by Kelly Meding
“If you say it’s my destiny, I’ll smack you.”
He brushed his lips lightly over mine. “You said it, not me.”
“Thank you for this. Listening. Supporting me.”
“It’s what we’ve always done for each other. Hey, you want to see one of my favorite memories of you?”
I tilted my head, but saw no humor or teasing in his expression. “Okay.” I pushed my thoughts toward him, easily stealing into his mind. A series of images flashed one after another. Our headquarters. The living room. Jaxon on the couch with his left leg in a cast. Smiling at someone. Me in a chair nearby reading a book out loud. Both of us laughing at a funny part.
“I broke my leg from a fall off a building during a case,” Jaxon said. “I hated being stuck at home while you guys went out and worked. But every time you were home, you tried to entertain me. You read me books, we played cards. But it was that specific day, that specific book, when I truly understood how blessed I was that you’d found me, befriended me, and had given me the brief opportunity to love you.”
I sniffled and wiped my eyes, overwhelmed by the force of emotion in his voice and thoughts, and I eased back out of his mind. “Thank you for that. It’s a beautiful memory.”
“You’re welcome.”
Jaxon stood and offered me his hand, then gently pulled me to my feet and into a warm, all-encompassing hug. I had ten hours of daylight looming ahead of me that felt like both an eternity until sunset, and not enough time to do everything that needed to be done. I wasn’t ready to give up and go with Damian, but I also didn’t see a viable alternative yet.
All I could do was hope my friends came through with a plan, or I’d soon be walking into a fate worse than death.
A fate that would cause me to welcome death with open arms.
Chapter 17
By the time lunch rolled around and my stomach growled, I could tell my friends were hiding things from me. Tennyson, in particular, was being crazy secretive and taking a lot of private phone calls. I’d tried brain-speak to get him to divulge something, but he started blocking me, and the impact of hitting that mental brick wall eventually made me stop.
And if I got close enough to someone to peek into their mind, all I got were thoughts of rainbows and bubbles and other bullshit. Not cool. I didn’t like being out of the loop, and I made my feelings known over a lunch of burgers and fries from the diner.
They were probably going to miss our business when we eventually pulled up stakes.
“We’re trying to protect all of us by keeping our plan quiet,” Jaxon said. “If it doesn’t go down how we hope it will, and if you get tethered to Damian, he might be able to get access to our plans before we enact them.”
“Well, when you get all logical about it,” I groused, still not happy. This was my fucking future, and I deserved a say. But Jaxon was right. Damian could gain access to my thoughts, so the less I was involved in this plan, the better.
“I agree with Jaxon,” Kathleen said, her voice a jolting surprise. She stood in the open motel room door, her face flat as always. “It’s best you be kept in the dark about certain things.”
“Except maybe not the rest of us,” Novak said. “Where in heaven have you been?”
“Speaking with my employer and ensuring aid in our effort to destroy this clinic and its research.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Destroy the research, huh? Are you sure your mystery employer doesn’t want it for herself?”
“I assure you she does not. She believes in the old ways and in leaving creatures as they are. However, she does have quite a bit of useful technology at her disposal.”
“Like those helicopters you mentioned that are supposedly waiting for us?”
“Precisely.”
“Do I get a hint?”
“No. However, I would like to speak privately with the others.”
“Fine.” I collected my food and took it to the room Tennyson had used last night, unsurprised to find it empty. He was off somewhere, hopefully preparing some sort of interference in tonight’s main event.
And now that I was alone again, my thoughts turned to things left undone. I didn’t really have anyone to say good-bye to, other than the people one room over. I’d say whatever I could to my mom when I saw her at sunset. My dad . . . no, he’d want to get involved, and that was too dangerous. Besides, I know he loves me, and he knows I love him.
I pulled out my phone and hovered a finger over the dial button on Vincent’s information. I owed him more than a breakup via text. I wanted to talk to him one last time, to hear his rich, accented voice. To picture his handsome face smiling at me once more. Maybe it was selfish, but I called anyway.
It rang for a long time, until the line picked up with a lot of noise in the background. “I didn’t expect to hear from you again,” Vincent said.
“I had to call. I hated leaving things the way we did. You deserve more than that from me. Where are you, anyway?”
“Chuck E. Cheese’s for my niece’s birthday.”
“You have a niece?” My stomach curled in on itself as I realized the wealth of information I truly had never learned about Vincent’s family and life outside of work. We hung out and we had great sex, but things hadn’t gotten much beyond surface stuff. And while I think we both wanted that in the end, I’d probably lost the chance to really get to know Vincent Ortiz, and that sucked.
“Yeah, she’s turning six. Isabella.”
“It’s a lovely name. Can you tell her happy birthday from a friend of her uncle?”
“Sure.” The noise stopped, replaced by the rasp of wind, so he must have gone outside. “So you’re a Para, huh?”
“Yes. Did anyone tell you what I am?”
“Said it’s classified information.”
Yeah, right. If the Marshals were involved in Damian’s clinic, more people had that information than I knew. “My mother is a magic-touched human, but my father is an earth djinn. I inherited some of his ability to grant wishes and use magic.”
