Nate barked out an amused laugh, shaking his head in disbelief.
“I’m glad you think it’s funny Sheriff.”
“Oh Cyd, she’s just trying to screw with your head. Besides, anyone with half a clue would know that you were the one lured in by my all too obvious charm, wit and innate skill with the ladies.” He leaned over, planting a brief hot kiss on her stunned lips. “Remember, you were the one to ask me to dance in the first place.”
“Only because Darcy made me.” Okay she hadn’t intended to blurt that revelation out quite so tactlessly.
Nate’s arm flexed so taut under her grip she was forced to let go.
Nate’s voice when it came was a harsh low whisper. “Just how far did Darcy instruct you to go?”
“Excuse me?” She crossed her arms over her body, rearing back, hoping he wasn’t implying what she thought he was implying.
“You said it yourself. Darcy will go to practically any extreme to get what she wants. So I think it’s a fair question. Did she tell you to insinuate yourself into my life, did you intentionally get in the middle of this vamp mess so I’d demand you stay? Just how far are you willing to go to get the information Darcy wants?”
“Why don’t you just ask?” Charisse was suddenly vibrating with anger. “Ask, if my having sex with you today wasn’t all part of my master plan to get you to spill the beans regarding Darcy’s mystical mark? Please, she’s my cousin, and madder than a cut snake but she would never… never, ask me to whore out my body. My talent, sure, she has no qualms about manipulating me on that front. But to say… to imply, that I’m some sort of… Goddess, I can’t even look at you right now. Go kill Destiny.” She waved a hand in a dismissive gesture.
“What, so then you can leave? Forget the last few days ever happened? That seems to be a recurring theme in your life Cyd. Put your head in the sand and maybe the problem will go away. Maybe one day the rock will magically reach its dickhead quota and say thanks for all your hard work Cyd, were done. Is that why you so eagerly shove men down its gullet? Is that why you let the thing manipulate you at every turn, practically indenturing you out there? Have you ever once dug your heels in deep and said ‘no more’? To hell with the cost? To anyone? To the rock? Darcy? To the men who prostrate themselves at your feet?”
Charisse fisted her hands, fighting the urge to punch him. “Why are you trying to pick a fight with me Nate?”
“Because from the moment I met you, I thought you were the most gorgeous, sassy… complicated woman I’d ever had the privilege to meet. You’ll go toe to toe with me. Maat, you’ll face off with Vampira but you won’t admit to having hopes or dreams. You’re so busy treading water Cyd, you’re letting life pass you by.”
“That’s not true.” Charisse rested her clenched fists on her hips.
“No. Then tell me why you’re so determined to push me away at every turn? Keep me at arm’s length? Giving me that whole Darcy made me crap?”
“Nate.” Charisse grit out his name.
“No, I believe I have a vampire Queen to destroy so that you can hurry back to your fulfilling life.” He turned to head downstairs.
Charisse did the only thing she could think of to stop him. She opened her mouth and began to sing.
“Maat, woman.” Nate slapped his hands over his ears, turning to scowl back up at her. “Don’t do that.”
“Well don’t you lay all that crap on me and expect to just walk away without letting me have my say.” Charisse walked slowly down the stairs until she could look directly into his eyes. “First off, you don’t get to judge my life. Not the man who describes his own existence as ‘mostly’ satisfying. That pretty much sounds like the definition of treading water to me. I get you’re shaking things up, buying the Folly, doing it up… but I am not part of your renovation project. You don’t get to judge my relationship with Bettina just because you’ve known me for a week and we’ve slept together.” She took a deep breath, the echo of her words rolling through the house was eerie, but she refused to get distracted.
“You don’t know what the past fifteen years have been like for me… the pressure, the pain. Dealing with it alone. And you certainly don’t get to be upset because Darcy strong-armed me into dancing with you. After all the traps she’s laid for you, are you actually shocked I had an ulterior motive in asking you to dance? A dance which half way through you just up and walked away from, I might add. What was that all about?”
