Warrior Betrayed: The Sons of the Zodiac 3

by Addison Fox

  “Ready?” Callie whispered.

  Quinn and Ilsa both nodded.

  “Montana. This is going to sting. I want you to hold on and scream if you need to.”

  She nodded and Quinn could see a lone tear where it pearled at the corner of her eye.

  With one hard pull, Callie ripped the material away from the skin. Montana screamed, the sound one of pure agony. It seared into his mind like a brand.

  As he looked at the mottled flesh where Callie had removed the material of Montana’s blouse, he was shocked to see a series of small metal barbs sticking from the skin.

  Montana felt the scream reverberate in her throat and wondered if she could ever make it stop. Everything she was—every thought, every molecule, every emotion—was centered in that one horrible place on her back.

  The world dimmed once again and she felt her stomach turning over on itself. Oh God, was she actually going to be sick?

  And then she felt it.

  Soft, soothing motions on her forehead and a light, crooning whisper. Both helped pull her from the maelstrom of the pain. Reaching for that comfort like a drowning victim, she focused on Quinn and the calmness his touch and his voice could provide.

  Although she couldn’t see their expressions, Montana could tell from the hushed whispers that something was wrong. “You can tell me.”

  “Shhh, darling. We’re trying to figure out what to do to help you.”

  “Yes, but what’s wrong with me?”

  Quinn kept up the soft, soothing strokes. “First I need you to tell me what the attack felt like.”

  “Sort of like last night. Only—” Montana broke off, because she had to acknowledge it hadn’t felt the same. That weird electric shock feeling was the same, but the outcome was very different. “No. It only started like last night. Then it changed.”

  “Changed how?”

  Montana realized the questions were helping. Talking about it—focusing on the pain instead of letting it consume her—was actually helping to calm her body. “Last night felt like sharp, harsh pings of static electricity. It hurt, but it was fleeting, somehow.”

  “And this?”

  “This started that way, and then it felt like someone was sticking a knife in me.”

  “Okay. That’s what we needed to know. Ilsa, I need you to run and get my medical book. The one down- stairs.” Montana wondered at the emphasis on the word down but chalked it up to strangers she didn’t know.

  “Why am I here? At your house? Why aren’t we in a hospital?”

  “You needed immediate attention and I didn’t want to wait.”

  His answer was ludicrous, but she couldn’t quite make sense of why through the boiling anger of the pain.

  Why weren’t they at a hospital? Was she shot? Was that the problem?

  Desperate to get her bearings and to focus on anything but the excruciating pain in her back, Montana simply kept on asking whatever popped into her head. “Oh. Who are you? The woman helping me?”

  “I’m Callie. I’m Quinn’s…”

  “Housekeeper,” Quinn finished.

  At the sharp intake of feminine breath behind her, Montana felt her stomach drop. Housekeeper, her ass. Clearly, this woman and Quinn were involved.

  Montana did wonder at how the woman’s hands stayed infinitely gentle against her skin—a decidedly odd reaction for a jealous wife or lover—but still. Facts were facts and all the evidence pointed toward a relationship between these two.

  Searching for something—anything—to remove her focus from the sexual politics going on behind her, Montana glanced at her hand where it splayed against the sofa cushion she faced. The Band-Aid she’d put on that morning had slipped and was coming unstuck on her thumb.

  That was odd.

  She’d nicked her thumb with her razor this morning, but a look at the exposed skin suggested she’d never even cut herself.

  Pulling her hand closer for a better inspection, Montana looked at the skin around the edge of her knuckle.

  Nope. Nothing.

  Before she could analyze it any further, the second woman, the one Quinn had called Ilsa, came back into the room. “Here you go.”

  A few moments passed as the book was opened and Callie ruffled through pages.

  “Here. Look.”

  Montana sensed the movements behind her and, although she was tempted to look over her shoulder, the pain had finally ebbed to a manageable state. She wasn’t anxious to upset that balance but she also couldn’t hide her curiosity. “What is it?”

  “You know how you mentioned that it felt like knives in your skin?”

  “Yes.”

  “There are,” the woman’s voice cut in over Quinn’s. “I need to remove each piece one by one, so I’m going to need you to stay very still.”

  “Each piece? How many are there?”

  “Thirteen.”

  Callie’s eyes shifted to the book she had open, laid next to where she kneeled on the floor. The large book was one of her healing manuals, part of the collection of works they maintained in their library.

  Quinn had insisted long ago that they needed to arm themselves with new technology as much as old. The wisdom of the ancients held rituals and spells that, although long forgotten by most, could still be conjured to do unspeakable harm.

  His brothers had agreed and each had contributed in their own way.

  Brody owned anything relating to the ancients and their religions and tools. Grey owned the histories of cultures and the underworld that ran each and every one of them. Even Max, their mysterious Capricorn, had contributed over the years. His intense fascination with space and science had ensured a series of texts on the development of air travel and cellular technology.

  Hell, the man had even managed to get his hands on a series of da Vinci’s works on flight.

