by A. C. Arthur
Eli inhaled deeply and let the breath out slowly.
“I’m not better. I pretend and I deny reality. But you, you’ve done a phenomenal job overcoming your past. You’re a great guard and you’re trustworthy and loyal. You are so much better than they are, Nivea.”
“But I’m a part of them. I’m a part of the man that kills his own kind. Or now, is selling them to the highest bidder. For the last five hours I’ve been worried sick that the woman that would blame me for her perverted husband was going to be killed. I’ve spent all these years away from my sisters in order to protect them. I didn’t send his ratchet ass to a human prison because I loved my sisters and my mother too much. What does that make me, Eli? How impossibly screwed up does that make me that I could let him get away with what he did?”
Eli moved across the seat, chancing the anger he could almost see emanating from her body, and choosing instead to try and soothe the hurt that was so evident in her voice. He wrapped an arm around her, tried to pull her against him. She didn’t budge, but she didn’t pull away again either.
“It makes you stronger and better than any of them, Nivea. It makes you the woman I’m damned proud to have standing beside me in battle.”
She’d turned to him then, staring into his face so intently Eli thought she might see right through him.
“Right,” she said quietly. “Thank you for saying that, Eli. Thank you very much.”
CHAPTER 18
For the first time since she was seventeen years old Nivea Cannon was confused. As she sat on the edge of the bed in her room she wondered why she was here at Havenway. Why, with all that had happened to her, had she come here and trained to be a guard? She could have gone anywhere and done anything.
Still, leaning forward with her head hung low, she was unable to figure out why here, why with these people, and why on earth was all of this coming down on her now?
It had been two hours since they’d returned. She hadn’t been able to get out of that truck fast enough. Her throat was raw from her heavy breathing because she’d felt like she was going to suffocate on the trip back. Eli was so close to her and saying so many things, she wanted to remember them all, to believe every word, and yet she couldn’t.
She wouldn’t. Ever again.
Once she’d been safely behind her closed bedroom door she’d convinced herself that she needed to shake off the self-pity and go check on her sisters, but that had been thwarted by another female that she wanted to put into a headlock.
“Orders are no visitors,” Rayna told her with a smirk.
Nivea really hated this chick. For one, she looked at Eli like he was a piece of steak cooked just right and she couldn’t wait to sink her teeth into him. Well, to be fair, she looked at most of the shifters around Havenway in the same manner. Tramp! And two, Nivea didn’t trust her. She didn’t like the glint in her cool blue eyes and that wasn’t because she was a Lormenian either. Nivea was not prejudiced by any means. There was just something about her that screamed “watch your back” each time Nivea was in her presence. The fact that she’d managed to save Shya Delgado may have bought her some get-out-of-jail-forever tickets with Rome and Nick, but Nivea was still holding strong to her instincts.
“They’re my sisters,” she’d retorted, really not in the mood for this female today.
“That doesn’t change my orders,” Rayna insisted, folding her arms over breasts that were barely contained by the tight-ass shirt she wore.
“That’s not the uniform,” Nivea said without her usual calm. She’d been up for hours. A hybrid had tried to choke her out. She’d seen her sisters tied in chains and oh yeah, her mother had bitch slapped her and called her a whore. Yeah, today was really not her day.
“It’s my uniform,” Rayna fired back.
Nivea’s fists clenched at her sides and then she exhaled slowly. “Look, just give me five minutes.”
“I’ll give you three to get your ass back to your room.”
And that was it. Nivea was in her face, hands gripping the Lormenian’s shoulders as she pushed her out of the way. Rayna went along with the shove but put her leg out so Nivea stumbled, almost smashing her face into the door.
“Whoa, hold on. What’s the problem here?” X appeared, pulling the females apart and directing his question to Nivea.
She heaved and pushed the hair she’d left hanging loose back from her face. “I want to see my sisters.”
“You know the drill, Cannon. They’re being debriefed,” he told her.
