Sapphire Nights (Crystal Magic Book 1)(101)

Sam emerged next, with a hopping Valdis on her arm. Walker thought he’d never seen anything more beautiful than Sam’s smile as he hobbled up to greet her.

“You’re alive,” she said, joy lighting her eyes like blue sapphires. Just the sight jump-started his long dead heart.

Someone took Val’s arm, leaving Sam’s free. In heady relief, Walker gathered Sam against him, offering prayers to this universe of insanity that had returned her to him, hearty and whole. He drank in the wonder of her heart beating against his, of her arms wrapping around him as if she could never let go.

And the adrenalin racing through him like speed found a focus. He was almost light-headed with the joy as his terror seeped away. That didn’t mean a new set of fears didn’t take its place, but this was the kind of anxiousness that formed when someone you loved was endangered.

“I need you,” she whispered, clinging to him as she never had before. “I spent these past hours with you in my every thought. It was almost like having Cass in my head again, but better. I knew you would come.”

He wanted to jump for joy and carry her away and make love and never come out into the real world again. He nibbled her ear and ran his hand down her back and pulled her closer. “I couldn’t protect you,” he protested, releasing some of the horror of these last moments.

“You don’t need to,” she told him, hugging him harder. “I am responsible for me.”



Sam said that heroically, trying to absolve Walker from his overactive sense of responsibility, but having him in her arms. . . she wanted to weep for joy. “I thought I might never see you again,” she murmured, giving in to tears.

He clutched her tighter, covering any part of her face he could reach with his kisses. “You want to imagine how I felt, watching a mountain tumbling down on you? I’m not sure I could survive losing you.”

And there it was—they’d both suffered such losses. How did they find the courage to move forward? She lifted her face to give him a salty kiss, then murmured, “Then you know how I feel. If we’re only given these fleeting moments. . . shouldn’t we face our fears and grab the joy while we can?”

Walker shuddered and rested his cheek on her head. “It’s more than just sex, isn’t it? That’s what scares the crap out of me.”

She smiled through her tears. “You can afford to lose a little crap. I want to believe what we feel is real and not just a result of terror, but I’m too shaky to think straight. Give me time.”

“I’d give you the stars, if I could.” Walker glanced over his shoulder to see if they could get way.

In the dusk, the mob of Lucys was gathering brush and blocking view of the door. The sheriff and the town Nulls were further up the hill, playing with ATVs and shotguns, going after the snakes and climbing up after Gump.

With decision, he shed the need to follow up on the killer. “Gump most likely killed my father for the same reason he blew up the mountain—money. He can go to a hell of his own making.”

She nodded in understanding. “We can’t help up there. I want you to see something before the Lucys hide it all again.”

“I’ll gladly follow you anywhere. Just don’t do that to me again.” Walker took Sam’s hand, relishing the warmth and life and fearing what lay ahead for his damaged heart..

“Do what? Stay alive?” she asked, blinking and feigning innocence as she led him down the cold stairs. “Did we have an earthquake?”

“Of the human kind.” That’s what he liked, maybe loved, about Sam. She might be a starry-eyed Lucy, but she stayed grounded. His heart still hadn’t slowed down, but he flicked on his flashlight to see what she wanted him to see. The beam glinted off a crazy construction of mirrors and crystals. Paintings were stacked against walls and hung anywhere that had space.

She briefly leaned into him, letting their mutual relief calm their racing pulses. As if afraid to get too close, she kissed his cheek, then pointed at a gallery of small portraits. “Look, that’s Xavier, when he was younger. His eyes are a lovely brown. He must have visited here back when it was a commune.”

She’d brought him down to look at an ancient painting? “What am I supposed to see?”

“No red,” she said inexplicably, dragging him on. “The small portraits are Lance’s style. Daisy probably stole them from his studio. He’s not very original, but he’s obsessive and a good copyist. Look, doesn’t this look like a younger Gump?”

She pointed at an arrogant-looking blond man in his early thirties, with his coat pushed back and his thumbs hooked in his trouser pockets. Even then, he wore expensive suits. There was something peculiar about the expression. Fascinated by the way her mind worked, Walker leaned over and studied it closer. “Why are his eyes red?”

“Evil. He’s infected with evil. Most of these paintings down here are portraits of evil. This is Daisy’s way of burying them.” Sam gestured at the bunker. “Let’s go back up before they lock us in.”

She grabbed the small portrait of Xavier and took Walker’s hand.

To hell with portraits and evil. What was important was Sam’s trusting hand in his—and that they were alive to see another day.



“I’d give you the stars, if I could.”