A Cloak of Lies Ch. 13

"That's everything until the floor and walls are washed—unless you want to grab a rag and help."

"So, you want me to catch some fish for dinner then, huh?"

He'd hoped his joke would bring a smile to her face, or at the very least, make her mad. She shrugged her shoulders, returning to her work. At that moment, she could have been on the other side of the earth; that's how far away she seemed.

Shaking his head, he walked away. He decided that once she wore herself out, she'd have no choice but to listen to him. She'd be too tired to find something else with which to occupy herself. In the meantime, he went looking for Brick. The big guy had been gone for hours and Niko wanted to make sure nothing was wrong.

Careful to stay on the narrow path, he watched his every step. Brick was likely to have the entire place booby-trapped. He was a paranoid SOB, but then he had good reason. Even though the man claimed to be retired, he had enemies enough for a small country. The life of a mercenary is anything but pleasant.

"Watch your step," Brick called out as the forest gave way to a bubbling stream.

Niko froze, not daring to move an inch. He glanced over to see Brick ass-deep in cold mountain water, holding what appeared to be a hand-made spear. On the end of the spear was a fat fish, impaled and wriggling in its death throes.

"What is it, landmine?" Niko asked.

"No, dumbass. You almost stepped on my supper."

Niko looked at the ground, finding it scattered with fish. Some of them were still flopping in an effort to escape the dry air. Another one landed on his shoe with a plop—and a chuckle from Brick—delivered just where it was aimed.

"Thought the girls might like a meal of fresh fish," Brick said as he returned to the hunt. "Don't imagine either of them's used to eating freeze-dried rations."

"Say it ain't so," Niko said with a laugh. "The great Marion Brickler doing something nice for someone? Must be snowing in hell."

"Shut the fuck up."

With deadly accuracy, Brick stabbed the water. He pulled out another fish, this one a crappie big enough to cover a dinner plate.

"Think you got enough?" Niko asked with no small amount of sarcasm.

"Enough for me and the girls," Brick snarled. He climbed from the water, tossing the stick and the fish down. "Don't know what the hell you're gonna eat."

"I was kinda hoping to wrap myself around a couple of those bass over there," Niko said with a grin.

Brick was busy stringing the numerous fish on a long tree branch. "You clean 'em, then," he said, shoving the branch at Niko before starting a second one. "Make yourself useful."

"You about ready to head back to the cabin?"

Brick grinned, shaking his head. "Nope. I got my orders. I'm supposed to clean up my act."

"Taking orders from a woman?" Niko said, his voice registering mild shock. "Obedience, thoughtfulness...what the hell's happening here?"

"Aw, hell," Brick growled, dropping the fish. He sat on a nearby boulder and picked up the toiletry kit Lorette had given him. "I don't know what's going on."

"Careful, there, big guy," Niko said. He laid the fish aside, wiping his hands on his jeans. "You sound like you might be in love or something."

"Shut up, Pavli. Just 'cause you're all soft in the head over some twist, doesn't mean I am."

"Uh-huh."

"How do you do it?" Brick asked.

"Do what?"

"I see the way you look at your woman. You go out of your way to make sure she's happy. Hell, you almost got us all killed just to get to her. How do you just give up everything for a woman?"

"I didn't give up anything," Niko said. He took a seat next to the giant and looked out over the water and the trees. They sat for in silence for a few moments before Niko continued, "She gives me everything, Brick. Because of her, I have purpose. She gives me a reason for being. Without her, I have nothing. I'd only be half a man."

"She does all that for you, huh?" Brick thought for a moment. "That little girl back there," he said, jerking his thumb in the direction of the cabin, "has sure got me in knots."

"I can tell."

"Wipe that grin off your face, Pavli."

Niko guffawed loudly. He was smart enough to dismount the boulder before Brick's big fist collided with his skull. It was only a half-hearted effort on the big man's part.

"I'm tryin' to talk to you here," Brick stated dourly. "You're acting like a smartass kid."

"Sorry, Brick," Niko said. "It's pretty funny to watch the great Marion Brickler get bushwhacked by a woman."

"Stop calling me that. Christ."

Niko sobered, taking a cautious step closer. He was getting a good look at someone other than the hulking soldier of fortune that was Marion Brickler. He was seeing a man once nearly broken by the past who was now faced with a greater challenge than all the battles he'd ever fought put together.

"Listen, Brick," he said. "If you're thinking of taking a woman for your own, I think you could do a lot worse than Lorette Shaffer. She's a good woman."

"What the hell would she want with a worn out old warrior like me?"

"Ah, so that's it. You're afraid you're not good enough for her."

"Yeah," Brick said with a broken sigh. "You seen her. She's perfect. She deserves to be romanced and danced around. I ain't got a clue about any of that. All I know is killing and hurting. I ain't near good enough for her."

