by Lila Felix
If we couldn’t visualize our target destination, then we couldn’t flash.
Nor could we pick out our captors without a brain that could process sight.
“I need to distract them. Maybe if I flash in front of them, they will think I’m gone.”
“That will expose your gift. I assume they already suspect. That’s why they are following you, but why give them more ammunition?”
“It will get them away from Colby.”
He sighed, sounding exasperated like a parent with a child, “Just go get her. If she throws a fit, I will restrain her myself.”
He grinned mischievously.
I knew something shady went down in the hallway while they were looking at the picture of Rebekah. They stared way too long.
I’m a jealous bastard.
“It would be a real hardship, I can tell.”
“What?” he shrugged like it was no big deal. “I don’t exactly have a harem around here. I can appreciate a handsome woman when I see one.”
“A handsome woman? What are you, eighty?”
“Maybe.”
“Okay, get ready to hold her down, but don’t have that shit eating grin on your face when she gets here.”
Collin saluted me.
In a moment’s time, I was in the back of the changing room of The Blue Lagoon and grateful for an empty space. I shucked my pants and shirt and tossed them onto one of the benches as not to look out of place. I quickened my pace through the lobby as I hadn’t paid to get in—and probably wouldn’t. There was only one thing on my mind and massages in sea water wasn’t it.
Clenching my hands into fists, I concentrated on her. I imagined the perfect curve of her hip that led to the hourglass of her waist. My fingers twitched—as though it were remembering the feel of her skin—and that’s when she appeared to me. The sensation was different from before when I just knew where she was. This was like being near her—close enough to take a picture.
She shot up to a sitting position and looked around her for something. I wondered if she could feel me.
I knew exactly her location and my feet took me there in an instant.
“We need to talk,” she bolted from the pool in a hurry.
“Yes, we do. We had…” I glanced around me to see if there were listening ears. “There are dirty people around the cottage. We need to move faster than I thought.”
“Dirty,” she shuddered, still not getting my drift.
“They like airplanes,” I said in a slow row of words, trying to get her to understand.
“Oh, them, yeah, okay. Can you show me pictures?”
“Not yet. Let’s get to Collin’s and then move from there. He will be worried otherwise.”
“Behind there,” she pointed to a fairly empty pool affront an icy wall.
In a moment, we were back at Collin’s, or once Collin’s, mansion. I expected to have to hide Colby from his sight, especially since she was wearing only threads and the old man was already jonesing for her.
But Collin was nowhere to be found.
“Where is he?” Colby inquired. We weren’t worried—it was a huge place.
“I don’t know. I brought our bags here. Maybe you should get changed before he returns,” I looked everywhere but at her, hoping she wouldn’t get soaked in my spew of jealousy.
“Okay,” she questioned with a furrowed brow.
When did I become this archaic man?
I searched the whole house for Collin. I had no way of calling his cell phone—no way of getting in touch with him other than coming directly to his home. Colby came out sometime later, having taken the liberty of using Collin’s shower.
“Where is he,” she repeated her earlier question.
“I don’t know, but now I’m getting a little worried.”
Colby popped out her bottom lip, “He’s a big guy. He can handle himself. We aren’t his babysitters. Maybe he had business in town or had to say goodbye to a girlfriend. You don’t know. That’s a handsome sasquatch.”
“Yeah, you two had a little moment in the hallway.”
She flounced onto the antique looking couch and laughed, “Oh yeah, it was so sexy. We had a real moment there. His eyes bore into mine. It was like our souls understood each other…talking about my grandmother!”
I could take a lot of things. Seeing Colby flirt and have fun with other guys had never been a comfortable situation. But all of this relationship in the air stuff had me on edge. Plus, that thing where I could possibly be the savior of the Resin.
I couldn’t even save myself.
“Sorry, I’m just—I don’t know what I am anymore.”
“You’re a man, remember,” she patted down herself as I’d done the night before.
“Funny.”
We sat in silence, both glancing back and forth at the door, expecting Collin any moment.
“Theo,” Colby said, throwing her legs over the edge of the sofa.
“Yes, Querida.”
The term of affection flowed so easily from my lips.
“What’s your greatest fear?”
I checked her face to see if the question was serious or just one of her games. The sternness of her chin indicated she was true in her want to know.
It made me squirm, her question. Mostly because I didn’t know the answer. I had a clue to what my ultimate fear was, but really, was it her goal to completely expose me? Did she have to dissect me all the time? I just wasn’t that interesting? But if there was anything interesting about me, she would dig it out.
“You have to earn that knowledge.”
“Earn it, pshh…”
Her response irked me. It irked me a lot. Just those two words and one sound made me know for sure what I’d suspected for so long but refused to acknowledge. I had spoiled Colby rotten. So rotten that she’d begun to take me for granted. She’d been doing it for years.
At first I didn’t mind it. I somewhat prided myself on being one of those guys who tended to my girl’s every whim. And for the first few years, it was give and take. She was affectionate and loving. But after her dad died, she began to slowly pull away. I knew it was aftershocks of her dad’s death, so I gave her the space she craved. But when I gave her a mile, she stretched it to two miles. She was fine over the phone or while we were with a group of people.