  Each and every one of them donated something to their shared collection of knowledge. Thirteen parts of one fighting unit, appointed by Themis to protect man. To leverage their individual gifts, interests and talents into one strong, united whole.

  They were lucky, Quinn knew. Of the twelve contingents appointed by Themis in her Great Agreement with Zeus, only one other was still fully intact. Kane had joined their band late, so technically they weren’t their original thirteen, but they still held an entire contingent of Warriors, representing each and every sign of the zodiac.

  Even their twins, Pierce and Kieran, were still a pair. Opposites in every way, but productive, active members of their team.

  “There are thirteen pieces in my back?” Montana’s horrified whisper penetrated Quinn’s thoughts. “Pieces of what?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Callie said gently.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Quinn heard the harsh tone of his own voice and forced himself to calm down to avoid further upsetting Montana. “It’s glass or something, right?”

  Callie turned her attention toward him. “I’m sorry, but I need to concentrate.”

  “Of course.” Leaning in, Quinn pressed his lips to Montana’s head. “Shhh, now. Let Callie do her work and then we’ll figure out what’s going on.”

  What was going on? The page Callie had left open spoke of a spell from the time of Hercules and his Twelve Labors. Although much of the lore was lost, winning each of his labors hadn’t been nearly as easy as the stories told and the hero had tried numerous approaches to each task before settling on the one that had worked.

  Callie had opened to the page on Hercules’s defeat of the Nemean lion. The difficulty in the task—aside from killing an enormous lion—was the fact that the lion’s fur was impenetrable.

  Hercules had tried several approaches, including a modified knife that would come apart when he threw it at his opponent, scattering into lethal pieces.

  The trick hadn’t worked, the varied pieces of the knife bouncing against the lion.

  But clearly the technology had survived.

  Quinn stared at Montana’
s back again, another layer of realization dawning. Only an idiot would ignore the fact that there were thirteen barbs in her skin.

  Just like there were thirteen Warriors for each of Themis’s contingents.

  Quinn reached for Montana’s hand, holding on to her as Callie began the tedious process of carefully removing each barb. Other than a sharp intake of breath each time one of the spikes was removed, Montana said nothing.

  Five agonizing minutes later, a small metal bowl of thirteen wicked-looking metal shards in varying sizes sat next to the open book on the floor. Callie taped gauze over Montana’s back. “You can sit up now. We’ve got something for you to put on. I’ve got a light bandage on the wound now and I’m going to go make a poultice to cover it before I put the final one on.”

  “Okay,” Montana whispered. Quinn heard the relief in that one word and cursed himself for his inability to keep her safe.

  Kissing her in front of the Plaza. What the hell was he thinking? But the truth was, he wasn’t thinking. She’d managed to get under his skin and he was fucking up royally because of it.

  Ilsa came forward with a robe. Quinn turned his back to offer her privacy, but not before he had the satisfaction of noting how the layer of pain that had covered Montana’s face had dimmed. The white pall of her cheeks had faded, her skin was quickly regaining its rose-colored hue and her lips no longer trembled with the pain.

  Once he heard her resettled on the couch, Quinn turned around.

  Realization flashed far too late. Montana was pointing toward the open book on the floor, where she could clearly see the details spelled out an ancient healing ritual performed by the Greek gods for use of a weapon that burst into pieces.

  “This has something to do with Themis, doesn’t it?”

  Chapter Eight

  “She doesn’t know?” Montana heard Ilsa whisper those words before being dragged from the room by the other woman named Callie.

  Quinn’s girlfriend-slash-lover-slash-potential-wife, Callie.

  Damn it, why did that news hurt so much?

  And whatever else she didn’t know, she had a suspicious feeling it would make the news that Quinn had a woman in his life feel like child’s play.

  Even if she felt every inch the scorned woman on that score.

  Shielding herself in her legendary Grant armor, she stared up at Quinn. “No, I clearly don’t know. Lots of things, apparently. Care to enlighten me?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “Well, I’m obviously not going anywhere for the moment. And based on what just happened to me, I have a right to know.”

  Quinn nodded and uttered a soft, “You do.” Other than that, he didn’t say anything more. Instead, he reached down and picked up the book, walking it over to a large cherry table that stood in the corner by an impossibly high shelf of books.

  In fact, now that she looked around, she could see the entire room was covered in books. “Is this really your home?”

  “Yes.” Quinn stood before the shelves, scanning for something as he moved down the rows.

  “Why did you bring me here instead of a hospital? And how did we get here? I know I was out, but I couldn’t have been out for that long.”

  “I’m getting there.”

  Montana mentally shrugged and stopped asking questions. He was looking for something and it was obvious he wasn’t going to be persuaded to talk until he found whatever it was.

  Shifting gently to avoid rubbing the bandage, Montana laid her head against the couch cushion and closed her eyes.

  How had she gotten here?

  Was this some outgrowth of poor decisions on the part of her parents? Because no matter how she sliced it, she couldn’t come up with any memory—any past dealing, any past action, heck, even any past relationship—that would explain why she had been targeted in such a personal manner.

