by Elisa Paige
“Easy, Coyote. I’ll have it out in a second. Just stop twitching or it’ll sting.”
“I don’t care. Get whatever the hell it is out of me!” My skin was crawling at the invasion. My flesh had been marked by countless scars and the fae brand had been both physically and metaphysically burned into me. The idea that something was beneath my skin set my pulse racing. “Get it out! Get it out now!”
Koda took one look at me and reached a hand to my cheek, pulling me into a tender kiss. The suddenness of it totally threw me as I tried to shift mental gears from mind-blowing, creepy-crawly panic to the sweetness of his lips and the instant passion he always ignited in me.
Which I realized was the point when Koda pulled back a moment later. Holding up the clear plastic tube and a thin needle, he waved it at eye level and smiled. “All done.”
Rubbing the inside of my elbow suspiciously, I glowered at the smear of blood welling from a rather large hole. “Was that thing really necessary?”
Koda tossed the tubing to the foot of my bed. In a rough tone, he said, “You’d’ve died without it.”
The door opened and Ahanu walked in, stumbling to a stop to see the two of us on our feet. I was surprised to see that he’d cut his long hair to collar length. It was also uncharacteristically messy, like he hadn’t bothered to brush it. For days. “Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Taking my arm, Koda led me past his brother. “Leaving.”
Our sweeping out the door wasn’t as impressive as I would’ve liked since I was tilting right and Koda was tilting left. By leaning into each other, we maintained a more or less straight line all the way down the short hall, through the main door and outside across the tiny lot to his truck’s dusty back fender. At some point, somebody had moved the pickup to the clinic and I was wildly grateful we didn’t have to go in search of it. I didn’t think I’d get another three feet without doing an undignified face-plant. Koda didn’t look much better.
For once, the sense of swift pursuit didn’t bring either of us whirling around. I’m pretty sure we’d’ve both keeled over if we tried.
“The two of you are insane. You don’t even have the truck’s key,” Ahanu swore. Moving ahead of us, he opened the left back door and reached to give me a hand in. Instinctively, I flinched away from him, almost falling in my haste to evade his touch.
“Imagine that,” Koda muttered. “She doesn’t trust you.”
“I saved her damn life! And yours, in case you’ve forgotten.”
I layered steel into my voice. “I have not forgotten. Anything.” Head high, I braced against the pickup and made my way to the open back door, trying to make it look like climbing in wasn’t taking every bit of energy I possessed. That I was so weak, so vulnerable, in front of Ahanu was unbearable. I was also acutely aware that we were on the reservation still, surrounded by people who loathed my very existence. My instincts screamed at me to go to ground until I was strong enough to defend myself. The difficulty was, I had to get out of here first.
Koda got in beside me, wrapping his arm around my shoulder and pulling me into his embrace. As much as I longed to melt against his body, to press my face into the crook of his neck and lose myself to the soothing comfort of his arms, I couldn’t drop my guard. Was literally unable to do it. Not with Ahanu’s anger and suspicion filling the truck’s cab. Not when we were still deep inside what my instincts insisted was enemy territory.
I felt Koda’s awareness, but kept my head up and my senses scanning for danger. That I was rapidly burning through what little energy I possessed was irrelevant to my screaming need for vigilance.
After flinging a medical bag onto the front floor board, Ahanu closed his door and started the truck. He drove us down the reservation’s main street toward the state highway, maneuvering the potholes and freely wandering dogs with practiced ease. His hard gaze found mine in the rearview mirror. “Your weapons are in the glovebox.”
The urge to lunge across the seat and arm myself had me fisting my hands in my lap. Apparently, Ahanu read me as easily as his brother did because he said, “You won’t need them. No one will prevent you from leaving.”
Refusing to acknowledge that he’d seen too much, I frostily looked out the window. “My compact with your leader is concluded. I will not restrain myself if anyone tries to stop me.”
“You can barely stand.” Ahanu sounded unimpressed, but his knuckles whitened on the steering wheel.
“I don’t need to stand,” I hissed, letting my anger and awareness surge free. I’d been pounded and tied and almost starved to death. I’d be damned before any of these people got near me again. Ahanu included.
