Elora looked up and searched Ram’s eyes like she was looking for evidence that he believed what he was saying. When she seemed satisfied with what she saw, she looked over at Storm and found no accusation there either.
“Should I volunteer as an incubator to try and convert the new strain?”
“NO!!” Storm and Ram answered in unison, without hesitation, and with conviction. If Elora was a normal person, she would have been startled enough by the suddenness of their response to jump from her seat.
After a few seconds of silence, she said, “Okay.” Looking between the two, she said, “I remember how I used to feel, thinking about you patrolling without me.” She let her gaze settle on Ram. “I honestly don’t know how I’m going to be able to sit at home wondering…”
Under the table she felt Ram’s big warm hand cover hers. She interlaced her fingers with his. “Maybe I should…”
Both men knew what she was about to say. Again the response was quick, sure, and in unison. “NO!!”
When a couple of beats had elapsed, Ram said, “No doubt ‘tis harder on the one stayin’ behind.” He gave her the signature killer smile. “You’ll have to endure the discomfort just like...” His smile faltered when he allowed images of himself being the one waiting for her to return from patrol. “Fuck.”
Storm looked at him with sympathy.
Elora took in a deep breath and blew it out. “As to the matter of my boys, I’d rather kill that pretty bastard than let him send my babies out before they’re ready.”
Ram scowled. “Pretty bastard?” He pulled back and looked at Elora like she’d grown a horn in the center of her forehead. “You mean the new Sovereign? You think he’s pretty?” Ram sounded distinctly unhappy about the idea.
“Way to miss the point, Ram.” She leaned into her husband so that her upper body was pressing against his arm. “Of course he’s nowhere close to walking perfection. Like you,” she purred.
His forehead cleared of lines as he smiled down at her, their faces inches apart.
“Gods of Halla. When are the two of you going to settle into old married life like the rest of us? To your point, Elora.” She looked over at Storm. “You can’t kill the new Sovereign. Without even broaching the morality of it, they would either send a replacement with the same orders, or order Glen and me to stand in. In which case they would also send the same orders. This is not going to be one of those times when you have a shot at fighting City Hall and winning.”
“City Hall?”
Elora had been in Loti Dimension for nearly two years, which was long enough to glean most cultural differences, but not all.
“Metaphor for authority.”
“Oh.”
“So. What do you do when you disagree strongly, but can’t fight?”
“Find a way to accommodate while preserving as much integrity as possible.”
“Yeah. Exactly.”
“You’re saying that, if I have to give up three boys, I can at least control the situation to the extent of picking the ones that stand the best chance of surviving.”
“Yep.”
Elora stared at Storm for a few minutes while various candidates filed through her head. When every one of them ended with a vicious vampire bite, she finally shook her head and said, “No. The new Sovereign has to die. He and every replacement they send. Storm, if that’s you, I’m sorry. You’ve been a really good friend. And rescuer. I’m auntie to your little girl and BFF to your wife, but I’m not sending lambs to slaughter even for you.”
Ram chuckled, slouched into the booth leather, and threw back a shot of Irish whiskey.
“Elora…” Storm started.
She hissed at him. “We’re supposed to be keeping the innocent safe from monsters, Storm. That includes those boys. I don’t have any kids who are ready to be knights.”
“I’ve got two Solomon Nememiah Medals of Honor that say otherwise.”
Elora looked at him like she’d been slapped. She opened her mouth, but having lost her breath, it took her a while to whisper, “No.”
The challenging expression on Storm’s face melted into regret when he saw how deeply she was affected by the possibility that she’d have to give up the two boys who’d saved her own life. She looked at him like he’d just suggested throwing her own children to wolves.
“I’m sorry. I know you’ve gotten close to the trainees since you moved back here.” He nodded toward the surroundings in general. “I don’t mean to be so hard ass about it. What can we do to help?”
