by Lauren Dane
It wasn’t that she completed him, or that he couldn’t live without her. It was that she filled his life in ways he knew clearly now that she was in it. Remembered the absence of from before she stepped up to him at Sea-Tac the month before.
Lark Jaansen wasn’t just a female he was interested in for a while. She was it. He’d lived a long time, long enough to stop pretending she was anything less than his heart’s and life’s mate.
She was everything he could possibly want in a woman and he meant to have her. Forever.
He found himself excited by the future for the first time in a long while. Anticipating what he could build with his ass-kicking little witch.
WHEN she came back out at last she’d braided her hair into pigtails, which sexed her up and rendered her young and fresh all at once. All his carefully created cool and calm sort of melted away and rather than let it agitate him, he found her even more fascinating.
She took the glass he held out and sipped. “Thank you. You’re a master martini maker.”
“Comes with owning a bar I guess. Sit, the steaks are ready.”
“Nice out here.” She tipped her head back and breathed in deep. “I’ve smelled too much death today.”
It outraged him that she did, even as he admired that she did her job so well. “Tell me about what you learned today.”
She ate with gusto, something he also liked about her. She wasn’t afraid of what she liked. And she liked to eat and drink and laugh. He wasn’t sure why he didn’t realize just how sexy all these things were until just recently.
The story unfolded as they ate and alarm, already a spark in his belly, bloomed into heat riding up his spine.
“What’s next then?”
“I’m talking to one of the Elders from the Cascadia Wolf Pack tomorrow. I need to call Helena tonight. This is more than just witches now, we’ve got to seek out leaders from Other groups to discuss this with them.” She ate for a while and he let her process before she spoke again.
“I came up here thinking you all just had a problem with some mages on your hands.” She shrugged. “Easy enough. I figured I’d shoot some people, use my magick, train, be trained, have some laughs and go back home.”
“And now?”
She met his gaze. “Now things are different. Far more complicated than I’d ever imagined. The resolution here… well, I don’t know, but I don’t think we’ll win from sheer guts or magickal talent. We seem to be outclassed in that area. I need to figure out how to beat this foe.”
He had faith in her abilities.
“How did it end before? How was the Magister defeated?”
Her brows flew up. “We don’t know. It comes and goes, but it’s been a long while for those of us on this plane of reality. The records are obviously not very helpful.”
He noted the way she hesitated over the name. Understood it, even as he wanted to shout it, to show the Magister he wasn’t afraid. But that was foolhardy. Because old magicks like the Magister should make any thinking being afraid. He remembered the awe and fear in his grandmother’s voice as she told him and his brothers the stories when they’d been young.
“I’d like to head home to speak with my father and brothers. To explain and get my people prepared. See what our Elders have to say about the threat.”
She nodded. “Good idea. I have a conference call with the hunters from several other clans tomorrow too.”
“When?”
Lark looked up from her plate to regard him carefully. She was sharp. He’d never get away with anything but what she chose to let him get away with. Which was… alluring.
“Ten.”
“Good. You can come with me then. I’m not heading home until later in the afternoon.”
“Come with you where?”
He put some more roasted vegetables on her plate. He’d made them for her, to keep her fortified and strong. It gave him a moment of pause, felt sudden, this need to protect and care for her.
And then he accepted it. Accepted he’d been taking care of her since that first night when he brought her to his home from the airport to feed her.
“To Lycia of course. Who better to speak with my father about what’s happening? You know all the details. It only makes sense.”
Instead of arguing, her features lit. “Really? I’ve never been on the other side of the Veil before.”
He didn’t trust how easy this was.
“I’ll pick you up from your building at three then. We can have dinner there.” Which wasn’t an entirely accurate word for the huge feast that his second-mother would arrange when he came home.
“Will they all frown at me for eating vegetables too?”
He laughed. “Some of them will. But I have the feeling you’ll charm your way past that. You have a gift for such things.”
“I do?”
Did she not understand? Even after last night and the time they’d had that morning? She wasn’t being coy. He could have resisted coy.
“Would you like to sit in the hot tub? Look at the stars?”
“Is that where you’re going to tell me what you’re thinking?”
Her face was entirely scrubbed clean of any cosmetics and she wore her emotions so openly right then. It got to him, much like most of the rest of her did. She was honest with him. Which he respected and he figured he’d have to return that honesty or risk blowing what he knew had the potential to be the best thing in his future.
“Some of it.”
“All right. My muscles are still sore from last night. Speaking of that, why aren’t you at work?”
“I’ll tell you when you’re done eating and in a bathing suit in my hot tub.”
* * *
LARK winced as she caught sight of the bruise on her side when she changed into her suit. It had gone a dull yellowy-green. This was alleviated a little by the room she stood in.
He’d filled it with flowers and the bedding was now ultrasoft, and yet an explosion of color. Bright blues, purples and greens. The pain faded as she took it in. He’d done it to make her comfortable. Knew enough about her to understand she’d like the space better this way. Disconcerting. And charming.
