Chapter Fifteen: Communication Problems
So the Team had another prisoner. A few years ago it had been Lisa locked in the interrogation room, answering awkward questions and receiving a medical examination from McGregor. She couldn’t help remembering what that was like: stripping down and being measured, poked, and prodded by the nervous doctor. At least Ianthe’s boyfriend hadn’t abandoned her there like she was a piece of filth.
Which, to be fair, Lisa was. Not then – at worst she’d kept a few secrets from him then – but now… now she was.
Lisa sidled up to Skylar outside the door. Their only contact had been years ago with Skylar as hunter and her as prey, but right now Lisa had the option of talking to Skylar or stewing in her own thoughts and she’d had enough of herself on the boat ride over.
“So, Skylar,” Lisa said. The brunette looked over, her face an unreadable mask. Big eyes, but completely disconnected from the thoughts behind them.
“Look, what’s your first name? I don’t want to have to keep calling you ‘Skylar’.”
“Why do you have to call me anything?” Skylar asked. “We could keep not-talking. That’s been working fine so far.”
“I just…”
“What? Thought that because we’re both women we have something in common? That just because we’re outnumbered we should band together against these men?”
“No, I… I thought it might be nice to chat to someone.” Yikes. James had said Skylar was sometimes touchy about sexism, but she hadn’t expected this. “Truman’s always fretting about strategy and the only other person here is McGregor who is, well, not exactly conversation material.” Lisa said it with a laugh that died on her lips the moment she realised how fake Skylar’s smile was.
“I know what you mean. Tedious, isn’t he?” Skylar said. When Lisa didn’t buy it, she added, “My name – and if you repeat this to anyone I will disembowel you – is Skye.”
Why was she ashamed of that? “Skye,” Lisa said. “That’s lovel… oh.”
“Yeah.”
“Skye Skylar?”
Skylar’s knuckles were white gripping her rifle. “Don’t even start. Don’t.”
“Fair enough.”
“Now can we skip the small talk?”
“Okay,” Lisa said, and went straight to the biggest talk. “Apparently my husband is going to kill his brother.”
“Apparently.” The woman certainly could play it cool.
“Do you think he… he would?”
“He’s your husband,” Skylar said. “Do you think he’d kill someone?”
James had always been afraid of himself. When he’d been thirteen, he’d lifted Lisa’s skirt in front of the whole assembled school. It was silly childhood foolishness, something he’d been told to do by an older boy, but James took it as indicative of some deep darkness inside him: that he’d used the flimsiest excuse to hurt his best friend as deeply as he could.
Lisa had thought he was worrying about nothing until the Andrastes had offered her their protection. Until she’d known he was prophesied to become a murderer.
“Of course not,” Lisa said. Shit. That lie was about as convincingly as Skylar’s earlier.
“Married life not everything you’d hoped for?”
Not really, but how could she say that to an almost-complete stranger? Besides, her disappointment wasn’t necessarily James’s fault. Yes, she’d hoped that by now he would have opened up more to her, but maybe he didn’t have a deeper level. Maybe this was all of him. Maybe he’d never be comfortable saying what he was really thinking.
Or maybe he was trying to protect her from the part of him that wanted to kill his brother. Shouldn’t she be glad for that? Happy that he was keeping the darkness from her? Or was she rightfully annoyed that he was still keeping secrets? Or scared that that dark part of him existed at all?
“James can be difficult to get along with sometimes,” Lisa said.
“Maybe that means he’s worth it,” Skylar said.
“What?”
“Why should it be easy?” she challenged. “The only thing that matters is if the good times are worth the bad.”
The good times were good. They were also further apart these days. The monotony of life, of waking up and him always being there, was dulling them. He used to be a splash of colour in a drab day. Now… well, perhaps James was just better in small doses.
Before she could decide whether to voice these thoughts, the door opened and Truman nodded Skylar through, then stepped outside himself. Apparently the Team’s new leader had the decency to allow a woman to oversee the physical examination rather than sitting in on it himself and staring like a vulture.
