Skyfire4 since you say you can't wait here you go. I was going to wait
until tomorrow but what the heck it is 10:40pm here. This chapter is very
Dylan and Anthony. Ok its only Dylan and Anthony which I'm sure you D & A
shippers will enjoy. I really want reviews about this one!! Oh yeah and
Niedersachsen is a state just south of Hamburg which Buchholz is in.
*-*-*-*-*
Anthony had gone for a short ride to clear his head. The antique Jag
handled well on the winding roads in Niedersachsen country side. He
knew at last why Katja was so anxious to get the angels; it had
nothing to do with her current fiancé but her previous one. He
wondered how many other men she had tried to marry for money. As he
drove he thought about going by the hospital and taking care of the
count but decided to wait until the evening when there were less
people around. He pulled back onto the street which the bed and
breakfast sat and parked across the street. As he walked to the inn
he by chance looked up at the window of his room and saw movement
inside.
He opened the inn door and went inside. He noticed Frau Krause
preparing the tables in the dining room with vases of wildflowers for
the lunch crowd. He crept quietly up the stairs and edged towards his
room. He could hear the synthesized voice of the laptop
announce "access denied". He pushed the door open carefully and saw
her sitting there intently concentrating on trying invading his
privacy which was something that angered him. Privacy was extremely
valuable to him since he had grown up in the very un-private world of
the orphanage where everything was spoken and no secrets allowed. He
walked up behind her and carefully unsheathed his sword and placed
the cane-cover on the bed. "Access denied," said the computer for the
fourth time.
Dylan typed another password and the thin man placed the edge of his
sword against her throat just as the computer welcomed her to his
world. She gasped as he applied pressure to her throat. He could feel
fear coming off her. She swallowed hard, "Anthony," she said trying
to sound calm. "I'm sure you want to know what I am doing." He
didn't want to hear it. His mind was swirling with indignation. He
had saved her life, saved her friends and this is how she repaid him
by going though his things? He had noticed when he came in that the
doors to the wardrobe were not quite closed and the lid to the
mailing tube wasn't on correctly.
He leaned over her and with one hand and turned shut the laptop using
the other to keep the sword at her throat. He could feel her head
against his chest as he leaned over her and got a whiff of her hair.
It smelled warm from the sun streaming in the window. It stirred a
vague memory in him, a memory of his mother collecting wash off the
line, Dylan's hair smelled of sun dried bedding. He collected his
thoughts; he wouldn't let her be his weakness again. He grabbed her
right arm and pulled her out of the chair and pushed her onto the
bed.
Dylan looked at his eyes, cold and emotionless. "He is really pissed
off," she thought. He began to pace the room. She watched him, as he
reached into his pocket and brought out a cigarette and placed it
between his lips. He felt around but didn't find what he was looking
for he had left his lighter in the Jaguar. He held his cigarette out
to her to indicate he wanted her to light it for him. "Let me go."
Anthony continued to remain silent and threw the unlit cigarette at
her. "I'm sorry."
He locked the door, placed the key in the inside pocket of his suit
jacket and walked back to the laptop. He opened it and typed, "Sorry
I caught you or that you did it." Dylan sat unmoving on the bed. He
brought the computer over to her and pointed insistently to the
screen. "Both," she said. Dylan watched as his slender fingers danced
over the keys.
"I should kill you," he wrote.
"Do it," she said angrily. He wasn't the same man who held her
tenderly at the costume ball. She barely even recognized him as the
man who kissed her on a rooftop a year ago. She could only see the
assassin from the ally outside Corwin's.
He didn't want to kill her. He wanted to hurt her. To betray her like
she hurt and betrayed him. He typed the same words that McCadden had
spoken to her at the mission, "Another father you will never know."
Dylan looked at the line typed in Lucida Blackletter font and her
stomach felt hollow. "What are you talking about," she said in barely
a whisper. Anthony reached into his pocket and pulled out the photo he
had taken from Karl Mills' wallet and threw it at Dylan, much like he
did with the cigarette. It fluttered and landed on her thighs.
