Key Of Valor (Key 3)

"It's good we're doing this." Malory sipped some of the lemon water Zoe had chilled in a squat glass pitcher. "If we're going to open on Friday, we want to work out as many kinks as possible, in all three areas."

Swallowing h

ard, she pressed a hand to her belly. "God, we're going to open on Friday. Even if it is a kind of dry run for the grand opening on December first, it's happening."

"Big day, all around," Zoe said.

"You're going to find the key." Malory touched her shoulder. "I know it."

The connection—Malory's hand on her, hers on Dana—bolstered her. "That's another reason I wanted to do this today. I needed some time with just the three of us."

She glanced up at the crystal again. It certainly seemed she'd become a bit more mysticalminded over the last few months. 'To recharge my energy. My girl power."

"Rah-rah," Dana cheered and made Zoe laugh.

"With what happened yesterday I feel more confident, but this little voice keeps sneaking in asking me why the hell I think I can do this."

"Is it Zoe's voice," Dana asked her, "or Kane's?"

"It's Zoe's, which makes it more irritating. Yesterday, there was this rush of excitement, of energy, when I realized what was going on, that I knew what it was and could control it. But I need to move it from there."

"You went back to a beginning, and an ending." Curious, Malory examined the bottles and tubes neatly lined up on Zoe's shelves. "And with the three of us here today, we're going back to basics. Both Dana and I had periods during our part of this when we felt discouraged and lost."

"Check," Dana confirmed. "And when we went off on tangents that dead-ended. Or seemed to."

"Seemed to." Turning back, Malory nodded. "But without those tangents would we have gotten on the right track? I don't think so. It's something I've thought about a lot," she added, leaning back on the counter. "A quest isn't linear, it isn't straightforward. It circles and it winds and overlaps. But every step, every piece, has its place. Let's take yours."

"Dana has to rinse off."

"Then hold that thought." Wrapped in the bath sheet Zoe provided, Dana headed for the shower.

"You've got some ideas." Zoe walked over to rinse her hands. "I can see it."

"I do, actually. It might be easier for me to see, well, the forest for the trees, because I'm not in it the way you are. And the experience I had in the attic here was similar to what happened to you yesterday. In that I knew what was going on, and controlled it. And part of me, a little part, wanted to stay in that illusion and let the rest go."

Zoe looked back, saw the sympathy, the understanding on Malory's face. The tension in her shoulders dissolved. "I really needed to hear that. So much. I didn't want James, Mal, not really, but part of me remembered how much I had wanted him."

"I know. I know exactly."

She could, Zoe thought. She and Dana were the only ones who really could. "Part of me felt that same way, had that same yearning. And it would've been so easy to drift back there and believe everything would turn out differently."

"But you didn't drift back."

"No." She began changing the cover on the treatment table, adjusting the pad, smoothing the cotton. "Everything but that one little part knew I didn't want it to turn out differently. I didn't really want the boy who couldn't stand by me or his own child. But I had to remember him, really remember him, and what I felt for him. So I could say good-bye."

"Do you want the man who's willing to stand by you, and your child?"

"I do." There was a flutter under her heart as she selected the lotion for Dana. "But I don't seem to trust either of us to make it work. Lie on your back," she said when Dana came back in. "And there's more than that, than not trusting us."

Efficiently, she adjusted the towel that covered Dana from breast to crotch, then warmed the lotion in her hands. "If I take that last step with him, how much danger will that put him in? It's kind of a quandary. If you love someone, you want to protect them. If I'm going to protect him, I can't let myself love him. Not all the way."

"If you love him, you ought to respect him enough to know he'll protect himself."

Zoe stared at Dana. "I do respect him."

"I don't think you do. You keep wondering if and when he's going to let you down, let Simon down. When he's going to walk. You're talking to somebody who's been there. You're thinking you shouldn't give him a hundred percent because you'll need something in reserve when he takes a hike. I'm not saying you don't have a right to that. You've got a lot on the line."

"And what's most on the line for Zoe? Personally," Malory qualified. "The single thing you won't risk?"