But one on one, she was distant. She made sure we were either making out or doing something equally busy so that we never had time to really talk about anything.
“Yes. Earn it. You’re my best friend before anything else, Colby. But we have hardly spoken in two years and now you just expect to jump right in and have me bare my soul? Give it five minutes for the love of the Almighty.”
Her eyes widened at my response. I bit my lips to stop them from immediately apologizing. That’s what I would’ve done before, apologized—even if I wasn’t wrong.
She had me by a noose and she knew it, but did she really have to tighten the knot so much?
“I’m sorr…”
The door busted open and in barreled Collin with a swollen eye and a slit lip. His button down shirt was torn from the pocket being ripped open and there was a cut across his broad knuckles.
“What the hell,” I asked him.’
“Resin—tried to break in—beat their asses.” He huffed out. A chuckle burst from me at hearing Collin say he’d beat someone’s ass.
“It looks like they got a few in,” Colby said, running to Collin’s aid. He was barely bleeding.
Chapter Twelve
Colby
Law Enforcement agencies should be circumvented in the case of a crime.
I was sure it was Theo’s newfound disdain for Collin that blinded him to the severity of his wounds. Either that, or it was another one of Theo’s man things—where he downgraded wounds, ticking them off of his gory bucket list.
Collin had taken a real beating—for us, for Theo. Those little Resin bastards must’ve had a stepstool or a ladder. That was the only way I co
uld imagine any of them reaching his eye or his mouth for that matter. But not only had they reached it, they’d had some real power behind their punches.
“How many,” I requisitioned.
“There were five of them. Two ran for the hills as soon as they saw me. But the other three tried to take me on. I left them unconscious. I didn’t want to…”
He didn’t want to kill them or render them physically incapable. His reasoning didn’t have to be spoken aloud. We had to get through whatever this was with as little Resin casualties as possible. The more Resin that were alive—the more who had the possibility of being restored by Theo—if he was what we expected he was.
“Did you recognize any of them?”
“No. All girls of course—two of the damned biggest Amazonian looking females I’d ever seen. I swear they had bigger biceps than me.” Collin took my chin between his thumb and forefinger and drew my attention to him. “I wouldn’t hurt a female—I’ve never hurt a female—I couldn’t let them get to you—him. I couldn’t let them get to Theo. I have no suspicions left. I know what he is.”
I reassured him with an insincere smile, “I know that Collin. I’m not afraid of you. You were just protecting us.”
He offered a curt nod. Despite his obvious strength, he hissed loudly when I dabbed his cut with alcohol. I cleaned up the welt on his eye and offered him ice.
“No, we have no time. They have seen me and will know soon enough that I am assisting Theo. There are enough spies working in connection with the Synod—they will all know soon what information we are searching for.” He grabbed my elbow and implored, “Theo will need us—more than he knows.”
It was my turn to nod.
“All cleaned up,” Theo’s voice broke us from the intensity of the conversation.
“Yes. Did you make the arrangements?”
I looked to Collin, “I am ready. Can you fly the helicopter like this?”
Collin frowned, “Female, it’s a bloody lip and a busted jaw. Neither are needed for the operation of a helicopter.”
“Oh, really? I thought you flew with your lips.”
In lieu of answering, he hopped down from the counter and began gathering his things. Theo’s foot was tapping involuntarily.
“Let’s go,” I prompted. His attitude toward Collin was grating on my last nerve. It wasn’t in Theo’s personality to not show appreciation. It also wasn’t like him to be so bitter all the time. I counted on him for those things. He was encouraging and mindful of good manners where I was jaded and bitter.
I didn’t like the shift of paradigm.
Not one bit.
Maybe it was my fault. I’d made him like this—as much as one person can alter another’s personality.
His glare bore down on me as I contemplated how to get him back to his normal self. Probably more feelings and emotional vomiting and shit.
Theo handed me my bag. He took my hand, showed me a quick visual, and offered a playful smile, “Wanna try it together.”
“No!” I wretched from his grasp. What was he thinking? His hurt expression told me he thought it would be some kind of bonus to this whole ordeal.
I may have overreacted.
Just a little.
He flashed without me and before I followed, I was enveloped by his wake, the tones reading the emotions I could already read by his sorrowful eyes and lips thinned in disappointment. They were dark, muddy greens, murky like his thoughts, no doubt.
We arrived in the middle of the picture he’d showed me. My landing feet tapped on the teakwood floors. I groped Theo’s shoulders for balance, nearly toppling us both over. It wasn’t the most graceful of landings. Certainly not one for the books.
“Sorry,” I shifted, regaining my footing.
“Don’t ever apologizing for using me to steady yourself,” he said in a faint whisper.
There was too much meaning between our words lately. Everything was a double entendre.