The redheaded angel picked up the picture. "It's my mom. Where did
you get this," she demanded. He stood there quietly watching her. "I
asked you a question. Answer me. I know you can talk you said my name
at the party. Where did you get this?" She stood up and walked
towards him. He hadn't anticipated her reaction and took a step
backwards from her blazing green eyes. "Where?!?"
Anthony took the picture from her and turned it over. "Rhonda Zaas
1974," she read. "Well you didn't get it from my mom so tell me." He
flipped it back over and pointed to the man in the photo. "From my
father? This guy is my dad?" Anthony simply nodded.
"You know my father? Who is he?" Anthony realized that Karl Mills
had changed a lot in the thirty years between when the picture was
taken and this week. He had even needed Karl's body to realize it was
the same man. "Who," she insisted. He gave her a cold knowing smile.
That is when she attacked.
Dylan threw a punch which he ducked effortlessly. She tried the same
kick on him that she used on Michael in the maze but he by now knew
her fighting style quite well and deflected each blow as though she
was nothing more than a child. Finally she sat on the bed exhausted
and placed her face in her hands. There was something about the
helplessness in that moment that caused him to weaken. Then her
shoulders began to shake. At first he thought she was laughing but
then he realized she was crying.
Dylan hated crying. Worse than that was crying in front of him. He
had wanted to hurt her and he had. She began to wonder how long he
had the picture, if he had killed her father, how long he had known
and never mentioned it. Why she expected him to tell her she didn't
know, its not like he would have said to her at the Coal Bowl or one
of the other places they encountered each other, "Hey Dylan, I know
your dad."
Anthony reached out and placed his hand awkwardly on her shoulder and
sat on the bed next to her. She looked up and faced him with red eyes
as she wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. He reached
into the pocket of his jacket and brought out a handkerchief which he
handed to her. She gave him a small smile and said, "What is that
thing Dr. Who's Tardis?" He didn't respond. She looked again at the
picture in her hand. "Could I bum a cigarette off you? I thought I
had quit but I think I need one."
Her request caught Anthony off guard and he looked at her with a
startled expression. "Helen Zaas used to smoke she explained. Dylan
Sanders does only on really rough occasions." He reached into his
pocket and took out one and placed it between his lips and handed her
the one that was lying on the bed. "Gee thanks," she said with a
smile. He gave her an arched eyebrow. Dylan reached into her pocket
and took out the lighter but he took it from her. "Hey," she said but
he lit his then let the flame burn and held it out to her and she lit
hers off of it. He closed it and handed it back. Dylan took a drag
and coughed. He patted her on the back. "These are terrible." He
looked at the laptop and set it on his lap. "You're used to those
cheep Marlboros."
Dylan and Anthony sat awhile in silence, smoking then she said to him
pointing at the picture, "Anthony, I really need to know who this man
is."
"You already know," he typed.
Dylan looked closely at the picture. Suddenly her eye widened. "No.
It can't be."
"I'm sorry Dylan," was printed from his fingertips.
"Karl Mills was my father? This is the picture that was missing from
his wallet. You took it. When did you know?" She started to get upset
again. He reached over and stroked her hair, but she pulled away, she
wanted answers. "Please," she pleaded. "I need to know, everything.
You know what its like to be an orphan. I need to know whatever you
can tell me."
Anthony started typing away on the laptop, "I don't know much. I went
through his wallet while you and your friends went downstairs to
check on the count. I noticed that the woman in the picture looked a
lot like you. I took it out, turned it over and saw the inscription."
"You didn't know before," she asked skeptically. Anthony shook his
head "no". "I finally find out who my father is and he's not only a
man who tried to kill my friends and God knows how many other people
but he is also dead."
"That is my fault." Anthony wrote and looked at her guiltily. He put
his cigarette out in the ashtray on the night table.
"It was an accident." Once again no words passed and they sat there
next to each other quietly. Out of the blue Dylan asked, "Did you
mean it?"