  What did she really know about them? The person her mother was now certainly wasn’t the glamorous woman who had married Jack Grant and graced all the magazines and newspapers of the time.

  And her father.

  For all his supposed pain after her mother left, it wasn’t something she’d had much experience with. He’d always kept himself very closeted and alone. When she was younger, their relationship was confined to rare occasions—holidays, birthdays, social functions—that he either trotted her out for or felt some responsibility to acknowledge her with some of his time.

  That all changed when she was a senior in high school and exhibited an interest in the business. He’d taken on a more nurturing role, encouraging her to learn the business and what it meant to run a global company.

  Thinking back on it, he’d been loving in his own way but very, very distant. As if he believed business instruction and time spent in boardrooms somehow equaled love.

  Before Montana could continue her musings, Quinn settled himself next to her. She felt the depression of his large frame where his body pressed into the couch cushions, smelled the masculine scent of fresh air and the subtle hint of sandalwood.

  God help her, she wanted him. Even though he was in a relationship. Even though she’d been attacked twice in his presence. Even though he clearly harbored an agenda he wasn’t sharing.

  Good Lord, what did that say about her?

  “Montana.” His voice was gentle. “I’d like you to look at something.”

  She opened her eyes to find a small volume in his hands. The bindings were old and worn, the leather pulling away at various points. She reached for it, her touch gentle as she took full possession of the book.

  Turning it over, she saw the dulled imprint on the spine, the colored paint that had once filled it to denote the title and author long since faded.

  A book by the Greek writer Hesiod.

  “What is this?”

  “You’ve heard of Hesiod. The Greek poet?” As she nodded, he added, “This is one of his works. Long forgotten and seldom printed.”

  “So how do you have it? Are you a collector of ancient texts?”

  “We thought it wise to translate it into usable form several hundred years ago.”

  Usable form? Hundreds of years ago? What was he talking about? “Quinn. I’m sorry. You’ve lost me. Who is we?”

  “My brothers and I.”

  “Your brothers? How many do you have?”

  “Brothers is actually a figurative term. We’re not biologically related. We fight together. Have fought together for a very long time.”

  “So you help one another out like brothers in arms? And the men who arrived in the park today? The ones who looked like they stepped out of a men’s fashion magazine?”

  He smiled but didn’t say anything.

  “They’re your fighting buddies?”

  “I’m not sure we’ve ever been called buddies, but yes, the men who showed up are my Warrior brothers.”

  She turned to look at him, a sinking feeling pulling at her stomach. The leather couch cushions that molded to her body suddenly felt like a trap she couldn’t get out of.

  What could he possibly be talking about? And even more disturbing, did he really believe what he was saying?

  “You’re not much older than me. Look at you. You’re in the prime of your life. How could you have fought for a very long time?”

  “I’m perpetually in the prime of my life.”

  Montana shook her head and tried to scoot herself forward, some insane urge to run propelling her limbs. The adrenaline that had pumped through her system only minutes before when dealing with the pain of her attack spiked once again in the urge to flee. “Whatever you’re trying to tell me, it can’t possibly be true.”

  “Montana, you said you wanted answers.”

  “Yes. I want the truth. Preferably something that makes any sort of rational sense.” She edged farther to the end of the couch cushion, her feet finding purchase on the floor as her heart pounded a rhythm in double-time. “The real truth about why you think I’m being attacked.”

  “You’
re the one who’s been asking about Themis. About all the things your mother has been saying.”

  “Yes. The troubled words of a woman who isn’t in her right mind.”

  His dark eyes turned stormy and deep lines crinkled his forehead. For some reason she couldn’t define, the look was oddly sexy. Scholarly.

  Oh man, she seriously needed to get a grip.

  Those crinkles deepened even further as he spoke. “Don’t go soft on me now, Montana. You know—somewhere deep down inside—you know.”

  “No, I don’t know.” She stood up and moved a few steps away, casting a glance toward the door. “I don’t know anything beyond the fact that you’re really starting to scare me.”

  “Themis. Me. This—” He flung a hand around the room. “Even what is happening to you. It’s not of this world.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Quinn reached for the book in her hands as if it were a standard paperback, his fingers deft on the pages, uncaring about the book’s age. He flipped through several until settling on whatever it was he was looking for.

  “Here.” He thrust the book back at her. “Read this. Then we’ll talk.”

  With that he stood and began to pace the far side of the room.

  To give her some breathing room?

  She glanced at his retreating back, surprised again that the panic had receded and all she felt was desire. Need.

  Want.

  But the fear? Even as she tried to analyze that feeling, she knew anything she felt wasn’t because of the large man across the room.

  With a tentative glance toward the open book in her hands, Montana read the header of the chapter, the ink still dark enough to read clearly, despite the book’s age.

  THE GREAT AGREEMENT BETWEEN THEMIS AND ZEUS.

  With gentle movements, she resettled herself on the couch. It was time to find out what was going on.

  Quinn shot Callie a text as he paced the far side of the library. He didn’t dare leave Montana behind and he wasn’t ready to bring anyone back in the room, either.