Truman disappeared behind a laptop screen to write the report for his interrogation, so Lisa sat around for the next ten minutes or so until the wolves and Beck returned. The instant James was through the door, Truman was out of his chair and in his bearded face. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“That if Adonis won’t come back to Archi,” James said, “we’d better know what we’re up against.”
The other wolves had taken up positions around Truman, ready to step in if trouble started. Truman noticed, but didn’t back down. “I didn’t authorise you to make deals.”
“Even if they don’t produce the Book, I bought you a day to talk to your prisoners.”
Truman shook his head, calmed down, and said, “It’s not a bad deal, all things considered. But it still wasn’t yours to make.” After another moment, the Archians backed off and went, in a group, to a corner of the room. As Truman left, presumably to interrogate the other vampire, Lisa approached her husband and led him to the back sitting room. The house was still dark – they were hiding, after all – but it was light enough to see the dank old couches and rugs that the owners of this house had left behind in their rush to join vampiretown.
“What’s up?” James asked. Maybe he had a lot on his mind; maybe rightly so. But it would have been nice to think she was worth a thought.
“What’s up?” she asked. “How about the part where you ignored my wishes and did what you thought was best? Again. Where you abandoned your wife and ran off to be the hero? Again. Where you left me with seven pissed off werewolves as you denied them their long-sought-after revenge against the man who exploited them for a dozen years?”
At least he had the sense to look guilty. “Ah, that.”
“Yes. That.” She sat. The couch threw up a cloud of dust. At least, she hoped it was dust. James remained standing, eyes roaming as he thought.
“Well?” she prompted.
“You’re… Lisa, the last time you were involved in all this, the Team tried to execute you. This time, I had the opportunity to save you from that – and maybe it wasn’t my place,” he said, when she opened her mouth, “but this… this isn’t like last time. The prophecy is more straightforward. We’re not dealing with mystical forces and hidden danger. This is war. Adonis wants me to kill my brother and I don’t doubt he’d do anything to make it happen. Including taking or hurting you.”
Lisa just looked at him. “If you’re stopping Adonis all to protect me, why didn’t you bring the boys?”
“Because they weren’t coming for the right reasons… And maybe you’re right and I’m too close to be objective, but I don’t see anyone here who would do a better job, so it’s me. Until someone else comes along, it’s up to me.”
Lisa took his hand, which finally convinced him to sit. “You remember last time Jim? Things got kind of out of control. And I know what you’re going to say – it worked out all right in the end – but you kept a lot of secrets from me and you promised you wouldn’t again. And now you are.”
James stared at their hands in his lap. “I need you… to trust me.”
“Based on what?”
“Based on two years of marriage!”
Shit. How could she say what she needed to without angering him? And what would happen if he did get angry? Adonis seemed to th
ink of him as a danger. A danger to her?
“James… we’ve had two years of bland marriage—”
“Oh, I’m sorry if the best years of my life were bland to you.”
Fuck… Now he was angry.
“—which were great,” Lisa said. “But in every high-pressure situation we’ve been in, you lie, or hide the truth, or… do whatever you think is best and screw anyone else. That’s not so different from Adonis, in case you didn’t notice.” She ignored the tightness of his jaw or the pressure squeezing her hand. “You’re reliable when you don’t need to be and unreliable when you do. So what am I supposed to base this trust on?”
He stared at her with hard brown eyes. Searching her face like he didn’t know it, or didn’t care to. Like he was searching for a weakness to exploit. Was that how he looked at Adonis? No wonder the vampire considered him a threat. There was something in his expression that said that… he just didn’t care. You couldn’t threaten or bluff, because there was nothing he held dear. Not even his own life. And he wouldn’t give ground. Not for anything. Ever.
“Fine,” he said. “So don’t trust me.”
As James stormed out, Lisa placed her head in her hands and took deep breaths. Why did she feel like she’d gotten off lightly? That he could as easily have said, “You’re divorced”. Cancelled their life together. What would he have done if she’d answered back? What if they had more than a spat, if they went all the way to a screaming match? Should she be afraid for her safety?
What would James do to her if he learned that she’d sabotaged Charlie’s boat?