by Tessa Cole
I yanked the duvet off the bed, tossed it on the floor out of the way, pulled off the white sheet underneath, and laid it on the bathroom floor. It wasn’t ideal and there wasn’t a whole lot of room in the bathroom for all four of us, but it was the best solution to clean Titus up.
“Oh, for the love of— Just put him in the bed,” Sebastian said.
“Once I’ve stopped the bleeding and he’s cleaned up, then yes, we’ll put him in a bed.” I pointed to the big, heavy man on the floor. “I doubt you want to have to remake the bed around him.”
Cassius set Titus on the sheet then perched on the closed toilet lid, his knee bouncing with what I knew was pent up frustration, his expression hard. A wisp of smoke curled around his fingers, the precursor to his fire magic escaping his control and wrapping around his hands with dangerous flames.
The muscles in his jaw clenched and the smoke broke apart as he got his emotions back under control.
I’d seen his control slip more times in the last few weeks than I ever had during our friendship, but I had hoped that with things finally settling down, he’d no longer be struggling to keep his flames at bay.
Of course, it probably didn’t help that we were just attacked and he was in pain. Something I could take care of. But first—
I sank to the floor beside Titus and pressed my hands over his heart to assess if moving him had damaged any of the work I’d already done. Somehow, he’d gotten through being hauled out of the park ring and up to Sebastian’s apartment without redamaging any of his still-fragile organs, leaving me a few bones and most of the lacerations to heal, many of which could wait until tomorrow when I’d recovered some of my power. And, much to my surprise, he didn’t have a single burn on his body from Cassius’s accidental flames.
“I’m assuming you don’t have a suture kit,” I said to Sebastian, “and that first aid kit isn’t big enough for all the gauze and bandages I’ll need so—”
“So come up with something. Fine.” Sebastian dropped the first aid kit on the counter and ran a hand over his spiky white hair, streaking blood over the tips. “You’re not going until he’s stopped bleeding, are you?”
I met his crystalline gaze. “Until everyone has stopped bleeding.”
His lips quirked and desire heated his eyes. “Does that mean we all have to get naked?”
A foolish shiver of need swept through me, but I was pretty sure he was flirting to change the topic, not because he was actually interested in me, so I squashed the emotion and forced my focus to the job at hand: healing my patients.
“Get her bandages, Bane,” Cassius growled.
Sebastian snapped his attention to Cassius. “Only if you promise to get the hell out of my apartment.”
“Tell me who’s after your friend and we’ll go.”
Jeez, neither man was going to budge figuratively on the topic and likely literally with their physical positions. Which wasn’t going to help me hurry through healing everyone. I hadn’t thought Sebastian was as stubborn as Cassius, but then I guess I didn’t really know him.
Either way, I couldn’t let this go on.
I jerked to my feet, slicing pain through my chest, and pointed to the door behind Sebastian. The room spun and darkened, and I grabbed the counter to steady myself. “Bandages. And you—” I tightened my grip on the counter to keep my balance and forced my expression into a hard, professional mask, praying neither man noticed how weak I really was. “Take off your shirt so I can assess your injuries without using my magic.”
Sebastian snickered. “So we do get to get naked.” He limped out of the bedroom, leaving me with Cassius and his hardened emotions.
“He’s as bad as an incubus,” Cassius growled. “Couldn’t get Gideon’s mate so he’s going after you.”
“Which implies I’m second best. Gee, thank you.”
Cassius’s eyes widened as he realized what he’d said. “That’s not what I meant.”
But it wasn’t wrong. I’d made a point of making it clear to everyone that I wasn’t interested in a romantic relationship… well, everyone except Marcus, because I’d been waiting for the one. I doubted anyone at Operations ever saw me in a romantic way — including Marcus — and I had no one to blame but myself. Except that hadn’t bothered me until I’d realized what a fool I’d been and how even just waiting for my inevitable soul mate took away my choice for who and how I wanted to first be intimate with someone.