"That's right. You're not."

When a man is as big and mean as Brick, he never has a need to move fast or strike quick. He was capable of scaring his enemies to death with a mere glance, but when he flew off his perch, Niko found himself jumping back on survival instinct. The man was quick as a coiled snake.

"Take it easy," Niko said, putting his hands up. "What I meant was no man is ever good enough for the woman he loves. You remember that, and you'll keep her happy."

Brick's stance relaxed by degrees until he finally walked to the water's edge. He kicked a stone into the pool, watching as ripples fanned out over the water.

"You think she could be happy with me?"

"I don't know," Niko answered honestly. "That's up to her—and you. I see the way you two look at each other and it reminds me of Camille, and the way she looks at me...the way she used to look at me, anyway."

It was Brick's turn to grin. "Trouble in paradise?"

Niko shrugged. "I can't seem to reach her since we left the ship. She wasn't too happy to see me when I took her from her house. She thought I was dead for eight years and then I showed up out of the blue to take her from her home and her life. She didn't want to go."

"You kidnapped your own wife?" Brick laughed out loud, a harsh sound from someone who hadn't done it much in life.

"It was for her own good," Niko said defensively. He picked up a rock and tossed it at a resting butterfly. "That's a lie. I did it for my good. She would've been safe if I'd left her alone. Maybe...Anyway, I found out she was going to get married again and I lost it. I went after her, telling myself she was in danger. Turns out she was. The guy she was going to marry was one of them, but I didn't really know that at the time. I was a selfish prick. I just wanted her for myself."

Brick let out a low whistle. "Women make men weak."

"You're wrong, Brick. Take a chance and you'll find out. You could have a hell of a life with Lorette."

Niko retrieved the fish and left Brick to his thoughts. By the time he got back to the cabin, the women were moving the now-clean furniture back in. They had blankets, freshly washed, drying over scrub brush. The filthy feather tick Brick had been using for a mattress lay over a thick tree branch where the women had been trying to beat some of the crud from it. If it were up to Niko, they'd burn the nasty thing.

"We held it over the fire and smoked it some," Camille said when she noticed Niko eyeing the mattress. "Thought it would be best in case of vermin. I don't see how he can stand lie down on it."

"Brick's used to doing for himself," Niko offered. He held up the two long strings of fish. "Wanna help me clean dinner?"

Camille wrinkled her nose. "No, thanks. I'll let you do the honors."

"Just my luck. Where's Lorette?"

"Inside. You should see the way she has the place fixed up. You'd think it was a honeymoon cottage."

"Seems to me, it might just be," he said with a wink. "I think the big guy's got the hots for her."

"I think it goes both ways," she said with a smile. "Hope those two don't rush anything."

"They're adults. Camille, you and I need to have a talk tonight. We need to get some things in the open."

"What is it?"

"Tonight," he said. He ran a finger over the frown lines between her eyes. "Don't worry. It's nothing bad."

He walked to a tree stump and pulled a knife from the holster on his hip. If only for her sake they needed to talk. Something was eating her alive. He couldn't help her if he didn't know what it was, although he could guess.

A twig snapped behind him, had him reaching for the gun at his back. He turned to see Brick strolling along the path leading to the cabin.

"You ain't got them fish cleaned yet?" Brick called out. "What the hell you been doing?"

Niko merely grinned and bent to the task. The sight of a clean-shaven, curried and polished Brick was almost enough to cause a fit of laughter. Laughing at the goliath could get a fellow killed.

***

"Holy shit," Camille said.

Nothing she'd ever experienced had prepared her for what walked up the path. Now she understood why Brick's huge shirt looked a size too small. The man was positively bulging. It wasn't just the over-abundance of man-muscle that caught her attention. His upper body was riddled with scars. The wound he'd acquired on Oleander's island only added to the war map on his chest.

To make matters worse, he had cleaned himself up. His face was shaved—exposing a long narrow scar on the left side of his face. His hair, still dripping, was slicked back from his face to trail down his neck. The military-style pants he wore clung wetly to his lower half while rivulets of water made paths over his scarred chest.

She found herself staring at the half-naked Adonis. Worse, she discovered that her mouth was wide agape. Drawing on a strength she didn't know she had, she snapped her jaw shut and tore her eyes from his flesh. She found Lorette standing in the doorway of the cabin with a similar expression on her face.

No, it wasn't her own shock that she saw mirrored in Lorette's face. There was more to it. The woman had pure adoration in her eyes, and maybe just a touch of sadness.

Brick stopped a few feet away from both women, fidgeting at the sodden shirt in his hands and the leather case he had tucked under his arm. He had the look of an unsure boy about him as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other and looked anywhere but at Lorette.