“Then I should be in there.”
X shook his head. “You should be in your room.”
Nivea’s lips went into a thin line, anger boiling just at the surface. She would respect X for the position he held but he might just get cussed out if he didn’t hurry up and move away from that door.
“So I shouldn’t be a part of my sisters’ debriefing and I shouldn’t have been a part of the meeting with all of you head honchos even though I’m personally involved in what’s going on. I should just close myself in my room like a good little female.”
“A good little bitch you mean,” Rayna said from behind X.
Nivea didn’t even bother to jump at her because she knew X wasn’t going to let her punch the tramp in her face.
“It’s protocol,” X told her.
“You’re lying,” she fired back.
He sighed.
“Okay, it’s Eli’s call. He said he was going to come talk to you about everything that went down. He’s probably waiting for you in your room now.”
“Bullshit!” she yelled. “I don’t have to sit around and wait for him like a good obedient—”
“Bitch, like I said,” Rayna added.
“You!” X shouted over his shoulder. “You’re relieved. Go. Now!”
Rayna didn’t look at all bothered by the Lead Enforcer’s reprimand, simply slunk her trashy self away, having the audacity to look over her shoulder at Nivea and smile. Nivea simply shook her head, rubbing her temples in the process.
“Look, X, I get it. I know the protocol, but I just want to make sure they’re okay.”
“They’re fine. Ary checked both of them out and they’ve been given some food. Kalina and Caprise are talking to them now and I’m sure one of them will fill you in on what’s being said. But for right now, you just need to go back to your room and sit tight.”
He’d rubbed her shoulder as he said that, like a big brother. She figured it was the equivalent of patting her on the head. Deciding it just wasn’t worth it to stand here and keep arguing with him, she simply turned away without saying another word.
Now in her room again she couldn’t do anything but think and hate her thoughts and wonder why she was even having them in the first place. She’d come so far, had healed so much and yet, these past few weeks had felt like she’d gotten on the treadmill and run backward a kazillion miles. It was heartbreaking and she wanted to cry.
But she didn’t.
She raged, she thought, she made her decision and when he knocked on her door, she didn’t even move to let him in.
“Hi,” Eli said when he finally used his override code to enter her room. She hated that he had the authority to do that.
She did not speak to him, did not lift her head. She just couldn’t at the moment.
“Listen, Rome is going down to talk to Cannon again, to see if he’ll give up who the buyer is. We were thinking it was Crowe but after checking the man’s financials, it doesn’t jibe. No way does he have the thousands of dollars that Cannon was being paid to deliver those shifters. There has to be a middleman.”
Eli continued to talk and Nivea only half listened.
“It’s possible the middleman could be a rogue. When you told Kalina that you saw the tattoo your father used on one of the dead guys at the cabin, she contacted one of her cop friends in Cecil County and learned the names of the dead men. Of course they only recovered one body, the one with the tat had been removed. But there was a wallet
with an ID at the scene that the cops were still searching. The name sounded familiar to Kalina so she ran it through the shifter database. It was Kegan Charles, brother of Darel Charles who was killed about a month ago. Darel was in deep with Sabar, if you remember. So we’re really working the rogue being the third man angle.”
He paused, took a deep breath, and wondered why she hadn’t spoken. Nivea looked up then, staring directly at him.
“Do you want my applause?” she asked him. “Or should I simply be grateful?”
He actually looked perplexed. “What?”
Nivea came to her feet, confidence surging through her bloodstream like a drug.
“Do you want me to thank you for coming to give me this information? For allowing me to sleep in your bed, to receive your sexual prowess, when you know damned well you never intended to mate me?”
The look of surprise turned to annoyance and then to muted anger, all in the span of about ten seconds. Nivea almost smiled with amusement.
“I don’t understand,” he said finally. “I thought we were talking about your father and how he’s connected to what’s going on with us.”
