My Forbidden Desire

by Carolyn Jewel

  A mageheld couldn’t harm a mage, and Alexandrine was pretty sure—though not certain—that she still counted as a mage. Therefore, she had nothing to fear. Right? Right. He might want to rip out her heart, but he couldn’t. She hoped.

  “Out of my way,” she said when he didn’t move. She did her best to sound like she expected to be obeyed. She got her legs moving again, climbing the stairs. Rasmus better not have had time to release his fiends, or they were all going to die a horrible death.

  The big mageheld didn’t move except to let go of the body he held. Said body hit the floor with a sickening thud. Blood from his hand dripped onto the floor in bright, crimson splashes. She didn’t react to the scent of blood. Not anymore. His eyes were pools of cobalt blue, tending to the maniacal, with a hint of insanity thrown in for kicks.

  “Coming through,” she said, taking another step toward him with her heart in her mouth and expecting any minute he would blast her into a pile of ashes. Or just rip out her heart. Which one was the faster way to go? At the last minute, she realized the mageheld’s head wasn’t shaved. His hair was slicked back and very long.

  “Get out of the way, Iskander,” Xia said from behind them. Gee, he sounded just like the old Xia. “That’s Harsh’s sister, for Christ’s sake. No killing her. Got that?”

  She turned. “You know each other?”

  Xia shrugged. “He’s sworn to Nikodemus.”

  Iskander moved, and the three of them came the rest of the way up the stairs. In the entryway, there were three more dead fiends, all with holes in their chests. And a lot more blood everywhere.

  “Looks like you were enjoying yourself,” Alexandrine said.

  “Where’s the mage?” Iskander asked Xia. Apparently, she didn’t count. She was light-headed and nauseated. Still deaf, dumb, and blind to magic, too.

  “Downstairs,” Xia replied. “Restrained for now.”

  “Kynan said you needed my help,” Iskander said. “Doesn’t look like it.”

  Alexandrine picked her way around the dead fiends and tried not to let the sight of all those lifeless bodies get to her. She was feeling even more nauseous. Her stomach wasn’t going to put up with this state of affairs much longer. Her head pulsed with the mother of all headaches. “Where are the rest of the magehelds?” she asked.

  “Hiding,” Iskander said with a dismissive look at the bodies at his feet. “Cowards.”

  “Xia has to sever them before Rasmus gets out of… whatever happened to him.”

  Xia ran a hand through his hair, but she ignored him. Hell. All three of them were staring at her like she’d grown a second head.

  Hands on her hips, she glared at them in turn. She was hollow inside, running on fumes, she realized. “Do you honestly think I’m leaving here without doing whatever is necessary to free anyone held against their will? Tell me you’re not that stupid.”

  Chapter 29

  Alexandrine watched Iskander and Durian watch Xia. The two were obviously waiting for the word from Xia. Constitutionally unable to believe Alexandrine could be serious? Yeah, well, they didn’t think too highly of witches, now, did they?

  Xia shrugged. “She’s the boss.”

  Iskander and Durian got in synch right away. She and Xia, not so much. She couldn’t feel much of anything. Maybe a glimmer every now and then, but that was it. All four of them knew they needed to work quickly, since there wasn’t any way of knowing when Rasmus would get himself out of whatever bind he was in downstairs.

  The first mageheld took a while for Xia to sever, but when it was done, with the fiend on the ground clutching his chest, a layer of frost formed around Alexandrine’s bones. Xia recited a phone number she didn’t recognize and told the mageheld to call it if he wanted to join up with Nikodemus. By then, Iskander and Durian had two more waiting farther down the hall. She followed Xia and got there in time to see him put a hand to the first one’s chest. He pulled, or so she guessed from his expression of concentration. The growing chill in her body was the only way she could tell he was handling magic.

  More ice formed in her. The next severance didn’t take as long as the first and not as long as the second, either. Proximity to Xia mattered, because whenever she lagged, he’d turn around with an impatient scowl and motion for her to hurry up. The process worked best if she was beside him, with five to six feet away the maximum effective distance. Any farther and he couldn’t make it happen.

