by Jaime Rush
Cheveyo’s eyes, now back to their normal color, flicked to her, then back to Pope. “You saved their lives. I’ll help you. But I won’t accept payment.”
Relief flooded through her. He was going to help. And he was doing it for her. Somehow she knew that’s what that subtle flick of his glance meant. Because Pope had saved her. The thought of that tightened her stomach.
“You called Pope an Otherling. What’s that?”
“My word for someone from the other dimension, a Callorian.”
“And you just assumed he was evil?”
“Every one I’ve encountered has been. I have no reason to believe otherwise.”
She wanted to say more about the injustice of that, but the first part snagged her. “Every one you’ve encountered?”
Pope stepped closer to her. “We have much to discuss.”
Cheveyo touched Petra’s forehead as though to brush away a stray lock of hair. His fingers remained, hot against her skin. “Leave now. There’s no need for you to be involved in this.”
His touch stole away her breath, her thoughts. She managed to shake her head. “I’m going.” She remembered he could exert influence over her. He’d gotten her to come outside once, pulling her from a dream state. Her body wasn’t moving, though. As if their bodies were magnetically drawn, she felt a force field holding her in place.
He dropped his hand and stepped back, breaking the hold. She inhaled, pulling her gaze to Pope. “Good luck. Please call me, let me know you’re all right.”
He nodded. “Thank you for your help. Have a good date. Be happy.”
Cheveyo tilted his head. “Date?”
“Yes, a social interaction with sexual motivation.” She turned and walked to the door, unable to stifle her grin. Had she imagined a flare of jealousy, of possession, in his eyes? She walked out, closing the door behind her, the screech of metal scratching across her nerves.
Walk away and go back to the normal, safe life you cherish. Whatever they’re up to, you don’t need to be involved. It’s dangerous. He’s dangerous. She conjured the memory of his eyes, black and deadly. Stay out of this. It’s not your business.
She got as far as her car, bracing her hands against the roof, pressing her forehead against the hot metal.
Don’t do this.
Dangit. She closed her eyes and tuned her hearing in to their conversation. It was an ability she didn’t use often, because it was invasive, and sometimes she didn’t like what she heard.
Cheveyo’s voice was all business. “Tell me what you know about the Otherling who’s hunting you.”
“He is called Yurek. Like you, he can manipulate the energy of his appearance, but his ability goes beyond that: he is gifted with mimicry. He can look like anyone, once he’s been near that person, and worse, can also absorb and mimic the powers of others. He was what you would call a mercenary, hired privately to take care of matters in both my and this dimension. When I saw him yesterday, I was surprised to see the Collaborate ring on his finger: a diamond shape with a C in the middle. He’s obviously working for them now. I’m sure he wants to take my place. He has been an assassin for a long time. He’s good at it.”
“So am I.” Cheveyo’s words chilled her. He meant them.
Okay, see, that’s why it’s a good idea not to be anywhere near him.
As she was about to pull out, Pope said, “That is why I wanted you for the job. When the Collaborate saw I was hiding something, they psychically handcuffed my abilities, intending to SCANE me. If they do, they will discover the existence of the Offspring.”
Cheveyo’s voice was tight. “And they will be killed.”
Her eyes snapped open, her heart lurching in her chest. They were in danger! It thrummed through her, pulsing in dark waves, closing in the edges of her vision.
“Without my major abilities, I am no longer on equal ground with Yurek. Killing him will only temporarily solve my problem, however, as they’ll only send another Extractor after me. I’m hoping my powers will return, and I will be able to handle future Extractors on my own. But I can never be taken back. Not only are the Offspring at risk, my brother would also be implicated, as it was his job to collect our father’s Essence. Some of it was taken before he could get there. The C would view that as a failure.”
“So you’re only concerned about the Offspring . . .”
“I can’t return to my home, my family. I am, in fact, a defector and criminal. My life now means nothing.”
