Key Of Valor (Key 3)

"Easy there."

"Oh, sorry," Zoe apologized when she realized she'd given Mrs. Hanson's hair a tug. "I start seeing red whenever I think about it. I did good work for her."

"Too good. And too many of her regulars wanted you doing their hair, not her. Came down to jealousy, and that's that."

"You know Marcie? She does nails there? I called her up a couple days ago, just to feel her out. She's going to work for me."

"You don't say."

"We've got to keep it quiet until I'm all set up. I don't want Carly firing her, putting her out of work before I open. But she's ready to give her notice as soon as I say. And she's friends with a stylist working out at the mall who's getting married first of the year and wants to find something closer to town. So I said how about in town, and Marcie's going to have her come see me. She says she's really good."

"Sounds to me like you're putting it all together."

"It feels right, you know? I got Chris on board to do massages and some of the body treatments. And my friend Dana? She's hired this woman to work in her bookstore, and she has this friend who just moved back to the Valley and used to work at a spa out in Colorado. I'm going to be talking to her, too. It's so exciting—as long as I don't think about the payroll."

"You're going to do fine. Better than fine."

"The plumber was in today, setting things up for my shampoo sinks. I got the lights in, and I'm going to be working on the stations. Sometimes I just look around up there and think this has got to be a dream."

"You don't have to earn dreams, Zoe. And you've earned this."

She had earned it, Zoe thought later as she washed out the color brush and bowl. Or she was earning it. Still, so much of it was like a gift. She promised herself she would never take it for granted.

She would do good work. She would be a good partner, and a good employer. She knew what it was to work for someone who was more interested in filling up the spaces in the appointment book than in the basic needs of her operators. Someone who'd forgotten what it was to stand on your feet hour after hour until they burned, until the small of your back ached like a bad tooth.

But she wouldn't forget.

Maybe this wasn't the road she'd expected to take, all those years ago when she was a young girl who imagined having pretty things and a quiet life that she would earn by using her brain.

But it was the road she'd taken, and she was making it the right road.

"You could go back, change it all."

She turned from the sink and looked at Kane. Surprise, shock, even fear were buried under thick layers of fog. She knew they were there but couldn't quite feel them.

He was beautiful, with a dark beauty. The black hair and deep eyes, the sharp bones sculpted under pure white skin. He was taller than she'd pictured. Not powerfully built like Pitte, but with a graceful, elegant body that she imagined could move as swiftly as a snake.

"I wondered when you would come." Her voice sounded hollow, as if formed more in her mind than with her mouth.

"I've watched you. A pleasant pastime." He stepped closer, and his hand brushed her cheek. "You're very lovely. Too lovely to labor as you do. Too lovely to spend your life working on the appearance of others. You always wanted more. No one understood."

"No. It made Mama angry. It hurt her feelings."

"She never knew you. She used you like a slave."

"She needed help. She did her best."

"And when you needed help?" His voice was gentle, his face full of understanding. "Poor young thing. Used, betrayed, discarded. And a lifetime of payment for one reckless act. What if it had never happened? Your life would be so different. Don't you wonder?"

"No, I—"

"Look." He held up a sphere of crystal. "Look at what could have been."

Helpless to do otherwise, she looked, and fell into the scene.

And swiveled in a deep leather chair to gaze out a wide corner window at the spears and towers of a great city. She had a phone to her ear and a satisfied expression on her face.

"No, I can't. I'm leaving for Rome tonight. A little business, a lot of pleasure." She glanced at the slim gold watch on her wrist. "The pleasure is a little bonus from upstairs for bringing in the Quartermain account. A week at the Hastier. Of course I'll send you a postcard."