The End is Coming

Chapter One

Rourke eased the dead Mulliner boy’s head to the rocks. Rourke stood up, tired suddenly, more tired than he had been for so long he couldn’t re-member.

He walked the few paces to the stream at the base of the falls, the roar there loud, steady, throbbing, pulsing in his ears. Spray pelted at his face as he dropped to his knees beside the water, dipping his right hand down, moving his fingers slowly in the cold, roaring waters, the blood drift-ing from them—Bill Mulliner’s blood—forming clouds in the water, red.

He heard movement behind him. He knew the source. Rourke closed his eyes, felt the hands—soft, cool—touch at his neck, move across his face.

“You have found them, John—”

“Probably,” Rourke answered, his voice soft, a whisper.

“I’ll take Paul to the Retreat—he can help me to unload the cargo from the aircraft and we can get it to the Retreat—I’ll stay with him until you come back.”

Rourke opened his eyes, hearing the water rush-ing, watching it move, turning his head, still on his knees, looking up at her. “And?”

“My uncle—I’ll go back—to Chicago—to the KGB—to—”

Rourke stood up, the falls roaring now, as loudly as his blood in the veins at his temples roared, his heart fast. “No,” he rasped, drawing her into his arms.

Natalia’s hands—he felt them move across his face, into his hair, his arms bound tightly around her waist and shoulders. He looked at her, at her eyes, their blueness, the whiteness of her skin—her mouth, the lips moist, slightly parting as she leaned her face toward his.

Rourke bent his face, his lips touching lightly at hers, then crushing down against her mouth, her body pressed tight against him.

Her hands—he could feel them move, he could feel her breath on his skin, her body rising and falling

against his, the pressure of her breasts against his chest.

Then her face was beside his, half against his left shoulder.

He heard himself telling her, “I love you—you won’t leave—you won’t go back—”

“Sarah,” she whispered.

“I—I—I can’t—I love her, too—I—”

“I’ll leave—”

Rourke took Natalia’s arms roughly in bunched fists, holding her away from him at arms’ length, her face downturned, her hair falling forward, her body limp-seeming. “You won’t leave me—I won’t—I won’t let—”

She looked up at him, her eyes open, wet at the rims, making their blueness that much more bright. Her left hand reached out to him, halting, awkward because of the way he held her upper arms below the shoulders. The fingers of her hand, splayed, now closed, soft as they touched against his lips. “I’ll stay with you forever if you want me—”

Rourke drew her against him. “Yes,” he whis-pered, not knowing what else to say. He laughed, and she looked up at his face.

“John?”

“I never planned for this,” he said, holding her, hugging her against him, hearing the sound of the water and the sound of her breathing....