She’d better get the call with Helena over with or it’d hang over her the rest of the night.
Her sister answered on the second ring. “Hey you. What’s up?”
Lark smiled. “You in a place you can sit down?”
“That bad?”
“Yeah.”
In the background, her sister excused herself and returned to the call in a few moments. “Shoot.”
Helena would be taking notes, she was organized that way, so Lark just dove into the telling, starting with the missing wolf and what she’d found out the night before about the Magister.
“Clearly we need you back here. They’re going to have to manage on their own. We have to build our moat and take cover.”
“That’s not only totally the wrong way to go about this, but it’s not going to happen. This isn’t something we can pretend away or hide from. I’m acting as hunter here until Nell comes back once she’s had the baby. They need me. You all need me here and others like me all across the country right now.”
“I don’t care what they need. We’re not taking any chances with your safety, Lark. I’m ordering you to come back home.”
“You can’t order me to do anything.”
“The hell I can’t. When I tell Dad about this nonsense he’ll say the same.”
And this was why she was considering Meriel’s offer. She and her sister simply saw things from a different perspective. They couldn’t both run the hunter crew anymore, not at the same time.
“No, he won’t. But it doesn’t matter. I’m not coming back and you’re going to have to keep running the hunter crew and get everyone prepared. This is coming, Hel, it’s coming and we have to be unified to meet it and not end up dead.”
“How do we know Owen didn’t do something to bring this thing back to life?”
“That’s your thing.”
“What is your damage? Why are you acting like a dick?”
“You flit off to play in Seattle while I still have to get this work done. This isn’t a game to me.”
“Are you insinuating it’s a game to me? Really?”
It never used to be this way. Sure they fought but they didn’t work at cross-purposes. “You don’t want me there and when I leave you don’t want me gone either? What is it you want, Helena? Do you even know?”
“I want not to be called by my flighty little sister with a new big bad in the background to menace me.”
She heaved a sigh. “You should be menaced. This isn’t a game. Meriel is going to be contacting Rebecca. If not tonight, then tomorrow morning. You can have a plan in place and stop acting like a petty bitch. Or you can be a petty bitch and not have a plan. Either way Rebecca is the seat of Gennessee. She’s going to take it seriously, thank goodness.”
There was nothing on the other end for so long she nearly repeated her sister’s name to see if she was still on the line.
“Mom made me bean curd cakes. And that tea with the crunchy stuff she says is so yummy.”
Lark laughed. “Better you than me.”
“You should come home. There’s no one here who’ll go on two a.m. chili-dog runs with me.”
It was easier, she realized, to deal with the roller coaster of her issues with Helena with twelve hundred miles between them. And they hadn’t gone out for chili dogs at two a.m. in over a year.
“This isn’t a vacation. This is work and you’re not taking it seriously.”
“So come back and make me. If this is such a big deal, why are you up there instead of here?”
“Let’s go there then. Right now. Let’s talk about all the reasons why I came up here.”
Helena sighed. “Why do you have to make everything about that? I want you home because this is a waste of resources. If this is as bad as you say, you should be home helping us prepare.”
Helena tended to get sloppy when she was emotional about something. Which was all the more ridiculous as her sister was so smart and careful usually.
“You know, I miss you. But not this part. This part sucks and it’s stupid and it’s going to end up with you making a mistake because you’re just not telling me whatever it is you’re so bugged by. I don’t want you to get hurt. I don’t want you to make a mistake. You’re too smart for this. If you miss me, pick up the phone. We can talk, work on strategy, all that stuff.”
“Why does it sound like you’ve moved to Seattle?”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“Why? We’ve got a great thing here.”
“No. You have a great thing. Or I could have a great thing. We can’t both have it and you know it. And until you deal with the stuff with Geoff and me and the broken engagement we can’t even really have a relationship. He’s still there, between us and that’s just dumb.”
“That’s not true. And it’s unfair of you to say. I don’t want to talk about that. Especially not on the phone.”
“Yeah, I’m aware. I have to go. I wanted to warn you and talk over some strategy. But you’re not in the mood and I find myself not wanting to do this again. When you find the guts to say what you need to say, you know where I am. Until then, let me know if you need any info about this new threat. I love you.” And she hung up.
Chapter 15
WHEN she went out and realized he’d lit candles all over the deck where the hot tub was, she realized she was defenseless against the charm. He interested her. She liked him. It wasn’t like a first date really because she’d already gotten close to him as a friend. Which she had to admit made her weak because she wanted to see what was next for them not just as friends but as more-than-friends.
Which was so silly. So. Silly. He was a prince. A big, gorgeous male specimen used to life’s finest things. Used to women who knew what the labels on stuff made in the last ten years meant. Women who used Spanx and got pedicures. She didn’t do any of that. She shopped in thrift stores. She wouldn’t balk at spending six hundred dollars on a weapon, but she’d never spend that on shoes or a purse.
