As I watch her walk across the roof away from me, I can't help but wonder how long it will take Mallory to realize I've lied to her.
I shouldn't have. But when you've made a living on the wrong side of the law for as long as I have, a petty lie comes as easily as your next breath.
Particularly when the truth is something even I don't care to hear.
I didn't lie about Lauran. He is my son. And I meant what I said, about him being proud of me-if he even knows I exist.
Because, you see, I lied about Shakura.
Don't get me wrong. Shakura Starwing was a wonderful woman, and a valuable member of the Brotherhood. She was always there when I needed a friend, a stiff drink, a few bucks, and yes, occasionally, a bedfellow. She was good to me when things got tough, and things might have worked out for Shakura and me if the Saurians hadn't come.
Maybe I even loved her. I don't know. But watching her die in that Saurian work camp was one of the hardest things I've ever done. And when Canard filched me out of there-despite what else you may hear-it was for Shakura, and Lauran, that I really joined the Resistance.
And I'd been truthful with Mallory when I told her what Shakura had done for Lauran before she died. Even if she'd lived, I never could have repaid her for that.
But still, I'd lied. Because-except in a casual, on-again/off-again way-Shakura, like Michael Jackson's Billie Jean, was not my lover.
And she wasn't Lauran's mother.
Her name was Martine la Dague.
I say was. She died when Lauran was six. Martine was always a slick one, but there were some things even she couldn't outrun.
They say redheaded girls are trouble, and Martine was definitely both. Her hair is the one thing I'll always remember about her, that peculiar dark red shade, like wine, that most women have to buy in a box, and she was so fair that the effect was that of blood on snow. In the Brotherhood, Martine's hair was taken as a testament of her deadliness-but, God, did it make her beautiful.
Yeah, Martine was in the Brotherhood too, though none of us could really ever figure out which side she was on. Technically, of course, we're all criminals. But there have always been two distinct groups in the organization: those of us who try to respect the law even though we don't always abide by it, like myself and Jezrael Swordfeather, who worked so hard to drag the Brotherhood out of the gutter; then, on the other hand, there are the artistes and the murderers, like Ernie Falcone and Ciaran Blackdrake, who don't care who or what they destroy as long as they profit from it. Martine catered to both groups, though I think she leaned a bit more toward the bad.
I can't say much about our relationship; we didn't really have one. I was young, I had the entire Brotherhood at my command, and I was looking for a good time. Martine offered me sex without strings, and I jumped at it.
Not that we didn't care about each other somehow-we probably were fond of each other, that peculiar fondness that people have for someone they sleep with regularly. But I think both of us knew the relationship, such as it was, was doomed. Martine was volatile, demanding and petty, insanely jealous of my friendship with Shakura; my fidelity lapsed only a few times, but she raged when it did. Living with Martine was like living with a volcano; I never knew when she'd erupt, or where I'd be when she did. So when she told me, five months into the deal, that she was pregnant, it was really just the final nail in the coffin. And I didn't lie to Mallory about that either. When Martine asked if she could name the baby after me, I did tell her she could do as she damn pleased-and yes, I regret it. Not so much what I said, but that I could have spared her, in the face of what came later, that little pain.
And this is where I get to the things I don't want to think about. Because it wasn't six months after Lauran was born that Martine was entertaining a new boyfriend.
Ernie Falcone.
I already knew that Martine's tastes ran to bad company. We'd agreed when I left that she would only keep Lauran as long as she could ensure his safety. Falcone had been a good guy once, but even then he and I had been far from friendly, and I knew that with him under Martine's roof, my son's safety was questionable. And when Martine started showing up at our gatherings with bruises and black eyes, I knew she was in a situation that I had to get Lauran out of.
But it was one time that Martine thought for both of us.
When she called me to tell me to come get Lauran, I could tell she'd been crying; there was that unmistakable thickness in her voice. She and Falcone had had an argument, she said. He was out of the house now, but she didn't want Lauran to be there when he got back.
She was at the door when I arrived, with Lauran on her hip and some of his things in a duffel. She looked pale and shaken; there were shadows beneath her eyes and blood in her hair.
When she handed Lauran to me I said, "Martine, what happened?" But she only shook her head and whispered, "I deserved it," and I knew by her tone that I'd get no more out of her.
But I wasn't satisfied. "Martine, why do you stay with him?"
"I love him, Duke."
She loved him? She loved that bastard? "Martine, for God's sake, he knocks you around! You're scared of him."
She lifted her chin stubbornly. "I'm not."
"Then why'd you ask me to come get Lauran?"
"Because-if you must know-he's what a lot of the fuss is about. He's your son, and Ernie doesn't want to raise him, and-I don't want Ernie to hurt him." There was a challenge in her gaze, as if she was daring me to speak, to defy her; but when she touched my arm I could feel her bones. "Now go, Duke. Please go. Things won't be any easier for me if Ernie finds you here."
And because I was young and stupid-I went.
I took Lauran to Shakura, thinking that maybe if I'd stayed and confronted Falcone, I could have saved Martine from what would undoubtedly come next.
But I found out, later, that Martine and Falcone hadn't been arguing about Lauran. They'd been arguing because Martine, damn her luck, was pregnant again, and Falcone wouldn't claim the kid-he said she'd been stepping out on him. In their fight he'd pushed her down the stairs, that was where the blood in her hair had come from-the fact that Martine didn't lose the baby was a miracle in itself. But Falcone had walked out on her, not long before I got there.
I'd like to say he never came back-if he hadn't, she'd still be alive. But I can't.
And I could have done something to help her.
And I didn't.
A few months and I'd moved on. Shakura was still raising Lauran-she was a better parent than I could ever have been-and she staunchly refused my offers of help, such as they were. Sure, I could have done something. I was his father. But Shakura thought of Lauran as her own son, and he knew her as his mother, and I didn't want to deprive them.
But I saw them as regularly as I could, before the Invasion, and it was from Shakura that I learned about Martine's other son. He'd been born prematurely, but otherwise mercifully unaffected by the hell his mother had endured, and Martine named him Talon.
Later, as if the woman hadn't been through enough hell, there was a daughter too-Keidre.
Lauran was young when he found all this out for himself, and I wasn't around as much as I should have been, so I don't really know how it's affected him. Lauran probably still thinks of Shakura as his mother, and she and Martine were never the best of friends. And I'm sorry for Talon and Keidre, in a way, because they had such a bastard for a father. But if they, too, survived the Saurians, then maybe they're on their way to overcoming that.
I'm sorry, now, that I lied. I know I'll catch it when I go in; Mallory's probably already spread my little sob story about Shakura all over the Pond. There will be questions-some I'll answer, some I'll dodge. One lie's as good as another, and anyway, someday I'll have all the answers.
And someday I'll set the rest of the team straight.
But not tonight.