He half collapsed on the sink, then, overcome with emotion. A sob ripped itself out of his chest. The kindness these people were showing him overwhelmed him. A day ago he’d been sure he was going to die in that place. Now he had something. Hope. The boys had hope. Rangan wept, racked with sobs, wishing Ilya had lived long enough for this, wishing Wats had, wishing he knew where Kade was or how to help him.

He pulled himself together, stood up straight, forced himself to stop crying, then splashed water on his face.

If I make it out of this… I’m gonna help people. I’m gonna pay this forward.

Levi was there when Rangan opened the bathroom door, standing there patiently. The minister just looked at him kindly, smiled, held out a hand and took Rangan by the shoulder.

Levi led him down a stairwell and into a basement below the small church, then through a door and into an office.

Rangan felt her before he saw her. Felt them before he saw them. He didn’t understand what it was he sensed until the door swung open and Levi stepped out of the way. And then he could see her. Levi’s wife, Abigail. She was seated in a swiveling office chair. A pretty, petite blonde woman in a floral dress. Thirty, maybe. She had a shy smile on her face. And her hands were on her belly.

Her giant pregnant belly.

Chapter 76: Prior Days

76

PRIOR DAYS

Friday November 2nd

Rangan crouched in amazement at Abigail’s feet, reached out his hands gently.

“May I?” he asked looking up at her.

The petite blonde smiled down at him, nodded enthusiastically.

Rangan’s fingers touched Abigail’s belly. His mind touched… something wondrous. Something like he’d never felt before.

The baby was aware, alive. She felt Rangan’s mental touch – she – and she touched him back, with her mind, with her feet pressing against the inside of her mother to make contact with his hands. Her world was an ocean of sensation, of warm constraint, of her mother’s heart beating and blood pumping, of her mother’s mind, her ever-present mind.

Rangan felt her curiosity, felt her thoughts probe his. Her mind was delicate, uncoordinated. She explored Rangan with her thoughts like his cousin’s newborn child had once explored his face with her tiny hands, flailing about, gently, trying to make sense of this shape she’d encountered. The memory made him smile, and she caught it, giggled mentally, touched on his memory of little Reina, his cousin’s child.

This is you, he tried to show her. You’ll be like this.

Waves of wonder and peals of mental laughter touched him in return.

He looked up at Abigail again. He could feel her joy, radiant, inundating this room, encompassing her unborn daughter.

“She hasn’t met many men before,” Abigail said. “Besides her daddy.”