"Brick," Lorette said as she walked toward the big man. "I owe you an apology."

His head shot up, his eyes seeming to search for something. "You don't owe me anything, Angel."

"Yes, I do. What I said to you was uncalled for. It was rude and...I'm sorry."

He smiled crookedly, his features lifting. In that moment, he was no longer the terrifying ogre that would rather spit in someone's eye than talk to them. In that moment, he was a smitten boy.

"I had it coming. Don't you worry yourself about it. There're worse things than bein' told by a pretty woman."

The sound of her giggle was one of relief. She reached for the shirt in his hand, pulling it free when he tried to hang on to it.

"What have you been doing?" she asked, giggling again. "You're soaked."

"I been following a lady's orders. Had myself a bath." He grinned again, pointing at the dripping shirt in her hands. "I tried to wash my shirt, but 'fraid I ain't much good at it."

"Let me," she said, taking his hand. "Come inside. I have coffee ready."

Camille watched them disappear through the door of the cabin. She was glad for them, offering a silent wish of happiness as she went to start supper. Falling in love was just what both those souls in there needed. Lorette had been so lost when Camille first met her—and no small wonder, too, with all she'd been through. Even though the young woman had smiled and said she was fine when asked, Camille had heard her cries in the night when the bad dreams came. Lorette was fighting the demons left her by Oleander and maybe the big moose was the best thing to drive them off.

Camille also had her ideas about Brick. He was gruff, ill-mannered and bad-tempered. Until now, he wallowed in his own stench with his unwashed body and unkempt appearance. He even went out of his way to drive people off as if he wanted to live up to their expectations of a giant. Through it all, though, she could see he was longing—and in pain. She recognized that pain, that lonely emptiness. She'd felt it often enough through the long years after Niko disappeared.

But now he was back, right? They were together again and the world was once more theirs. She had little doubt Oleander would be tracked down, taken into custody for all his crimes. Their time in hiding was just temporary. She and Niko would have their life back soon.

So why did she feel so broken?

"Where are you?"

Niko's voice startled her, causing her to drop the log she'd been carrying. She hopped around on one foot, thankful for the steel toes in her hiking boots. It might have been worse than just a bruised instep. Casting him a caustic glance, she hobbled to a nearby stump to rub her injured foot.

"You okay?" Niko asked with real concern.

She flipped her hair back, fixing him with another baleful gaze. "Yeah. I'm fine. You just scared the crap out of me and I think I broke my foot, but I'm great. How are you?"

He set a pan of cleaned fish on the ground and started unlacing her boot. "You're pretty jumpy,agapi. You been through a lot over the past few weeks. As soon as you feel safe again, you'll settle down."

"Who are you trying to convince, me or you?"

He'd just taken the sock from her foot, was examining the darkening bruise when he looked up to see the sadness on her face. She tried to hide it behind a sarcastic sneer, but he wasn't fooled. She could see it in the way he looked at her.

"I'm sorry, Camille. Do you think there's any way for us to fix everything? I'd give anything to see the light in your eyes again."

"The light's gone, Niko." Her voice sounded like death to her own ears.

"I'll never believe it,agapi mou. The sun rises in your eyes."

She pulled her foot from his grasp, reaching for her sock and shoe. As she hurriedly put them on, she could feel him watching her. His gaze was unsettling, almost overwhelming.

"Quit staring at me."

"You're tired," he said. He returned to his feet and retrieved the pan of fish. "You should go lie down. I'll fix us some food."

"Why don't just pat me on the head and tell me to be a good girl while you're at it? Jesus, Niko. Give me the damned fish."

That's when his famous Greek temper flashed. "Katarameni gynaika!" he yelled.

Camille raised an eyebrow. She'd heard that phrase before.

"Go fuck yourself, Niko. If I'm damned it's your fault. If you'd just left me alone--"

"You'd be married to one of Oleander's goons," he said, cutting her short. "I came for you because I was foolish enough to want to protect you, but I can see you'd rather be dead."

"At least I wouldn't be a murderer then!" she screamed back at him.

The truth hit her hard. The image of Doug—the man they called Gerhardt—falling under a hail of bullets she'd fired was burned in her brain. She had killed a man, had willingly fired a weapon and brought death to another human being. She was one of them, one of the vicious, cruel, evil people of the world. She had taken life.

She couldn't stand the site of Niko or his presence. With a cry of pain, she ran down the path that Brick had taken, moving as fast as her feet would carry her. Somewhere in the back of her mind was a warning about trip wires. She heard the desperation in Niko's voice when he called after her, but it didn't matter. She only knew she had to get away.

Thank you for reading this latest chapter. I promise to have the next one out soon. Won't you take a moment to leave me your thoughts and a vote? ~Molly