“So this is Tibet,” I made a three sixty. The home was sparse but beautiful. Everything was built of the same teakwood. I gave myself a tour of the place while Theo stood on the porch which overlooked the landscape of peaks and valleys. The further into the house I got, the cooler it got. And when I reached the very back wall of the home, I realized why. The wall wasn’t a wall at all. It was a solid sheet of mountainous rock. The home wasn’t built on the side of a mountain as I’d first guessed. It was built into the mountain.
The house boasted three large bedrooms and one bathroom that rivaled some modern ones in the States.
I crossed through the living room and went through the sliding doors. Theo hadn’t moved from his previous position. I sidled up to him and made a childish attempt to make conversation by pushing his shoulder with mine.
“If it’s not okay, we can find somewhere else.” He said imperviously.
“Come on. I’m not that bad, am I?”
His lack of answer was my answer.
“I am not high maintenance.”
He cut me a look that argued otherwise.
“Name one thing that makes me high maintenance.”
Theo turned in my direction and began to tick off reasons on his fingers, “The soap, the Slush Puppies, the dresses, the bikinis, the shoes, the shampoo, the fingernails, the…”
“Okay, okay.” Maybe he had a point.
Doubt crawled into my heart. This wasn’t exactly the kind of mission for a newly discovered fickle girl like me. Did he need some stealth woman with highly attuned senses and at least decent manners?
“I’ll try not to be,” I swore the oath to myself more than him.
He squeezed my waist and drew me in closer, “You’re…particular. There’s nothing wrong with that. You know what you want.”
Again with the two-headed meanings.
Everything became clouded in his presence. I inhaled his exhales as if I survived on them. Had I mentioned how divine his lips were? A freckle lay directly in the middle of his bottom lip and it beckoned me to relish once again in the feel of his mouth and the things it did to me.
“You can’t do this to me,” he begged.
“Do what?”
“Always making me wonder where we are,” he took advantage of our position and stroked my back. I could almost feel the details of the pads of his fingers through the lightweight material of my dress. A remembered heat built in my chest and meandered throughout my torso, searching out his touch. “You can’t let me touch you like this and not give me anything. You love me. You said it.” He placed tender nips at my bottom lip and all logical thought fell away.
“I did.”
“You’re mine again,” he inquired sincerely.
I nodded. But I should’ve known the lack of words wouldn’t suffice for him.
“Do I need to pin you down again?” He teased.
I argued, “There’s more going on here more important than me and you.”
He narrowed his smoky eyes and tightened his hold on me. His fingers pulsed, as though they were trying to draw out more of a verbal reaction. When that failed to work, his lips, those delicious, truth serum-like appendages descended on the curve of my neck. The short hairs on the side of his head tickled my cheek bidding caged goose bumps freedom.
But when those lips reached my earlobe, I lost it.
“I’m yours.” I finally relented. All movement froze.
“Is it getting easier,” he asked in secret next to my ear. I wish that expressing my emotions was like recovering from surgery—the more you did, the easier it got. Nope. Not for me.
No,” I answered truthfully.
“It will, Querida. I’ll help you.”
Of course he would.
Must he be so damned—Theo all the time?
“There are more important things at stake here,” I attempted to change the subject off of anything but me.
“There are,” he again took up his luscious assault on my neck. “And now, with all of this settled, I can finally concentr
ate on it.”
Too bad I couldn’t concentrate on anything but how low his hands had gone. He was going for the thighs. I just knew it.
“I’m hungry,” I grasped at a straw, not quite ready to jump all the way back into our relationship so quickly. I knew it would throw him into ‘take care of me’ mode.
“Okay. Let’s go into the village for soup or something.”
“Sounds good.”
We flashed down to a valley near the town, courtesy of one of my satellite apps. Walking into town, I watched the people go about their business. Each country had their own feel and smell. Tibet, so far, smelled like candied incense and mustard powder. Bells and the bustling of street vendors selling their product filled my ears.
Monks dressed in orange garb paraded down the street in a perfect line chanting prayers, probably for themselves at the news of who would arrive the next day—nosey foreigners. One of them, the last one in the procession, caught my eye. There was something not quite fitting about him amongst his brothers. I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what the difference was. Thinner than the others, his carriage and gait registered differently than his predecessors. He caught my gaze and immediately came to a halt.
“What,” Theo followed my stare.
“There’s something different about that one.”
Theo popped a shoulder in nonchalance and dragged me away. He was always afraid I was going to start a cultural faux pas while in other countries—especially those where caning was a prominent punishment. Really I think he was saving me from possibly setting of the domino that would lead to WWIII, because that’s something I would accidentally do.
No, really, it’s something I would do.
He was completely justified in that line of thinking.
We settled on the only vendor who seemed to speak some English. The enormous hunks of meat had me squelching a gag. So when we sat on the curb of the street, our makeshift dining table, the first thing I did was scoop out my hunk, which I swore was a hoof, and plopped it into Theo’s bowl.
He chuckled at my blatant disgust for all things meat related. I wasn’t a vegetarian as a rule. But eating heavy things usually stagnated my flashing and made me feel sluggish.