She took in a shallow breath like she was fighting for emotional stability and shook her red and pink head. “There’s no good angle. If you put the trainees with veteran knights it’s not only dangerous for the trainees, it’s dangerous for the knights…” She stopped like she’d just received a message from the gods. “That’s it! I need to be scheduled to go with them when they draw on rotation. I’ll be their fourth!”
“NO!!” They answered in unison.
“The two of you are beginning to sound like the narrator’s chorus in a Greek tragedy,” she scowled. “And, in the words of the new Sovereign, it’s not up to you.”
“The fuck ‘tis no’.”
“Elora, you’re a member of B Team and we’re one of those outfits that’s hard to get into and hard to get out of once you’re in. I know what you’re thinking. It’s on your face plain as the day is long. You can’t babysit knights. Not even very shiny new ones.”
“I can.”
“No,” he said firmly. “You cannot. If The Order is going to give them the title, then you have to give them the respect that goes along with it. Compromising their confidence, which is what you’d be doing - and they’re not dumb - threatens their safety more than a nest of vampire ever could.”
Lines formed between Elora’s brows as she let that sink in. She looked over at Ram, who responded with a slow nod. “Give the fucker his due, love. He’s no’ always right, but this time he is.”
“After he put that out there, even if I didn’t think he was right, I couldn’t go with them now. Just on the off chance that he is right. Thanks a lot, Storm.”
He shrugged. She was being sarcastic, but she should have been giving him genuine thanks because he was right.
“I’ve been so preoccupied thinking about what this means for me.” She looked at Ram. “And you.” She looked at Storm. “And you. And my boys. I hadn’t even thought about how awful this must be for poor Baka. He was so, I don’t know, euphoric about the vaccine putting an end to the plague. I’ll bet he’s taking this really hard.”
“Well, I’ll tell you one thing,” Storm said. “He’d better make sure he keeps his ass away from fangs because there won’t be any ‘third time is the charm’.”
Ram snickered.
“That’s not funny,” Elora scowled at Ram whose smile didn’t waver in the least.
Storm’s cell vibrated against his hip. He pulled it out and glanced across the table at Ram and Elora. “Kay.”
He opened the connection with a tap. “Yeah?”
Storm jerked the phone away from his ear. Ram and Elora could hear Kay yelling from across the booth. “Hold… (pause). Hold… (pause) Hold… (pause) HOLD ON JUST A MINUTE!” I’m putting you on speaker. Ram and Elora are here.”
“Well, hail, hail the gang.”
The three looked at each other. Sarcasm wasn’t Kay’s typical style.
“Look. We’re all in the same boat,” Storm said. “Nobody’s happy about this.”
There was a long pause before Kay said, “What’s the real story? There’s got to be more to this than just report in seven days.” Kay made some sort of indescribable noise. “SEVEN DAYS!!”
“We’re not ALL in the same boat. Ram and Elora have got each other. I can’t bring Katrina to J.U. and you can’t bring Litha either.”
Storm looked around the table. His gaze fell on Elora and stayed there. “That’s partly true. Since Litha’s an employee, she could move in here te
mporarily if she wanted to, but one thing is for sure. Wherever they are, Trina and Litha are not going onto the patrol schedule.”
Kay’s sigh was long and heavy enough that they heard it over speaker. “Yeah.” He was sounding a little calmer. “That is something on the positive side.” (Pause.) “I’d like to say that Elora is equipped to take care of herself, but we all know that’s not true.”
“Hey!” She jumped in while they chuckled. “Getting hung like meat while biters feast on your naked body and try to drain you isn’t exactly a picnic.” They stared at her without saying anything, each caught in the throes of his own memory. “Well. I guess it is a picnic if you’re vampire.” She smiled, not wanting to remain in that memory a second longer.
“So,” Kay said. “Seven days. You told Litha?”
“I’m not calling from the hospital.”
Kay laughed darkly. “Yeah. She could do it, too. What I’m likely to get out of it is a very sullen, unfun wife and a very dry wick.”
“Hey!” Elora repeated. “Ladies present.”
