[Quinn 04] - The Silenced

He stood by the bed, paralyzed.

“Nate, please,” she said. It was the first time she’d called him by that name. “It’s okay.”

He lay down on his back and pulled the covers over him. He and Liz weren’t touching, but he could feel her warmth only inches away. He could also sense that her eyes were open. He was about to tell her to go to sleep, but she spoke first.

“Tell me that I have nothing to be worried about, and it will all be okay.”

“It will all be okay,” he said. “I’ll make sure of it.”

Silence.

“Why are they coming after me?”

“They think they can control Quinn if they have you.”

“But they can’t?”

“No.”

“He’d just let them have me?”

“That’s not what I meant,” Nate said. “They wouldn’t be able to control him, because if they did somehow take you he would come after them and get you back. And if that happened, they wouldn’t know what hit them.”

“He could do that?”

“Yes.”

More silence, then the rustling of blankets as Liz turned on her side toward the window.

“I’m sorry I lied to you,” he said. “We weren’t sure if there was going to be any trouble, so it seemed best to —”

“It’s okay. I get it,” she said.

Nate hesitated, then said, “We should get some sleep.”

She didn’t say anything, but he thought she nodded her head.

“It’s all going to be okay,” he said as he instinctively reached out and put a hand on her shoulder. “Just try to sleep.”

Her left hand touched his. He thought she was going to push his off, but she grabbed it instead, pulling it around her so that he was hugging her. As if it were a single movement, they moved closer together, her back pressing against his chest.

She seemed about to say something, but her voice remained silent. He, too, opened his mouth to speak, but no words came.

After a few minutes, he could feel her body begin to relax. He thought she had fallen asleep, so he started to pull his arm into a more comfortable position. As he did, his hand brushed against her breast.

Before he could pull it away, she turned under his arm until she was facing him. She looked at him, her eyes soft. The fear was still there, but there was something more, too.

He leaned forward, his lips finding hers.

As her left leg slipped over the stump of his right, she hesitated. But it was only a second, and after that it didn’t seem to matter to her that he wasn’t whole.

THE 2 A.M. PICKUP WENT OFF WITHOUT A hitch. Nate had slept for just over an hour and a half before he got up and made his way to the trash can on Rue de Rivoli across from the Jardin des Tuileries. Just as arranged, inside he found Liz’s false documents wrapped in a paper bag, stuffed halfway down.

Nate had been afraid when he returned he wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep. But within a minute of closing his eyes, he was out.

At 4:30 a.m. he woke again, courtesy, as it so often was, of the alarm on his phone. Liz was draped across him, her head on his chest, her legs intertwined with his.

He started to stroke her hair, then stopped, suddenly realizing what he was doing. I should have slept on the floor. Or the bathroom. Hell, I should have taken a second room. His hand started moving again, lifting strands of hair from her face.

Her eyelids parted and she looked at him.

“Time to get up?” she asked.

“Almost,” he said.

“What are you doing?”

“Your hair fell on my hand.”

She smiled, then pulled herself onto him.

“You probably shouldn’t do that,” he said.

“You want me to stop?”

In his mind, he said, Yes, but in the real world, he slid a hand behind her head and pulled her mouth to his.