Forgotten Sea Read Online Free PDF Page B

hurt. But the ground pitched under him like a ship’s deck in a squall. His stomach rolled like a rookie sailor’s. He needed to pee. Preferably without help.
    Gritting his teeth, he dragged his feet up the shallow stone steps.
    “One more,” Lara said. “You’re doing fine.”
    He appreciated her concern. And the lie.
    They maneuvered through a doorway with stained glass insets. He kept his head down, taking stock of his surroundings from beneath his lashes. Carved wood panel walls, old, dark, muted paintings, a curving staircase fit for a hotel. A chandelier, an explosion of light and color sparkling with crystals and candles, threw patterns on the hardwood floor.
    The place didn’t look like a hospital, he noted with relief. But there was a vaguely institutional smell in the air, a patina of many bodies over time, a whiff of dust and floor polish.
    “Where . . . are we?” he croaked.
    “Home,” Lara said.
    Justin tried to get his mush-for-brains to work. He had no home. “The place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in , ”  Rick liked to say.
    So, okay, this was Lara’s home. Would they take him in because she brought him here? Did he want them to?
    He looked at the two people waiting under the light, a man and a woman, both tall and arrestingly beautiful, not old, not young. The woman’s skin was the color of coffee, the man’s face austere and pale. Something about the guy, his cool blue eyes or his chiseled profile or his stick-up-the-butt attitude, reminded Justin of . . . somebody.
    “Who’s he?” His speech slurred like a drunk’s. “Your father?”
    Lara sucked in her breath.
    “Simon Axton.” The tall blond man introduced himself, offering a lean, well-manicured hand.  Or two. Justin’s vision wavered. He was afraid if he let go of Lara, he’d fall.
    He shifted his weight, stuck out his hand, gave them the name on his passport. “Justin Miller.”
    Axton’s hand was cool like his eyes, his grip firm. Nothing to prove , Justin thought. Until the man’s grip inexplicably tightened. His dark blond eyebrows rose. “What is this?” he asked Lara.
    Justin’s head buzzed. As if his skull had been invaded by a rush of wind, a swarm of bees.
    Lara cleared her throat. “He . . . I . . . This is the one I was sent to seek.”
    Sent?
    Justin pulled his hand free. He needed to sit down.
    Axton glanced at the woman standing under the light of the chandelier. “Miriam?”
    The handsome black woman came forward and took Justin’s arm. The Boyfriend had already moved away toward the long curving staircase. Distancing himself, Justin thought. Smart move. The ritzy entrance hall had all the tension of a bar before a fight broke out.
    “Let me help you to a chair,” the woman said.
    He leaned on her, grateful for the support. But he wasn’t about to leave Lara’s side. Not until he’d figured out what the hell was going on.
    “What is he?” Axton asked.
    Justin frowned in concentration. Or maybe he’d asked,  “How is he?”   The buzzing in his skull drowned out everything else.
    The woman—Miriam—continued to hold his arm, like a doctor taking his pulse. Like a guard with a recalcitrant prisoner.
    The pounding in his head intensified. His wound throbbed in time with his heart. He focused on Lara, warm and solid and real beside him, on her pink polished toes, on the clean, sweet scent of her hair. He breathed in, out, the rhythm of his breath like the sigh of the surf or the beat of the tide. In , filling his lungs, swirling in his head. Out .
    The room stopped reeling.
    A crease appeared between Miriam’s brows. “He is not of air.”
    Heir of what? he thought, confused.
    “He needs our help,” Lara said.
    Axton’s cool blue gaze rested on her without expression.
    “His needs are not our concern.”
    “I should examine him,” Miriam said. What was she, a doctor?  “He has something. An energy. I felt it.”
    Amusement bubbled inside him. Some