  That became the pattern. Iskander and Durian rousted the magehelds, and Xia severed them, each one faster than the one before. Alexandrine got a little emptier and a little colder every time. Afterward, he gave out that phone number with instructions to call if they wanted. By the tenth, Alexandrine was more or less the South Pole wrapped in a thin outer shell that might or might not be human. By the end, she was shivering and losing her sense of balance. She kept herself upright by staring at the line formed by the right angle of a wall meeting the floor. Following a straight line kept her from flailing about like a dying trout.

  She gritted her teeth and made it outside with the others. At least Xia wasn’t getting all bent about her lagging anymore. She took her time. Once she was outside, sidewalk lines helped keep her steady. Nobody seemed to care that she was moving slowly, so she took her time. The sidewalk ran out, and she stopped moving.

  A car she didn’t recognize was in the driveway, its nose about three feet from the sidewalk. A black Lamborghini, unless she was mistaken. Probably Iskander’s since the Jag was still there and she knew the Italian car hadn’t been there when she arrived.

  The tattooed fiend was on a cell phone, talking softly. When he was done, he closed the phone and said, “Nikodemus is back.” He looked at Durian. “You coming with us, my friend?”

  “Yes.”

  “You?” Iskander said to Xia.

  “Yeah.”

  Nobody asked what she wanted to do. Why would they? she thought. They wouldn’t want to be around a witch any more than they would want to meet Rasmus Kessler for a beer. She stayed at the edge of the driveway, apart from the other three, wishing she’d borrowed six or seven of Xia’s hoodies. Awkward moment now. There were four of them and two cars, neither of which seated four, unless you wanted to count the pickup bed.

  “Nikodemus know you have his Reventón?” Xia asked. He’d sidled up to the car and put a hand on the hood, stroking the gleaming paint. “You know this is a million-dollar car, right?”

  Iskander shrugged. “Kynan told me to get over here ASAP,” he said. He grinned, and Alexandrine didn’t think she was imagining his tattoos were a brighter blue than just a minute ago. “I hit one-fifty on the Richmond Bridge.”

  “Sweet,” Xia said.

  Nobody said who was going with who, but it was more than obvious the four of them weren’t going to fit in the Lamborghini. Behind them, Rasmus’s house was quiet. Lights were on upstairs, though. One of the newly severed fiends came out with a duffel slung over his shoulder. He paused to face them and to press three fingers to his forehead, first to Xia, then to Iskander and Durian. They responded with a similar motion. And then the fiend did the same in her direction. Go figure. He was probably disoriented like Durian and didn’t know what he was doing. When he straightened, he vaulted over the iron fencing along the side of the property and disappeared.

  Iskander pressed a fob and the car came to life. “I saw the Chevy at the bottom of the drive,” he said.

  Alexandrine cleared her throat. “Um.” All three looked at her. She fought her stomach and won, enough to speak without feeling like she was going to barf. “Uh. I borrowed it to get here. Hope that’s okay. There’s a change of clothes in the front for Xia. The keys are in it. And, uh, sorry about the window. It kind of fell down on the way here.”

  “I’ve been meaning to tape it shut,” Xia said. “It falls down every time I drive it.”

  “Oh.” She wrapped her arms around her midsection, holding on tight to ward off the chill. Her insides still felt like the Antarctic. �
�Well, then, I guess I feel better about that.”

  For some reason, the result of her giving up that bit of information was Iskander flipping the Reventón’s key fob to Xia. “Meet you at the bottom, then.” And he and Durian headed down the drive, leaving her at the edge of the driveway and Xia naked and standing in front of the Lamborghini. Xia pressed the fob, and the doors swung up.

  In a way, she was relieved at the way things worked out, because she wasn’t sure she could have made it down the driveway on foot. Not without stopping to say goodbye to whatever was in her stomach. She also wouldn’t deny she was nervous about being alone with Xia.

  “Get in,” Xia said.

  She took a step, and when she didn’t fall over, she took another. Xia walked over and took her elbow. “Come on, baby.”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  He walked her to the passenger side of the car, and when they got there, she didn’t dare look at him; she just kept her head down and got in. Xia went around to the other side and slid into the driver’s seat.

