by Sarah Fine
“I thought, for once, here is someone who is no more than she seems. Here is someone who is simple and sweet. I had no idea you would cause me so much agony.”
“You did it to yourself, asshole.” Asa was straining so hard against the handcuffs that I was afraid he was going to break his wrists. “Every ounce of pain Mattie inflicted? You brought it on yourself.”
“Could I say the same to you, Mr. Ward?” Daeng asked, his thumb stroking up and down my arm as he held the syringe only a few inches from my skin. “Have you brought this on yourself? Did you make the same mistake I did? Were you foolish enough to crave her?”
He brought the needle closer and Asa roared, the sound so loud it made my ears ring with his frustration and rage. But then his head bowed abruptly, and he started to laugh, half-hysterical, his shoulders shaking. Both Daeng and I stared at him, though I still had half my attention on the needle that hovered only an inch from my arm.
Daeng frowned. “What’s so funny?” He sounded peeved that he’d been deprived of Asa’s horror and fear.
Asa was laughing so hard that a tear streaked out of the corner of his eye. “Oh, man. Daeng, you have the worst luck.”
“What?” Daeng forced out a stiff giggle. “You’re the one who is tied up.”
“And you’re the one with the relic in your pocket,” Asa said loudly. “Guess who’s gonna pay?”
Daeng whirled around and his eyes went wide. I turned to see three men standing just inside the doorway, and my eyes went wide, too.
Zhong’s people had found us. Tao strode forward, his strides a little clumsy but his hands steady as he pointed his weapon at Daeng. Shan and Bai were at his sides.
“Put the syringe on the cart,” Tao said, drawing in a deep breath as his brow beaded with sweat. His eyes zeroed in on Daeng’s breast pocket, where the Sensilo relic lay.
“This is kind of an interesting scene,” said Shan, looking over the contents of the cart and then at me. “Couldn’t we have let it play out?”
“Zhong wants the relic secured as soon as possible,” Tao said, his voice stern.
“We can do a deal,” offered Daeng, dropping the syringe on the cart before raising his hands in the air. “Such an esteemed man as Mr. Lei . . . a good price . . .”
“Unnecessary.” Tao glanced at Asa and then looked over the cart again, his weary, melancholy features hardening with dislike. “It is best to keep this simple.”
He raised his weapon abruptly and shot Daeng between the eyes. Daeng fell backward, and Tao immediately removed the Sensilo relic from the dead sensor’s pocket.
I tensed as he rose to his feet, and my eyes found Asa’s. My sensor was staring steadily at me, no longer laughing. Shan and Bai had moved over to the cart. “Tao, get over here and tell us what’s what,” said Shan. “We can have a little fun before we go.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Asa muttered.
“I might be a sniffer, Shan,” Tao said, raising his weapon again. “But I am finished being your trained dog.”
And as the two henchmen turned to him, surprise etched on their features, Tao promptly shot them, too. I screamed as Shan dropped right between me and the cart, his eyes still wide open.
Asa tilted his head back and let out a long, relieved sigh. “Took you long enough.”
Tao holstered his weapon. “The Buckhead area is swarming with Headsmen. It was hard to pick up the scent at first.” He held up the relic, which was wrapped in one of Asa’s lead-padded pouches. “And he had it packaged, albeit carelessly.”
“Wait a second,” I said, trying to inch my chair away from the growing pool of blood near my feet. “You guys planned this?”
“Not Daeng,” said Asa. “He was a nasty surprise.”
“Asa called me a few days ago. He was kind enough to offer me an opportunity.” Tao fastidiously covered the cart of torture instruments as if he couldn’t stand the sight of them, yet left the three men he’d just killed lying where they’d fallen. “He requested my aid and backup in exchange for the Sensilo relic.”
“You can buy your freedom with that,” Asa said.
“And I intend to. I am in your debt.” He offered Asa a quick bow of his head.
“So could you maybe find the key for these cuffs?” I asked.
He smiled. “Oh, no. I don’t trust either of you quite that much.”
