by Gow, Kailin
Chapter 14
“Everything seems good and I must say you look rather radiant this morning,” Dr. Sorensen said, his blue eyes twinkling “Eager to leave us?”
Finishing the last bite of my soft cold toast, I nodded.
“As good as everything appears now, I’d still like to see you again in a week or so. Stop by the nurse’s desk for an appointment.”
I continued to nod though I hardly doubted I’d be back. My head ached only when I moved too suddenly and my ribs felt only slightly tender. I knew I’d be just fine and even in top form in only a day or two. Taking great pains not to wince, I shoved my tray aside and edged my way out of bed.
“Do you have someone who can get you home?”
“I’ll call my parents.” Despite those words, I immediately thought of Brax. I’d not heard a word from him since he’d left me two nights earlier. Had he found Moore? Or had he perhaps fallen prey to Shayne? After two sleepless nights, I felt numb with worry and fatigue. Between the busy nurse’s station nearby that had offered a surprising array of chatter, and the questions surrounding Moore and Brax that’d played over and over again in my head, sleep had been a rather hit and miss proposition every night. The few moments I managed to nod off I was awakened again by a nurse’s gentle prodding for my temperature or blood pressure, or a sudden and vivid image of Moore.
“Hey, I hear they’re letting you out.” Brax bounded in with a wide grin.
I turned to Dr. Sorensen, standing next to Brax. “Guess I have a ride after all.”
He patted Brax on the shoulder. “Just make sure she gets straight home and takes it easy. She may look strong, but her wounds aren’t completely healed. If she pushed too hard, she could make matters much worse.” With those final words of wisdom, he left.
“Brax.” I opened the small closet that housed my street clothes. “Where’ve you been? I’ve been going nuts here. I thought you were going to come right back.”
“Sorry. Figuring out where Moore went then heading out to find him took a little longer than I expected.” He put his hand to my shoulder. “You’re not going to like what I have to say.”
Staring blindly at the jeans and shirt my mother had so lovingly set on a hanger, I held my breath. Had something happened to Moore? The deep sense of dread surprised me and reminded me once again how much he truly meant to me.
With a sharp sigh I grabbed the jeans and shirt then shut the closet with more thrust than intended. I turned to Brax wearing my bravest face. “What is it?”
“Let’s get you out of here and I’ll fill you in on the way home.”
My frantic desire to find out about Moore overrode any scruples I may have usually had. Just barely turning my back to Brax, I slipped out of the flimsy hospital gown and hopped into my jeans. Twisting around to face Brax as I tugged down my shirt, I found him with his back to me, his head tilted up as he stared at a crack on the far wall.
Charmed, I smiled. “You can turn around now.”
Red-faced, he twisted tentatively and dared only a guarded peak. “Damn it, Lux,” he said as he turned fully around. “You can’t just go around throwing your clothes off like that. I mean… damn, I’m no angel and…”
“I turned my back to you, Brax,” I said through a teasing snort. “It’s not like I just flashed you.”
“Makes no difference to me. Seeing you nude, back or front, and… damn, you just look too enticing. You make it downright impossible to think of anything else.”
“Like Moore?”
“Huh?”
“Moore… you were telling me about Moore.” I opened the drawer of the night table and grabbed my purse.
“Ah, yeah, right. Sure.” He seemed painfully uncomfortable in his jeans.
“Come on, lover boy,” I said, grabbing his arm and leading him out.
Still hot and obviously bothered, he followed me into the elevator. His eyes spoke loud and clear of the notions going through his head as the doors slid shut, but the two other occupants forced him to remain in control.
However, the moment we arrived at the next floor and the occupants stepped out, his resistance crumbled. The doors weren’t even completely closed when he pinned me to the elevator wall. His lips crashed over mine while his tongue plunged in deep and long. It was an exciting and intoxicating kiss, made all the more thrilling by the chance of getting caught.