And I had to stop thinking about that. There was no point wallowing when I had a job to do. There wasn’t even any point in planning. Once I’d healed Cassius, Sebastian, and Titus and had recovered, then I’d take action.
Hunh. I could use the excuse of checking up on Titus to come back to Sebastian’s. If I was lucky, Cassius would be busy and I’d be able to discreetly hire Sebastian to remove my mating brand.
The man would make a big deal about it, me coming to him, but I could live with a little humiliation if it meant I’d be free.
“You know that’s not what I meant,” Cassius said, a whisper of smoke curling from his hands.
“I know.” I heaved my attention back to business. Why was it so hard to focus these days? “How badly are you hurt?” I asked as I shrugged out of my ruined suit jacket, turned on the tap, and pumped soap from the dispenser into my palm.
“I’ll be okay.” He shrugged and winced.
I cocked an eyebrow at him, dried my hands, and checked the first aid kit for gloves more out of habit from using a combination of human and angelic healing than anything else because my healing magic wouldn’t let me transmit diseases or infections. The kit didn’t have any gloves, so I turned my attention back to Cassius.
“I can manage,” he said, his tone returning to hard and commanding, as if I was an agent under his command… which I wasn’t. Trauma trumped agent-in-charge every time. Just silly agents liked to forget that.
“I’m not letting you go after those men while injured,” I replied, matching his tone because I knew once he’d pulled enough information out of Sebastian he was going after them. “Take off your shirt and let’s see.”
I didn’t really need for him to disrobe for my magic to work, but given I was low and still had Sebastian to heal and Titus to top up and the fact that I was in a bathroom with limited resources and not an OR, I needed to be smart about how I used what I had left.
“Amiah, I’m—”
“You already know it’s useless to lie about your physical condition. Why do you insist on it every time?” He always did this, always pretended he wasn’t hurt, or it wasn’t as bad as it was, and always told me to take care of someone else first, as if I couldn’t assess how best to use my magic. “Take your shirt off, agent. Don’t make me work any harder than I have to.”
I shuffled past Titus to stand in front of Cassius. His eyes narrowed. The icy hard edge that had been his almost constant expression since he’d returned to Union City just under a month ago grew into a silent challenge to my command.
Well he could challenge it all he liked. I wasn’t giving in. I could be just as hard and icy as he could. I’d spent a lifetime hiding my emotions for the sake of my patients, and right now I was exhausted and dizzy and trying not to tremble. I had every reason to be angry, more reasons than he did. I just wanted to go home, crawl into bed, and pretend I could stop thinking about Marcus and my brand, but I couldn’t ignore the compulsion to heal Cassius, Sebastian, and Titus. Even if my magic hadn’t locked on to them, I was still compelled to help. It would drive me crazy if I had an opportunity to help and I didn’t take it. At least now I could choose how much I healed them.
“You’re the agent on duty, you’re going to put yourself in a dangerous situation. I can’t let you walk out of here still bleeding. Please.”
The look in Cassius’s eyes softened, and his piercing blue gaze locked with mine.
My breath caught and my pulse stuttered at the intensity in his eyes. It sent a shiver racing down my spine, bringing back with a v
engeance the yearning Sebastian had awoken in the park ring, defying my iron grip on my emotions, and making my body throb with need.
Cassius dragged his sliced and bloody shirt up over his head, revealing his gorgeous sculpted body and making my pulse stall completely.
Chapter 4
Amiah
I was certain Cassius didn’t mean for his gaze capturing mine to be sexual. We didn’t have that kind of a relationship and never would. But I couldn’t stop my thoughts from jumping straight to desire… for him?
That wasn’t possible. We were friends. Nothing more.
No, I just yearned for anyone at this point. How long could an angel go without intimacy before she lost her mind? Especially knowing that my not-soul-mate was being intimate with his actual mate, quite possibly at this very moment.
Which I didn’t want!
Why was that so hard to remember?
