Frost & Bothered (Discord Jones Book 4)

by Gayla Drummond

  Bless his gorgeous green eyes. “Yeah, we’re working. Sorry, but I kind of don’t have time to chat right now. Bye.”

  I managed a smile, grabbed Logan’s arm, and dragged him along as I speed-walked away. I didn’t stop until we’d gone around the dance floor far enough to change directions and hit the bar. “Holy crap.”

  “Can I have my arm back?”

  “Sorry.” I let go, and Logan rubbed his arm. “That was awkward.”

  “Kind of got that impression.”

  “Thanks for bailing me out.”

  “No problem.” He ordered an ale when the bartender stopped to see what we wanted. I passed, climbing up on a stool. “Are you okay?”

  “I don’t know.” My hands were shaking. I clasped them together and dropped them in my lap.

  Logan noticed. “If you still have feelings for him...”

  “No. I mean,” I bit my lip. “I kind of used him, and I feel awful about it. Plus, he’s been jealous of you since we met, and he pretty much accused me of breaking up with him because of you.”

  “Oh.” Logan accepted his drink and tipped the bartender before resting his elbows on the bar. “What do you mean by ‘kind of used him’?”

  I sighed. “Remember the day you washed my car, and I babbled about rushing things?”

  “Yes.”

  “I got together with him because I was lonely, and there was a freak-out involved, too, the day he and I met. I mean, I didn’t like, plan it, but it did happen. Us hooking up, no prior dating.”

  “So you feel guilty.”

  “Big time. That’s a horrible thing to do. And then the ring thing, and...well, everything. It’s a mess.”

  “Compounded by my asking you out.”

  Maybe I did want a drink. “Yeah, I guess. Not really, but kind of, because if he hears we’re dating, he’ll think I lied to him.”

  “Instead of believing you broke off things because the two of you weren’t working out.”

  “Right.”

  Logan nodded and drank some ale. I ordered a mojito. Talking had calmed my stomach.

  “You’re not responsible for what he decides to believe.”

  “I know, but jeeze. I already hurt him, and don’t want to make it worse. You know?”

  “Yeah.”

  “The only way to keep him from believing you’re the reason I broke up with him is to tell him the truth, and that’s a truly crappy thing to hit him with. ‘I was lonely, and you were available’.” I drained half my freshly delivered mojito. “But I don’t want him mad at you either.”

  “I can handle it.”

  “You shouldn’t have to. Man, this being an adult thing is hard.”

  Logan chuckled. “My suggestion is to not worry about it. We haven’t had an official date yet, and I’m not about to rub Nick’s face in the fact we’ve talked about it.”

  “You sure you still want to? I’m doing a lovely job of causing you trouble and unpacking all my baggage on you. If I were you, I’d find a girl who’s less of a pain the butt.”

  “You’re not a pain in the butt.”

  “Thanks. I hope you keep thinking that.”

  “Pretty certain I will.” Logan gazed at me for a few seconds. “I really don’t mean this to sound pushy, but I like you. I’m attracted to you, and I want to see what happens with us, since both of those things are reciprocated. Okay?”

  Afraid my response would be a squeak, I nodded.

  “Good. I’m going to get back to work. Yell,” he tapped his temple with a finger. “If you need me.”

  He left me with plenty to think about.

  I spent the rest of the evening avoiding Nick and Patrick while trying to watch my assigned third of the club. For most of it, I seriously thought Nick had cloned himself. He seemed to be everywhere I looked, but at least he didn’t attempt to corner me for a talk.

  About one-thirty, I met Dane and Logan at the bar. “Any luck?”

  “No weirdness, and I haven’t heard anyone mention a friend disappearing.” Dane polished off his ale and immediately ordered another.

  “Same,” Logan said.

  “Let’s stake out the exit,” I suggested. “We’ll leave if nothing happens there.”

  “I just ordered a drink.”

  “We’ll grab the coats,” Logan told him. “But head that way when you get it.”

  “Okay.”

  In the break room, as Logan unlocked the locker, I laughed. “You know what this reminds me of?”

  “What?”