The light chime of a bell announced our arrival at the next floor and Brax pulled away just as suddenly as he’d charged me when the doors opened once again. A nurse got on, and a knowing grin quickly spread across her face.
In squirming silence we rode the remaining floors.
The doors finally opened to the main floor and I sighed, inhaled and laughed all at the same time.
“Sorry ‘bout that,” Brax said. Now in full control of his senses, he led me out. “There’s only so much I can take before the animal in me succumbs.” He grinned and hiked his brow. “Being in an elevator alone with you and having those delicious visions of you still in my head…” Pushing through the doors that led out to the parking lot, he shook his head in mock defeat.
“Well,” I said, slipping my hand into the crook in his arm. “Who knew such a wild beast lived and breathed within the tight wall of control you so masterfully keep up?”
We’d reached his SUV and my thoughts returned to more serious matters. “So, where did you find Moore?”
“Yosemite.”
“The park?” I got in and closed the door.
“That’s the one.” He made his way around the car as I tried to figure out how long a drive it would be.
“But that’s, like…”
“Three to four hours away.”
“And Moore is out there?” I didn’t want to let on just how worried I truly was. Brax was already so generous of his time, finding Moore when I knew full well he’d like nothing more than to lose sight of him forever. I didn’t want to rub in how I felt.
“There’s more. Shayne is up there, too.” His hands on the wheel, he made no move to start the car.
“Then what are you waiting for, Brax? Moore is there to kill her. I can’t let that happen. It’ll destroy him. He wants his revenge for what she did to me so badly, I know he doesn’t’ see the consequences.”
Brax paused. “Lux, you’re fresh out of the hospital and I was right there when the Doc told you to take it easy. Yosemite is huge and…”
“And what?”
“And Shayne… Shayne is more dangerous than ever.” He turned to me, his eyes filled with concern. “She fully intended to kill you, Lux. It wasn’t just a beating that got out of hand. Her intent was to kill you and it still is. If she sees you out there… and besides, I don’t think she’ll just sit idly by and let Moore get even close to her, so you don’t really have to worry about him.”
“She’ll kill him.” I muttered. “Please, Brax, stop arguing with me and get me there.”
“You care about him that much, huh?” He turned the key in the ignition, a flat and resigned line on his lips.
And you care that much about me, I thought with a pang of guilt. I sighed inwardly. I needed all of them, like Lothario had told me. I just never thought they would end up having romantic feelings for me, too, and becoming rivals. I needed everyone to work together. “Please, Brax. If we’re to have any chance of saving him, you have to hurry.”
“I have a way of getting us there much faster.” He turned onto the road. “I’ll fly you there.”
I glanced at him, wondering if he could possibly have the power of flight.
“Don’t look at me like that, silly. I mean on a plane.”
I snorted. “You have a plane, too?” The riches that surrounded me continued to prove astounding.
“It’s considerably more modest than Moore’s, but it’ll get us there.”
After a quick drive to the airport, Brax parked near a hangar and came around to help me out of the car. Inside the hanger, we came upon a small two seater that sh
ined with promise.
“Come on,” he said, opening the passenger door.
“What about a pilot?”
“You're looking at him.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded.
“Don’t look so surprised. I’m more than just a pretty face. My uncle thought it’d be a cool thing for me to do. Besides, look how handy it turned out to be.”
He hopped into the pilot’s seat and put on a headset while gesturing I do the same. In an instant the motor roared to life.
“You must miss him,” I shouted into the din.
He shrugged, pointed to his ear then set the little microphone close to my lips and said, “What did you say?”
“I said, you must miss your uncle.”
“Yeah.” He directed the plane to the tarmac. “More than I thought I would. The old guy kinda grew on me.”
Concentrating as he brought the plane into the air, he was confident and self-assured as he piloted the small plane with an expert hand, but I could see how his uncle’s death still affected him. Only when we’d reached the desired altitude did he completely relax. With pain in his eyes, he looked at me.