  “Sweet,” he said, running his hands over the dash and along the panel between the front seat and hers. The doors engaged, and then he pressed a button and the motor purred. Alexandrine slumped on her seat and wrapped her arms around her empty body. Xia didn’t seem to mind being naked, but she was going to be cold for the rest of her life.

  Xia turned the car around and headed down the drive. He engaged the front end lift so they’d make it out of the driveway without scraping the bottom as they headed past the melted iron front gate. Iskander took no prisoners. Must be nice to enjoy your work like that.

  On Wildcat Canyon Road, Xia pulled onto the inside shoulder and popped the driver’s side door. He stood and caught the bundle of clothes Iskander threw at him. The shoes came next, one then the other. He dropped them on the ground to put on the jeans she’d brought, not bothering with underwear. Then the shirt. Shoes last, no socks. Iskander was already in the Chevy, idling the motor, and swear to God, Alexandrine thought he was caressing the dashboard the same way Xia had caressed the Reventón. Dressed, Xia got back into the car, dropped the driver’s side door down, and before long, they were heading to—well, she had no idea.

  “Where are we going?” she asked when they’d driven several minutes without a direction she recognized. Shit. Her heart dropped to her toes. He was taking her home. The danger was over, right? The talisman was gone; Rasmus had been given the smack-down of a lifetime.

  “Tunnel Road.”

  “Huh.” She waited a bit, then remembered that Tunnel Road led to Highway 13, which led to the Bay Bridge and the City. Xia kept driving. “Be faster to go through Berkeley, wouldn’t it?”

  He didn’t answer right away. She didn’t have the benefit of a connection with him, so she had no idea what he was thinking. “Iskander says he got this thing up to onefifty, but I know it can go two-ten.”

  She was too empty to care about dying in a car crash, however spectacular, but then he floored it and, hell, she understood his affair with the car. They didn’t miss any corners or go crashing down into some cow pasture canyon tucked into the Berkeley hills. In fact, the way the car hugged the road, Alexandrine figured they were stuck to the asphalt. She was hardly scared at all.

  Xia got the Reventón down to a mere eighty going back along Wildcat Canyon and then downhill and into North Berkeley. Without the thrill of speed and impending death to keep her awake, Alexandrine bottomed out. Next thing she knew, the car doors were up, there was cold air in her face, and they were parked in front of an enormous house she didn’t recognize. “Now where are we?”

  He got out but leaned down to answer her. “Tiburon.” Tiburon being a Marin County enclave mostly for the extremely wealthy.

  “Righty-o.” She hauled herself out and thought the front door looked about a hundred miles away. Her balance was improved, though. She didn’t need to find a straight line to walk without falling down.

  Xia gave the car one last loving stroke before he headed for the house. Ten yards from the front door, he came to a halt.

  Alexandrine stopped behind him. “Something wrong?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “Carson’s here.”

  “Oh.” That would be the Carson Philips everyone worshiped.

  “And Nikodemus.” He started walking again, and Alexandrine followed. What else was she supposed to do?

  The house was gorgeous but in need of someone to clean up. There were moving boxes everywhere, some open but most closed. Empty picture hangers marked the place where something had been on the walls. Were they in the middle of moving in or moving out?

  Xia went through a door that led to a downstairs that was as posh as the upstairs part she’d seen. There was somewhat less chaos here, moving-boxes-wise. A glimmer of something tickled in her and then petered out. She heard people talking, and then Xia turned a corner, went through another door, and they were in a living room with a large mahogany table in the middle. Iskander was at the table with Durian, Harsh, and another man she didn’t recognize but figured, rightly as it turned out, was Nikodemus. Durian had a plate of cold chicken in front of him, and there were open beers on the table. Lucifer’s Golden Ale, the bottles read. Good grief. There were little red devil horns on the labels. Durian was chowing down. She and Xia came the rest of the way in. The smell of food made her sick to her stomach. Without a word, Nikodemus picked up a beer and tossed it to Xia. He caught it one-handed.

  Harsh got to his feet. “Alexandrine? Are you all right?”

  “Hey,” she said. She dug her hands deep into the front pocket of her hoodie.