  “School. If you had a boyfriend, you shared each other’s lockers.”

  He pulled out my coat. “Did you have a boyfriend?”

  “No, I was too shy in tenth grade, and then the Melding happened, so you know, Snoozeville.” I slipped into my coat as he held it for me. “I missed out on all that stuff.”

  “What else did school girls do when they had boyfriends?” Logan retrieved his jacket and handed me my purse.

  “Tried not to get caught holding hands or sneaking kisses in the hallways.”

  He grabbed Dane’s jacket, shut the locker, and looked at both doors.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Seeing if the coast is clear.” He grinned and quickly kissed me. “There. We didn’t get caught.”

  “Nope.” Maybe one day, I wouldn’t respond to a kiss from him with my dopiest grin.

  “Want to see if we can get away with holding hands?”

  “Sure.” The warm tingle returned as we fitted our fingers together. We were so busy smiling at each other while walking to the door, we failed to realize a giant clue had appeared in front of us.

  One second, we were in the break room, the next, we were falling into coldness.

  THIRTEEN

  “Ow.” I landed on my side in a few inches of snow, which wasn’t enough cushion for the frozen ground beneath it. About eight feet overhead, the circle of light we’d fallen through winked out.

  Logan landed in a crouch, and immediately helped me to my feet. “You okay?”

  “Yeah.” I slapped snow from my coat. “Guess we know what happened to the missing people now.”

  “Uh huh.” Logan shoved Dane’s jacket at me. “Hold this. I don’t like the looks of that.”

  “Of...” Then I saw the tall, white figure loping toward us, something flapping from its shoulder. “Oh, that. What is it?”

  “Golem.”

  “A what?” I asked, but he was moving, charging toward the golem. “Dude!”

  “It’s ice,” he called back. “I’ve got it.”

  “Okay, I’ll just stand here looking stupid,” I muttered, watching as the distance between them narrowed. “I mean, it’s not like I could melt it or anything.”

  If I had, I would’ve missed the chance to admire Logan’s fighting moves as he efficiently took the golem down in a fast series of whirling kicks. A few “oohs” and “ahs” may have escaped as I walked closer. “Ooh, big strong tiger man beat down the bad monster. Not that it had much of a chance. You are fast, dude.”

  “Thanks. Can you melt the pieces, before,” Logan stomped on a hand that tried to skitter away. “They pull back together?”

  “Oh, yeah.” I called on my pyrokinesis, and in short order, was melting the various shards as he tossed them in different directions.

  When we’d finished, he dusted off his hands. “Now we need to get out of here.”

  “We can’t. This is our best...”

  “I meant out of this area. It’s not dead, but it’ll take a while to reform.”

  “Oh. Frickin’ golems.”

  Logan laughed. “Come on. Let’s put some distance between it and us.”

  “Okay.” I picked up the leather bag the golem had been carrying, which was what I’d seen flapping behind it. “This is a big bag.”

  “Yeah.” We started walking, and I loosened the drawstring to look inside.

  “Looky what I found.” I showed him the strips of black cloth. “I’m going
to guess the golem collects visitors.”

  “Then we’re on the right track.” Logan pointed to the imprints in the snow ahead of us.

  “Yay. We’re so awesome at this stuff.” After putting the strips and Dane’s jacket in the bag, I held it out to him. “Carry this, please?”

  “Sure.”

  I looked around as we walked. Mountains rose on either side, and they weren’t very far away, but a thick line of trees hid the bottoms of them from sight. We were walking down a clear, flat plain of snow, unbroken other than the golem’s footprints and our own. The plain was somewhere between a quarter and half a mile wide.

  “Tell me about golems.”

  “Magical constructs. We’re lucky that one was made of ice. Those made of earth or rock are a lot harder to put down.”

  “If it’s a magical construct, that means there’s a magic user around here.” Who had to be our bad guy, since it definitely appeared the golem had been sent to grab anyone who dropped in. I giggled. “Dropped in.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing. Hey, maybe this is Narnia?”

  Logan shook his head. “We came through a portal, not a wardrobe.”

