by Kita Bell
She wouldn’t be happy.
The cashier caught his gaze and blushed bright red. Brand sighed, rubbed the bridge of his nose, trying to stem the oncoming headache, and asked, “How about I just leave a fifty, and you ring it up when you get the price back? You can keep the change.”
She gave him a look like he was trying to skip out on paying. Then her gaze slid over Brand’s shoulder, and her blush heightened, and Brand mentally steeled himself as he caught the aggressive edge to Joshua’s scent.
A gloved hand clamped over his shoulder like a vice, gave a small shake that was meant to look playful, but Brand could tell his cousin was fucking pissed.
“Seth got intel back on this Rohe. It’s a wonder your little girlfriend wasn’t messed up worse.”
Joshua spoke in his native French and the cashier looked like she was about to faint. Brand grimaced and turned around; Joshua’s gray eyes sparked with a furious gold. “Tell me,” Brand sighed. This was going to give him a mother of a headache.
“She’s a sadistic Court bitch who everyone, up to this point, thought was in Italy. But Seth’s intel says she jumped ship at New York a year ago, and no one’s seen her since.” Joshua shook his head. “The Gens watcher in New York didn’t even bother with a report. He assumed Rohe left. With that sort of fucking incompetence, we can probably expect Sakai to be all across the country.”
“Is Rohe a Summerbourne or a Winterbourne?”
“Summerbourne.”
Well. Thank god for small favors. Brand didn’t want to deal with the power a Winterbourne could draw on. “What House is Rohe from?”
“Don’t know yet. Seth hasn’t heard back from Reese.”
“Why not?”
“Reese went…”
Something changed in the air.
Brand lost the rest of whatever Joshua was saying. Foreboding slammed through him, his gut clenched. Brand’s eyes focused through the Plexiglas doors of the Walmart entrance, where Eva had been waiting for him just moments before – she was gone.
Joshua stilled. “I smell Sakai.” A guttural inhumane growl rolled up through his chest, deadly and furious and loud. The once-admiring cashier gaped, her face going chalky white as she stumbled backwards.
Brand threw money at her, grabbed the bags, and left.
Three hours later, he was pacing the Walmart parking lot. After a particularly pointless circuit, Brand stopped to brace his gloved hands on the roof of the car as he attempted to stem his rising panic. He could sense that Eva was in danger and he could still scent the Sakai on the air. But he had no idea how to find her. Her scent lingered, dull and muddled by ice and snow and car exhaust, and for the life of him, he wasn’t a tracker. If Eva had been nearby, Brand could have found her. But she wasn’t.
Fuck, she was his amati.
Was this how it had started with Khael? The sense of loss, the tangled desperation?
Brand snarled his need to see her, to touch her – then got back into the warm car as Joshua slid the phone shut. He barely caught himself from slamming the door.
“Seth’s going to think that you’re avoiding him,” Joshua said with a probing look. Brand scowled and his cousin sighed, locking the doors. “Maybe Khael can track her. All you have to do is give Seth the go-ahead, he’ll ask Khael, and your big bro will fly down tonight. If you can help him find her scent then we’ll have your girlfriend in no time.”
Khael? Brand flinched. “No.”
“He doesn’t blame you.” Joshua frowned out at the snow and ice of the parking lot. They hadn’t moved the car because Brand didn’t want to risk Eva returning to find them gone.
“No,” Brand’s voice was sharp. “Khael blames himself.”
“And you blame yourself for that, too,” Joshua snapped. “And if you could take that away as well, you probably would.”
Brand hit him.
There was the crunching sound of fist on jaw, and Joshua slammed back into the driver’s seat, twisting his body in a smooth motion to minimize the impact to the car. His claws were out and buried in the leather of the steering wheel.
Brand glared at Joshua, but his cousin met the look squarely.
Slowly, Brand lowered his fist.
“You provoked me.” A sour twist of amusement – and irritation – floated through him.
Joshua touched the blood at the corner of his mouth, but didn’t sheathe his claws. “Feel better?”