She was walking back to the door, one foot going automatically in front of the other.
“Which brings me to the other, more important part of my request for your services,” Pope continued. “If I am captured, I want you to kill me.”
“I can do that, but be absolutely sure.”
“I am.”
The door screeched when she yanked it open. “No!” She walked in and stalked toward the two men, her finger pointing at Cheveyo. “You are not killing Pope. I couldn’t help overhear—okay, purposely hear—your conversation. I want to know and I don’t want to know. Maybe that makes me crazy, but whatever. You can’t just . . . just kill Pope! That’s not a viable solution.”
Pope shook his head. “You humans get so sentimental.”
She could hardly utter the words, “Sentimental? Sentimental? We’re talking about killing another person here! Killing you!”
Cheveyo said, “Death isn’t that big of a deal. Our bodies die, not our souls.” His voice went lower. “It’s only hell when you lose someone and you have to live day after day without them. Dying is easy compared to that.” His eyes sharpened. “You need to get away from us. This has nothing to do with you.”
“That’s not what I just heard. If he’s taken back, we’re all dead.”
“And you as well,” Pope said to Cheveyo. “You will be in my memories, too.” He shifted his gaze to her. “I don’t want any of you involved in this. Cheveyo can handle this situation, and you will be safe. Now, go.”
She had been daydreaming about, yearning for a cold-blooded killer. He’d just agreed to commit two acts of murder without hesitation.
Cheveyo put his hand on her back and ushered her to the door. He opened it but turned her to face him before he might give her a shove through the opening. His hands settled on her lower arms, and his calluses felt like the light side of an emery board across her skin. He tilted his head down, eyeing her from beneath thick black lashes. “It’s dangerous for you to be involved in this. Do you remember how it was when you were being hunted? When you were hiding in the old asylum, running through the woods with that man gunning for you?”
Those memories seized her. “How did you know?”
“I saw it, before it happened. I also saw Eric save you. Think about everything you went through.”
“I’m trying to forget.”
“Good. Forget it all. Forget what you heard today.”
Logical advice. She looked into his eyes. “Am I supposed to forget you, too?”
“Yes.” He let go of her and took a step back. “Go.”
She lifted her chin. “I will forget you. Watch me.” She started to walk but turned. “You’ll let me know if . . . if something happens to Pope?”
“Of course. But that’s not going to happen.”
Another step. “Don’t you dare kill Pope. Find a way.”
“I will.”
He looked confident. He sounded confident. She released a breath and continued walking. Everything she’d heard bombarded her as she reached her car. She never turned around again—good job on that—but felt him watching her. She wouldn’t tell the others that danger loomed unless it became an imminent threat. She set the stuffed dog on her lap as she pulled out.
“Toto, we’re still not in Kansas.”
Cheveyo watched her leave. How many hells would he have to endure where she was concerned? Every time he left her, it tore a part of him. Watching her leave was no easier. You think you’d be used to it by now.
; He closed the door and found Pope regarding him curiously. “What?” he growled, uncomfortable with being assessed.
“I find humans very interesting.”
In other words, amusing. “Must be nice not having emotions. I wish I’d inherited that from my father.”
“No, you don’t. What I sense, the pain, joy, love and hate, all of it makes you alive.”
Cheveyo glanced back at the door. “And it shreds you. She made me promise not to kill you.”
He smile was bland. “She feels loyalty, a debt of gratitude. What she feels for you, however—”
“Isn’t important. How will I know if you’re captured? I may get a vision, but there are no guarantees.”
“We bond. A replicate of the bond you share with her. You will see my capture, and I will let you know where I am. Yurek will have to take me to one of the finestras. There are two near here.”
“Finestra?”
“What you call a portal. The first finestra to your dimension was found a hundred years ago in a tomb. We named it after the ventilation hole in case anyone overheard an insider talking about it. We can’t let our population know about the finestras, which are guarded. It’s bad enough that some know about the cracks between our dimensions.”