“Sephti, relax,” Koda murmured. He gave me a tender look, cupping my cheek with his hand and breathing a kiss across my forehead.
Ahanu’s hard eyes were on us in the rearview mirror. He turned right onto the two-lane highway before suddenly slamming on the brakes and swerving to the shoulder. When the truck rocked to a stop, he flung open the door and stomped off onto the grassy verge.
“I’ve had enough—” I growled. Koda bowed his head and his sudden stillness brought me around to him. “What is it?”
He took a deep shuddering breath. “It is impolite to speak her name now. But Ahanu’s fiancée didn’t make it out of New Orleans that night, Sephti. He’s taking it even harder than I’d feared. I’m worried about him.” Koda scrubbed at his face, his expression haggard from grief and weariness. “She was…she was pregnant, Sephti.”
“Oh…no.” I squeezed my eyes shut and swore. Just because I was created sterile didn’t mean I didn’t cherish children. “Is that why his hair is short?”
Koda nodded. “It is a sign of extreme mourning.”
I chewed my lip and re-thought the last few minutes. Maybe I’d been way too focused on my own feelings to accurately read Ahanu’s. Maybe the emotion in his black eyes hadn’t been rage, but despair. Maybe his watching Koda kiss me hadn’t set off his disgust, but had been a reminder of his own agonizing loss. Maybe the way he was pacing up and down beside the truck wasn’t anger, but was a man on the edge of losing it and struggling desperately to keep everything inside. The short, messy hair. The wrinkled shirt with its coffee stain. The torn jeans. The bruises beneath his eyes.
Koda caressed my cheek. “He’s said some awful things, Sephti. Things he needs to apologize for. Although he hasn’t done anything to demonstrate it to you, Ahanu is a good man.” Blowing out a breath, Koda murmured, “He’s my brother. I’ve no right to ask but…could you be patient with him? Give him a chance to pull himself together?”
“You love him?” I didn’t have a true grasp of what the word meant, but I had an inkling of its importance to those who did. To Koda.
“He’s a pain in the ass sometimes. But yeah, I do.” Like it said everything, he repeated, “He’s my brother.”
It was a given that I would do anything for Koda. Especially when he was looking at me the way he was now. If he ever figured this out…
Chewing my lip like I had to think about it, I finally nodded. “Okayyy. But only because you asked me to.”
Koda’s smile told me he saw through the subterfuge. “You’ve won him over, by the way.”
I gaped at him. “Did the wendigo crack your skull? Why on earth would you think that?”
“Because underneath the grieving, he’s ticked. And Ahanu is always ticked when he knows he’s wrong. He’s just so stubborn, it’ll take him a while to admit it.” Koda settled himself more comfortably on the seat. “But he will.”
Giving him a dubious look, I resisted commenting. Exhausted, I rested my head against his shoulder, closing my eyes and murmuring happily when he tightened his arm around me.
I must have dozed on the ride home because, the next thing I knew, Ahanu had slammed on the brakes and only Koda’s grip kept me from sailing through the truck’s cab.
“What the hell?” I groused, righting myself.
“‘Hell’ is ab
out right,” Ahanu muttered and a white-faced Koda nodded assent.
Following their fixed lines of sight, I looked out the windshield and froze.
I was acquainted with death in its many gruesome forms. But what had been done to the person staked, spreadeagle, to the cabin’s wall exceeded even the worst of what I’d witnessed. Birds had been at him and it was obvious he’d been here a while—maybe the entire time we’d been on the reservation.
“Do either of you know him?” Ahanu asked grimly, turning off the truck and getting out.
“No.” Koda joined him, reaching a hand to me when I eased down from the pickup’s four-wheel-drive height. “What about you, Sephti?”
“Yeah.” It was difficult identifying the hoarse croak as my own voice. My eyes insistently tracked over every horrific atrocity that had been done to the man’s body—given the amount of blood, while he still lived. And my brain was trying frantically not to catalog any of it. More ghastly memories, I didn’t need.
Koda startled. “Who—?”
