Page 32 of A Waltz with Lord Death
Although a shiver still raced through her blood, she took a deep breath to calm herself. She never thought she would see him ever again. But here he lay with closed eyes on the brink of death before her.
“You must. I beg you. What has you convinced you cannot?”
Swallowing the lump in her throat, she raised her gaze to look Betha in the eye. If she did not know the truth, then what she was about to say would surely sting.
“Barret is my father.”
****
“What?” Death whispered.
He stared wide-eyed at Meira from the doorway, looking at her as if just seeing her for the very first time. The hair color and skin tone were different. But the blue eyes… An exact replica. The nose. The shape of the mouth. Why hadn’t he seen it before?
But even more shocked was Betha, who stood rooted to the spot as if frozen in her own capsule of time. Betha’s shock turned to disbelief, which transitioned to pain, written plainly in her features.
“He was with another woman?” Betha gasped. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-four.”
Betha paced back and forth, back and forth before stopping in front of Barret. “I met him when I first became Time. Seventeen years ago.”
Meira crossed her arms over her chest as if to make herself smaller while she stared at the ground. “He did not go by Barret when I knew him. His name was Reeve. He came and went at his own convenience, until he stopped visiting me and my mother altogether when I was seven. I’m not sure he deserves to be saved.”
“Betha,” Death said, still reeling from his shock. “The mortal who killed Barret admitted to hunting him for years. What if he left to keep Meira safe?”
“Barret would havetoldme!” she cried, holding her hands over her heart. “I know he has a history of lovers. He’s much older than me. But he would have told me if he had a child.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose, now faced with a dilemma he had not expected to cross his path. “Barret always told me everything, too, but he did not tell me about this.” His gaze drifted to Meira. More specifically, to the sliver of Life that flickered in her soul. She did not die from his touch because she was Barret’s daughter, and therefore, immune to his power. How had he not seen it before?
So many questions churned in his mind. Was it a coincidence he had found her when he had? Was it a coincidence he had fallen in love with her?
But now that he knew she was his friend’s daughter, how did the knowledge affect his relationship with her?
“I need some time to think about this,” Betha murmured.
“Are you changing your mind? About saving Barret’s soul?”
“No, I am not. But I need to…to process this. Excuse me.”
He watched Betha disappear, leaving them behind in Barret’s sanctuary. When he turned back to Meira, she averted her gaze from him, from Barret, and intensely studied the floor.
His deep voice rumbled in the room. “Barret would never have abandoned you, Meira. I know him. He shoulders his responsibilities.”
“But he kept leaving.”
“Likely to do Life’s job. We are plenty busy, and I’m sure keeping a family, a mortal one at that, would have been a difficult thing to do.”
“Why are you making excuses for him?” she hissed, but then her voice cracked. “Do you have any idea what my mother had to do to provide for us? I don’t care why you think Reeve did what he did, he still did it.”
Not knowing how to respond, he remained silent. The only way they could know what really happened was for Barret to tell them himself. There was no use arguing, not when Meira was so upset.
“Does this…” She took a deep breath and lifted her gaze. “Does this change the way you view me?”
A bubble of surprise moved through his stomach at the uncertainty in her eyes. The surprise quickly transitioned into hope.
“Honestly? A little. For starters, I am afraid Barret is going to break my face on his fist when he finds out how I feel about you.”
“Which is…what?”