“Tao,” Asa yelled as the other man started to walk away. “Hey, Tao! A little help, please.”
“Sorry, Asa. Not my style,” he called as he walked out the door, and for the first time since I’d encountered him, his voice was full of laughter.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I sat across from Asa in the diner booth, fidgeting. It had taken us a long, painful hour to free ourselves from the handcuffs, and it had involved us both getting much closer than desired to Daeng’s dead body. But we’d worked together, and here we were, free and clear. We’d hightailed it out of Atlanta and hadn’t stopped until we’d crossed into North Carolina. Now we’d exchanged our blood- and sweat-stained clothes for cleaner, more casual duds, and Asa had just ordered me a “Hungry Man’s Platter” of french fries.
“How does it feel?” he asked as our waitress bustled up to our table, a salad in one hand and my trough of fries in the other. She promptly set those down in front of Asa and offered me the salad, then blinked at us in surprise as we exchanged dishes.
I took a deep, pain-free breath and smiled. “Fucking incredible.”
Asa, who had been taking a drink of water, began to cough. “Dammit, Mattie.”
Every time he said that to me, it made me feel like I could fly. Dammit, Asa.
My stomach growled, and I started in on my french fries. Attending to them was less painful than thinking about what was coming. “You ended up without any of the relics,” I said after a few minutes of silence. “I thought you were going to keep one of them as payment.”
“I did. I just spent it quickly.” He winked.
“I think we made a lot of enemies today.”
“You’ll be okay, Mattie. I’ll make sure you’re safe.”
Frustration zipped through me. I hadn’t been asking for his protection or reassurance. I wasn’t worried about myself, though maybe I should have been. I was worried about him. “Thanks,” I mumbled.
He gave me a quick, detached smile and stared out the window at the interstate, watching trucks speeding by. Now that he was out of reach of powerful magic, he looked like himself again. I smiled as I stared at his crooked profile.
We really had been a good team.
My smile faded. Who was I kidding? We had been more than that. I fucking love you, Mattie Carver, he had said, and then we had kissed, and again, it had been just me and him, no excuses.
Had he meant it, or had that just been the aftereffects of the magic he’d unleashed on the wedding reception? Or the heat of the moment, the threat of impending pain and death?
I wanted to ask. I needed to ask. We have to figure this out. We—
“So when’s the big day?” Asa asked, his eyes still directed out the window.
I twisted my engagement ring around my skinny finger. “Three weeks from today.”
“I’ll be sure to send a gift,” he said, and went back to eating his salad. I picked at my french fries, but I had lost my appetite. I had nothing to hide behind now. No more burying my head in the sand. I needed to face what had happened and decide what to do—about Ben, and about Asa.
I had loved Ben for years, almost since the day we’d met.
I thought he truly loved me, too.
But he had hurt me. More than anyone had ever hurt me. I had trusted him without question. I had believed in him. And he had used those things as a weapon against me. He had left scars on my heart.
And yet, I craved the life he represented. The solid certainty of my family’s love and support, my small town, my friends. Plus, I dreaded the idea of disappointing people. I hated the idea of giving up. I had committed to Ben when he had put that
ring on my finger. He had accused me of thinking it was meaningless, but he couldn’t have been more wrong.
That dread nearly choked me as Asa paid the check and we hit the road again. As the highway lights lit our path, I mulled over everything between me and Asa. It would have been easy to let him be Ben’s foil, the opposite of my fiancé. Forcing him into that box didn’t do him justice, though. I needed to think about him separately, sort my feelings out separately, and give both room enough to be whatever they actually were.
I kept waiting for Asa to say something, to tell me to come with him, to tell me to leave Ben, to be defiant and angry and forceful—to make it easy. To make the decision for me. But he didn’t. He just drove, and stared out the windshield, and left me all alone with my thoughts.
The time passed agonizingly slowly as I wrestled with feelings bigger and more complicated than I’d ever wanted to acknowledge. And then, all of a sudden, Asa was pulling into the campground, and there was a light on in the cabin at the end of the trail, and that was that.