Nivea shook her head. “No,” she told him. “I know my father is a betraying asshole and that everything he’s done his entire life has led him and his family to this exact point in their lives. But thank you so much for relaying the highlights from today’s meeting to me. Even though none of that comes close to talking about what’s going on with us.”
Eli took a step back, literally and physically. She watched him brace himself, legs spread apart, muscled arms coming up to cross over that broad and well-defined chest. He had the perfect body—slim waist, washboard abs, thick bulging muscles in his chest, biceps, and thighs. She could actually visualize him naked and aroused standing there in front of her. But she didn’t. Instead she saw the shifter that had taunted her with his presence, albeit not intentionally, for more years than she could count.
Fortunately, for Nivea, that time was over.
“Okay, you’re right. I’ve been giving this some thought.” He took a deep breath and released it slowly, as if whatever he was about to say was so heavy he had to prepare himself to say it. “Why don’t you just pack up all your stuff and move into my room?”
For a moment Nivea didn’t think she’d heard him correctly and apparently her silence—and most likely odd glare—signaled him to expand on his little statement.
“I mean, if we’re sleeping together—and since everybody knows we’re sleeping together—then we might as well do it officially.”
She nodded slightly. “And moving all my things to your room is making our sleeping arrangement official?”
“Yes,” he said with another sigh as if this was truly hard for him. “I made it very clear to Rome and everyone else that we are together. They all know where we stand now,” he continued.
Nivea narrowed her eyes at Eli, resisting the urge she had to run over and swat at him with her clawed hand. The cat inside hissed because that’s precisely what it wanted to do.
“They all know that you’re sleeping with me.”
Now he looked exasperated, which Nivea thought was good. At least he was showing some emotion where they were concerned.
“Last time I checked we were sleeping with each other, Nivea. What is your problem? I thought this was what you wanted?”
And that was it, the proverbial straw that broke, yada, yada, yada.… Nivea was moving before she could think better of it. Her cat was pressing forward, taking this seemingly human situation in its own hands. With a pointed finger she jabbed directly into the center of Eli’s chest.
“You are an idiot!” she yelled into his face. “We were not sleeping with each other, asshole. I was making love to the shifter I thought was my mate! Now you go and tell everybody that we’re sleeping together and then come in here with your chest all poked out, spoon feeding me the information you want me to have, when you want me to have it like you’re doing me some big ol’ favor. Well, I’ve got news for you, Eli Preston. I don’t need any of this and I don’t need you!”
Her chest heaved, her hand wanted to shake but she willed it not to. Eli hadn’t moved, the bastard. He was still standing perfectly still, staring down at her through those stupid-ass shades that she wanted to reach up and grab. The moment she tried, he thwarted the effort by gripping her wrist when her fingers were a couple of inches away from his glasses.
“Don’t,” he said solemnly.
She yanked away from him then, taking a step back to steady her breathing. “That’s right. Don’t touch Eli’s precious glasses. Don’t ask Eli to share any piece of himself with you that’s beyond the physical. Don’t expect him to get past his big dark past and move into a blissful future with you of all people, Nivea, because that’s never going to happen.”
He opened his mouth to say something and Nivea’s hand flew up into the air to stop him. “Oh no, don’t you dare,” she said. “Don’t you dare try to say something that you think will make this better. It will probably only piss me off to the point where I’m ready to literally knock your head off!”
She was glaring at him now, knowing full well that her cat’s eyes were visible, and she didn’t give a damn.
“I want you and your arrogant words and thoughts to get the hell out of my room. And if you think of coming back here without offering…” Her words trailed off. “No, Eli. No. Don’t you ever think about coming back here or to me again. Ever!”
There was nothing he could offer, Nivea realized with a start. Nothing that Eli Preston was willing to give her that would fill the void that she’d just concluded might never go away.