Because it wasn’t intimacy I didn’t want. I didn’t want the control-stealing soul bond. And now my reason for celibacy was gone.
That, and I missed physical contact. We might have just been friends, but Marcus had needed physical contact. I doubted he’d even been aware of his need since he wasn’t a naturally born shifter and probably didn’t know shifters had a much smaller personal space than most people, especially angels. I’d selfishly not told him and allowed him to stand too close and to embrace me when he’d thought I needed comfort… when I did need comfort, and now that I’d gotten use to that kind of closeness, that touch, it was gone.
Except Cassius was the last person I’d get physical comfort from, even platonic comfort. That need for closeness just wasn’t in his nature. He’d fight all my battles if I let him, but he’d never sit just a little too close. And now I’d gone weeks without something I’d had for the last four years. I hadn’t thought I’d need physical contact on the same level as a shifter, but maybe I’d been wrong.
And again! I wasn’t supposed to be thinking about that right now.
I refocused my attention on Cassius, his gaze still boring into me, his chiseled muscular torso on display. Blood smeared his skin and the parts not bloody were red and swelling with the beginning of heavy contusions. The laceration across his chest still wept, along with another gash at his ribs.
I contemplated telling him to take his pants off since his left pant leg was pasted to his thigh with blood, but we weren’t in triage, and I doubted he’d appreciate me asking him to strip to his underwear in Sebastian’s apartment… especially since Sebastian had already teased us about getting naked.
“Just slow the bleeding,” Cassius said, dropping his gaze from mine, his voice strangely gruff.
“I know how to do my job.” I sagged to the floor, using the counter to help lower myself, mindful of my cracked ribs, and laid my trembling hands against the laceration across his chest. If I didn’t think he’d go headlong after those men, I would just heal him enough to slow the bleeding. Angels didn’t have the fastest innate healing among supernatural beings, but they did have some, and with a partial healing, the wounds would be fully shut within twenty-four hours. They’d scar unless I gave him another session, but he’d survive.
Except I knew Cassius. He wouldn’t allow those men to endanger anyone else, and he’d been more dogged about protecting everyone since the mess a few weeks ago where he’d helped his brother take down Lilith, the Hellfire Queen.
My magic swelled into my palms, the oozing heat weak compared to the flood I’d poured into Titus. I closed my eyes to concentrate and gently pushed my power into the wound. He didn’t need to be healed quickly so there was no point in hurting him while I healed him.
My power billowed but instead of staying in the chest wound, it slipped down to the laceration in his side, heading to the worst injury first. Except the added distance thinned my magic, stretching it taut, and that required more magical strength to heal him, so I moved my left hand to his side to ease the pressure growing inside me.
A shiver trembled through his body and his muscles tensed. “You can go faster.”
“This won’t take long. You can wait.” Through my connection to his body, I felt the flesh in his side start to knit together. And now that the laceration in his side was no longer the worst injury, a stream of my magic split off and sank into his thigh, thinning my power even more.
Another split and my magic swelled back through the laceration across his chest. My muscles contracted, my body drawing into my deepest reserves to keep going, and even with my eyes closed, I could feel the bathroom spinning.
“Amiah.”
The voice was far away and yet close at the same time. Tender yet stern.
Just a little more, just to ensure he was at full strength when he put his life on the line again.
“Amiah.”
Fingers clasped around my wrists — Cassius’s fingers — and he jerked my hands from his body.
The connection between us snapped, jolting through me with a ghost of a backlash and another sharp slice of pain from my ribs, and I wrenched my attention up to him. Or at least I tried to. The light in the bathroom had dimmed and he was slightly out of focus.
“That’s enough,” Cassius said, and for a moment he had the same look of pity and concern that he’d had when he’d found me chained in that tent all those years ago. A look I swore I’d never see again on his face or anyone’s. A look I desperately wanted to forget, but couldn’t.
I wasn’t helpless. I wasn’t. And I’d never be helpless again.