She was not his type. She didn’t fit in his world.
And it didn’t matter. Not then.
He waited, leaning against the rails. She loved that moment, when he hadn’t turned yet so she could take him in. Devour him from the bare feet, up those powerful calves and thighs. The high, tight butt showcased so lovingly in his snug swim trunks.
And the expanse of his back with all his tattoos and marks. Just so ridiculously beautiful, this man. And she was totally going to let him get way past second base before things were done that night.
He’d turned at her approach and made no attempt to hide the way he took her in from head to toe. His face darkened when he went back to her bruise. Her heart sped at that perusal. So ridiculously protective and masculine. This was the problem with alpha males, they emitted so much testosterone and hot-guy stuff she lost her head. Her normal type didn’t befuddle her in the slightest. But there she stood, fighting a blush like a teenage girl. He’d had six hundred years to perfect the weapon of his charm. She was twenty-five; how the heck could she even compete?
“Come on. I hope you don’t mind that I’ve opened some champagne.”
She took his hand and allowed him to help her up and then she stepped into the steamy, bubbly water and groaned as she sat. “This is soooo good, Simon. Just what I needed.”
“I’m glad.” He got in and sat close. Goose bumps made themselves at home on her arms as the heat of him wrapped around her body.
He gave her a flute of champagne and then clinked his against it. “To beginnings.”
“Beginnings?”
“I suppose it’s only fair to tell you.” He paused to sip his champagne and she tried not to gulp hers. “I’m a predator. So when you get so delightfully nervous and your heart speeds when I get close? It’s delicious.” He leaned close and breathed her in. “Sexy and totally irresistible. Beginnings of what this new Simon and Lark will be. Don’t deny it.”
“I… I don’t even know how to respond. Where did this come from?”
He shifted, putting his champagne down and then she was in his lap. He was, she also noted, really happy to see her.
“You’re so beautiful.”
That made her grumpy. “See, why do guys do that?”
“Do what? Also, I am not a guy.”
“You get offended by the oddest stuff.”
“The bruise on your skin offends me. Being compared to some silly human half-man who clearly didn’t know what he had and let you go offends me. I am a full-grown male. I know what I want. And as it happens, I can’t remember the last time I didn’t get what I wanted. What makes this even better is that you want it too.”
“You’re totally going to get some so spare me the pretty lies. I’m not beautiful though, so stop saying that. I’m unusual. I work what I have. I am totally all right with that. You appreciate my right hook. That’s way sexier to me than you making up some dumb biz about how I’m beautiful. I’m not like those women at your club.”
“Thank goodness for that. And your right hook is beautiful too.” He took her chin and angled her to look her in the eyes. “You are beautiful. I have no need to make things up. When the light hits you just right, quite often at totally random times, you’re so stunning it knocks me back a little. It’s not just those big eyes of yours that take in everything, miss nothing and hold nothing back when you’re with me. It’s not the lips that damn me to hell
and back with how much I want them on me. It’s not just your body, though it’s quite hot that you hide it under your clothes. All fourteen layers of them.” He grinned and she grinned back. He was so good at this. This was also really amazing. No man had ever done this to her system.
“It’s all that and then some. It’s your right hook and the way you make Krav Maga look easy. It’s the way you can clean a weapon with ruthless efficiency. It’s the way you light up over things most women would curl their lips at. The night is my favorite time and you’re there with me. That’s beautiful. You love the dark as much as I do.” He meant it more than just the time of day and that appealed in ways she was too scared to fully appreciate just then.
“We are creatures of the dark, you and me. No other female has been that.” He sniffed her again and she made a little sound. He froze and groaned. “Remember what I said. Delicious.” He moved back enough to see her face again. “You are beautiful, Lark Jaansen. In your entirety you are quite honestly the most stunning female I’ve ever met.”
“This is… I’m… overwhelmed. I’ve never… you’re so different than anyone I’ve dated. I don’t know how to process this.”
“So don’t. I’m not a math problem you need to puzzle over. I’m not human, Lark, and neither are you. I don’t buy into that whole let’s get to know each other and court and then in three years we can work with our mutual schedule books to find a date to get married. I know what I want. I have no hesitation in admitting this to you. This isn’t dating. To me, to my people, once you find that person who makes you feel like this, that’s it. I did get to know you. Which is why you’re dug in so deep. Before I realized it, I already thought you were perfect. And then I saw you fight. That coupled with the way you were on the roof, in the gardens? That was it. I’m here, you’re here. We’re here. I’m making a declaration to you. Openly. You’re meant to be mine.”
Her mouth dried up. Shew. This man. His arms encircled her and she felt… safe. Kept in some sense, but not in any way that made her feel negatively. She understood what he said. She understood it and had her own beliefs about fate and his appearance in her life at this exact time.