Vincent sputtered. “Your dad is a genie? Are you serious?”
“Perfectly. And I don’t share that information easily, because there’s no one else like me in the world, and my powers have been used against me in the past.”
“Nine months, though, Shiloh. I get you were protecting the half-genie thing, but you could have told me at least that you were a Para-Marshal.”
“I’d like to say I would have, if we’d actually gotten serious. But I blew that, didn’t I? By lying to you for so long about what I do. Who I am.”
“I’ve been lied to before. Four years ago. She lied and then she took me for everything I had, including my own construction firm. I lost it all because I trusted and fell in love, and I never thought I could do that again until I met you.”
This time, I didn’t try to stop my tears from falling, fueled by the depth of his wounds and my own keen sense of loss. I’d lived my life and never stopped to think what my lying could do to Vincent, or that he’d be this wounded if/when he learned the truth. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
“You shouldn’t have to know about someone’s shitty past to be honest with them. I probably could have handled you being a Para-Marshal, but you didn’t give me a chance to be honest with you in return.”
Probably could have handled.
“What about me being half-human?” I asked, while staring at a creepy oil painting of two kids in a field that looked more like snakes than grass. This motel decorator had issues.
“I don’t know. I’m not a fan of the Paras, but they’ve never hurt me directly.”
And there it was—the indirect racism. Lumping all of us under one umbrella and assuming we acted, reacted, and believed in the exact same ways, simply because of the past actions of others. But at least we were finally being honest with each other.
“I’ll take that as a no, then,” I said, then released a long breath. “You deserve a safe, happy life, Vincent. I hope you
find a woman who can give you that. I really do.”
“Thank you. Shiloh, is something going on? You sound strange.”
“There’s a lot going on, actually, which is why I had to call you. I couldn’t leave things like we left them last night. I had to talk to you one last time.”
“One last time? Are you in some kind of trouble? Do you need help?”
I smiled at the protectiveness in his voice and wiped away a few more errant tears. “I am surrounded by people trying to help me, but I may have come face-to-face with an enemy I can’t defeat.”
“Are you sick? Is it cancer?”
“No, goddess, nothing like that. Someone is trying to use my own powers against me, and they have the leverage to do it. Hopefully, it doesn’t come to that, but I just can’t say for sure if I’m going to win this fight. And I’d regret it every day for the rest of my life if I wasn’t able to talk to you. For us to at least make peace with each other. Say good-bye.”
“No good-byes, hell no.” He swore a blue streak in Spanish, which made me smile. “Maybe we aren’t together anymore, but I still care about you. Tell me how to help.”
“You can’t. You’re a mortal man, and this is a magical battle. Promise me, no matter what, you’ll live the best life you can.”
“Shiloh—”
“Promise. Me.”
He let out a soft, sad sound. “I promise. You make me a promise, though.”
“I’ll try.”
“Fight. You fight with every fiber of your being, and when you win, you call me and let me know. Maybe once we’re both back in Maryland, we can get together and have a celebratory drink.”
I closed my eyes and breathed a few times before I could manage a watery, “I promise to fight. It’s in my djinn nature to fight and rebel, so no problem there.”
“And the drink?”
“As long as you’re paying, I’m in.”
“Good. And, uh, good luck with this bad guy. You deserve a safe and happy life, too, Shiloh.”
“Thank you.” I wanted to keep the conversation going, to stay on the phone with the last remnant of my old life, and forget what I was about to face. But I couldn’t, and staying on the line wasn’t fair to Vincent. “Enjoy the birthday party, okay? Don’t eat too much pizza.”
“Be safe.”
“I’ll do my best. Until next time?”
“Yeah, until next time.”
I hung up and sank onto the edge of one bed, my cooling lunch no longer appealing to me, despite still being a little hungry. Maybe I should head over to the diner with the company credit card and gorge myself on my favorite foods. Nachos and cheese fries and a big slice of cheesecake. The DOJ owed me at least a final meal, considering their apparent duplicity.
And goddess knew what my life would be like under Damian’s thumb.
No, I couldn’t think like that. I had to believe we’d find another way. Or if we couldn’t, and I did end up tethered to Damian, that my friends would do everything they could to get me back. I’d only been tethered to Kress for nine days, before my father intervened. I couldn’t imagine a lifetime of that sort of pain and misery.
I’d sooner find a way to kill myself.
Bored with staring at the walls—and needing to distract myself from such morbid thoughts—I played with my tele-picture ability a little. I’d already looked into Jaxon’s head, and maybe if I wasn’t in the room they’d let their guard down. I didn’t want in on the plans for obvious reasons, so I’d have to be careful.
Curious if it would work with everyone or only certain species, I tried to push my way into Novak’s mind. At first, I didn’t see anything, only had an odd sense of darkness. And then a rapid slide show of naked men and women flashed into my mind, and I shut that feed off fast.
Sweet Iblis, he truly did think about sex nonstop. I mean, okay, he’s an incubus, but good grief. And it was an effective way to keep me out of his head and away from their plans. No more mind surfing for me right now.