“Tanner.” Without realizing I’d crossed the distance to the innkeeper’s brutalized corpse, I was standing three feet away. The nauseating reek of fae jasmine and Cian’s distinctive scent saturated Tanner’s body, leaving no doubt who’d tortured and killed him. “They must have tracked me to him. Dammit! How? I didn’t slip up! I know I didn’t!”
Koda’s arms wrapped around me from behind and I leaned gratefully into him, breathing against the rising frenzy. “Easy, Sephti,” he said in a soothing voice.
I nodded, willing the red haze from my vision. Save the fury until I can put it to use.
“You have no other marks that could be used to track you?”
I shot an arch look at him over my shoulder. “Have you seen any other marks?”
His eyes darkened at my less than subtle reminder of our extensive intimacy. “Point taken,” he said with a wry smile.
Ahanu cleared his throat and there was tension in his broad shoulders. Bracing myself for a caustic remark, I was surprised when he asked, “Could a piece of metal be used to track?”
Everything in me went rigid and the fury began to uncoil. Hastily, I slammed it back down. “Why do you ask?”
“Because I dug a dime-sized disc out of a scar on your right bicep.” Before I could ask how he’d found it, Ahanu said, “I sensed something wrong and followed the sensation to your arm. I thought the disc was a piece of shrapnel. I would’ve stitched the incision I made, but you’d already begun healing.”
Dumbfounded, I stared at Ahanu. I’d thought I was free all along, but in truth had been magically tagged—just like a microchipped pet. “Cian has known where I was since the day I escaped. All this time, he’s known.” I had to sit down. Easing out of Koda’s arms, I lowered myself to the porch’s top step. Putting my head between my knees, I breathed with slow, concentrated effort.
Over my head, I heard Koda’s hard voice. “What did you do with the disc?”
Ahanu snorted. “I gave it to Waneta.”
“Good. He’ll have known to sandwich it between iron or steel.” Koda growled something in Sioux the way I sometimes did in Fae when English wasn’t sufficient to capture the intensity of my meaning.
Grunting his agreement, Ahanu said, “The wendigo’s attack and the body being staked out here means the fae know where you live now. Your home isn’t safe.”
“I will not run.” Koda’s power strained against his control, lifting the fine hairs along my arms. “If the bastards want a fight, they damn sure know where to find me. They won’t get a second chance at an ambush.”
“Or killing any more humans,” his brother growled.
Wincing at that last part, I stared at the worn wood beneath my boots. I couldn’t console myself that nothing I’d done had caused Tanner’s or the cop’s death…because nothing I’d done had stopped it, either. I’d been so confident the only tracking mark on me had been the tattoo. The very visible tattoo, colorfully marking my shoulder for all the world to see. And it was so freaking obvious. Too freaking obvious.
What a stupid dumbass I’d been. I, who knew the fae and their duplicitous ways. Not once had I considered the possibility…no, the guarantee that they would’ve had a second way to track bitterns. Me, in particular, since I’d always been so difficult, so resistant to their training methods.
Utterly disgusted with myself, I surged to my feet, catching the stair rail before vertigo landed me on my ass.
“Sephti?” Koda asked, turning to frown at me. “What are you doing?”
I made a noncommittal noise, not having the energy to answer. Setting off on a swaying course for the truck, I wanted to crow when I made it there but settled for climbing clumsily across the front seat. Fumbling with the latch, I got the glovebox open and—just as Ahanu had said—found my daggers wedged inside, having barely fit in the pickup’s large storage compartment.
Blinking to focus, I slipped the blades’ harness on, and on the third try, got the buckles closed correctly. Easing down from the front seat and obstinately ignoring the list I couldn’t control, I made it one shaky step before I had to stop, catch my breath. While wrath had gotten me vertical and moving, even the most violent emotions remained subject to the body’s ability to endure and to the laws of gravity.
From a distance, I heard Koda call my name. As if space had distorted, his hand reached toward me, seeming to take a long damn time to make the journey. The world dimmed around the edges, and despite my orders to the contrary, my knees folded beneath me. Warm arms caught me as I fell, then everything went black.
