BodyGuard (Butterscotch Martini Shots Book 2)

by Jennifer Ashley

  She glared up at him. “For what reason? This blade doesn’t belong to me. It’s part of my family’s estate. As I said, I’m just the—”

  “Keeper of it. Yes, that’s correct. But there’s also a power within it that does belong to you. Only you.”

  The imploring in his peridot eyes returned. It was acute, compelling and…desperate.

  Her heart wrenched.

  “Kage… Whatever you’re thinking—”

  “Do it, Taelyn,” he all but begged. His palms cupped her cheeks and he gazed deep into her eyes. “I’ve waited so damn long for you and that sword to be in the same fucking room with me. Pick it up. Now. Please.”

  He released her. Taelyn’s throat nearly seized up with the intensity radiating from him and now flowing through her.

  But what did she have to lose? Other than to prove him wrong of whatever theory was rattling around in his head.

  He’d told her himself that the sword belonged to a slayer.

  She wasn’t that person.

  Still, she couldn’t deny him. Taelyn turned back to the bed and twined her fingers around the handle of the sword. Slowly lifted it while admiring its beauty and the way the metal gleamed in the light.

  Kage mumbled something under his breath. Words she couldn’t make out. His eyelids closed and he continued. A bit louder. A language she couldn’t even begin to discern.

  He stopped speaking. His eyes snapped open. He stared at her.

  Taelyn stared back. Her brow quirked.

  “Was that some sort of séance?” she lightly jested in hopes of cutting some of the tension.

  “Sort of,” he told her. And stared harder. “What do you remember?”

  “That some asshole shapeshifters destroyed my entire business for a weapon no one has used in centuries.”

  She returned the blade to the case.

  Kage rubbed his nape, as though a mammoth knot had formed there. “You don’t remember anything new? Anything different? Anything about your past?”

  “I still believe you about the shifters—because I saw them myself. But I have to ask, Kage… Are you on some sort of medication I should know about?”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he ground out. Dropped his hand. He secured the lid and hoisted the box, tucking it under his arm. “Let’s get the hell out of here before the wolves return.”

  He stalked off. Taelyn watched him go, at a complete loss as to what she should do now. Follow? Or take her SUV and drive far, far away from this place—and him?

  Either way, she’d need clothes. So she stuffed tank tops into a bag in lieu of a bra, since wearing one was out of the question. She added panties, socks, sweaters and jeans. Another pair of boots and gloves. Some basics from the bathroom and her purse. She changed from Kage’s T-shirt and pants and freshened up, then bounded down the steps and retrieved her keys from the upended secretary’s desk. Thank God they hadn’t stolen her car.

  Then again, what need would wolves have for it?

  Kage’s gaze dropped to her hand holding the keys. “Where are you going?”

  “I haven’t decided yet, but I am not getting back into that death trap you’re driving.”

  “Fine.” He snatched the keys from her palm. “We’ll take your vehicle.”

  “I didn’t say I was going with you,” she huffed.

  “Bodyguard,” he merely said and strutted out the door.

  Taelyn shot daggers with her eyes at his retreating backside, but that did no good. He would’ve only snickered if he’d seen her glowering.

  So she said to-hell with it and followed him out. She had no idea where she’d go without him, anyway.

  Taelyn didn’t have any family. She was twenty-six years old and her parents had died in a car accident when she was twenty. They’d both been only children and her grandparents had passed not long before them. She’d moved to Rhode Island a year or so ago and hadn’t had much time to make friends. There were a few acquaintances she’d have a glass of wine with on occasion. But mostly, she’d devoted her waking hours to collecting antiques. So she was pretty much on her own.

  The thought occurred to her that she could call Van. That made her realize she’d forgotten to grab her phone—where had she left it? She was about to turn and head back into the house when Kage said, “Get in. We shouldn’t hang around here a second longer.”

