I should probably let my family know what happened before they start to worry.”

“Certainly do,” he said agreeably. “But first, I’d rather have you eat something so that we can get some medicine into you.”

“That sounds alright,” Skye said, pushing back the covers and slowly swinging her feet towards the edge of the bed. The man moved out of her way, and thoughtfully turned his back to look out of the window.

It hurt to move, but Skye gritted her teeth and pulled herself to her feet, digging her nails into her thigh to distract herself. Her clothes were dry, but stiff with salt spray and tattered in places, presumably from the crash. She tugged them away from her skin, and grimaced. Hardly the nicest things to be wearing when faced with such a gorgeous specimen of the male of the species.

Now that she was up and moving, her mind gave a little pained twinge. Her fiancé, Lewis would not approve of the fact that she was thinking about how handsome another man was. Even if it
was
their most recent blistering row that had led to her being in the air a day ahead of schedule, she still cared for him. It felt disloyal to be looking at this stranger in any way. She could almost hear the chastising voice of Lewis in her head.

The man turned away from the window. His brow was furrowed, his glorious blue eyes darkened with what looked like pain. He shook his head as if to clear it, and offered Skye a smile that somehow, wasn’t quite as warm as before.

“Ready to move?” he asked, and Skye nodded.

“Lead the way,” she said, and followed as the man led her down the stairs.

From the looks of things, the bedroom she was in stretched the full length of the cottage. The stairs were shallow, leading down to the open-plan lower floor. To the left was the living area and to the right was the kitchen. A frosted glass door at the far end of the building was presumably the bathroom. It was a cluttered home, but it wasn’t a mess. Books and magazines were piled up on every surface, stacked two or three deep on shelves, and spilling from overflowing bookcases onto the floor. The whitewashed walls were almost invisible beneath photos and pictures of the natural world. One wall of the living area was completely dominated by the huge granite fireplace.

The exposed wooden beams of the ceiling were dotted with odd-looking objects that Skye struggled to identify as the man ushered her towards a seat in the living area. He slid a pile of magazines out of the way and righted a fallen chair for her to sit in. She sat, and he moved towards the kitchen. She heard water running.

“How does soup sound?” he called.

“Sounds good to me,” she replied, leaning back in the chair.

For all its clutter, the house was inviting and warm. She felt comfortable here, as if she’d been here before. It was nothing like her own small apartment, and it was worlds away from her fiancé’s minimalist lifestyle. But it suited him, in a way that she couldn’t explain in words.

As the kettle came to the boil, the front door rattled and opened. Another man entered, wrapped in a bright yellow slicker.

“It would freeze you out there,” he called to the man in the kitchen, before he seemed to realise that Skye was sitting there. His face brightened in a smile.

“Ach, hello there lass. Glad to see you up and about.”

His accent wasn’t a local one, Skye thought as she watched him strip off the slicker and make his way towards the table, dodging the stacks with the ease of long practise. He moved three books from another seat, before offering his hand across the table.

“Jack Millar, lightkeeper here at station fifteen. And don’t take this the wrong way, but now that I get a proper look at you, I’m sure that I’ve seen your face before. Have I?”

Skye had to laugh. “Skye Metcalfe, and you might have. I work for Channel Thirty Two, doing documentaries and interest pieces.”