When I awakened, I was in bed with Koda sleeping soundly beside me. The room was constructed of huge golden timbers, so I assumed we were in his cabin’s bedroom. Dawn’s bright rays poured in through tall windows that ran the length of one wall and the only external sound was the gentle breeze sighing past the eaves.
I still seethed at having been such a fool and longed to exact bloody vengeance for Tanner’s brutal murder, for the cop’s and for whoever else Cian had slaughtered along the way—simply because they’d been found somewhere along my backtrail. Rage at having been so stupid set my muscles quivering with the urge to strike, waking my instincts to near-battle readiness and bringing the edges of a frenzy on with startling speed.
Breathing deep, I worked hard to compartmentalize the fury, knowing it would cripple my intellect if it got loose. To achieve the revenge I now burned for, I’d need all of my wits. Because at the heart of the black rage was the determination to kill Cian, but in such a way that his brother would never discover my identity. Never have reason to point the Hunt my way.
Trembling with both bloodlust and fear at my own crazed audacity, I squeezed my eyes shut and fought the wildness down. When I had a better grip on myself, I rolled carefully to my side and let my gaze rest on the man lying beside me. Instantly, the rage subsided to the merest background whisper as I drank in the sight of Koda asleep.
He looked so incredible. A living, breathing miracle of all-male perfection. The comforter had fallen to his waist and his dark skin against the snowy bed linens, the spill of his long black hair on the pillows, his face gentled in sleep…my heart surged into my throat. I yearned to run my fingertips across his lips, parted and inviting as he dreamed. To kiss the hollow of his throat and feel his pulse beating reassuringly strong and steady. But the exhaustion I sensed in him still, the fresh parallel scars marring his ribs and belly and the too-apparent press of bone beneath flesh, stopped me.
Too restless to stay in bed, I eased out from under the covers and padded into the living room. Remnants of a fire glowed in the fireplace, drawing me to the large stone hearth. The thin T-shirt I wore was Koda’s and it came down to my knees and past my elbows. I smiled to think of his care for me since I had no doubt he’d been the one to clean me up. My legs and feet were bare and the room’s chill had me shivering after the warmth of our bed. I put two logs on the embers, stirring flames to life with a poker I found leani
ng against the hearth.
“Sephti?” Koda appeared in the living room and stumbled a little when he saw me holding my hands out to the fire’s welcome warmth.
“Morning.” My heart gave an extra thud to see his tousled hair and sleep-softened features and tenderness for this wonderful man filled my entire being.
He let out a breath like he’d been worried. Getting the throw from where it lay on the sofa, he slung it around his bare shoulders like a large cape. Coming up behind me, Koda wrapped his arms around my waist so the blanket cocooned us together.
His voice came from deep in his chest. “When I woke up, you were gone. I thought…I thought maybe you’d left.”
My heart gave another lurch and I turned in his arms. Framing his beautiful face with my hands, I kissed him long and hard, pressing my body to his and trying to imprint upon his skin the wild, intoxicating, miraculous feelings I had for him. When both our breathing was ragged, I eased back the tiniest space to look up at him. “No take-backs. Remember?”
I heard the ghost of a smile in his voice. “No take-backs,” he agreed.
The moment’s solemnity was shattered by my stomach’s demanding growl. Giving him a quick kiss, I went into the kitchen and opened the fridge. Poking at a mound of aluminum foil, I freed a chicken leg and stood straight, shutting the door. Leaning against the counter, I nibbled on the tender meat. “Where’d this come from?”
“Ahanu. While we slept.”
“It’s good.” I took another bite, chewed, swallowed.
Koda came over and rummaged around in the pantry, taking out a box of cereal. Pouring it into a bowl, he splashed some milk in and got a spoon. After putting the milk and the box away, he sat on a barstool and ate a couple mouthfuls.
“What has you so agitated?” he asked, his keen eyes steady on my face.
The chicken suddenly tasted sour. I put it down, wiping my fingers on a paper towel. “I should have known.”
He took another bite of cereal, a soft frown creasing his brows. “About the disc?”
“Yeah.”