I reached for his hand. “I’m really sorry. We won’t let Shayne get away with this. I’ll help you, Brax, in any way I can. And before this is all over, we’ll find the link between you, Shayne, your uncle and Moore.”
“And my parents.” He stared out at the bay as it drifted further and further away.
“And your parents.” I kissed his cheek, feeling his sorrow and loss.
“I have so many reasons to hate the Hatchett’s; Shayne for obvious reasons and Moore…. Well, for the spell he put you under and this hold he still has over you. Despite all that, I know I need them in order to understand what happened to my parents… and what’s happening to me. I think my uncle knew… or at least he had a good idea, but he’s not here…” He choked.
“I’m here, Brax.” I squeezed his hand.
He pressed a tight smile. “I don’t know what I’d do without you. I’d go nuts. I need you; your goodness, your light.” He was silent a long moment. He occupied himself with the adjustment of various dials and switches, gazed out at the horizon then glanced at me. “I’ve been seeing things, and now I even see my parents… as demons.”
“You’ve seen them?”
He nodded. “At the estate. I completely freaked. My mom spoke to me and I instantly knew the voice… and my dad… his eyes, just like I remembered them… green and intense, but those were the only things I could recognize. Their skin was charred, black and malodorous. The kid in me wanted to block out the ugliness and follow the voice of my mother, but all I could do was vomit.”
“What did your mom say?”
“‘I’m sorry, I love you and I’m sorry,’ over and over again.”
“I can’t imagine how you must feel.”
“Yeah, can’t say it’s all that great. And the worst of it is they warned me about something happening to me.”
“What do you mean?”
“What will happen to me? Am I gonna become like them? Am I gonna become like Shayne and Moore, like the very demons we fight?”
“I don’t know,” I muttered. “We’ll start by finding out what happened to them, and why they disappeared.”
He grunted. “I’m not like Moore. I couldn’t live with myself knowing an evil entity was taking over my body. I’ve seen what it’s done to them, how it’s destroying them and I won’t allow that to happen to me. Maybe Shayne and Moore had a more innate ability to allow the evil into their lives, to live with it, but I don’t.”
“It’s not as easy to control as that, Brax. Look at Shayne. As demonic and evil as she’s become, she’s desperate to avoid what’s coming. The whole thing with Asher and the Book of Angels… it was all an attempt to… to find a cure in a sense, and Moore, he’s fighting it.”
Brax gripped the controls of the plane as though hoping to gain some control over the course of his life. “I’m more and more like them, Lux. I’m becoming one of them.”
I glimpsed his aura and hoped to find a hint of what awaited him, but it was impossible to know whether his aura was angelic or demonic.
Whether to find a clue or just to sooth the growing fear I felt for his fate, I leaned over and kissed him.
His lips were soft, supple and innocent one moment, then charged, hungry and urgent the next. Intense and consuming, the kiss grew into something else; something new, strange and foreign.
No. Deep in the recess of my mind, I knew the sensations brought on by the kiss were not so foreign, not so new. I tried to find when I’d felt so swept away, so consumed by a kiss. Every inch of my skin longed for him, hungered for him.
He pulled away and brought his focus to piloting the plane. “That was...hot.” His teasing grin only made me want him more.
“Don’t you have an autopilot or something.” I couldn’t take my hands off him. My fingers walked along his lap while my other hand played with his soft hair.
“Ah, Lux,” he said, “if you keep this up…Damn, I wish I had autopilot. You sure know how to make a guy forget everything.” He tensed, visibly having a hard time concentrating on flying. “Now I just want to forget them all and just concentrate on you.”
“How long before we land?” My voice was a blend of husky wantonness and sharp command, as my hand inched its way up his thigh.
Brax closed his eyes for a second and swallowed. “We’ve still got a good twenty minutes to go.” He turned to me, a crooked and naughty grin on his lips. “I’ve never seen you like this, Lux. You’re so seductive. I like it.”
