VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 11:17:56 10/12/12 Fri
Author: celtgirl
Subject: Snippet inside>>>
In reply to: celtgirl 's message, "" on 11:07:07 10/12/12 Fri

copyright 2012 Cindy Brandner

“What is it you’re not telling me, Robert?” Jamie asked, setting his tea cup down on the desk.

The Scot moved his glasses back up his nose. “Why do you think that, sir?”

“Because it’s roughly the size and shape of an elephant, and standing right here on the rug.”

“That will be my cue, then,” said a sharpish voice from the entry.

Jamie stiffened. “Grandmother,” he said, and the tone could not be construed as one of great joy.

“Grandson,” she replied tartly and nodded to Robert, who stood and, like the wise man he was, exited the study posthaste.

Small and neat, his grandmother crossed the room to him and proceeded to startle him with a rather fierce hug. It only served to add to his feeling of having arrived in a world unfamiliar in its lineaments.

She held him out at arm’s length. “Well, yer a bit worse for the wear, but that’s not anything that can’t be mended.”

Jamie thought he'd had quite enough of being assessed by the women in his life. “Would you like a drink?”

She quirked a brow at him in a fashion which he recognized.

“Yes, I will take a drink.”

He poured one out for her, but not for himself. He needed to keep a clear head for a few more hours.

She sat, drink in hand, on a hassock by the fire, her bearing almost military in its composure.

“Is the news really so bad that you have to deliver it?” Jamie said, sarcastically, though inside he wondered what could be so dreadful that hadn’t already been imparted.

“Not so bad, mayhap, but personal-like. Pamela would have told ye, but as she cannot at present, it’s down to me.”

In answer she handed him a picture.

He took it and raised one gull-wing eyebrow at her in puzzlement.

“That would be yer son.”

“My son?” Jamie said, and laughed. “Is this some sort of bad joke? My son is upstairs asleep in his crib.”

“Aye, well, ye’ve more than the one. Look at the picture an’ tell me ye don’t see it clear.”

He looked. He blinked and looked again. He was aware of sitting down, suddenly, the starch gone from his knees entirely.

He was a young man, not a child. At least nineteen years of age, he would guess. And if that was his age, only one woman could be his mother. He took a breath, and looked up at his grandmother. The sharp green eyes missed nothing, and so he schooled his face as quickly as he might.

“You’ve met him?”

“Aye, he’s caused no small grief for all of us—Pamela and yon Scotsman mostly—he tried to take the companies out from under them. He didn’t succeed, but it was a fight to the finish. Pamela will tell ye the details of that though, when she can.”

He looked back down at the picture.

He had his mother’s coloring—that dark hair, a rich brown that was like a pond seen through the barest skim of ice, gleaming with golden tints in its depths. His eyes were an intense sapphire blue, an intensity that made his gaze seem alive even in the static of a photograph.

Beyond the coloring though... Jamie sighed. Beyond the coloring there was nothing in him that was not a direct result of Kirkpatrick genes. The irony of it was almost too great. That his one living son should be one he had never seen and had no hand in raising.

“I could have been gentler with the news, but there hardly seems time for it now.”

“It’s not news that can be given gently,” Jamie said.

“So you truly did not know?” she wore a bemused look on her face.

“You think I would have allowed him to go in complete ignorance of me?”

“Aye, it might be wise to have done so, though it’s neither here nor there now that he knows. He's not an easy lad, but there’s maybe something in him worth the saving. That will be up to you.”

Jamie realized he hadn’t taken a proper breath since he had entered the study. He could not quite absorb the idea of a grown son, one that looked disconcertingly like him. His mind was elsewhere and could not yet light upon this new fact of his life.

He could feel his grandmother’s eyes once again assessing him.

“She will be awake,” she said. “I don’t think she sleeps these days. And she will be wonderin’ how ye are, since ye’ve arrived home. Go see her.”

Finola left shortly thereafter, discombobulating him further with a sound kiss to his forehead, something she had not done since he was fifteen. He checked Kolya, left instructions with Vanya about where he would be, should anything arise in his absence and went out to the garage. The car was gleaming with a recent cleaning and turned over without hesitation. No detail had been overlooked around his arrival it seemed.

Twilight touched the face of the land as he moved through it, car a low hum against the coming of night. He saw it in miniature as he drove—the narrow, winding road set like a scatter of crushed jewels in the larger setting of countryside. His mind traced the path, past the edge of the rubble-strewn city, into the squared-off farm land, banded by high dark hedges, past the tiny smoke-furled cottages and the sheep-dotted fields, the tumbling stone walls, near to the border of the murder triangle. To the sloping hill with the weary ash guarding its head, down the drive to the wee farmhouse, whitewashed and braced with brambles and bare rose cane. A house that had been built with love and hope.

“Where are you, you bloody bastard?” he said out loud.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

Post a message:
This forum requires an account to post.
[ Create Account ]
[ Login ]
[ Contact Forum Admin ]

Forum timezone: GMT-8
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.