“No.” Brand pulled off his left glove and reached to touch the blood on Joshua’s jaw. Brand pushed power into the injury, watching as the injury darkened and set. He drew back when the bruise matured to a gruesome shade of green, but wasn’t too painful. “Now I feel better.”
Joshua poked at his jaw and peered in the rearview mirror with a faint grimace. “At least you left me some color, cousin.” A pause, then a bit awkwardly. “Eva. You’re not acting…yourself with her. She’s your amati, isn’t she?”
No point in denying it. “Yes.”
“Fuck. We don’t have to tell Khael.”
“He’d figure it out. That’s not exactly something you can hide, Joshua.”
“Yeah. And he’ll probably know what she is as soon as you ask him. It’s not like you make it a point of asking for Khael’s help. Ever.”
Brand just shook his head, recognizing the truth behind those words and swallowed his regret. Joshua knew well enough by now that if there was one thing Brand didn’t talk about, it was his fucked up relationship with Khael. Fucked up, or fucked over? he wondered bitterly. Definitely the latter. Some things just weren’t salvageable.
Joshua shifted next to him. “Seth said he’d dig deeper, and run a trace on the plate numbers we pulled from the security cams. If Sakai have her, he’ll find it in the feed. And if not…” Joshua shrugged. “Then she’s out there somewhere,” he motioned at the ominous line of trees Brand had already combed through, multiple times, “and no matter what you think, you’ll want Seth to ask Khael to fly out asap. Hell, he’s a bastard – but he’s your brother. I don’t think he’d want you to end up like him.”
Brand had his doubts about that. Still, he struggled with himself, staring at the trees. “We’ll wait,” he finally forced out, “until Seth gets back to us. Maybe he’ll find something on the footage.” Brand wondered if he was making the right decision. If Eva had been kidnapped again, every second counted.
When he got his hands on her, he wasn’t going to let her out of his sight again.
Joshua swore. “Brand, ask him for help. He’s the best. If she is your amati, then you would think…”
“I don’t think anything,” Brand snapped. “Except that she’s been tortured and she’s in trouble. And that she’s out there, cold and terrified and alone – with Sakai. Fuck,” Brand snarled, his temper surging. He glared at Joshua. “Leave Khael out of this.”
Joshua’s phone began to ring. But Joshua didn’t answer it immediately, holding it in his gloved hand as he stared at Brand. “A long time ago,” he finally said, “Someone once warned me that tigers in Kade Gens grow unreasonable when they first find their mates. Dangerous, even – to themselves and others. I believe that person was you, Brand. We were both drunk and three sheets to the wind, but I believed you then, and I definitely believe you now.”
Brand tensed, his arm bunched. Joshua’s eyes turned cold and gray as a knife blade.
“Cousin, if you hit me again,” Joshua’s deep voice was stripped of all warmth, going deadly and soft, “I won’t be able to answer this call. Because I will be sliding a knife through your ribs. Then you will be the one to explain to Seth why you’re avoiding his calls. And why, of all things, you won’t ask Khael for help.”
“I’d ask him,” Brand said, his jaw tight as he glanced out at the parking lot, sweeping for threats, “but not for this.”
But what he really meant was Not for her. Of all people he would ask to help find Eva, he hoped never to ask Khael.
It wasn’t because Brand felt guilty.
&nbs
p; No, Brand didn’t want to ask for Khael’s help because, deep down, he knew that if Khael found Eva for him, it would hurt his brother far worse than anything else. Khael would hide it, but damn it…if you carried a man’s memories of his amati for a half-millennium, then you got to know that man pretty damn well. And Brand knew that finding Eva would hurt Khael as badly as if he had taken those memories all over again.
If Joshua couldn’t put those facts together, Brand wasn’t going to point them out.
Asking Khael was a…well, he would only do it if he had to.
“Fuck,” Brand swore, turning away as he raked his fingers through his hair. He resisted the urge to pace the parking lot one more time. Because Eva was out there somewhere.
“A word of advice,” Joshua flipped open the phone, connecting the call. “Get your head on straight, Brand. And soon.”
Then Seth’s voice said, from the other side of the line, “Turn on your radio. Police just reported a tiger sighting in Evans Park. If there are any Sakai in the area, they are sure to be there too.”