“Oh?” Kay said. “Who else is there?”
She snorted. Ram grinned. “No’ a problem, lover boy. Just flip the switch in that great room of yours and start the mirrored ball goin’ round. She’s a sucker for your Disco Dino. I give her less than three songs to be callin’ your wick wicked.”
He wiggled eyebrows at Elora when he said the word “wicked”.
“You’re never growing up, are you?” she asked.
“From here it looks like growin’ up is highly overrated,” he said as his hand was slowly creeping up her thigh under cover of the tabletop.
She gave him a receptive smile, but moved his hand away and whispered, “Later,” into the beautiful pointed ear that was closest to her.
Storm abbreviated the events that culminated in the necessity for recall and, after Kay fully understood the gravity of the new developments, he resumed the Kay persona that they knew, loved, and counted on.
“Better get to it. I’ve got a lot of wrapping up to do if I’m going to be there in a week. So what are they saying about how long they’re going to need us?”
The three in the booth looked from one to another and shrugged. “They didn’t say. The new Sovereign…”
“New Sovereign? That’s news you left out. Who and when?”
“Guy who’s been hunting in Brazil for a few years. Seems okay so far. The biggest surprise is that he’s kind of taking to it like a duck to water. I swear you’d think he’d done it before.”
“That’s got to be a load off you and that kid.”
“Seems to me Glen and I just jumped out of the room temperature pan and into the fire. The Sovereign gig comes with headaches and long hours, but at least it’s a desk job.”
“You have a point.”
“Speaking of points, you in shape for hunting? I bet you have a paunch.”
“Yeah? I’ll see you on the mats. ‘Bout a week from now.”
“Count on it.”
Storm looked over at the famous couple across the table. “No point in delaying the inevitable. Better let the better half know what’s up.”
“She’s got to come pick you up anyway. Have her come join us for drinks right now. We’ll all four talk it over together,” Elora said.
“You don’t think that will make her feel like it’s an ambush?”
“I think there’s no good way to say this. I think that if she sees that none of us want this, but that we don’t have any choice, it will go down easier.”
He pulled out the phone and pushed a contact. She answered. “What are you doing?”
“I’m at the Farmers Market. Glen’s coming to dinner. He’s still a growing boy and I want to feed him good stuff.”
Storm grunted at that. “Growing boy, huh? What about me?”
“You’re a boy, but your body has finished growing.”
“Well, can it keep? What you bought? I’m having drinks with Ram and Elora. Something important’s come up and we were thinking you could join us for a little while.”
“What is it?”
“Tell you when you get here?”
There was a pause that made Storm visibly nervous. “Are you in the lounge?”
“Yes. We’re in one of the booths.”
She hung up.
A few minutes later Storm reached for his tumbler and raised it to his lips, but jumped when she appeared next to him.
“Gods Almighty, woman!” He set the glass down and started swiping at the spilled whiskey. He motioned to the bartender and pointed to his shirt. Within seconds he was holding a damp white linen towel.
“’Tis goin’ to take more than that to cover the aroma of that fine whiskey you’re now wearin’.”
Litha wiped Storm down with the damp towel doing a terrible job of hiding the fact that she was amused.
“I ordered you a double foam latte with cinnamon, but it may have cooled off.”
“Not a problem.” She curled her fingers around the mug and four seconds later steam was rising along with an enticing aroma newly refreshed.
As she brought the cup to her lips Storm smiled and shook his head. “Some things you just never get used to.”
She took a sip and moaned approval as her eyes slid closed. When she opened them, she looked around the table. “So what’s up?”
Elora spoke before Storm had finished his internal deliberations on the best way to proceed with breaking the news. “We’ve been recalled to active duty.”
Litha was at full attention instantly. She jerked a big-eyed gaze to Storm. “What does that mean?” she asked him point blank.
“Well…” he started, but Elora beat him to it again.
“It means B Team is back in duty rotation in ten days. All of us. Including Kay.”