  She hedged. But then conceded Vander Cari would never comprehend what she was suddenly embroiled in. And Lord knew she didn’t want to drag him into something that would put his life in danger as well.

  So she opened the passenger door and climbed into the Range Rover while Kage secured the case in the cargo area.

  He slid in beside her and said, “The sword will be safe in the cabin, under the protection spell.”

  No, Vander definitely wouldn’t grasp any of this. Only seeing was believing in this instance.

  And if anyone knew or suspected she had the sword, she’d be much safer with ninja warrior Kage Deville than on her own or even with Van, since Kage was so well-versed in the paranormal. Could kick serious shapeshifter ass without thinking twice about it.

  She tried to find some sort of logic in how she’d unwittingly gotten tangled up in this insanity, but she didn’t know enough about the current state of affairs to piece it all together.

  And, admittedly, there was still a part of her that couldn’t stretch her mind far enough to think of vampires and “innumerable species” of demons, as Kage had referred to them. Though, in the shadowy parts of her brain, she couldn’t deny that she’d come across several books in her acquisition phases that had given accountings of nocturnal creatures that preyed on humans for their blood—and out of pure evilness.

  On the flipside, she’d also read an abundance of prophecies predicting the world’s end. Yet civilization as they knew it continued to exist.

  So she was at an impasse as to how deep this well ran and how she could stop drinking from it. Extract herself completely from the situation.

  Except…

  “You have the sword now,” she said to Kage as he took the rural, tree-lined road to the lakeside cabin. “Drop me off at the nearest bus station so I can get the hell out of Dodge and then you can reunite the sword with the slayer. Win-win, right?”

  She shot him a hopeful look.

  Kage’s grip tightened on the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. His jaw set. He ripped his gaze from the road ahead of them and said, “Taelyn. You are the slayer.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Taelyn stared at him. Stunned. Rocked. And clearly doubting she’d correctly heard every word he’d just said.

  Kage groaned. Returned his attention to the turnoff into the southern portion of the vast property where twenty or so cabins were scattered in the woods and several campgrounds lined the west and east shores of the lake as it sprawled north to the mountains.

  He was agitated and befuddled and just plain stumped. Something had gone horrifically wrong with the invocation of Taelyn’s memories. They hadn’t been restored to her, as they always immediately were when she was faced with both him and the sword at the same time. As though the enchantment on her had been broken.

  Not once in the history of her multiple resurrections had there been a single complication when reuniting her with the sword—and him—and the release of her bound memories coming to light. It happened every single fucking time. For God’s sake, Kage had this down to a science!

  Yet she’d stared at him with a blank expression when he’d performed the brief incantation the council had provided him eons ago. Well, maybe not quite so blank. There’d been a hint of who the hell is this guy and why am I listening to him? flickering in her eyes.

  Nothing had happened thereafter.

  Every occasion before, she’d literally been zapped with the recollection of who she was and what she’d willingly committed to as an eternal mission. Sure, it was sort of a mental madness, he’d learned, and it could take days for her to reconcile her
purpose and all of the extraordinary things she was capable of achieving with that sword in her hands.

  Above the skills she’d honed and the instincts she harbored that were unleashed when Kage came for her, she would also recall what they meant to each other. It took much less time for her to accept her love of Kage than to understand her position as slayer. The bond between them was so strong it transcended centuries.

  Hell, even when she didn’t have her recollections of the past and the life they’d shared, a connection always formed with them as soon as he introduced himself.

  In this current case, it had been under dire circumstances. Kage usually had a reasonable period to build a rapport with her and acclimate her to the realm of the damned. Not so this time around. She’d been thrust into this world because Davian had taken a more aggressive approach to his attack on the mortals and was invading ahead of schedule.

  Perhaps that was the problem. Taelyn had not been given ample chance to figure out who Kage was and how their existences were intertwined. Not to mention what the council expected of her—to defend her race against demonic slaughter.