Joshua cursed and Brand snarled.
Fuck. Human police – that was the last thing they needed. Well, that and Sakai.
She had lost the Sakai, but she had also lost herself.
Actually, Eva thought, replaying what had happened in her mind, she had probably only imagined the Sakai – she hadn’t seen them. Not once. Just shadows, and shadows didn’t count for anything. She hadn’t even sensed Sakai chasing after her. It was likely all in her head, some sort of PTSD thing, and she had panicked like a silly cub and left behind the only people she could trust to help her.
Worse, if she dropped her blood tiger form and turned human again, she was going to freeze to death. Lake-front snow? Eva twitched her tail in abject disgust. Was that what the woman had called it? “Postcard picture from hell freezing over” would be a more accurate description. Eva had never imagined it could get so cold in Ohio. Her breath came in great clouds from her nostrils, her chest burned slightly, and she was more than glad for her thick coat of fur.
Brand and Joshua would be long-gone, glad to have washed their hands of her and her problems. Face it, Eva told herself as she slipped through the thick winter brush beside a park trail, You’re lucky they helped you as far as they did. They’re Kade Gens. Kades don’t bother with lesser Gens. Eva rumbled a growl and tried to swallow the angry disappointed sensation that rose with that knowledge – Brand had promised everything would be okay, that he would take her home. But instead he had taken her to Ohio, forced her to buy an oversized coat, and now she was completely lost.
Get a grip. She was being weak again. Dependent.
And this situation wasn’t so bad. Anything was better than being Rohe’s test subject.
So. She flexed her paws against the snow, glad for the cover of nightfall, and slunk toward the central structure of the abandoned park. Just how does a tiger with no money and no sense of direction get her paws on a map?
Eva had just slunk over the top stair to the small park amphitheater, debating that issue, when a heavy weight slammed her to the ground.
Sakai.
Terror rose inside Eva, so that her pulse turned thready as a dozen half-healed injures flared to life across her body. She snarled, whipping her claws around to eviscerate the threat and instead found herself in the grip of a much-too-strong hand as it latched around the ruff of her neck and shook her like a kitten. A quasi-familiar voice snarled, “Change back, Eva! Before the police get here!”
She scented the dark masculine scent of citrus, of warm sunlit leaves in shade – aka the scent of desire and her inconveniently over-active hormones. Brand.
Oh thank god. Eva didn’t think, she turned and wrapped a foreleg over his shoulder as he rose from his crouch and licked his face. Brand tasted as good as he smelled – and he gave a soft snort of amusement, the harsh biting scent of his concern fading as he buried strong fingers into her fur and gave another, lighter shake. “Change back now, Evita. Someone sighted you in the park and called the police. Sakai are going to be all over the place in a matter of moments.”
“As if we don’t have enough problems,” Joshua muttered before looking at her. His brows arched and he smirked, “Bad kitty,” even as Eva flashed her teeth in annoyance. Joshua rolled his eyes, almost entirely cloaked in the shadows of a pillar as he thrust a bag forward. “Give her the clothes Brand, so she can Change and we can at least stop worrying about animal control.”
Brand pulled his fingers from Eva’s fur, leaving her strangely bereft as he set the plastic-smelling Walmart bag on the ground before her. When he looked like he was going to stand there and watch her Change, Eva gave a short growl. Brand may have seen her naked, but this – this was personal. Only family members were allowed to watch her change. Joshua laughed softly from the shadows as Brand turned away.
Perhaps it was because Eva had such a fine view of Brand’s backside, but the Change came easier than usual for her. But then, the Change had always felt like foreplay, and with Brand standing so close…
Eva snarled softly as she resumed human form. The cold night air bit at her skin. Her nipples, already hard from the Change, tightened painfully. But the cold was in no way as palpable as the hot feel of Brand’s eyes tracing her naked body.
He had turned back to watch her.
Was there an air of possessiveness in his gaze?