Nate froze for a split second before exhaling deeply. “Is that everything?”
“No, because I’d like to know why you’re suddenly angry with me? And I’d sure as heck like to know why I’m now yelling at you?” She drew in a deep breath, trying to calm down. “Now I’m finished.”
Nate lifted a hand, reaching out to cup the side of her face gently. “I’m angry at you because I… care. And I really, and I can’t stress this enough, really don’t like walking into a room to find someone holding a gun to your head.”
Charisse shifted her weight, leaning into his hand. “I like that you care…”
“But?” He forced himself to say the unspoken word out loud.
“But I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“Because?”
Charisse bit her lip. “You have to ask? Now you know about Bettina and exactly how much of a bad bet I really am?”
“Like I said Cyd, from the first moment I laid eyes on you I knew you were different and I think you felt the same way about me. I know you think Bettina’s presence in your life is a big deal and that your family are kind of demanding and… unique. But essentially, they’re just excuses. And I think you know it. You keep saying one thing Cyd but your actions… your actions say a completely different story when it comes to me.”
Charisse jerked her head back suddenly from his touch, as if she was only just realising the intimate hold he had on her.
Nate shook his head, laughing under his breath.
“What?” She scowled, confused by his amusement.
“You know what you said a minute ago about it not being a good idea for me to care? Well that ship has long since sailed Cyd.” From outside came the crash of steel against steel. “It sounds like Destiny is getting impatient to meet her maker, I have to go.”
“Damn you Nate.” She hissed softly under her breath. “Don’t get dead out there tonight, this conversation isn’t over.”
“Count on it Cyd.” He handed her the small cross bolt firing device. “You take this, my swords are downstairs.”
Charisse followed him down the dimly lit stairs to the ground floor, her mind whirling with questions. Did she really use Bettina as an excuse… not to get involved? Not to let people close? Not to plan and dream?
Perhaps no more so than a Maat warrior, who immersed himself in an immortal quest to fight injustice, right wrongs and balance chaos. Yet hadn’t Nate already proven he was willing to step beyond that world. Case in point, Kaleidoscope Folly and the mission he was on to renovate it. He had plans here… dreams and a vision for change. For more in his life than just; kill the mystical bad guys when they step out of line, sleep, wake up and do it all again the next day.
Could she truthfully say the same? What were her plans and hopes for the future? It was kind of confronting to realise she had none. Oh, sure she loved to paint. But where was the challenge in it? On a personal achievement level, triumphing over the dreaded flowery wallpaper had proven more exhilarating… more fun, than she’d experienced in… forever.
Goddess damn it, she hadn’t just become complacent when it came to Bettina, she’d become complacent with herself. What were her goals? Get out of bed, head out to Bettina, paint, go home, sleep and do it all again the next day? Hardly inspiring stuff.
Sure she was a successful painter, but success wasn’t what she sought when she painted… escape was, from her life, from Bettina, from her very small world. That’s why her paintings were so colourful and often so large. She’d felt trapped and burdened for so lon
g, she’d been suffocating and hadn’t even realised it.
Grrr, it kind of peeved her that Nate had been right. A smug warrior was an annoying warrior she’d found. Of course none of these realisations resolved the two major issues on her plate. What was she going to do to get out of the rut she’d let herself sleepwalk in to? And what, Goddess help her, was she going to do about Nate? He said he… cared for her. What in the name of the Goddess did that mean in guy speak? It was such a wishy washy word now she’d begun to think about it.
Not in fifteen years of having compliments showered upon her had a man ever declared that he ‘cared’ for her. Goddess, she had scrapes on her ass from where they’d had hot mindless sex up against the bedroom wall, the word ‘caring’ just didn’t seem appropriate after what they’d shared together. Too insipid, too minor to describe something that felt so major, life changing even.
As she followed Nate down the final staircase she glared hard at his back. So what was the right word she asked herself, if caring didn’t fit the bill? Love? She’d been battered by that word since she was a teenager. It spilled so carelessly, so effortlessly, so relentlessly from the mouth of almost every man she’d ever met that she found the word to be meaningless. Love? A word that too often in the past had made her cringe.