  “Lewis could’ve changed the details. It was a series for kids.”

  “You have a point.”

  “I know, and it’s a great point, because it leaves the option for this being Narnia wide open. How cool would it be if our magic user turned out to be the witch?”

  “More cool than we’d like. Didn’t she freeze people into statues?”

  “I’ll freeze her first.” I wiggled my fingers. They were cold enough that it kind of hurt, and I shoved them into my pockets. We kept walking for what felt like a couple of hours, until it began to snow.

  Logan muttered, “Shit.”

  “I was just about to say that.” He glanced at me with a raised eyebrow. “Okay, I wasn’t. We can still see them.”

  “For maybe ten more minutes.” He kept walking. So did I, until the falling snow concealed the golem’s tracks.

  “Now what?” I covered a yawn, wondering what time it was. My cell phone was dead when I pulled it out to check. “My phone’s not working. I charged it before we left the house.”

  “I doubt this place has wireless or electricity.” Logan blew out a misty breath. “We better find some shelter.”

  “Think there’s an empty igloo around here?” I was much colder than I had been, thanks to stopping, and tired enough to feel a little punchy.

  “Don’t know. I do know that I don’t want that golem sneaking up behind us.”

  “But then I’ll get to watch you karate kick it to bits again. That was cool.” I wiped snowflakes from my eyelashes.

  Logan smiled. “I didn’t think you were impressed by that sort of thing.”

  “Are you kidding? I can’t do those kinds of kicks, dude. I’ve fallen on my butt every time Jeff’s tried to teach them to me.”

  “Who’s Jeff?”

  “Ex-Marine who teaches self-defense.” I made a face. “I’m like his worst student. My coordination’s not great.” Or maybe I didn’t practice enough, which is what Jeff constantly told me. Busy Discord was too busy to fit in extra practice time. I also didn’t care to sweat a lot, because eww.

  “Golems aren’t intelligent.”

  “Huh?”

  “If we move away from its path, we should be okay,” Logan said. “The question is: right or left?”

  “We could choose by the time-honored method of Eeny Meeny. There’s even a part about tiger toes.”

  Logan focused on me. “You’re tired.”

  “How’d you guess?”

  He touched my cheek, and his fingers felt hot. “And half-frozen.”

  “Yep, that too.”

  “All right, shelter’s our top priority. We’ll go right.”

  “Sure thing.” I followed him as he turned right.

  “Cordi.”

  “Huh?” It was a struggle to open my eyes. Logan began chafing my hands.

  “You have to keep moving.”

  “I’m not moving?”

  He peered into my eyes. “No, sweetheart. You stopped walking.”

  “Oh, sorry.” I couldn’t feel my lips.

  “Come on.” Logan hooked his arm through mine. I stumbled alongside him, my feet not sending any information up to my brain. I looked down.

  “My feet still there?”

  “Shit,” Logan murmured before assuring me they were.

  “Okay.” I took his word for it and looked up. “Oh.”

  “What?”

  “It’s Aslan. I knew it.” I tripped, my bleary eyes snapping shut. “Oh, no, gonna fall.”

  “No, you’re not.” Logan kept me upright. “And that’s not Aslan. It’s Connor.”

  I managed to open my eyes for another look. The huge lion paced toward us, and shook snow from its black mane. “Nope, that’s Aslan.”

  “Okay, it’s Aslan. Keep moving. Maybe he’s found some shelter.”

  “Told you it was Narnia. Because that’s Aslan. And it’s winter. See the snow?” I mumbled.

  “Yes, I see the snow. Hard not to.”

  “Hah. I’m right.”

  “You’re right,” Logan agreed, but for some reason, I thought he was arguing with me, and went into a long, mumbling tirade about all the ways I was right about the place being Narnia, and the lion, Aslan.

  “Is she going to be all right?”

  My eyes crossed, honing in on the tip of a nose.

  “If we get her warmed up. More wood, kid.”

  Darn, it really wasn’t Aslan. I felt cheated as the nose retreated, and my eyes slowly uncrossed. “Uh.”

  “Hey.” Logan bent over me. “How are you doing?”