I tightened my mask of cool professionalism and dropped my gaze, unable to hold his. The lacerations on his chest and side were sealed shut, but because he’d pulled me away and my magic hadn’t withdrawn from him, I knew they weren’t completely healed. They, along with the laceration in his thigh, were probably still tender to the touch under all that blood.
His eyes narrowed. “You need to rest.”
As much as I wanted to argue with him, I couldn’t. I was exhausted, except I wasn’t done. Sebastian and Titus were still bleeding, and my compulsion to heal them, the compulsion that had left me weak and helpless all those years ago, made my pulse pick up.
I loved and hated my magic. I saved lives, gave people second chances, but I often did it whether I wanted to or not. Sometimes I could ignore the compulsion, but right now I was too tired to fight it. It was easier to just give in, finish what I could, and be done with it.
Which made me want to scream in frustration. It didn’t matter how hard I tried to be in control, I never truly was.
I searched inside my palms, the place where I always felt my magic, to see how much I had left. A spark still warmed my hands. If I was careful, I could partially close the worst of Sebastian’s and Titus’s wounds, but that was the best I was going to get.
“I’ve a little left for Sebastian and Titus,” I said, standing. The bathroom lurched and darkened, and I clutched the counter. “Then I’m done.”
“You might be able to convince everyone else you’re still fine, but I know you’re more tired than you look,” Cassius said, his expression softening even more, worry dimming the angel glow in his eyes. “Bane is a big boy. He can take care of himself.”
“He sure is and he sure can,” Sebastian said as he limped into the doorway, holding a pair of scissors and a folded white sheet. He’d thought to wash the blood from his hands and forearms, but hadn’t changed his clothes yet. “Especially if that means you get out of my apartment.”
Except he looked pale— or rather paler, which I hadn’t thought was possible with his complexion, and his skin had a grayish hue and wasn’t as luminescent as usual.
“Just sit and take off your shirt.” I pointed to the toilet where Cassius sat then turned on the tap again out of habit and scrubbed Cassius’s blood from my hands.
“No, Amiah,” Cassius insisted, “you’re going home.”
“Don’t tell me what I can and cannot do.” And really, if I didn’t want a bigger fight about it, I shouldn’t waste ti
me arguing. I should just heal Sebastian and Titus and end the conversation.
I split the magic I had left in half, lurched to Sebastian, and grabbed his forearm with my clean but still wet hand. With a forceful burst, I shoved one half of my power into him and partially knitted the worst of his injuries together. He screamed at the sudden painful blast of magic into his body and dropped the sheet and scissors to clutch the doorframe, his breath ragged his eyes wide.
“Jesus,” he gasped.
The muscles in my legs gave out and I dropped to the floor at Titus’s feet, painfully jarring my ribs. Cassius leaped from the toilet seat to grab me, but I shoved the rest of my power into Titus before he could reach me.
Titus howled and his eyes flew open. His hand snapped up to hit me, and Cassius seized it and yanked it back, as Sebastian pressed one hand to his shoulder activating a glyph, dropped to Titus’s side, and placed his other hand over Titus’s heart. The big man’s eyes rolled back with Sebastian’s spell and he collapsed, unconscious again, onto the bloody sheet on the floor.
“Jeez, Amiah,” Cassius groaned as he leaned against the side of the counter. “Of all the stupid—”
“You don’t want to finish that sentence.” We’d argued before about me overexerting myself — a lot, actually, during the war — but I’d thought he understood how I had to help. I’d had power left and both Sebastian and Titus had needed it and I just couldn’t fight the compulsion. It was really that simple.
I jerked a trembling hand over Titus, falling back on my cool professional persona to stay in control. “Now he still has a few broken bones and his condition is fragile. Clean him up, pack and bind the wounds that are still bleeding and get him into bed.”
“You know that in your condition, I now have to escort you back to Operations,” Cassius said, standing and washing his hands. At least he was going to do as I’d asked and finish with Titus first.