Eva shivered, cupping her fingers over her breasts, and very carefully did not look at him. She bent her head, looking for her shoes…or something. Anything to avoid those electric sapphire eyes. Desire had sparked inside her earlier, when she first saw Brand – it had jumped, leaping for him – and now Eva was afraid what she would see reflected in his gaze as he looked at her injured, too-thin body.
No, she wasn’t even remotely attractive at the moment. She knew that.
I never should have allowed myself to be taken by Rohe.
She had been weak – stupidly weak.
“You weren’t supposed to watch,” she said quietly.
Brand shrugged, cleared his throat, and didn’t say anything.
Eva turned her back and quickly sorted through the plastic bag for a pair of jeans and a sweater; she’d worry about underclothes later. Eva was shivering by the time she pulled the clothes on turned back around. Brand frowned at her bare feet. “You need shoes again.”
“These will work until we reach my Gens.”
“Yes. About that. We need to talk, Eva.” Brand grabbed her hand, pulling her back into the thick shadows that surrounded Joshua.
“You mean, talk about why we’re in Ohio of all places?” she said, trying to find the edge of her earlier temper – and failing. They both ignored her.
“The Sakai are nearing the treeline. We need to split up to break the trail, otherwise they’ll find us all.” Joshua’s voice was low.
Eva felt as if cold water had just been thrown over her. “So there are Sakai here? I thought maybe I was imagining…” her words dwindled under Joshua’s disbelieving look.
“What, you chose to run away from the Walmart parking lot? You just thought you’d go for an excursion through the park at night, naked? Is this something you do often, kitten?”
“Joshua. Suggestions rather than criticism?” Brand interrupted in a clipped tone.
Joshua turned back to him. “I need some of her hair.”
Eva flinched back even as she heard Brand growl. “No.” Anger rose inside her.
“If she had older clothing, something with a scent-mark, I’d use her shirt,” Joshua said patiently, ignoring her. “But since she doesn’t, I need either her blood, or her hair. Then I’ll go out through the trees and mark a trail. The Sakai will think she doubled back. They’ll follow, then the two of you can start for the car.”
“What about the police?” Eva asked.
Joshua gave Eva a long look. “Now that you aren’t furry, I don’t give a damn about the human police. We don’t have much time. Hair or blood, Eva
. Make your choice.”
Eva stretched slightly, feeling the scab pull at her back. “Blood might be easier.”
“Then give me something I can work with.”
“How…” Eva flushed, not sure how to go about doing that.
Joshua snarled softly, focusing on the trees. “God, female. Do you want to be tortured by Sakai again? Because I certainly don’t.”
And Eva snapped into focus. “Don’t look,” she said fiercely, and turned her back on them as she scooped a pair of socks from the sack and gritted her teeth, preparing for the pain that would come when she ripped the scabs on her back so she could bleed…
…and jumped, crying out as a large hand gripped her shoulder and took the socks, stopping her.
“Hold still,” Brand murmured, his low voice vibrating against her ear, “You want me to do that. If you have a fresh wound, it won’t matter how hard Joshua tries to confuse the trail. The Sakai will find us regardless. They can track blood like sharks. I’ll have to heal it for you.”
Brand was close, Eva could feel his breath on her neck. He was big, tall. Warm. Eva forced herself to relax, then nodded.
And then his large hand pushed up under the back of her sweater, smoothing along her spine as he searched out the furrow of the bullet wound from the other abrasions. He growled softly when he found it, and traced the edge of the injury with his fingers. Eva tensed, preparing herself for the pain when he would rip the thick scab open, then instead felt the sharp prick of a razor-sharp claw as it lanced down through the skin just beneath the edge of the scab, neatly slicing it open.
Eva froze, shaking. The claw withdrew, swiftly replaced by the rough cotton texture of the socks.
It was almost…painless.
Brand was running his other hand over her shoulder blades, back and forth, as if trying to soothe her. It was working.
Well, soothing and other things.
“I’m sorry, Evita,” he said softly, and she shook her head. It hadn’t hurt. Not like the original wound.
“Not many can do that,” she finally said, striving for control, but her voice was uneven. She couldn’t see Brand’s face as the material withdrew. She felt his fingers come to rest against the fresh wound. “Shift just their claws, I mean.”