Anthony looked at her confused. "What?" He typed. Dylan reached into
her back pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. He felt his
blood turn to ice. He had forgotten about that and hoped that in the
excitement of the day before she had as well. She handed him the
note, the same one he had given her as the arrived back at the house
after tying up Michael. If he had his lighter with him he would have
burnt it.
"Did you mean it," she asked again pressing the question. He looked
at her with pleading eyes but she looked back with a look that said
she wasn't going to let it go. He sighed and handed the piece of
paper back to her. "I guess that answers that," she said. Anthony
resented the she took his sigh all wrong. It had nothing to do with
her, it had to do with him, his regret at the power she had over him,
his resignation that he couldn't fight it, it had nothing to do with
what he had written on that piece of paper. She stood up and walked
towards the door. "That was it? She was just going to walk away from
him?" He wondered.
She hesitated at the door. "Its locked, you can let me go now."
Anthony walked over to the door. Dylan stood looking at the knob. She
felt so embarrassed. Of course he didn't mean what he wrote in the
note. She was the fool like always. For some reason she had built a
fantasy out of the kiss on the rooftop, where he would come back and
claim her as his. She had to stop reading Natalie's romance novels.
He reached into his pocket for the key and she reached around her
neck and removed the medallion. "Here you go," she said holding it by
the filigree chain. "I suppose you want it back." Anthony reached out
and clasped his hand around the one holding the medallion and pulled
her close to him. "What are." she began but he stopped her words
with a kiss.
Dylan's eyes widened in surprise, he was kissing her. His lips were
cool and she could taste the cigarette he just smoked. She could feel
his hand snake into her hair, but he didn't pull, he just held on to
a handful. She began to return the kiss deepening it so their tongues
intertwined. "That cinched it," she thought, "he is defiantly the
best kisser I have even had."
Anthony broke away from the kiss; his normally pale face was slightly
flushed. "Dylan," he said softly, gazing down at her. He took the
medallion from her hand and placed it back around her neck, kissing
her throat in the process. A small moan escaped her lips. He smiled
against her neck and kissed her again slowly up the side to right
below her ear. She could feel his hot breath and heard him
whisper, "Don't doubt me angel." Then he stepped away from her
leaving her stunned, opened the door, and gently pushed her through.
In the room he relocked the door and out in the hall Dylan stood
there wondering just what the Hell happened.
*-*-*-*-*
Anthony had gone for a short ride to clear his head. The antique Jag
handled well on the winding roads in Niedersachsen country side. He
knew at last why Katja was so anxious to get the angels; it had
nothing to do with her current fiancé but her previous one. He
wondered how many other men she had tried to marry for money. As he
drove he thought about going by the hospital and taking care of the
count but decided to wait until the evening when there were less
people around. He pulled back onto the street which the bed and
breakfast sat and parked across the street. As he walked to the inn
he by chance looked up at the window of his room and saw movement
inside.
He opened the inn door and went inside. He noticed Frau Krause
preparing the tables in the dining room with vases of wildflowers for
the lunch crowd. He crept quietly up the stairs and edged towards his
room. He could hear the synthesized voice of the laptop
announce "access denied". He pushed the door open carefully and saw
her sitting there intently concentrating on trying invading his
privacy which was something that angered him. Privacy was extremely
valuable to him since he had grown up in the very un-private world of
the orphanage where everything was spoken and no secrets allowed. He
walked up behind her and carefully unsheathed his sword and placed
the cane-cover on the bed. "Access denied," said the computer for the
fourth time.
Dylan typed another password and the thin man placed the edge of his
sword against her throat just as the computer welcomed her to his
world. She gasped as he applied pressure to her throat. He could feel
fear coming off her. She swallowed hard, "Anthony," she said trying
to sound calm. "I'm sure you want to know what I am doing." He
didn't want to hear it. His mind was swirling with indignation. He
had saved her life, saved her friends and this is how she repaid him
by going though his things? He had noticed when he came in that the
doors to the wardrobe were not quite closed and the lid to the
mailing tube wasn't on correctly.
He leaned over her and with one hand and turned shut the laptop using
the other to keep the sword at her throat. He could feel her head
against his chest as he leaned over her and got a whiff of her hair.
