The woman backed slowly away, sobbing quietly and shivering. Copper watched until she disappeared completely from sight before turning to exit the Inn. It was good to be back after so long. It was good to be remembered.

The limousine sat as he had left it. He returned to the driver's side, climbed in behind the wheel, and started the engine. They had their own entrance, and he was eager to reach it. Rosa didn't like to be kept waiting and she would blame any delay on Copper. Since Rosa's satisfaction was his life – he could not allow delays.

The engine purred and the spinning tires sent streams of gravel shooting off behind them as he drove out of the small dirt lot and around the corner of the building. There was an attached shed at the back of the Inn, a garage of sorts. Copper got out, opened the door, and then came back to pull the long black car into its "stall." Only after the door had been sealed behind him, plunging the limo into utter blackness, did he move toward the passenger door. A stray sliver of light might have meant his death.

Within seconds of the door opening, Rosa stood beside him. She poured from the interior, a darker shadow flowing against the ebony of the void that surrounded him. Her appearance brought a strange vertigo – a sense of detachment. She existed so far beyond any reality he had ever known that he'd never been able to reconcile the two worlds, past and present. When Rosa was near, the world became a dream, or a nightmare.

Rosa stood nearly six feet in height. Her hair, the color of mellow flames in the dark hours of the night, not quite orange, but not pure red, fell in a brilliant cascade over slender shoulders, reaching to the small of her back. Her eyes, the deepest, sea-green eyes Copper had ever seen, were remarkable to the point of distracting one from the physical perfection of her form. Even a man enamored of the beauty of a woman's legs, or her breasts, would find that what he could never forget about Rosa was her eyes.