Rise (Elemental Hearts Book 2)

by Jayelle Morgan

  “Got it,” Ajax confirmed. He fingered one of his knives in the holster. Things had been too calm with the Chaolt lately, and before Emory showed up, he’d actually missed fighting them.

  Emory. He needed to call her, to let her know something came up. But he couldn’t yet, with Walker still on the phone.

  “Okay, you set up here.” Walker tapped his brakes, and Ajax pulled off the road as Walker drove on. “Make sure that area will work. If there aren’t any trees tall enough, you might have to move on.”

  Ajax got out of the truck, and visually measured several trees in the glow of his headlights. Plenty of them here that he could topple with a strong gust. He picked a couple favorites and sent a test gust through, to see how much force he might need to get them to all break in the directions he needed. He was rewarded with the groan and crackle of flexing trees. “This will work, Walker.”

  “Good,” he said, “Be waiting for my call.” Walker disconnected and Ajax took a deep breath of dusk mountain air.

  Antsy, he waited five minutes until he knew Walker was at his spot, and then dialed Emory. She didn’t answer. Shit. He couldn’t risk re-dialing her several times and perhaps missing Walker’s call. He’d have to wait and call her back later.

  Emory knelt on the couch, elbow on the back of it and chin in her hand, and waited. And was still waiting.

  An hour ago, she’d gone and changed into the one sort-of-sexy thing she had; a thin-strapped knit nightgown in pale pink, with lace at the short hem and around the deep V-neck. But she was starting to think that had been stupid.

  Wait up for me, he’d said. And she had, with butterflies in her stomach. Nervous and excited like it was her first time.

  She sighed heavily, eyes burning and lids heavy. She couldn’t stay up much longer, no matter how much she wanted to wait up for him. Especially since he didn’t seem to be in as big a hurry as she thought.

  Hopefully nothing serious had happened to keep him away. She’d probably see his headlights coming down the road any minute. Five more minutes… she’d give him five more.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  He didn’t know how long he’d been waiting when his phone finally rang. He flexed his powers, kicking up the wind as he answered. “They’re coming?”

  “No,” Walker ground out, “They’re not.”

  Stunned, Ajax stilled the wind he’d stirred. “What do you mean? What happened?”

  “Silverthorne called. They recovered the Erratic.”

  “So why don’t you sound happy, Walker?”

  “Because they picked her up off the side of the road. For whatever reason, the Chaolt dumped her there for them to find, and took off.”

  “What. The. Fuuuck.”

  “Exactly,” Walker replied.

  It was just so uncharacteristic. They were upending everything the Warriors knew about Chaolt behavior from experience. But he didn’t have to tell Walker that, he was muttering constantly under his breath on the other end of the line. Ajax laughed.

  If the situation wasn’t so screwed up, Ajax might even be able to enjoy Walker’s discomposure. But his mirth faded quickly as Walker’s mutter turned to a yell.

  “Shit! Ajax, here they come! They just passed by me. Black van, speeding your way. At least two Chaolt.” They didn’t have the Erratic anymore, the one they’d kidnapped in Colorado, and yet they were still coming to Topaz Ridge? Why? “Block the road,” Walker ordered.

  “Yes, sir.” Ajax disconnected, pocketed his phone, and clenched his fists. With inward focus, he began stirring the air currents, pushing them, until his hair lifted from his back with the force of the breeze. And then with a shove, he aimed it at the chosen trees.

  The sharp crack of them snapping reverberated through the forest on either side of him.

  But it was done. The road was blocked with three downed trees, too big to drive over, and impossible to drive around.

  Ajax sent another push of power out and felt them, the Chaolt, the speed of their vehicle whipping up the air along the road. A second vehicle, close behind. Walker. And a third, a few miles back.

  Silverthorne?

  Had to be. As they got closer, he could sense other Elementals, and one powerful Air Erratic.

  Bright headlights appeared on the mountain road below them. Ajax un-holstered his knives.

  “Show time.”

  Much later, Emory awoke, disoriented. She was still on the couch, and Ajax’s truck still wasn’t in the driveway. Where was he?

  Jackson was crying in his bedroom, the sound muted by the closed door.

  She sprang up and rushed to his room. How long had he been crying? She opened Jackson’s door and saw him flailing in his crib, the mobile swinging wildly in the wind above him. Oh, god, he was so upset.

  She picked him up, shushed him, rocked him, and still he cried.

  She normally would have heard Jackson long before he got to this point. She always turned the baby monitor on before she went to bed, but it was in her bedroom, and she’d fallen asleep on the couch waiting for Ajax.