  “You liar. That’s not Aslan.”

  “Better. That’s good. I told you it was Connor, but you wanted to argue.” He touched my nose. “Can you feel that?”

  “Yeah.” My eyes drifted shut.

  “No sleeping.” Logan hauled me into sitting position.

  “I’m freakin’ tired.”

  “I know, but you need to get warm first.” He moved me around and then sat behind me to keep me from lying down.

  I blinked. “Pretty fire.”

  “Yeah it is, if I do say so myself.” Logan rubbed his hands together before pressing them against my cheeks.

  “You’re squishing my face.” My words came out sounding like “Oor skithin mah faith” and I started giggling.

  “It’s for a good cause. You don’t want it falling off, do you?”

  The fact I had to think about it made me realize I might be in trouble. I dredged a couple of words out of the slush my mind had become. “Frost bite?”

  “I think we got you under shelter in time. Shifters aren’t susceptible to it, and I don’t know what it looks like. I’ve only heard of it.”

  “Oh.”

  Logan dropped his hands and hugged me. “But you do have a healing ability. You’ll be okay. I just need to keep you warm.”

  “She’s coherent now?”

  “Mostly.”

  “Great.” Connor dumped his armful of wood by the fire. He proved to be the spitting image of his father, aside from his skin being the same beautiful, clear light brown as Tanner’s. He wore Dane’s jacket, which was too big in the shoulders for him.

  Kneeling beside us, he smiled at me. “Hi. Sorry I’m not Aslan.”

  “ ’S okay.”

  “You did make a good argument for it. I mean, the whole lion in winter thing? I’d probably think it was Aslan too.” He picked up one of my hands. He felt as hot as Logan did. “You take the chilling out thing way too seriously.”

  As he began gently rubbing my hand between his, I wondered how big of an ass I’d made of myself. I couldn’t remember much from first seeing him to being here. Wherever here was. I blinked a few times, and finally looked around. We were in a cave. “Ow.”

  Connor stopped rubbing my hand. “Does that hurt?”
r />   “Pins and needles.”

  He grinned, not at me, but Logan. “That’s a good sign.”

  “Yeah.” Logan hugged me a little tighter.

  I woke up nice and toasty, due to sleeping between two huge, fur-covered bodies. Those same bodies presented a problem because I needed to locate the closest approximation to a bathroom, having just woken up.

  Once I made it clear they were in danger of getting wet if they didn’t immediately rise and shine, the guys took my trip outside as an opportunity to shift and put their clothes back on. Even though I hurried to avoid freezing my delicate bits, I missed out on the chance to admire Logan’s chest. Dude could dress faster than he could kick an ice golem to bits.

  “Let me see your hands.”

  I held them up for inspection. Logan pinched the tip of each of my fingers after inspecting their color. “I’m fine.”

  “I’m hungry.” Connor patted his stomach. “Haven’t found a damn thing to eat except snow.”

  “Lucky you.” I pointed to my over-sized purse. “I have some breakfast bars in there.”

  “You just became my most favorite person in the world.”

  “There’s a bottle of water too.”

  “Marry me.”

  Logan rolled his eyes at the other man. “When did you start carrying food in your purse?”

  “After I turned into a giant crankypants because I kept forgetting to eat while we were looking for my mom.” Those hadn’t been my finest moments. There’d been screaming and tears and I vaguely remembered threatening to stake Derrick “where the sun don’t shine”. Or maybe it had been Stone? One of them.

  Connor picked up my bag. “May I?”

  “Yes, and pass a couple over here.”

  We munched strawberry-filled cereal bars and sipped water. After Connor finished his, he asked, “What’s the plan?”

  “Try to pick up the golem’s trail and see if we can find the others who were nabbed. Unless you want us to take you home first?”

  “Well, I hate worrying my parents, but are you certain you can get back here?”

  Good question. “I’ve been able to teleport into a sidhe when I want to, and I teleport into the Barrows a lot.” But the Barrows were mostly public spaces, and for all I knew, Thorandryll could have given me a free, anytime pass into his sidhe. “But honestly, I don’t know.”