Well here another one written again in the wee hours of the morning, I thought I'd be nice and post another chapter before I went to bed and then have to get up and go to work. This way you can read while I have to work, see I'm nice even if I can't spell to save my life. P
Luke felt bad for Kaleena but he knew that if things worked out properly then she would be fine, but still he couldn't help but feel bad. With a quick backward glance toward her he entered the house, his attitude change to a happy cheerful one as he entered the house knowing that Kaleena wouldn't want anyone knowing what she'd been doing out there. The one good thing about the two of them was that they were both really good actors sometimes they could even fool themselves.
After Luck had sat down Jeremy asked, "Is something wrong?"
"No," Luke said then added, "Kaleena just wanted some air. You talked to her first was something bothering her?"
"No, she just thought we were acting weird." As he finished speaking Kaleena walked through the door with a smile on her face as if she didn't have a care in the world .
"Sorry about that I just love night air, are we going to have any pie tonight?"
"Well yes but, Kenneth and Uralla, are bring it over," said Kaleena's mother.
"What!" yelled Kaleena, Jeremy and Thomas.
"You didn't, why would you even think about asking them?" asked Thomas.
"Thomas, he's your bother and his wife and I want you to behave," said Marcus.
"It's not Kenneth dad, it's Uralla, you know that none of us can get along with her she's evil," Thomas turned to Luke and said, "Kenneth is the oldest of us kids he's a good guy but his wife she's as bad as a stormwing."
"Thomas stop that there going to be her soon, be nice to them," said their mother.
Kaleena rolled her eyes maybe Uralla would drive Luke crazy, almost as she thought it she realized that she wouldn't be so lucky. "You know what ma, I think I have somewhere that I need to." She never got a chance to finish as Kenneth and Uralla walked in the door.
"Well you really did have company coming over, picture that," said Uralla in a condescending tone then she added, "Kaleena it's about time."
Kaleena growled slightly in the back of her throat before saying, "Uralla I heard you got into trouble last month with some nasty flour shipment and rotten eggs. Have you managed to recover yet?"
"Kaleena," yelled her father.
Luke leaned over and whispered in Kaleena's ear, "You had her order changed to rotten eggs and maggoty flour?"
She replied with a shrug, and whispered back, "So times you just have to."
Kaleena's mother got up and grabbed the pie from Uralla telling them to have a seat as she cut the pie. Uralla replied with, "Thank you, Caitlin," after she had seated herself she went on, "Kaleena, why haven't you ever brought this cute thing home before?"
Kaleena gritted her teeth then said, "Because he was in Persopolis for the past five years."
"Oh that's to bad, but he's here now. I can't imagine what it would be like not having something like him around."
Kenneth saved her the trouble of answering by saying, "Jeremy, have you been by the smithy lately, I heard that they have a new way of working on broken weapons."
The rest of the night passed in the same fashion Uralla throwing most of her insults at Kaleena, finely when Kaleena figured that Luke had spent enough time with her family and she had suffered enough insults she excused herself to show Luke home. Most of her family didn't want to let her but they all understood that she just wanted to get away from Uralla so even though they didn't think it the wisest thing they still let her.
When they had gotten a little ways from her house Luke said, "I now understand the rotten eggs and bad flour." There was a long pause then he said, "I hate to tell you this but we need to tell you that we need to speed thing up."
"How much?"
"By the end of the month."
"Damn it Luke, fine give me something to take home so my family will know."
He fished a ring out of his pocket and handed it to her, "It's not as nice as the last one but that ring would look weird coming from someone on the right side of the law who isn't a wealthy noble."
She held it up looking at it in what little light there was outside then said, "It'll do."
"Are we going to talk about why you had been crying out behind your house?"
"Why do you want to know?"
"Kaleena," he sighed, "We have to get along you know that, and despite the problems we've had in the past I'd like to think that at the very least we can be friends."
She looked at him wondering just what was going through his head, "It was nothing, I was just getting a good cry in sometimes it helps you figure out what's going on sometimes."
"Is it because of what we're doing?"
She sighed, "A little, but it important and I really like when people owe me makes my life easier. And after all what's better than having the king of thieves owe you. We've managed to stop our major fights, I like that just throwing me off a little, I mean other than playing poker we were never really around each other before, and then all we ever did was fight. Do you even know why we never got along? I don't, the only really reason I could ever come up with was that we liked fighting with each other."
"I think that might of been part of it," the Dancing Dove was just within sight, "Why don't you come in and we can talk about this a little bit?"
"I think that I need to go back, I don't want to worry my family," then she remembered that Uralla was still there and said, "You know what, why not."
When they were sitting in chairs next to the fire in Luke's room he started talking again, "Kaleena, how do you really feel about me?"
Kaleena was taken back by the question not really sure what to say, "Why would you ask?"
He took a deep breath, "Kaleena will you just promise to hear me out if I say this?"
Kaleena looked at him knowing that if any person ever said hear me out, then you usually didn't want to but knowing that she needed to prove to herself that she had grown up since he had left (no one else seemed to believe her when she said that.) She said, "Alright, I'll hear you out."
Luke looked at her for a moment then said, "I'm not sure how I should start this but, Kaleena I know that we had a bad start but," he paused not sure how to continue, "I'm just going to say this Kaleena I."
