Page 53 of Finding Lexie
Lexie turned around and saw Midas, Mustang, and Aleck standing at the door to the balcony. She hadn’t even heard it open. “Yeah.”
“I didn’t know that,” Midas returned as he came toward her. “Scoot forward,” he said, and without thought, Lexie did just that.
He sat behind her on the lounge chair, then pulled her back against him, so she was essentially using him as a backrest. He handed her a cup of coffee, and with one look, she could tell he’d made it just how she liked it. With a ton of sugar and milk and a dash of actual coffee.
Relaxing against him, Lexie continued, “I sent him a note right after I got to Germany, as well as the day after Dagmar’s funeral. I wanted him to know how sorry I was about what happened. It took him a while, but I finally did hear back. He’s hurting, and desperate for any scrap of information he can get about his brother’s last moments and about our time in the desert.”
“Hmmm.”
“What does that mean?” Lexie asked, craning her neck to look at the man behind her.
“Easy, Lex. Nothing. It’s just interesting, that’s all.”
“Do you guys believe in the twin connection thing?” Elodie asked Mustang and Aleck. Her husband had lifted her and plopped her on his lap in her chair, and Aleck was in a third chair, leaning back against the wall as he stared out at the ocean and the quickly passing rain storm.
“I’m not a twin, but if someone said they could feel what their brother or sister felt, I’d have to believe them,” Mustang said.
“Same,” Aleck agreed. “Although it would be weird. I mean, can you imagine being Magnus and feeling his brother have a stroke, or his fear when he was kidnapped, or when his heart finally gave out in the hospital from stress?”
“I think that’s why Magnus wants to talk to me,” Lexie said. “He wants to understand what happened.”
“I have to say it,” Midas added quietly. “If he hadn’t insisted on us stopping in Galkayo, Dagmar may not have died.”
Silence met his statement.
Lexie couldn’t argue or disagree, because he was probably right. “It still sucks,” she said after a minute. “It’s not fair to judge on what we should or shouldn’t have done after we know the ending. I mean, we could go back and say that we shouldn’t have walked out of the Food For All building at the exact time we did. If we’d only stayed an extra ten minutes, maybe we wouldn’t have been taken.”
“Not true,” Slate said, joining them on the balcony. Jag and Pid were at his heels, as well. “I think they’d targeted Dagmar for sure. He was a bigwig in the organization. And having a woman always helps the cause. Makes people more desperate to rescue her.”
“Seriously? That’s stupid,” Lexie fumed.
“Stupid or not, it’s a fact,” Jag said with a shrug, leaning against the wall next to Aleck. “If they’d been able to nab a kid, it would’ve been even better.”
Lexie sighed. “Why are people so cruel? I just don’t get it.”
Midas stroked her arm as she took a sip of her coffee. “Good versus evil,” he said softly. “It’s the way of the world.”
“Well, it sucks,” Lexie said with a pout.
“Agreed. But you’re doing your part to help those less fortunate,” Pid said. “How’s that going?”
It was the right thing to ask. Lexie loved talking about the men, women, and children she worked with. “It’s interesting how every city I’ve worked in has different needs. I mean, hunger and needing shelter is always a constant, but here in Hawaii, there are fewer entire families that are homeless, and more mentally ill men and women than I’ve seen in other places.”
“Yeah, it’s a problem,” Aleck agreed.
“You’re being careful though, right?” Midas asked.
“Of course. And they’re not as scary as you think,” Lexie told him.
“Um…okay, if you say so,” Midas replied, obviously not believing her in the least.
“They aren’t,” she insisted.
“Holy crap, look!” Elodie cut in, the awe easy to hear in her voice.
Looking to where she was pointing, Lexie gasped. There were two perfect rainbows arching over the ocean right in front of them. “Oh my God, it’s beautiful,” she whispered.
“Eh. Wait two minutes and the tourists will be back on the beach, screaming their fool heads off and ruining it,” Aleck said cynically.