“Moore,” I murmured as tears rushed to line my eyes.
The naughty grin clenched into a tight line and his eyes filled with dismay. “Again?”
“No, it’s not what you think.” The inevitable was right there, right in that hypnotizing kiss, and I didn’t want to face it. “I didn’t have visions of Moore.”
“Then what? I know you guys are close and I know how he feels about you. This damned spell he has…”
My fingers tightened on his thigh and a pinching and painful sensation grasped my heart. “The pull Moore had on me, the amazing and inexplicable attraction… arousal I always felt when I was close to him, that’s what just happened now… with you.”
He turned to me, his jaw tight as he fought the fear growing inside him.
“I think you have a lot more in common with Moore than you thought.” Tears streaked my face as the truth dawned on him. “I’m afraid you may have that same curse.”
Chapter 15
“No!” His shout of denial rang out long and loud.
Pulling the headset off before I went deaf, I set it in my lap and stared silently at it.
The roar of the engine filled the void, masking Brax’s angry and confused mutterings as the majestic peaks and jagged ridges of Yosemite came into view; such beauty, mesmerizing and breathtaking. Under any other circumstances this would have been a fascinating and inspiring flight filled with sights few ever witness, but now, it was just a mass of mountains and forest filled with potential evil and possible death.
Brax patted my headset and I put it back on.
“We’ll land over there.” He pointed to a long stretch of flat land. “It may be a bumpy landing.”
He spoke in a professional tone, cool, calm and in control. The effect was chilling, sending a shiver across my shoulders. His full concentration, good training and probably a bit of luck brought us to a landing that wasn’t as bad as I’d expected.
The plane rolled to a bumpy stop and Brax killed the engine. With the task completed and the silence weighing in, his gaze lost its resolve.
“I can’t be, Lux,” he muttered softly. “I can’t be like them… like him.”
He pulled me into his arms and I fought the painful ball in my throat. This wasn’t a time for tears. There was too much to do.
“I won’t become like Shayne. I won’t hurt you. I’ll never hurt you.�
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I pulled back to look at him. “You probably won’t be able to help yourself.”
“Moore fights it. He’s never hurt you. Surely I can control this as much as he has.” He grasped my shoulders, his piercing eyes desperate to convince me. “I’ll fight it.”
He licked his lips and I saw the hunger in the slacking of his jaw, in the subtle parting of his lips and in the narrowing of his eyes.
When he kissed me, my reaction was as strong and rapid as it had been earlier, but his restraint, his attempt to control was obvious.
“This desire for you, it’s stronger every day. Every time I’m close to you, touch you, I can feel it take over, but it has nothing to do with a demonic spell.” He covered my face with heated kisses. “I wanted you from the very moment I laid eyes on you. That attraction, that need to get closer to you… it had nothing to do with what I’m becoming. It was there from the start. We had something special right from the start.”
I wanted to tell him how insidious evil could be, how it could fester and grow in unpredictable increments. It was impossible to know how long he’d been acting on the demands of the demon in him.
“Brax,” I said. “Your parents, or what I thought were your parents, asked me to help you. They begged me not to slay you. It’s the last thing in the world I want to do… so we have to find a way to help you… and the Hatchetts before it comes to that. We have to find Asher.”
Brax nodded, his gaze resolute and ready to fight. He hopped out of the plane, helped me down then pulled his cell out. “I said I’d get in touch with him the moment I got back.”
“This place is so big. It’s acres and acres…” I muttered softly as I looked at the endless mountains around us.
”Hey,” Brax said into the cell. “I’m back.” Listening, he nodded, looked up at the nearby forest and nodded again. “Got it. Ier.ll be right there.”
Clapping the phone shut, he returned to the plane and grabbed a backpack.
“Anything you want me to carry?” I asked.
He grabbed a flashlight and compass, and shoved them into his pack. “No. What I want is for you to stay here and sit tight. You’re still recovering, remember? I’ll be right back.”
