~*~Chapter 33~*~

Elizabeth stands back to admire her work, absently rubbing her stomach. She’s four months pregnant, and is beginning to show. Even though the circumstances behind the whole pregnancy were far from desirable, she found herself looking forward to having a baby.

She had finished the garden mural a few weeks ago, and is now working on the adjoining wall, painting her and Lucky’s church. So far, it was coming along well. It was hard to do without a picture, but she had spent enough time there, especially during the year she thought he was dead, that it was pretty much ingrained in her memory. Now that she was painting the nursery, she spent most of her free time there. She would still sit in the garden for a few hours during the afternoon, but Sergei was visiting her there more frequently. So far, he was respecting her privacy in the nursery, so she tended to gravitate toward that room now.

Her feelings about Sergei were still conflicted. One the one hand, he was Helena’s prodigy, the child she pretty much raised in her own image. That alone was reason enough to hate him. But, on the other hand, he was a Spencer, and there were moments where she could see that part of him showing through the Cassidine mask. They were rare and fleeting, but she still saw them. Then there were the times that he would act as though he was on her side, confiding in her or pretending to truly care about her, but she could see right through it. Still, she holds out hope that one day she will get through to him, to appeal to his Spencer blood, and get him to break his ties to Helena and help her escape. Until then, all she can do was wait.

~*~

“Sergei, there you are,” Helena greets, walking briskly into the small study. He is sitting at his desk, reading the paper, which he quickly puts down.

“Helena, what can I do for you?” he asks formally.

“I have a new job for you. It’s about Elisha.”

He raises an eyebrow, waiting for her to continue.

“I know you think you are making progress with her, and you are, somewhat. But, most of what she’s been doing is all an act. I can see right through it. Obviously, she didn’t buy my vague implications that her precious husband was no longer living, and is still holding out for him to rescue her. As long as she has that small sliver of hope to hold on to, she will never truly be ours.”

“So what is it you want me to do?” he asks, not liking where this is leading.

“Simple. Just find a way to convince her that Lucky Spencer is dead. I don’t care what you have to do: fabricate newspaper articles, death reports, accident reports, whatever. Make her think it just happened recently, or else she won’t buy it. Do you think you can handle that?”

Sergei sighs and looks down at the desk. He knows that convincing Elisha of this is going to be next to impossible, and will probably destroy her, but he wasn’t exactly in a position to say no to Helena. “Of course. I’ll get right on it.”

Helena smiles. “Good. Let me know if you need anything from me.” She turns and quickly exits the room, leaving Sergei to figure out how he is going to accomplish his newest task.

“Great,” he mutters to himself, “as though Elisha doesn’t hate me enough as it is! Why can’t Helena do this herself?” He stands up and begins to pace the room. “Okay, so how should Lucky die? No fires, that would be too obvious. Car accident? Suicide? No, he’s probably one of those people who would never take their own life. She wouldn’t buy it. “ He continues to brainstorm for the rest of the afternoon, finally coming up with a plan.

Sergei smiles as he looks down at the tentative headline he has written for a bogus newspaper article, reading it out loud to himself with pride. “Club Owner’s Son Victim of Mob Violence.”

~*~Chapter 34~*~

“Lucky, what’s wrong with using your own name?” V asks. Lucky was insisting on taking on a stage name for his recording project, and she didn’t like the idea.

“Because I don’t want this to affect my family. I want to keep it totally separate from the rest of my life. What’s so horrible about that? A lot of singers do it.”

She sighs. “I know, but it just seems unnecessary. All right, I can see you’re not going to budge. What did you have in mind?”

Lucky thinks for a minute, then smiles. “Robert Foster.”

“Robert Foster? But that’s so plain!”

“I know, that’s why I like it. It’s easy to remember, easy to pronounce, easy to spell. It’s inconspicuous.”

“Lucky, you don’t seem to get it, when you’re breaking out in the music business, being inconspicuous isn’t a good thing!” V argues in frustration.

Lucky shakes his head. “V, if I’m going to put out an album, I want it to sell because the music is good, not because I’ve got a flashy name or because my picture is plastered all over it. You knew when I agreed to this that I wasn’t going to sell myself out.”

Knowing that she wasn’t going to win this particular argument, she put up her hands in defeat. “All right, Robert Foster it is. Mind if I ask where you got the name?”

Lucky chuckles. “Robert was my dad’s best friend. He was killed by the same man who kidnapped me. And Foster is my dog.”

V laughs and shakes her head. “Working with you is never dull, that’s for sure!”

~*~

After recording another song, Lucky goes to Jake’s for a drink. He needs to drown his sorrows, and his parents keep constant tabs on his own liquor cabinet, to make sure he isn’t drinking himself to sleep every night. So, whenever he has a bad day, he goes to Jake’s instead.

The day had been going fine until it came time to record. The song they were working on was about Elizabeth, and it always drained him emotionally to sing it. He sits down at a table and glances at a menu, trying to decide if he wants anything to eat.

“Are you ready to order?”

He looks up in surprise, not realizing the waitress had been standing there. “Oh, um, I’ll just have a scotch on the rocks for now, thanks.”

She smiles at him and leaves. A few minutes later, she returns with the drink. “Is that all?”

“Yeah, for now, but keep them coming, okay?” He looks at her, suddenly realizing that he’s never seen her there before. “You must be new. I’m here a lot, and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen all of Jake’s staff by now.”

She smiles and nods. “Yeah, it’s my first night. I’m Kimber.” She reaches out to shake his hand, wondering what a guy as gorgeous as him is doing in a dump like Jake’s.

He takes her hand and shakes it quickly. “I’m Lucky.”

She chuckles flirtatiously. “I don’t know about that, I think I’m the lucky one!”

He shakes his head and laughs. “If you only knew how many times people cracked jokes about my name like that... Anyway, it’s nice to meet you, Kimber.”

“Same here. I’ll see you with that next drink in a few.” She walks away from his table, throwing a quick glance back at him, in time to see the smile he had been forcing fall away. He stares down at his drink, wistfully spinning the glass in his hands, and she wonders what his story is, why he’s there, looking so sad all of a sudden.

Once Kimber walks away, Lucky lets his smile drop. Her comment about his name had brought back memories of his first meeting with Elizabeth, causing him to be thrown back into his earlier depression. He stares at his drink, turning the glass in his hands for a few minutes before finally bringing it to his lips and gulping the whole thing. He puts the empty glass down on the table and sighs, waiting for the next one.

Kimber sees him chug the entire glass from across the room and hurries to the bar for another. She brings it to him and smiles. “If you keep drinking them that fast, you’re going to give me quite a workout!”

Lucky chuckles bitterly, forgetting about his earlier attempts at looking happy. “Well, you better put on your sweats then, because I don’t plan on slowing down any time soon.”

“Mind if I ask what’s got you so upset?”

“It’s a long story, and I’d rather not talk about it.,” he answers simply, throwing back the drink she had just placed in front of him. He holds up the glass and smiles sheepishly. “Next.”

Kimber sighs and walks back to the bar. There’s something about this guy that intrigues her, and she decides to make it her goal to figure out what his story is. She noticed that he was wearing a wedding ring as soon as he sat down, so maybe he was having problems with his wife. She smiles to herself as she brings another scotch to him. “Whoever she is, I’d be happy to make you forget,” she mutters to herself.

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