Gypsy Dance

He saw Katie first, his eyes doing his customary sweep of the room as he turned away from the bar. Matt was ten feet away, Joel thirty, holding the innocent Petra in his arms, her head of black curls resting trustingly on his shoulder, her face buried in his neck. Katie sat at a table across the bar, her eyes also canvassing the room. But it was the shock in her eyes, and the guilt, that he recognized.1

His hand jumped to his hair, running through its shaggy blonde length, and part of him wished he’d remembered to cut it last week when he’d seen it in the mirror. The room was filled with people in a strange mixture of traditional and non-traditional garb, but their attention was on the dance floor. He’d heard the jingle of bells that had warned of the gypsy’s dance, but the gypsies always danced here. It was tradition, or so he’d heard. But he knew, knew the sound of her bare footsteps, which were suddenly louder than any in the room, perfectly timed to the music that was being played by the band on the stage. Perfectly timed to the jingling bells.2

He only held Katie’s gaze for three long seconds. Then his eyes turned unerringly to the dance floor.3

She wore a long skirt and a small top with a beaded fringe, her back open, the muscles and the bones both well defined. Even the long scar below her left shoulder wasn’t ugly or disfiguring. Instead, it showed her strength, and every man in that room knew it. He knew better than any of them, though. He’d listened, completely helpless, as she, near death but fearing for the lives of others more than her own, had demanded that her flesh be cut into, to reach the device that would save them. She was strong, she always had been.4

Her hair was black and straight as a pin, which went well with her dusky skin, but he knew that it was a lie. Her hair was naturally only a few shades lighter than his own, a honey color that no one could ever quite decide was blonde or brown. It was part of what made her perfect for her job. It was part of what had allowed her to disappear for three years, without a trace.5

He heard Matt’s hissed question, saw from the corner of his eye that Joel was looking at the girl as well, his eyes open wide in recognition. Joel would tell Matt.6

He started forward, pushing lightly but firmly through the throng that had gathered to watch her dance. She turned then, her eyes unfocused, but thankfully, oh thank God, they were her own, the natural light grey, blue, green mixture he knew so well. Her front was covered more modestly than her back had been, but the lower half was that same beaded fringe, tempting him when it moves, allowing glimpses of her toned stomach. He knew her, all right, knew the curve of her jaw, the slope of her nose, the shape of her lips. Other things, those she could change, they had changed, but not that. She couldn’t hide those from him, not from the man who had loved her so deeply, for so long. Her long arms traced intriguing patters in the air, her unadorned hands dancing like fairies. From this view, her body looked fragile. She was anything but. She was caught up in the music, but still alert to dangers, he knew. She might even be aware of his gaze, now, a gaze that held more than idle lust and appreciation for her fine art. But he didn’t want her to react to his gaze. So he strode forward more firmly, faster, intent on reaching her, on holding her, on hearing her heartbeat.7

He was aware of Matt and Joel behind him, moving less conspicuously through the crowd, and Katie approaching from his left. A man’s shout sounded from near Matt, and, two feet away from his target now, he saw her tense up, aware.8

And her gaze leapt from the sky and straight into his. The grey of her outfit had brought out the grey pigments in her eyes, so it was that dark storm that met his hazel brown one.9

He saw her pupils contract, then open wide as her mouth dropped and color fell from her cheeks. “Zach,” she breathed, seconds before he crushed his mouth to hers.10

Her arms went around him automatically, her tongue fighting his within seconds. She had left him, he had let her. And now she was here, thousands of miles from their home, and probably in more danger than he was. If he were thinking with that rational part of his brain that had never failed him yet, he would admit that this was the most dangerous thing he could be doing, when he knew that there were people trying to kill both of them, all of them really, when Petra’s brother was already dead.11

Right now, with Callie back in his arms, he almost didn’t care. His hands flew over her, over the flesh of her back, feeling the many scars she had accrued over the years. The one below her shoulder, long and thick, the thin one at the small of her back, from a knife fight on their first mission together, the ones that circled her wrists and ankles, below the bells she wore, from the manacles that had held her in one place for five months. Here on her left arm was a flesh wound where a bullet had grazed her in the attack that had occurred before their first conversation, there, along her thigh, the nearly invisible razor blade wounds that that sadistic bastard had used on her, when once again she had sacrificed herself for the good of others she barely knew. Time had not erased these wounds, like it hadn’t erased those he carried, that she was running her hands over now. She moaned into his mouth before dragging herself away, pushing away from him.12

He didn’t want to let go, but he did, taking another step back to increase the distance between them. But her eyes had snapped to something behind him, which he knew couldn’t be any of the others by the way fear jumped into her eyes.13

He grabbed her hand and Katie’s, yelling behind himself to Matt and Joel, and the six of them ran as the sound of machine gun fire filled the smoky room.14