Holidays are Hell

His smile was fleeting. He knew she was saying goodbye. "And do you think you'll need to? Track me again, I mean?"

"I'll want to."

"But you won't."

They didn't look at each other for a time, and Zoe knew he was considering every obstacle facing them and like her, was unable to see any way around them.

"The children?" she finally asked, turning to him.

He nodded. "All freed. Returned to their homes and families. They'll have nightmares, of course, but they'll outgrow them in time, and there'll be no permanent damage. We also stole the masks the Tulpa was using to control them. He won't be able to do it again."

Zoe thought of the young boy she saw wailing in the Tulpa's hallway. "Good."

"His home was burned to the ground," Warren said, and she nodded to let him know she'd heard. He finally sighed. "So that's it, Zoe? You can just walk away and leave it all behind." Leave me behind, he was really saying.

Zoe ran a hand through her shortened hair. "I'm not walking away, Warren. Everyday that I'm out here on my own I'm ensuring our troop's legacy. I'm carrying out a prophecy that will benefit us all."

Warren's eyes fell shut. "Why do I have to love a woman who always puts duty first?"

She placed her palms on his cheeks and waited for him to look at her. "Because if I didn't you wouldn't have loved me at all."

When he finally nodded, she worked a wide ring off her finger. "You know what to do with this, right?"

He looked it over, studying the grooves that gave way to hinges around the stone. "I'll put it away for you… or for the next Archer. Are you sure you don't want to keep it, though? It's all you have left to remind you of our world."

"No." Zoe smiled bittersweetly, thought of her daughters, and granddaughter, now safe, and shook her head. "I have myself."

And before his eyes could glaze with pain, before he could get out the words, And that's all you've ever needed, Zoe exhaled the wistfulness she held in her soul—the sharp hunger she'd been staving off since they'd made love, and the despair she'd felt in the Tulpa's stupa when she thought she'd never lay eyes on this face again. Warren's mouth still opened, but it stuttered and eventually closed as he inhaled deeply, tasting of the air and of her. And then he sighed. She wished she could smell his feelings on the air, too. She wished she could bottle them and carry it, apply it like perfume or a balm that would melt against her skin and seep into her pores so a part of him would always be with her. Warren scented this, too, and finally it was enough.

"Goodbye, my Phantom," he whispered, and though his face remained tight—brows drawn, jaw clenched—his eyes were suddenly wet and luminous and soft in the icy air. Zoe choked out a laugh at the shared pet name, stolen from a superhero that didn't exist, given to ones that did. To anyone else it had always appeared to be just that, a nickname, but it was much more… and it was an endearment she'd never expected to hear again.

My Phantom Limb, the ache that is you existing outside of me, the pain of every moment spent apart, the empty throbbing that remains behind.

And Warren did leave after that, in a movement too fast to catch with mortal eyes, leaving Zoe slumped against the stairwell wall, scenting and seeing nothing in the cold December night.

Then she stopped feeling sorry for herself.

Then she straightened and turned her thoughts to the Tulpa.

Then she narrowed her eyes and considered what she'd learned about the power of imagination.

If she was right, what she was planning would take months, seasons, years. It'd take stubborn belief and the doggedness required of Tibetan monks, and all those mortals who most valued long-term goals. But Zoe had a purpose again, and a plan. And she was still alive. She could suck in the cold air and blow it out again, no worse for wear. And as long as she could do that?

There was hope.

About the Author

After ten years with the Tropicana's Folies Bergere, Vegas native VICKI PETTERSSON traded in her sequins for a laptop, but she still knows all about what really happens behind the scenes in Sin City. Her first two novels, The Scent of Shadows and The Taste of Night, were published in March and April 2007.

For more information, go to www.vickipettersson.com.