The motel room door swung open, and I expected Jaxon, but I got Tennyson instead. He swept inside and shut the door, cutting off the scant bit of direct sunlight and casting him in a backlit shadow. It was hard to believe that a little over a week ago, I’d been intimidated and a little scared of him and his powers, and now I barely blinked when he entered a room.
He’d saved my life more than once, and I didn’t know how to properly thank him for it.
“You are apart from your team,” he said as he lowered the cloak’s hood, showing off that many-colored hair that fascinated me so much.
“Kathleen came back and they’re discussing strategy. Apparently, I’m a liability if Damian does manage to bind me.”
“An intelligent maneuver on their part. However, you seem distressed.”
I snorted hard through my nose. “I am far beyond distressed at this point, Tennyson. I genuinely do not know if we can beat Damian tonight, and I hate it. I hate not knowing who I’m going up against. At least when I faced down the necromancer, I was aware of his plan for you, you know?”
“I understand.” He surprised me by sitting beside me and unsnapping his cloak. I rarely saw him without it. Black linen pants and a matching shirt hugged his tall, lean frame, and despite lacking muscled bulk, his entire body radiated power and strength. I soaked a bit of that in, because I needed the comfort it offered without any actual physical contact. “Would it soothe your fear any if I informed you that Drayden is currently seeking a powerful ally to assist us tonight?”
“Depends on the ally.”
“Danu deserves to know her children are being held against their will and that they are being exploited in the name of science.”
That perked me up a bit. “You think Danu will come here and help?”
“It’s possible.”
“But back in Portland, she said she could only offer information, not directly help us.”
“Goddesses say many things out of impatience, young djinn, and at the time, Danu had no reason to believe her children were being harmed. Discovering they are in danger may force her hand, especially as Cailleach is her rival.”
“They’re rivals?”
“Ah yes. Since the first spark of life on this world, they have fought over the British Isles. Cailleach was jealous of Danu’s ability to turn wolves into men and she sought to destroy the wolvish residents of Ossory Island by imbuing men with magic. But instead of following Cailleach, those men used the magic gifts for their own purposes, and it is often believed they became the first dark magic users in Europe.”
“Cailleach didn’t stop them?”
“She was too focused on her battle with Danu to care, but by then the Ossory wolves had spread across Europe. You see, as you experienced during our visit with Brighid, time moves differently here than it does on the astral plane where the old gods and goddesses still live. Centuries passed in the blink of an eye, so Cailleach created the Gaelic witch line in her own image, but because the world was changing and so few still worshipped Cailleach, her power was diminished, and the witches were not powerful enough to hunt down and destroy Danu’s children.”
“So Cailleach is still jealous of Danu, but Danu doesn’t give a shit because she’s stronger and would rather play video games than be worshipped by people who clearly still believe in her?”
“Correct.”
“Do you think Danu coming will lure Cailleach here? I don’t want to turn this no-stoplight town into a magical OK Corral with goddesses going at each other.”
“I do not know Cailleach, and I do not know if she’s on this plane or elsewhere, or if she still protects her own. The ward on the clinic wall suggests she does, but we will not know unless she makes an appearance.”
“Well, let’s hope she doesn’t. I mean, I’m all for Danu helping us free her wolves, but . . . yeah.”
“I understand. It is in your nature to protect the people of this town, despite them meaning nothing to you personally.”
“T
hat’s part of being in law enforcement. You put yourself out there and protect the innocent, whether it’s a jogger from a mugger, or an ancient evil trying to take over the mind and body of your friend.” I met his eyes, which sparkled with flecks of green. My nose tingled from the warm, sweet scent I always associated with his positive emotions. “No matter what happens tonight, thank you.”
“It’s been my pleasure, Shiloh.” His lips twitched, and he touched his side where he’d had flesh scooped out by that blessed melon baller during the necromancer’s ceremony. “Mostly.”
I chuckled, the first time I’d really laughed in ages. “I feel you on that. Are you healing?”
“The flesh is no longer raw. However, vampires do not regenerate, per se. I will always carry the scars of that day on my body.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It is what it is. I did what I had to do for my line’s safety, and I have no regrets.”
“That makes one of us.”
“We all make mistakes, young djinn, and you will make many more over the course of your natural life. But wallowing in those mistakes helps no one, least of all yourself. You are young, you are strong, and you possess the vast stubbornness of any earth djinn in existence. You will overcome this.”
Overwhelmed by his unwavering belief in me, I did something I never thought I’d do—I threw my arms around Tennyson’s shoulders and hugged him. Really hugged him, his slender body cool against mine. His own arms draped loosely around my waist and he pressed his cheek to mine.
“You do your people proud,” he whispered. “Human and djinn alike.”
“Careful there, Tennyson, your humanity is showing.”
He made a soft, not-quite-chuckle noise, then gently pulled out of my impulsive hug. “Perhaps I have not completely forgotten what it’s like to be human. You remind me of all the things vampires forget over time, such as compassion and sacrifice. Thank you for that.”
“You’re welcome.”
Of course, Jaxon chose that tender moment to walk in. His eyes narrowed at the sight of us sitting so close together, but he didn’t comment directly. “Can I have Shiloh for a little while?” he asked.