It smelled warm from the sun streaming in the window. It stirred a
vague memory in him, a memory of his mother collecting wash off the
line, Dylan's hair smelled of sun dried bedding. He collected his
thoughts; he wouldn't let her be his weakness again. He grabbed her
right arm and pulled her out of the chair and pushed her onto the
bed.
Dylan looked at his eyes, cold and emotionless. "He is really pissed
off," she thought. He began to pace the room. She watched him, as he
reached into his pocket and brought out a cigarette and placed it
between his lips. He felt around but didn't find what he was looking
for he had left his lighter in the Jaguar. He held his cigarette out
to her to indicate he wanted her to light it for him. "Let me go."
Anthony continued to remain silent and threw the unlit cigarette at
her. "I'm sorry."
He locked the door, placed the key in the inside pocket of his suit
jacket and walked back to the laptop. He opened it and typed, "Sorry
I caught you or that you did it." Dylan sat unmoving on the bed. He
brought the computer over to her and pointed insistently to the
screen. "Both," she said. Dylan watched as his slender fingers danced
over the keys.
"I should kill you," he wrote.
"Do it," she said angrily. He wasn't the same man who held her
tenderly at the costume ball. She barely even recognized him as the
man who kissed her on a rooftop a year ago. She could only see the
assassin from the ally outside Corwin's.
He didn't want to kill her. He wanted to hurt her. To betray her like
she hurt and betrayed him. He typed the same words that McCadden had
spoken to her at the mission, "Another father you will never know."
Dylan looked at the line typed in Lucida Blackletter font and her
stomach felt hollow. "What are you talking about," she said in barely
a whisper. Anthony reached into his pocket and pulled out the photo he
had taken from Karl Mills' wallet and threw it at Dylan, much like he
did with the cigarette. It fluttered and landed on her thighs.
The redheaded angel picked up the picture. "It's my mom. Where did
you get this," she demanded. He stood there quietly watching her. "I
asked you a question. Answer me. I know you can talk you said my name
at the party. Where did you get this?" She stood up and walked
towards him. He hadn't anticipated her reaction and took a step
backwards from her blazing green eyes. "Where?!?"
Anthony took the picture from her and turned it over. "Rhonda Zaas
1974," she read. "Well you didn't get it from my mom so tell me." He
flipped it back over and pointed to the man in the photo. "From my
father? This guy is my dad?" Anthony simply nodded.
"You know my father? Who is he?" Anthony realized that Karl Mills
had changed a lot in the thirty years between when the picture was
taken and this week. He had even needed Karl's body to realize it was
the same man. "Who," she insisted. He gave her a cold knowing smile.
That is when she attacked.
Dylan threw a punch which he ducked effortlessly. She tried the same
kick on him that she used on Michael in the maze but he by now knew
her fighting style quite well and deflected each blow as though she
was nothing more than a child. Finally she sat on the bed exhausted
and placed her face in her hands. There was something about the
helplessness in that moment that caused him to weaken. Then her
shoulders began to shake. At first he thought she was laughing but
then he realized she was crying.
Dylan hated crying. Worse than that was crying in front of him. He
had wanted to hurt her and he had. She began to wonder how long he
had the picture, if he had killed her father, how long he had known
and never mentioned it. Why she expected him to tell her she didn't
know, its not like he would have said to her at the Coal Bowl or one
of the other places they encountered each other, "Hey Dylan, I know
your dad."
Anthony reached out and placed his hand awkwardly on her shoulder and
sat on the bed next to her. She looked up and faced him with red eyes
as she wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. He reached
into the pocket of his jacket and brought out a handkerchief which he
handed to her. She gave him a small smile and said, "What is that
thing Dr. Who's Tardis?" He didn't respond. She looked again at the
picture in her hand. "Could I bum a cigarette off you? I thought I
had quit but I think I need one."