Litha cut right through the turbulent emotions circulating around the table. “No,” she pronounced with an emphatic shaking of her wild curls.
“Baby…”
Storm didn’t get far with whatever he was going to say.
“No. And that’s the end of it, buster.”
There was nothing funny about the situation and Storm knew that making light of it wasn’t the best way to handle a worried wife. But she was cute when expressing authority and he couldn’t help but chuckle a little. “Buster?”
Unconsciously he reached over to push a wayward tendril back from her face. She slapped his hand away. “I’m not kidding!” A noticeable flush was creeping into her cheeks. “I have to get dinner started. We’re having company tonight.” She was looking around for her purse.
Storm looked across the table.
“Sorry,” Elora mouthed.
He shrugged. “I’m gonna catch a ride with her.” He looked like a kid on the way to the principal’s office. Ram and Elora nodded silently and sympathetically.
As soon as Storm cleared the booth and stood Litha snapped a purple sheepskin lined handcuff on him and they were gone.
Ram looked at Elora. “So. That turn out like you were thinkin’?”
She gave a little shrug that Ram found charming and feminine, maybe even adorable. Of course he found most things about her charming and feminine. And the rest he found adorable.
“I hoped we could soften the news, but we didn’t really get a chance. I haven’t seen her that upset since…”
As Ram leaned into Elora he caught and held her eyes. “Since her da’ lost him in the passes. That what you were goin’ to say?”
Elora took in a deep breath. “Maybe she hasn’t had enough ‘normal’. It’s always something. A long lost demon dad. Having a baby in record time. Storm being lost. Rosie growing up in a few months. Then leaving. I guess we just witnessed the last straw up close and personal.”
“I would no’ be surprised if she took him straight to some other worldly hideout and left him there where she thinks she can keep him safe, sound and all to herself.”
She looked at Ram with an open mouth. “You’re wearing that
you-can’t-tell-what-I’m really-thinking face, but I know you’re joking. Litha isn’t the sort of person to take prisoners. And especially not her husband.”
Ram leaned back and put both arms across the back of the wide booth in a display of masculine territorialism. “If you say so.”
“Besides. Can you see Storm accepting that? Meekly submitting to being a love slave?”
Through the thin fine cotton of Ram’s tee, Elora saw his abs contract with silent laughter. “Love slave is it? ‘Tis a fantasy of yours?” He arched an eyebrow and canted his head to indicate interest in the subject as he brought his face closer. “You been holdin’ out on me? ‘Cause I’m thinkin’ I would go willin’ly and comply eagerly.”
Her lack of rejoinder coupled with the serious expression on her face made him stop teasing and sit up suddenly. He glanced around, leaned into her and dropped his teasing tone about an octave. “Are you entertainin’ an image right this second?”
She looked away, but couldn’t hide a telltale blush.
Ram’s eyes twinkled with wickedness as his smile returned. “You are!” He slid closer and put his mouth next to her ear, grinning. “Tell me.”
“No.” She pushed him away playfully.
“Aye.” He doubled down by drawing a finger up her outer thigh. “Tell me, love. I’ll die if I do no’ know.”
She started laughing. “You will not die, Ram.”
“Oh. I will. I swear.” He said the words into her hair, her ear, and her neck.
“Stop it,” she said giggling. “Drink your whiskey.”
He looked down at the tumbler sitting half full on the table, but it didn’t distract him for long. Within a second he was right back on target, enjoying the game of extracting information from her as much as a hunt.
“The whiskey can wait. What I’m after now is a look inside that beautiful head.”
“Gah. Rammel. Some things are personal. Just mark that door private and move on to something else.”
He sat back. “Private? Personal? These are no’ words I’ll be acceptin’ if there’s somethin’ I could be doin’ to please. Somethin’ that‘s been left undone.”
“You mean you’ve never thought about anything, um, sexual and kept it to yourself? Really?”
Knights of Black Swan, Books 7-9 (Knights of Black Swan Box Set Book 3) Page 11
