Chapter 8

Lara woke up early one morning three days after they arrived at the lake house. She rolled over to gaze at her husband. He looked so peaceful in his sleep, but she knew better. He'd had a nightmare in the middle of the night and had woken her up with his soft anguished cries and his thrashing about. He'd told her his dream had been about pain, death, and there was an explosion at the Senate building on Coruscant. "Obi-Wan and Padme were there, but you weren't," he'd said shakily as he clung to her.

"You don't know if they were the ones killed in your dream, do you?" she'd asked softly, trying to comfort him.

"No, and that's what scares me."

Lara shivered as she recalled what happened after they talked through the dream. They made love, but it was filled with desperate fear, like Anakin needed more intimate comfort and Lara was willing to deliver. When it was over, the two newlyweds fell asleep in each other's arms, both feeling better about the dream. If there was a problem, then either Obi-Wan or Padme, or even his mother, would send him a transmission.

She finally slipped out of bed, and pulled her nightie and wrapper on. Planting a kiss on Anakin's cheek, she padded to the door. Poking her head into the hall, she spots a servant and beckons her over.

"Yes, milady?" the servant girl asked.

"We'll have breakfast in here," Lara whispered. "Bring a tray."

"Yes, milady." The girl hurried off to prepare the breakfast tray, and Lara slipped back into the bedroom. To her surprise, Anakin was awake and sitting up in bed, admiring his wife's negligee-clad form.

"Like what you see?" she teased, walking slowly toward him. He grabbed her hand and pulled her back onto the bed.

"Tease," he growled, kissing her deeply. Before long, they were rolling on the bed, kissing and caressing, and she was just about ready to let him have his way with her when a knock at the door interrupted their passion.

"Who's that?" he mumbled. She grinned and squirmed out from under him.

"Breakfast." She threw on her nightgown and wrapper, and ran to the door where a servant was waiting for her with a cart, loaded with the couple's favorite breakfast foods. She smiled and thanked the servant, sending her out so they could eat in peace.

She giggled as Anakin fed her Nubian strawberries dipped in a sweet whipped cream. She returned the favor and it took them an hour to finish breakfast, and then they dressed in their swimwear for the planned trip to the island to swim and have a picnic.

While they were tempted to just swim out to the island, they opted to take the boat so they'd have a place for the picnic basket and other essentials. They spent most of the day swimming in the cool lake, eating their picnic lunch—even feeding it to each other—and lying out in the warm sun. Anakin didn't even mind the sand. Sand on Tatooine was of a different consistency than on Naboo, he found. Naboo sand wasn't coarse or gritty; it was actually soft and smooth. Once he finished his bottle of Naboo grape juice, he rinsed the bottle out in the clear lake water and began to fill it with sand. He wanted to have something to take back to Coruscant when the honeymoon was over and he and Lara would have to return to his Jedi assignment and her work in the senate.

Lara took off her wrapper, revealing her pink bikini, and she began to venture into the lake, coaxing her husband to come with her.

"Temptress," he growled, grabbing her hand and pulling her close when they were waist deep in the water.

"You do the same stuff to me, and you know it," she mumbled just before their lips met. He guided her back to the shoreline and they made love on the beach with the water rushing over them. At that moment, life couldn't be more perfect.

Padme walked into the apartment she shared with Obi-Wan and from the moment she saw him, she knew something was wrong.

"Obi-Wan," she whispered. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"I don't know," he admitted. "I just have this…feeling that something terrible is going to happen. I was meditating today and all I could see was pain…and death…and Anakin grieving…" His voice trailed off and his body trembled.

Padme made her way over to her husband. "Obi-Wan, Anakin and Lara are fine. They're at the lake house on Naboo, and they're probably having the time of their lives, without even leaving the bedroom." Her eyes twinkled as she slipped her arms around her husband, but when she saw his look, she became serious. "You had a premonition, didn't you," she said. It was a statement, not a question.

"Yes, I think someone is going to try to assassinate Lara."

Padme's eyes widened. "On Naboo?"

"No, when they come back to Coruscant."

Amara was meeting Mimi Calrissian for lunch, deciding to confide in her about her plan to fake an assassination on Lara Naberrie, now Lara Skywalker. She wanted nothing more than to stick it to Kent Lars, and this would probably do it.

"What the hell are you thinking?" Mimi demanded. "I know you want to stick it up his ass, but this ain't the way to do it."

"Relax," Amara insisted. "I did some checking, and Skywalker and his new senatorial bride are honeymooning somewhere private on Naboo. That buys me some time to get the smoke bombs ready."

"Yeah, and if Kent Lars finds out, he'll kill you, not to mention your son."

"Not if he knew Han was his, and I'll take that secret with me to the grave." Amara's eyes were hard. The only good thing that had come out of Kent's taking his liberties with her had been her son, and because she didn't want him to know about her child, so he wouldn't have anything else to hold over her, she'd given him her maiden name, Han Solo, and once he'd been weaned, she gave him to Mimi and her family to look after on the planetary system of Bespin. Last she heard, Han had become interested in flying, and was always hanging out with Mimi's own son, Lando. The two of them were thick as thieves as they trained at the flight school in Cloud City on Bespin.

"If you get killed Amara," Mimi said. "You know I'd take Han and raise him with Lando, but he needs his family. Why don't you try to track down your cousin and his daughter?"

"Rina's a Jedi," Amara told her. "The Jedi don't always allow for attachments. Even if she took him in, he wouldn't be happy there, with all those unfeeling Jedi."

"I got a feeling you missed the memo. Attachments were allowed, no matter what. That's why Jaden's been able to keep contact with his daughter."

"How do you know this?"

"I've run into Jaden a few times while I've been here on Coruscant. He's told me everything."

"He's here on Coruscant?" Amara's eyes were wide. The last thing she needed was Jaden getting involved in her latest scheme, especially the last part of it. "He can't know I'm here. The last thing I need is for him to get involved, especially when it comes to the last part of the job."

"What else does that bastard Lars want you to do for him?" Mimi demanded.

"He wants me to kidnap a woman out of the Jedi temple and bring him to him," came the reply. "I'm sure you can guess what for."

"You agreed to this?!" Mimi practically shouted in a whisper. "I can't believe you!"

"Don't worry; I just made him think I agreed to it. I know better than to walk into the Jedi temple and demand the Jedi Masters put the woman into my custody."

"Honey, they'd laugh you out of the temple, and that's before they'd chop you into pieces with their light sabers."

Amara chuckled and put some credits on the table to pay for her lunch. "It would put me out of my misery; that's for sure." With that, she was gone.

Once she knew for sure that Amara was gone, Mimi picked up her comlink. She dialed the familiar code and waited for the connection to be made.

"Jaden Solo," the man on the other end greeted.

"Jaden, this is Mimi Calrissian," she said softly. "We need to talk. It's about your cousin. I think she's in way over her head."