But Nate, he cared for her? She found herself smiling for no particular reason. They were on their way to face off against a mad vicious vampire Queen and she was smiling like some smitten schoolgirl because Nate hadn’t said he loved her but that he cared for her. Goddess help her, she was in so much trouble.
Ahead of her, setting a fast pace, Nate was almost at the doorway leading into the conservatory where he’d left a cache of wicked sharp weapons. Charisse raised the cross bolt instinctively as she caught sight of Destiny pacing outside, past the wide open double doors.
A smug smile curved the vamp Queen’s lips, her incisors glinting in the moonlight. “I was beginning to think you’d forgotten our date Lover.”
“Now Destiny would…” Nate ducked as out the corner of his eye, a shadow detached from the corner of the room, racing towards them. Shit, Destiny had a second daytime minion. Another woman, dressed in Destiny’s regulation minion attire of all black, pointing a gun at Charisse.
“Hold it right there warrior.” Her voice toneless, probably due to the noise cancelling headphones she was wearing.
Nate held his arms high, palms facing upwards, watching the new player stroll across the room as if she owned it. She looked capable and deadly, well except for the headphones and the rather raw looking bite marks on the side of her throat. Nice to know that Destiny and her gang had been eating 'in' the last few nights, rather than roaming the countryside.
Nate was surprised when the newcomer came to a halt almost directly between himself and Cyd. It didn’t make sense to him that she was prepared to put her back to one of them… unless. He didn’t have time to react as the woman pivoted and leapt, swinging her leg out wide, smashing her boot against his gut, he took a small step back. If she’d just stopped there it would have been fine, but the woman kept spinning, this time bringing her other leg around, giving him a hard booted shove to the sternum.
“No.” It was Charisse who’d figured it out. Bringing her cross bolt up, firing on reflex as one of Nate’s arms pin-wheeled back, Destiny waiting for just this opportunity snatched it lightning fast, hauling Nate across the threshold into her arms just as one of Charisse’s cross-bolts struck her high in the shoulder, a matching book end for the arrow still stuck in her ribcage.
Within the next blink of an eye Destiny was gone, taking Nate with her.
It had all happened in a matter of seconds. Still operating on instinct, Charisse dropped to the ground, flinching as the minion’s gun went off, the bullet’s trajectory well over her head. She had one cross-bolt left to fire, aiming for the woman’s torso, the biggest target, she couldn’t afford to miss. Except she did, as the woman likewise ducked and rolled away to come up her on knees, the gun once more pointed business end in her direction.
They both froze for a split second, taking stock of each other. Thank the Goddess for the almost full moon, without the light it cast Charisse may never have noticed that in the struggle the minion’s headphones had been knocked ever so slightly askew.
The note burst forth from her lips like she was firing a weapon and she supposed she was, as hardly more than a second later the minion slumped to the floor unconscious. Ignoring the sprawled figure, Charisse stumbled outside. Where in the name of the Goddess would Destiny take Nate?
She studied the splatter of black blood on the ground. She’d hit Destiny twice now. Even with her royal strength, how far could Vamperella have gotten with her injuries, carrying a warrior of Nate’s size?
Absently she slapped a hand to her side; Bettina was upset about something and fussing down their bond. Now is not the time… unless, her head snapped around. Oh no, that bitch Queen wouldn’t. Even as she had the thought her sandshoes were hitting the ground hard as she ran for the cliffs. Goddess help her, Corkscrew Point her destination.
Chapter Eighteen
Nate hated flying, but he quickly discovered he hated falling even more. Especially with Destiny’s grating laughter as an accompanying soundtrack to the wind rushing past his ears. He hit hard, flat on his back. Winded and disorientated.