When he didn't seem to be going on she said, "You what? How am I supposed to hear you out if you wont even speak?"
After a moment more he blurted out, "I love you."
Kaleena did a double take, "What did you say? You didn't really just say," then it dawned on her, "you did just say. What am I supposed to say to that?"
"Well how about something other than that?"
"I have to go, I don't want to worry my family," with that said she left the room and headed home the whole time asking herself, why would he say that? Did he really mean it? But the real question running through her head was HOW DO I FEEL ABOUT HIM? When she got home she didn't even talk to anyone she just went into her room to think.
Luke wasn't sure how to take Kaleena's answer or rather her lack of an answer no matter how she acted it didn't change how he felt about her but it did kind of brake his heart. He just wished that she would have gave him some answer, as he sat there thinking Jordan came into his room.
"What are you worried about, your face it scrunched up?"
"Oh nothing I just talked to Kaleena and."
Jordan cut him off, "What she do to you this time?" Jordan couldn't help but feel a little over protective of Luke, they had been good friends almost all their life, they were like brothers. And no matter what ever happened he always saw Luke as putting other people before himself (even if it wasn't true) and so he felt that Kaleena was some how in the wrong even if he didn't know what it was about.
"Jordan stop it, Kaleena didn't do anything, what do you want?"
"Oh I wanted to tell you that someone has been asking about get this not you but Kaleena and it's not the type that's normally looking for her."
"What type is it?"
"Your not going to like it, it's the noble type."
"Who?"
"Sir Myles."
"What's he doing asking about her?"
"I couldn't tell you, but I can tell you this the questions that are being asked they aren't the kind that make you think that it's anything good."
"Was he asking about Kaleena or Doll Face?"
"See now this is the part your not going to like."
"Just spit it out."
"Both, I'm not sure if he's put the two of them together or not but it still could be big trouble even if he doesn't put them together. No ones told you this yet but she made a big sale, Liadan told me that she didn't really want to do it but I don't really know. I can tell you this much ever since that sale she's been acting weird, but not really in any way that you can put your finger on."
"How long ago was this sale?"
"About two months ago, I just really want to say this right now and I'll never say it again, I think she's trouble."
"Well you have one thing right, you're never going to say that again," he thought for a moment then said, "I'm going to go talk to her and find out what's going on."
Kaleena was sitting on her bed thinking when Luke knocked on her window, she got up and walked over opening up the window saying, "What are you doing here someone might see you?"
"We need to talk and not about us, let's go over to Liadan's, to your office, it's important."
"Alright," Kaleena answered she could tell by the way she way he was speaking that it was really important. With in fifteen minutes they were sitting in Kaleena's office with the door lock and a double check of every spell in the room. After they were sure that everything was good she ask, "all right then what's this all about?"
"What big item did you sell about two months ago that you didn't want to sell?" Luke said just jumping in.
"What, oh, it wasn't really that important, it was who I got stuck selling to, that's why I didn't want to sell."
"Well then who was it?"
"Well I'm always careful about who I sell to even if I'm selling crap, but I kind of got stuck on this one selling to a rather well respected noble who I was sure was just trying to get people into trouble. I'm not even really sure of his name, the other thing was that he wasn't Tortallen he was Scanran noble looking to cause trouble here and I didn't actually sell to him. He was looking to find people to work for him to help cause trouble here so that he could use them as escape goats. It took almost every person who owed me to get rid of him and theirs still that chance of him coming back."
"That's what Jordan was talking about?"
"Did he say that I'd been acting weird since then cause if so then yes. I have this feeling that he's going to come back and be really pissed at me, Mithros only knows what he would do if he ever found me again."
Just then there was a knock on the door in Liadan's signal saying that it was her with someone that they needed to talk to. Kaleena looked at Luke as she got up and went to the door carefully opening it so that she could react in what ever fashion she needed to. When it was opened it revealed Liadan with a man in a cloak, Kaleena looked over to Luke giving him the look of I have a clue but can't really be working with "him".
Liadan showed the man to one of the seats in the room then headed out when she reached Kaleena who was still at the door she whispered in to her ear while facing away from the man in the cloak and Luke, "He was insistent and starting to bother the girls, you know I wouldn't have brought him up here if it wasn't important. I know how you hate known people just coming in, but I was afraid that the questions he was starting to ask could cause you some trouble."
Kaleena nodded then closed the door behind Liadan locking it one more time then turned around to look at the man in the cloak. Once the door had been lock the man took the cloak off his head revealing himself to be the Baron George Cooper, he looked at her then said, "You must be Doll Face, I had wanted to ask you to help with a friend you made a few month back but now I find myself wondering why Luke is here."
"Don't," answered Luke, "I'll save you the time of wondering, George let me introduce you to my wife Kaleena."
"Wait a minute your wife, I hadn't heard that you got married yet?"
"That's because we've been estranged for five years and I never told you, we're working on making it look more proper."
"Wait a minute, your married to Doll Face, well doesn't that just make things easier, I was just going to ask her if she would mind becoming involved in this mess."
Oh aren't I just evil I still haven't told you what the mess is but I can promise this much it WILL be in the next chapter. I'll try to get it out as fast as I have been doing but I can't make any promises because tomorrow I open at work then it's two days in a row of closings. But I should at the latest have it up by Thursday as I have Wednesday and Thursday off.