Her request caught Anthony off guard and he looked at her with a
startled expression. "Helen Zaas used to smoke she explained. Dylan
Sanders does only on really rough occasions." He reached into his
pocket and took out one and placed it between his lips and handed her
the one that was lying on the bed. "Gee thanks," she said with a
smile. He gave her an arched eyebrow. Dylan reached into her pocket
and took out the lighter but he took it from her. "Hey," she said but
he lit his then let the flame burn and held it out to her and she lit
hers off of it. He closed it and handed it back. Dylan took a drag
and coughed. He patted her on the back. "These are terrible." He
looked at the laptop and set it on his lap. "You're used to those
cheep Marlboros."
Dylan and Anthony sat awhile in silence, smoking then she said to him
pointing at the picture, "Anthony, I really need to know who this man
is."
"You already know," he typed.
Dylan looked closely at the picture. Suddenly her eye widened. "No.
It can't be."
"I'm sorry Dylan," was printed from his fingertips.
"Karl Mills was my father? This is the picture that was missing from
his wallet. You took it. When did you know?" She started to get upset
again. He reached over and stroked her hair, but she pulled away, she
wanted answers. "Please," she pleaded. "I need to know, everything.
You know what its like to be an orphan. I need to know whatever you
can tell me."
Anthony started typing away on the laptop, "I don't know much. I went
through his wallet while you and your friends went downstairs to
check on the count. I noticed that the woman in the picture looked a
lot like you. I took it out, turned it over and saw the inscription."
"You didn't know before," she asked skeptically. Anthony shook his
head "no". "I finally find out who my father is and he's not only a
man who tried to kill my friends and God knows how many other people
but he is also dead."
"That is my fault." Anthony wrote and looked at her guiltily. He put
his cigarette out in the ashtray on the night table.
"It was an accident." Once again no words passed and they sat there
next to each other quietly. Out of the blue Dylan asked, "Did you
mean it?"
Anthony looked at her confused. "What?" He typed. Dylan reached into
her back pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. He felt his
blood turn to ice. He had forgotten about that and hoped that in the
excitement of the day before she had as well. She handed him the
note, the same one he had given her as the arrived back at the house
after tying up Michael. If he had his lighter with him he would have
burnt it.
"Did you mean it," she asked again pressing the question. He looked
at her with pleading eyes but she looked back with a look that said
she wasn't going to let it go. He sighed and handed the piece of
paper back to her. "I guess that answers that," she said. Anthony
resented the she took his sigh all wrong. It had nothing to do with
her, it had to do with him, his regret at the power she had over him,
his resignation that he couldn't fight it, it had nothing to do with
what he had written on that piece of paper. She stood up and walked
towards the door. "That was it? She was just going to walk away from
him?" He wondered.
She hesitated at the door. "Its locked, you can let me go now."
Anthony walked over to the door. Dylan stood looking at the knob. She
felt so embarrassed. Of course he didn't mean what he wrote in the
note. She was the fool like always. For some reason she had built a
fantasy out of the kiss on the rooftop, where he would come back and
claim her as his. She had to stop reading Natalie's romance novels.
He reached into his pocket for the key and she reached around her
neck and removed the medallion. "Here you go," she said holding it by
the filigree chain. "I suppose you want it back." Anthony reached out
and clasped his hand around the one holding the medallion and pulled
her close to him. "What are." she began but he stopped her words
with a kiss.
Dylan's eyes widened in surprise, he was kissing her. His lips were
cool and she could taste the cigarette he just smoked. She could feel
his hand snake into her hair, but he didn't pull, he just held on to
a handful. She began to return the kiss deepening it so their tongues
intertwined. "That cinched it," she thought, "he is defiantly the
best kisser I have even had."
Anthony broke away from the kiss; his normally pale face was slightly
flushed. "Dylan," he said softly, gazing down at her. He took the
medallion from her hand and placed it back around her neck, kissing
her throat in the process. A small moan escaped her lips. He smiled
against her neck and kissed her again slowly up the side to right
below her ear. She could feel his hot breath and heard him
whisper, "Don't doubt me angel." Then he stepped away from her
leaving her stunned, opened the door, and gently pushed her through.
In the room he relocked the door and out in the hall Dylan stood
there wondering just what the Hell happened.