I am, Michael. I see them sometimes. When they need me, I'm with them. That's another good part.
I reach out and suddenly hold her thin wrist. I move over to her hand, run my finger over her wedding ring.
I made it back to you. I knew I would. I never doubted it.
When she squeezes my hand back, my sadness evaporates, and I'm overcome with a pulsing warmth. I'm being filled inside and out with peace. Suddenly there's a pop, and a rushing sound fills my ears, like water roaring violently through a pipe. The bed starts to shake.
Will you show me everything? I say, holding on to her hand for dear life.
Of course, Michael, she says as she lets go of my hand. But not now. It's not the right time.
But I don't want to go back, I yell. Not yet. I have so many questions. What about us? What about Mary Catherine?
I know you'll be good to her, Michael, Maeve yells over the increasing roar. I know you. You would never play with a person's heart.
That's when I turn.
But Maeve isn't there.
Nothing is. Everything is gone. My room, the block, the city, the planet. There is nothing but the roar, and my breath and sight fail as it swallows me whole.
Chapter 106
First, there was just blackness and pain and a relentless chirping beep. It was like a bird had gotten inside of me somehow and was trying to peck its way out. Two large predator birds. One in my side, one in my face.
I opened my stinging eyes. Outside the window beside me, sun sparkled off an unfamiliar parking lot. On a highway in the distance, cars passed normally under a blue, cloudless sky.
A red-haired nurse with her back to me was moving some kind of wheeled cart in the corner. When I opened my mouth to call to her, I tasted blood again. I felt dizzy and weak, and nausea crowded up on me, and I slipped under again.
Next time I woke up, my eyes adjusted to the gray shapes. At first I thought there were people hovering above me, but then I realized they were balloons. Red and blue and shimmering Mylar ones. About as many as floated out of Carl's chimney in the movie Up.
I looked away from them, wincing in pain. My face and my side were hot and tight with an itchy, horrendous stinging. The head-to-toe tightness was the worst. I felt like a sheet being pulled apart.
"Thank the Lord. Oh, thank you, God," someone said. It definitely wasn't me.
A second later, Seamus's face appeared.
"Please don't tell me it's last rites."
"No, no, you've got at least another fifty years to suffer in this vale of tears, you crazy SOB. You scared the H-E-double-hockey-sticks out of us all."
"How long have I been out?"
"This would be day three."
"How's…?"
"Apt? Deader than dog excrement," said another voice.
Emily Parker appeared next to my grandfather.
"Mary Catherine followed you down to the beach. She said when she saw you fighting, she ran back and started ringing doorbells. I guess it pays to have half the police and fire department for neighbors when you're on vacation."
I nodded.
"How's…?"
"Your condition?" Seamus said.
I shook my head.
"Mary Catherine."
"She cried for two days," Seamus said. "But now I believe she's fine, Mike. She's one remarkable girl, or I should say, woman."
"It's true," Emily agreed. "She saved your life. And Ricky's. All of your lives. Feel better, Mike. Call me when you can. I have to go now. There's about a thousand people waiting to see you."
I squeezed Emily's hand.
"I'm sorry," I said.
"For what?" she said.
"For leaving the hotel."
She smiled.
"You're where you're supposed to be, Mike. I know that now."
The redheaded nurse came back then, looking pissed.
"Visiting time is over," she said as she shoved Seamus toward the door.
"Get better," ordered Seamus.
"I will."
"Promise," he called back.
I smiled.
"I swear to God, Father," I said.
I slept for another stretch. When I opened my eyes, it was dark and all my kids were there.
At first, I flinched. I didn't want them to see me this way. Their mother had died in a hospital bed. They'd seen enough horror in their young lives, hadn't they? But after a minute, I found myself smiling as I looked from concerned face to concerned face.
They were all trying to be brave and to make me smile, I saw. Mary Catherine most of all. A wall of concern and love and support was bearing down on me whether I liked it or not.
After a little bit, I smiled back through my tears. I couldn't have helped it if I'd wanted to. Resistance was futile.
"Go give your Da a kiss," Seamus instructed my kids.
And incredibly, somehow, all at the same time, that's exactly what they did.
HAYS BAKER: FATHER. HUSBAND. PATRIOT. HERO. #1 MOST WANTED. FOR AN EXCERPT, TURN THE PAGE.
"My, my. The president wants to meet us," Lizbeth whispered in my ear as we followed Jax Moore farther into the mansion.
"Of course he does," I said with a wink.
Actually, Lizbeth and I were considered stars at that particular moment in time. We'd just returned from Vegas where we had saved countless lives while arresting a gang of moderately clever human bank robbers who had been terrorizing the West.
Anyway, Jax Moore whisked us through eight-foot-tall carved oak doors that led to the mansion's private living area. Well-concealed scanners examined every pore of our bodies as we walked to the entrance of the president's oval-shaped office, which was modeled after the famous original in the now-sunken city of Washington, DC.
I was immediately reminded that humans had created some good things in the past, such as this fine neoclassic style of architecture. But they'd also severely ravaged the planet, hadn't they? A couple decades ago, the first generation of Elites had barely managed to save it from total destruction. Washington, DC, was one of many cities on the casualty list, along with most of the low-lying eastern seaboard, including New York City, Boston, and Philadelphia, all of which had been swallowed up long ago by the rising oceans.
When we stepped into the Oval Office, President Hughes Jacklin was standing in front of a full-length mirror, fumbling with his cravat. At his side was his faithful bodyguard and supposed lover, a behemoth named Devlin.
Seeing us, the president let the tie go and strode across the room to greet Lizbeth and me, as if we were old friends. He was a hugely impressive man, classically educated, firm-jawed and broad-shouldered, and his thick dark hair was just beginning to gray at the temples.
"My dear, the sun is down and it's still as bright as day around you," he said to Lizbeth, kissing her perfect cheeks, one, then the other.
"Mr.-Mr. President," Lizbeth stammered ever so slightly, "I'm speechless-almost anyway."
"What you are is incredibly charming," countered the president.
He turned to me and gave a firm handshake. "Hays Baker, this is a great pleasure. You're beautiful too. Look, I'm late for my own party-we'll have time to get better acquainted later. But I want you to know I've followed your careers at the Agency closely. And I'm a big fan. That operation in Vegas was pure genius. Efficient and effective. Just what I like."
"We're proud to help, Mr. President," Lizbeth said, actually blushing a little now.
"Then would you help me out with this thing?" He flapped the loose ends of his cravat with good-humored exasperation. "I never could get the hang of it. Or the significance of ties, damn them."
"I could do that," said Devlin, but the president waved the bodybuilding guard away.
"Lizbeth?" he said, exposing his throat to her. "Let's see how you would garrote a world leader."
"It would be my pleasure, sir!"