  Yeah. That was a lot to grasp in twenty-four hours.

  He got it. He really did. Yet the insistency that she promptly catch up to him clawed at him. He needed her to remember her place and her role in all of this.

  Just as desperately, he needed her to remember him. Because it was torturous enough to live without her for decades upon decades. When they were finally together, all Kage wanted to do was make up for lost time. And it made him crazed to have to keep some semblance of distance. To not do everything in his power to convince her they were the loves of each other’s lives. Forever.

  He pulled up to the cabin he’d been renting since Taelyn’s rebirth here in Rhode Island. Whatever memories she had of her family were false. Whispered in her ear during the resurrection so that when she awoke as a twenty-six-year-old woman living in a house full of antiques that she brokered out, she had an entire lifetime of remembrances to prove she existed in this present world—and the forged identification to keep her current with the times.

  Her physical appearance and her name always stayed the same. She’d been Taelyn Abrams when Kage had met her in the Highlands of Scotland in the mid-twelfth century when Somerled had sacked Glasgow and conquered the Norse King of Mann and the Isles. Whispers of a demon allegiance aiding him had led Kage to Scotland—Taelyn as well. A newly ordained slayer who’d already defeated several factions of demons across England.

  They’d paired up and had eradicated the alliance rumored to be under Somerled’s control. The warlord who’d usurped his brother-in-law to rule the Isles died a decade later at the Battle of Renfrew. Kage and Taelyn had since moved on to thwart more attempted uprisings of the damned. Until the turn of the century, when she’d been wounded while protecting a kingdom from attack under the most revered of demons at the time. She’d slain him in the end…but the injuries he’d inflicted upon her had proved fatal. She’d died two days after battle. Two days after the council had enchanted her. Two days after Kage had placed a ring on her finger.

  The woman sitting next to him now knew none of this.

  A jagged pill for Kage to swallow.

  He swung the driver’s door open and went around to her side. She stepped out of the SUV and carried her bag up the porch steps. He followed her with the case in hand. They didn’t say a word as they deposited their haul and he then returned to the porch, her right behind him. He locked up, regardless of the spell, and gestured for her to get back into the Range Rover.

  He drove them to a sports bar on the outskirts of town. It was dark and dreary, with frayed gray-wood paneling on the walls, a scuffed floor and scarred tables, but the food was good and the beer was cold.

  They took a spot in the far corner where the pool table sat. No one occupied that area. In fact, there were only a handful of patrons. Three at the bar with the bartender, all watching golf on the big screen mounted on the wall above the shelves lined with liquor, and not even a half-dozen more scattered about at the high-tops across the room.

  Kage pulled out a chair for Taelyn and she sat as the server approached. A tired-looking forty-something with faded red hair and a few extra pounds on her short frame.

  She dropped two sheets of paper before Kage and Taelyn and said, “Whatever’s on the menu is what you get. No substitutions.” She eyed Kage. “The usual beer and a shot?”

  He gave a brief nod.

  “And for you, honey?” the woman asked Taelyn.

  “Whatever he’s having.”

  “Great. I like easy orders.” She turned on her rubber-soled shoes and waddled off.

  Kage said, “The burgers are the house specialty.”

  “Then a burger it is.”

  She hadn’t even looked at the menu. He pushed them away. Sat back in his chair, propped his elbows on the armrests and threaded his fingers together at his waist.

  “Do you have questions?” he asked.

  “I’m not sure.” She crossed her legs and reached for the rollup on the table, unraveling the sticker, setting aside the silverware and then absently toying with the edge of the paper napkin.

  “Not sure where to start?” Kage offered.

  “Something like that.”

  “A drink might be a good place.”

  The waitress doled out the pints of draft beer and two shot glasses. She poured the whiskey, then asked Kage, “Leave the bottle?”

  He fished out a fifty from his front pocket and handed it over. “Two burgers, loaded. Fries. Add cheese to the lady’s. Mayo on the side.”