My heart picked up a brutal cadence as I hopped out of the van. I could hear Gracie barking in the distance. “I think our presence has been noted.”
Asa smiled. “She sounds good. Strong.”
“She does.”
“I guess we’d better get up there.”
“Yeah.” But I just stood there, looking up at him, his face lit in profile by the warm light from the cabin. The sight of him made me ache. But it didn’t matter, because we had run out of time. “Yeah,” I said again, then turned and marched up the trail.
He fell into step next to me as we hiked the trail to the cabin, but we stopped again just before we reached the porch. “Where will you go from here?” I asked, desperate to prolong our time together, trying to decipher the unsteady feeling inside my chest. It felt different from magic, but it was no less powerful.
He shrugged. “I was thinking—”
The door swung open, and there was Ben, wearing a nervous smile. “I was starting to worry that you’d run away.”
“I—”
“Oh, Mattie,” wailed my mother, charging past Ben.
“M-Mom,” I stammered as she enfolded me in a hug, but then my surprise melted and I put my head on her shoulder, treasuring the safety and certainty of her embrace. My dad wrapped his long arms around us a moment later, and there I was, encased in my parents’ love, and it felt like nothing in the world could reach me or harm me. It felt amazing, and I stood there for at least a minute, just letting them hold me tight.
“We’ve been so worried,” said my dad, loosening his grip. “We flew down last night after Ben called.”
My parents released me, and I looked into the cabin to see Asa hunched over Gracie, letting her frantically lick his face as his hands smoothed over her wiggly body. “I take it this is Ben’s brother,” Dad said. The kindness had disappeared from his voice, replaced by stern disapproval.
Asa didn’t look up from Gracie, but I saw his body stiffen.
“Mom and Dad, this is Asa,” I said loudly, stepping into the cabin. “He’s saved my life more times than I can count. If it weren’t for him, I’m pretty sure I’d be dead or insane.”
I narrowed my eyes at my dad, who cleared his throat. “Well, then,” he said.
“I’m gonna go get Gracie loaded up.” Asa didn’t meet my eyes as he lifted her from the floor.
“I’ll get the crate for you,” my dad said gruffly.
Asa gave him a wary look and then headed out the door. My mom hustled out a moment later, carrying a bag of dog food and the duffel Asa had left behind, full of Gracie’s medicines and supplies. My heart beat really fast as I watched them trudge down the trail single file.
“So, it went okay?” Ben asked.
“Yeah,” I said huskily. “I guess so, in that we both made it out alive.”
“I haven’t slept. I’ve thought about you every minute.”
I turned to him. “I’ve thought about you a lot, too.” I stepped into his arms and gave him a fierce hug.
“Oh, Mattie,” he whispered, holding me close. “I swear I’m going to make you so happy.”
“I think maybe you would have,” I said quietly, pulling away from his embrace. “But things have changed, Ben. I’ve changed.” With shaking hands, I pulled my engagement ring from my finger and held it out. “I can’t marry you.”
Ben paled a little as he looked down at the ring. “But—”
“I wish you all the best. I really do. I hope you learn to be strong and brave like you want to be. I think you have it in you.”
“I could do it, if you were with me!”
I shook my head, blinking away tears. “I think that’s something you need to do for yourself.”
“Well, he’s all packed up, and he looked pretty eager to get out of here,” my dad said as he strode back into the cabin, then froze as he saw the scene in front of him. “Oh no, what’s going on here, sweetheart?”
I grabbed Ben’s hand and pressed the ring into his palm. “I’m not getting married next month, Daddy. I’m sorry.”
My mom, who had walked in just as I spoke, braced herself against the wall. “Oh, Mattie, are you sure?”
I looked up at Ben and then turned to her. “Yeah. Completely sure.”
She opened her arms and I walked into them, wishing my heart would slow down. It was kicking against my breastbone, hard enough to fracture it. “I told you that whatever you decided was okay,” she murmured. “We’ll take you home. You can have your old room. We’ll take care of you.”