“My father never spoke about the finestras, other than to say he’d come through a vortex a long time ago. What happens if a human finds one that leads to your dimension?”
“Humans feel them, like they feel the energy vortexes in certain areas. But their bodies won’t respond to the finestra in a way that allows them to slip through. At least not the finestras we’ve observed humans encounter.”
“What about my body?”
Pope considered that for a moment. “I would stay away from the actual finestra, just in case you have enough Callorian DNA to get you through in one piece. The guards on the other side would apprehend you immediately.”
He thought about what it would be like on their end to have someone like him pop in. Not good. “So you’ll telepathically let me know where you are.”
“You’ll have time to intercept us at the finestra, or possibly even catch up to us before we reach it. It’s more important that I die than for you to kill Yurek. The danger to the Offspring exists as long as I do. I have even considered simply having you terminate me now to save us all the trouble.”
Cheveyo shook his head. “I won’t kill you unless I have to.”
“Which is amusing, considering you had a knife to my throat minutes ago.”
“Yeah, amusing. I didn’t think Callorians had a sense of humor.”
“I get twinges now and then. This is an entertaining dimension. Maybe it’s rubbing off on me.” Pope’s pseudo smile faded. “If you do terminate me, know it is for the best. I have nothing.”
“You have the Offspring. As you said, you’re family.”
He lowered his head. “But I pose them great danger. Being near them brings even more risk. I cannot do that.” He met Cheveyo’s gaze, his light eyes softening. “I believe you understand this.”
He nodded, feeling a twist in his chest. “Too damned well.”
Chapter 3
Petra had almost canceled her date, now that her mind was muddled with thoughts of Cheveyo and Pope. And Cheveyo. And Cheveyo. As she sat across from Greg Swenson, however, she was glad she hadn’t. This was a distraction, and more importantly, a test to see if she could push all that away and pretend it never happened.
A mariachi band wended its way around Margarita’s large, crowded dining room, taking requests at each table. She rolled her eyes as they launched into their next song. How many times would she have to hear the “One Ton Tomato” song? Piñatas hung from the high rafters, and the wait staff would bat them as they passed by so the twenty or so donkeys, parrots, and sombreros were always swinging.
This was a great place for a first date, filled with opportunities to people watch and chat about surface things. She took in Greg’s blond hair, combed to one side, his bright, blue eyes and easy smile. They’d shared a couple of brief conversations as they crossed paths in the hallways at the Baltimore School of Massage. She’d sensed that he’d had to build up his courage to ask her out, which she totally didn’t understand. Was she that scary?
After the waitress brought another round of margaritas, he lifted his and said, “To having a salty margarita with a beautiful woman.”
She touched her salt-rimmed glass to his and murmured a thank-you, but those kinds of compliments felt like empty peanut shells. What she looked like had nothing to do with who she was. Even though she was taking courses to learn skin care and makeup artistry, she didn’t like being judged on her outer appearance. Confidence was key, and she was working on that from the inside out.
“Did I say something wrong?” he asked, his salt-crusted glass held aloft.
“No, not at all.” She would rather have him say she was smart or funny, though she wasn’t sure she was either. All her life people had said she was beautiful, but no one had ever made her feel beautiful.
She’d noticed a man sitting at a booth nearby. He was alone, and apparently the only people he was interested in watching were her and Greg. That he didn’t avert his eyes when she looked over made her uncomfortable.
She turned back to Greg. “So, what’s the craziest thing that’s ever happened to you?”
He rolled his gaze up, chewing on his lower lip as he thought. “I fainted at my high school prom. In my defense, the air-conditioning wasn’t working properly and I hadn’t eaten much.”
She gave him a genuine smile, though he couldn’t have guessed exactly why. See, that’s what normal people experience.
“How about you?” he asked.