  “Coming right up.”

  When the other woman was out of earshot, Taelyn pinned Kage with a quizzical look. “How do you know what I like? Mongolian beef, Sangiovese, cheeseburgers, dipping my fries in mayonnaise instead of ketchup?”

  “I told you when we were being attacked by wolves that I know you.”

  She leaned toward him. “How? How can you possibly know me? I hadn’t even met you until yesterday. I’ve never seen you in town, you’ve never come into my shop. I would remember meeting you, Kage.”

  Lust flared in her eyes. Her cheeks flushed.

  Kage resisted the urge to gloat that she had such an innate reaction to him—and couldn’t deny it. He was still too shredded by all she didn’t know and accept to take even the smallest of victories.

  He said, “People meet in other lifetimes, you know?”

  She stared at him. His gaze held hers for several suspended seconds. Then she snapped out of it and reached for her shot. She threw it back in one gulp. Returned the glass to the table. He poured her another before he slammed his.

  Taelyn downed the second shot. Sipped her beer. Blew out a long puff of air.

  “Alright,” she said. “I’ll bite. In what other lifetime did we know each other?”

  “In many, actually.”

  She gaped. Incredulous.

  He smirked. “You did ask.”

  Apparently catching the waitress’s approach in her peripheral view, Taelyn held in check the sarcastic retort he could clearly see she wanted to make.

  When they were alone again, they each polished off half their burgers and fries before Taelyn pushed her plate aside, did one more shot, then folded her arms on the table and demanded, “No bullshit, Kage. How do you know me? And how did you know I had the sword? I assure you, it being in my possession is not public knowledge. Yet you came looking for it. Is this all just some ruse to acquire the sword so you can sell it?”

  “I would never sell the sword,” he vehemently replied. “Not in a million fucking years. It belongs to you. Always has, always will. I’m keeping it in my cabin only because of the protection spell. The sword stays in your possession, Taelyn. It connects you to the past—and to your future. Your destiny.”

  “Which makes absolutely no sense to me at all.”

  He leaned in and insisted, “I’ve already explained to you its significance…and yours.�
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  “Oh, right,” she said, drawing out the words. “Because I’m the slayer.”

  Kage shoved his chair back and stood. Took a long drink from his beer. She gazed up at him, her brow crooked.

  He drained the glass and signaled the server for another. To Taelyn, he said, “Let’s play darts.”

  “I don’t play darts. I don’t want to play any games, Kage. I want to know what the fuck is going on.”

  He grinned despite the tension ratcheting between them. “You’ve always enjoyed challenging me. I happen to find it sexy. So come throw some darts with me and I’ll show you what you’re capable of—without even knowing it.”

  “You’re full of crap,” she countered. “I swear to God, Kage Deville. Right now, you don’t have a leg to stand on. I neither have any idea what you’re talking about, nor have I ever thrown darts.”

  He held his hand out to her. “Then this should prove especially interesting. You actually were good at this, back in the 1800s when the game was invented.”

  Taelyn glared. But she got to her feet. Avoided his hand altogether, which made him scowl. She crossed her arms over her chest in an impatient stance as he collected the small metal missiles from the board. Three for her and three for him. He joined her at the white line on the floor and, glancing at her over his shoulder, said, “We’ll start easy. Inner bullseye, dead-center. All three darts.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure that’s a piece of cake.”

  He smoothly launched each one and they clustered in the middle of the red dot on the board. Kage gathered his darts.

  “Your turn.” He moved behind her, raised his arm and gestured as he spoke. “Use a gentle, fluid motion and follow through.”

  He let go of his dart and it stuck in the inner circle again. He left it there.

  “I’m supposed to work around you?”

  He grinned once more. “Walk in the park for you, I promise.”

  “You make a lot of promises.”

  Kage stared into her eyes and said, “Stick around for a while and you’ll see I don’t break them.”