  “Where’s Carson?” Xia opened his ale but waited to drink any. Of course that’s who he cared about.

  “Upstairs resting.”

  “Kynan?”

  “Haven’t seen him.”

  Nikodemus lifted his eyebrows and held out a bottle to her. “Lucifer?” he asked. He happened to be sitting close enough that she could have taken it from him.

  She lifted a hand, palm out, and shook her head. His sandy-brown hair was shoulder length and a bit shaggy, and he had the most intense blue-gray eyes she’d ever seen. His presence was something. She felt all of them—her brother, Durian, Iskander, and Xia, of course. But of them all, Nikodemus resonated the most. He was a good-looking man. Fiends seemed to have that going for them. “No, thanks.”

  “Nikodemus, by the way,” he said.

  She licked her lips. “Nice to meet you.” Should she offer him her hand? What was the protocol here? She figured he wouldn’t want to touch her, either, what with her witch cooties, and kept her hands in the pocket of her hoodie. “Alexandrine Marit.”

  “You sure?” Nikodemus said, lifting one of the Lucifers.

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  “Put the beer away,” Xia snarled.

  Nikodemus got quiet. “Just being polite,” he said.

  “I said, put it away.”

  “Relax, Xia. It’s cool.” She looked at Nikodemus. “I don’t drink, that’s all.”

  “Well, that’s a damn shame,” Nikodemus said.

  She shrugged. “Just the way it is.”

  “Are you all right, Alexandrine?” Harsh asked again.

  She nodded. A big fat lie, but she wasn’t going to admit that in front of these men. She didn’t know what to do or how to act. Xia wasn’t giving her any clues, and she wasn’t feeling much like a mind reader. She stood there, a frozen lump.

  Nikodemus took a drink from his beer. “Interesting,” he said. His eyes followed Alexandrine from her head to her toes, and she didn’t think she imagined the way the air felt a little denser around her.

  “What?” Xia said.

  “She feels like one of the kin.”

  Xia hadn’t touched his beer yet, but he lifted the bottle like he was going to. “So?”

  Nikodemus’s attention moved to Alexandrine. “And Xia here feels almost like a mage. One of you want to explain that?”

  “Well, there
was this talisman, see,” she said. Her body shook with the cold congealing her insides. If she didn’t sit down soon, she might just fall down. Nikodemus reached out and grabbed her arm, and a good thing, too, or she’d have done a face-plant.

  “A talisman, huh?” Nikodemus said.

  Alexandrine remembered then that she still had Rasmus’s ring. She dug it out of her pocket and held it out to the warlord. “This was my father’s. He was using it against us.” Her arm shook. “Want it?”

  Nikodemus studied the ring without touching it. “What happened to it?”

  “I stabbed it with Xia’s knife.”

  Xia slipped an arm around her and drew her away from Nikodemus. She let the ring fall to the floor. She heard it hit the ground, but in her head, she saw it falling still, twisting and turning over and over. She was too dizzy to do much but lean against Xia and pray she didn’t pass out. Xia held her close to him, but nothing, she thought, that would give away they’d been to bed. Of course, he wouldn’t want his buddies to know about that.

  “Get your hands off her,” Harsh said.

  “Fuck off, Harsh.” Xia let out a breath. “Alexandrine, I need to talk to you.”

  She turned her head to look at him. “Yeah?”

  “In private.”

  “Oh.”

  “Over my dead body, Xia,” Harsh said. “I’m not letting you go off on her.”

  Alexandrine faced her brother. “Would you just butt out?”

  At the same time, Xia said, “Fine with me, Harsh. Come on, Alexandrine.”

  Chapter 30

  Xia caught Alexandrine before her knees buckled a second time, but she recovered on her own and pushed him away with an elbow jab to his gut. Didn’t hurt anything but his pride. Great. She didn’t want him touching her. His chest got tight with the fear that she’d tell him to get lost. Would he blame her? Not much. Caring what anyone thought of him was new to him, just like his freedom. But, then, he didn’t remember caring all that much about other people’s opinions before he ran afoul of Rasmus. Like that mattered. Different life. Different world. The point was that today, right now, he cared what Alexandrine thought. The prospect of her hating him turned his heart to dust.