* * *
That night Eli lay on his cot staring up at the ceiling until his eyes closed of their own volition. In an instant he was back in the Sierra Leone rain forest, the evening air thick with humidity beneath its thick canopy. The hut he and Ezra shared was unusually quiet and when he looked over expecting to see his brother in the bed beside him, it was instead the naked body of a female that had him sitting straight up. Breathing heavily he let his feet hit the matted floor, sweat already pouring from his mostly nude body. For endless moments he sat on the side of that cot staring at her curvaceous backside, the straight spinal cord and long legs. Hair, dark in the dimness of the room, fell like a scarf onto the pillow. Up, down, in and out, slowly, measured, she breathed.
When staring did not seem to be getting him anywhere and fear snaked around his neck like a noose, Eli stood. Deep inside like a pulse, the need beat slowly at first, then more persistently as he continued to watch her. It burned and when he swallowed, it felt like acid pouring over an open wound. It was so painful to want this way and to not be able to possess.
Acacia was not his. She was mated and nothing, not even the intriguing Topètenia twins were going to change that. Fine, he’d thought with a clench of his fists. That was the way it had to be.
Leanne was sweet and soft and accommodating, until he told her there would be no commitment. No marriage and no damned house with a picket fence to hold their children—their half-breed children. There was no future there for Eli because Leanne was a human and his gut instinct told him that humans would never understand or tolerate a Shadow Shifter. He’d been as honest with her as he could about his limitations and in the end, that honesty had killed her.
Just as the brutal honesty he’d had to face with Acacia had led to the outpouring of anger that had controlled him, forcing him and Ezra to kill her.
Now there was Nivea … no, he thought. Just no.
Eli turned away from the female lying on the other cot. Just as he’d done years ago after Leanne’s death. He was finished with females, done with all those trappings that mating and joining and loving entailed. It just wasn’t for him. It couldn’t be.
And yet …
“Eli,” she called to him, her voice like a whisper on the dew-scented air.
“Come back to me, Eli.”
He was shak
ing his head as the words were repeated. She begged, she needed. That burning inside him ceased, as if a slow, cool trickle had tempered it.
“Eli.”
Each time she spoke his name something inside him shifted. His cat reared up eagerly, intrigued by the voice, the calling. That dark pain that had been as steady a part of him as breathing lessened, until he had to completely focus on it to identify its presence. And the cool, the soothing, the need swirled around like a building storm.
When she called his name again he turned, his eyes opened wide—no sunglasses—ready and waiting to see, to reach out and maybe this time, just maybe to hold onto.
But when he looked down she’d turned onto her back and was staring up at him. Her eyes a soft brown, her cheekbones high, chin stubborn. Her hair was free, unlike the ponytail she wore when in battle. She lifted her arms to him, the scar from when Rimas had stabbed her in the shoulder long gone. And she called to him again, “Eli.”
“Nivea,” he whispered a split second before noticing the necklace.
Its band was a circle of pure gold. At the center was a cascade of quartz pieces surrounding a clear yellow orb like a halo. No, Eli thought with a gasp, an eye—a jaguar’s eye.
“Boden,” he whispered, his gaze glued to the necklace. “Boden’s joining necklace for Acacia.”
With a start, face damp, chest heaving, Eli sat straight up in his bed in his room at Havenway. He stared over to his dresser where he’d put the box that had been mailed to him at his shop.
He picked up the necklace, felt its heat in his palms as he held it, as if it were alive. It wasn’t and neither was the one it had been meant for. With a frown he realized that’s what all of this had been about.
Boden was sending him a personal message. The conniving bastard had been planning this moment, this revenge for his mate’s death, all along. And now Eli would have to come full circle. He would not return physically to the place and time that had changed his life forever, but everything that had happened in the Sierra Leone rain forest was about to land right at his doorstep. He was finally going to have to deal with his past head-on, and that was just fine. If Boden wanted to try and take a piece of him, Eli was more than willing to oblige the exiled shifter. But he was certain that Boden had no idea what he was in for … and for that matter, neither did the rest of the Shadow Shifters.