Her words hit me sideways, knocking the wind out of me. “No, Mom.” I glanced over her shoulder, out the door, panic rising in my veins. “I need to take care of myself.” I disentangled myself from her embrace as my decision slid into place like a slab of iron, unavoidable and certain. “And I need to go, okay?”
“What?” yelped my dad and Ben at the same time.
“I have to go.” I moved toward the door as my mother clung to my arm. My eyes met hers. “Mom, I’m not a little girl anymore. I’ll never be happy if I don’t explore what’s out there for me. I have to do this now.”
My mom’s eyes were wide and shiny with tears.
“Let me go, Mom,” I said gently. “I’ll be okay.”
She pressed her lips together and nodded.
And then she let go of my arm.
Without a backward glance, I took off running, terrified that I was too late. I sprinted down the trail toward the parking lot, crying out as Asa’s headlights lit the darkness. He was already rolling toward the road leading away from the campground.
“Wait,” I shrieked. “Asa, wait!” My feet pounded the dirt, and my hope sang in my veins. “Please!” I waved my arms as I burst from the trees and into the parking lot.
Asa’s brake lights flared red, and I let out a strangled laugh of relief as the van came to a stop. The driver’s-side door opened, and he stepped out, looking cautious. “I was trying to avoid an awkward good-bye,” he said warily.
“Do you think you could use a reliquary on any of your upcoming jobs?” I asked, panting.
He looked up the trail toward the cabin. “Mattie . . .”
“Take me with you.” Nervousness coiled like a viper in my belly—he hadn’t asked me to go with him this time. He hadn’t made it easy, hadn’t made the decision for me, and I couldn’t blame him. But now I had to put myself out there and risk him turning me down. “Please, Asa. Take me with you. I can earn my way. You know I can.”
“I’m not going to help you run away from your problems.”
“I’m not running away. I made a decision.” I leaned on the van, trying to catch my breath.
He looked down at my bare left hand. “You’re sure?”
I put my hands on my hips. “Do you trust me?”
His gaze met mine as the corner of his mouth lifted in a sly half smile. “I guess maybe I do.”
“Then tell me honestly if you don’t want me as a partner. I�
��ll go find my own way. But I’m not going back to Sheboygan.”
“A . . . partner.”
I lifted my chin. “A business partner.”
Here’s the thing—I was done with Ben. I think I had been done for a while. And Asa loomed large, casting a shadow over my heart. Denying it would have been stupid at that point. But I wasn’t about to jump right out of one relationship and into another—especially one as complicated as anything with Asa was bound to be. Plus, everything about the man in front of me screamed heartbreaker, and mine had already been cracked a few times.
Didn’t mean he wasn’t tempting as hell.
“Strictly professional,” I added.
“Strictly?”
“Strictly.” I folded my arms over my chest.
He pursed his lips and looked me up and down. “Hmm.” He reached forward and slid the side door open. “What do you think, Gracie? Room for one more?”
Gracie yipped, her stub of a tail wagging madly as she pressed her nose against the side of her crate, her bandaged leg sticking up in the air. I offered my fingers and she licked at them frantically, her best effort at a kiss.
“Okay. I suppose we could swing this.” Asa gestured toward the passenger seat. “All aboard, partner.”
I stifled a nervous grin as I jogged around the back of the van and got in on the other side. “So . . . where are we going?”
Asa threw the van in gear. “I’m thinking Bali.”
“What’s in Bali?”
“A vacation. I need one.”
A vacation in Bali. This would surely involve Asa with his shirt off. “Oh,” I said in a choked voice.
“There might be a certain relic there that I’d like to swipe.”
“Oh!” That sounded less dangerous.
“But any reliquary working with me has to be healthy.” He reached over and jiggled one of my skinny arms. “We’re going to put some meat on those bones before we ask your body for any more than it’s already given.”
“Good plan. Will there be french fries?”
“A whole island of french fries, baby.”
“Right. Okay. Good. Wait!”
“Yeah?”
“Asa, I don’t have a passport.”