“Uh . . . me?” You should have seen that coming. “Let me think.” Breaking into an abandoned insane asylum to free a prisoner? Cheveyo turning into a panther right before her eyes? She ran her finger along the salty rim of her glass and stuck it in her mouth to buy time. Of course, nothing normal came to mind. “I saved my brother’s life.”
“Wow. What happened?”
Oh, shoot. She couldn’t tell him Eric was shot. Nor could she say that, actually, she’d saved the lives of the two most important people in her life.
“CPR. He, uh, nearly drowned.”
Greg’s blue eyes lit up. “I’m impressed. What an incredible feeling it must be to know you saved someone’s life.”
“Yeah.” Her face flushed, warming to his admiration and the memories of how it felt. “When he started breathing again, it was like the world shifted. Not the ego thing of, like, ‘I have the power to save a life.’ It’s that I didn’t lose them—him.” Damn, she was getting teary-eyed just thinking about it.
“I’ve never done anything heroic like that, other than rushing my little sister’s dog to the vet.”
She smiled. Sweet. Nice looking. Couldn’t dress himself well, but that could be fixed. She liked Greg. Except that compared to Cheveyo . . . Forget Cheveyo.
She waved her hand. “Other than that, nothing weird ever happens to me.”
“Petra.”
She jerked her head to the right, where the breathless male voice had come from. Her heart leapfrogged into her throat at the sight of Cheveyo standing there. He still wore the red shirt and black leather jacket, and was holding a helmet in his hand. His eyes were wild, scanning the restaurant before locking onto her again. She could barely begin to grasp that he was there when he said, “You have to come with me. Now.”
She lurched to her feet, sending her margarita glass tipping, and dousing the basket of chips. “Is it Pope?”
“No. It’s you.” Now she saw the fear that glowed in his eyes. She’d seen it before, when he’d come to her psychically with his vision of her and all the Rogues dying. She couldn’t breathe. Her. It was her.
Greg stood, too, his blond eyebrows furrowing. “Is everything all right? Who is this guy?”
A bubble of hysterical laughter erupted. How did she identify him
?
Cheveyo answered for her. “I’m a relative, and we have a family emergency. She has to go.” He put his hand at the small of her back and guided her to the door.
“I’m sorry.” She grabbed her purse, throwing Greg an apologetic look. She made the I’ll call you sign as Cheveyo was escorting her out of the restaurant.
“Do you know how to ride on a bike?” he asked the moment they were outside.
“I’ve ridden a few times, but not in a miniskirt and high heels.”
“There’s a first for everything.” He’d left his bike at the curb, and he wrenched the black helmet over her head and adjusted the strap. It had a plastic shield that went over her face and gave her a moment of claustrophobia.
She hitched up her skirt and felt the cool leather slide against her bare thighs as she got on.
The man who’d been watching her in the restaurant stepped out, his gaze on them.
“Hell.” Cheveyo jumped on the bike, starting it in almost a simultaneous move, and tore away from the curb.
She turned to see the man running to his car. She tightened her body against Cheveyo’s, squeezing her eyes shut, holding back the questions she wanted to scream out.
Breathe, she commanded herself, smelling the scents of nearby restaurants and the leather of Cheveyo’s jacket. She wasn’t crazy about riding on motorcycles, and going way fast was even worse.
A sense of exhilaration raced through her veins, as though some part of her had been waiting for this for a long time.
Which was just plain insane.
Maybe the thighs tight against his waist part, or him barging in on her date to steal her away part. Not the running for her life stuff again.
He looked back, and she followed his gaze. A sleek black car was trying to pull away from the curb but was blocked by the stream of traffic. The driver wailed on his horn, but traffic wasn’t moving. They were, since Cheveyo could slip between cars and around the driver that was holding things up because he was waiting for a parking spot.
She wore his helmet. He’d sacrificed his own safety for hers. She could smell the scent of shampoo, crisp and clean, inside the helmet. He stopped at a light and turned to her. “We’re going to your place. You’ll need to pack your things.”