His hands automatically fisting into the ground beneath him, noting the sand that had helped cushion his fall, covering what felt like rock underneath it. He had a pretty damn good idea of where he’d ended up, no surprise really, given his size and refusal to stay compliant whilst Destiny flew them away from the Folly. Vampira only had a limited number of nearby isolated destinations open to her. It was hardly a shocker they’d ended up on Bettina.
The air escaped from his lungs with a low groan for the second time in as many seconds as Destiny chose to land with one knee planted firmly in the middle of his chest.
Crouching over him she arched her back, and laughed again. “I believe I could watch you do that all day Lover? How’s the back?” She shifted position, deliberately settling more of her weight on him.
“Fine.” He was pretty sure he hadn’t broken anything, but the idea of moving was a foreign concept to the numb muscles in his lower body. So maybe he’d just lay there for a bit longer, let the vamp Queen get her monologue on whilst he gathered his strength. Time for a distraction. “Cyd’s a surprisingly good shot.”
Destiny frowned down at her injuries and pouted. Two small beads of black blood appearing on her lower lip as her fangs dug in deep. “Another outfit ruined.” Reaching over she yanked out the cross-bolt embedded in her shoulder, casually licking the blood off the end of the bolt like a lollipop. “Want some?” She offered Nate with an evil smile.
“I’ll pass thanks, trying to cut back.”
She frowned down at the bolt, only trace amounts of her blood evident. “Hmmm, and I’m still hungry… what’s a girl to do?” The smile was back on her face as she gleefully rammed the bolt into Nate’s thigh, yanking it out and popping the bloody end of the bolt into her mouth, sucking on it loudly.
Nate winced, not exactly the distraction he’d been hoping for. And now the woman had quite possibly ruined all porn for him… was there no end to her evil?
When she was finished Destiny tossed the bolt hard over her shoulder, catapulting it out into the inky black sea. “What, you thought I’d leave potential weapons just lying around out here?”
Well, he had kind of been counting on it. Wincing despite himself as Destiny tugged once, twice… three times on the arrow stuck in her side before it finally came free, arcing black blood out across the sand covered rock. Under his bare arms Nate sensed Bettina shudder in distaste as the vampire Queen’s blood came to rest. “I know exactly how you feel,” he muttered under his breath.
He’d never taken the opportunity to touch the rock on any of his previous visits. Had he always been able to sense Bettina or had something changed beca
use of his developing relationship with Cyd? Either way it was kind of unsettling for him to have evidence that the ground beneath him had feelings.
“Really?” Destiny, always thinking the world revolved around her, responded. “And just how am I feeling Lover?” She enquired, throwing the arrow casually over her shoulder, on the same trajectory path as the cross-bolt before leaning over so her face was mere inches away from his.
Nate tried not to tense. The vamp could just as easily be going to kiss him as bite his lips right off. The smartest plan was to keep her talking whilst the feeling continued to return to his lower body. “That the time for game playing between us is over.”
Destiny’s silver, cat-like eyes stared at him unblinking. “Do tell Lover.”
Nate moved one of his hands slowly over to rest on her leg, forcing himself to give her bony thigh a slight squeeze instead of crushing it. Come on lower body, he commanded silently, get your act together. The fact that he could now feel the throbbing in his thigh from where Destiny had stabbed him with the cross-bolt was a good sign but he still had a ways to go before he could flip Destiny off. “Hasn’t my job application been successful?”
“Job application?” Destiny frowned.
“How many more minions do I have to kill before you’ll consider me for the position?”
“You want a job? Working for me?” Destiny reared back from him in genuine surprise.
“Well not so much for you, as with you.” Nate let his eyes travel slowly down her pale throat to rest for a moment on the vast amount of pale flesh she’d left exposed thanks to the low zipper on her leather suit.
“You want to be an assassin for hire?” Destiny looked more than a little dubious.
“Not particularly. But our current occupations aren’t exactly compatible, are they? Let alone conducive to us actively spending any time together.”
“You expect me to believe you’d give up being a Maat warrior and come and work for me?”
“With you.” Nate corrected.
To Seduce A Siren Page 17