  She paced with Jackson, bouncing and singing, while he wailed. She tried to calm her own temper and exasperation, because Jackson seemed to respond to her mood sometimes. If she was upset, he’d stay upset. If she could relax, so would he, eventually. But it was hard, so hard when she was tired and mad and Jackson kept crying. Her ears were ringing from his cries and the wind whistling around the room before he started to calm down.

  Finally, he was calm enough to feed and she sat down heavily in the rocking chair and coaxed him to nurse. Tired, frustrated beyond belief, she leaned her head back and tried to regain her own composure.

  The wind, which had already lightened, finally died down to stillness.

  Jackson taken care of, her thoughts turned to Ajax.

  He’d asked her to wait up for him, and then hadn’t come back. Why? Hopefully, nothing bad had happened. She wanted to get up and check her phone for a message, but it was in the other room and getting it would mean disturbing Jackson. It could wait until he’d eaten and was back in bed. There was no guarantee Ajax would’ve called anyway, he never had before. She basically had no idea what went on once he left her house, and tonight that made her stomach tight. How did she know for sure that he was doing Warrior stuff?

  Emory took a deep breath and pushed away the thought. He didn’t deserve her suspicion. Sure, he’d been enough of a playboy when they met that his commander didn’t think twice about him being at some chick’s house for sex…but that was before. Things were different now.

  Ajax stayed with them even at the expense of his duties, which was why tonight was so unusual. Usually he was only gone a short while.

  And she had little doubt he wanted her as much as she wanted him. Even now, the memory of what he’d done to her before he left made her cheeks burn, made her heart skip.

  But that was sex.

  And to her, it was a lot more.

  She put her hand over her mouth as her heart contracted painfully at the realization. She’d fallen for him, hard. She was in love with Ajax. The Elemental Warrior from another world who was here fighting a war against Chaos. Oh god. Lust and an odd feeling of connection had turned to love in the last few weeks. Despite how they met, despite what he was, or wasn’t.

  And other than saying he wanted to “work on things”, Ajax had never said much about the future. What if he successfully drained Jackson? Would he walk away? They hadn’t really talked about commitment, or marriage, or being a family once all this was over.

  And, oh god, she wanted all of that.

  But he was going to break their hearts. This, tonight, proved it. She’d never have all of Ajax, and Jackson wouldn’t either. She’d fooled herself into thinking she could have more with him, at the expense of Jackson’s future well-being.

  Ajax would only ever be there in half measures. Half Elemental, half human. Half playboy, half lover. Half Warrior…half a father.

  And yeah, maybe her math
sucked, but it was all true none the less. This was a mistake.

  She looked down at Jackson, sleeping peacefully across her arms, his warm weight against her chest, and her heart broke for him.

  She wanted to protect Jackson from pain, not bring him more. She wanted him to know that he was loved with her whole heart and soul. To know he was the center of her universe.

  She didn’t want him to know the pain of being only half loved. The way it could make you doubt yourself, and wonder what was wrong with you. Why you weren’t good enough, or cute enough, or smart enough to keep someone’s attention.

  The way it could make you wonder why they didn’t show up when they said they would.

  She stroked Jackson’s hair. He was so worn out from his crying fit that he had fallen asleep without fully eating. He’d wake up hungry and upset again soon.

  Emory sighed, so tired that she wasn’t sure if she could put him back in his crib. What if moving him woke him up again?

  The thought was painful. With all the stress and a certain teal-eyed soldier keeping her awake at night, and keeping her waiting, she was even more tired than usual.

  Maybe she could let him finish out his sleep on her, and get some rest herself. If he started getting upset, she would know and could hopefully calm him quickly, before either of them had to fully awake.

  Yeah, that sounded like a good idea. She would think about what to do about Ajax in the morning. Maybe they could talk it out, together.

  She quit resisting her heavy eyelids and just enjoyed the feeling of her son in her arms as she drifted to sleep.

  Ajax hid in the deep shadows under the trees as the Chaolt drove towards him, bringing their stink with them. Even the animals seemed to sense them. All the creatures were hunkered down in their holes, barely disturbing the air.

  He stopped feeling the small changes in air currents as the power drain from the Chaolt started, the metallic, grating buzz ramping up in his head.

  The black van came up the road and came to a tire-screeching stop in front of the downed trees.

  Two Chaolt stepped out of the van, cursing. When they tried to work together and move the first tree, Ajax stepped out of the shadows, flipping one of his blades in his hand.

  “Hey, assholes. I heard you left your package on the side of the road a way back.”

  Both turned toward him, pulling blades of their own, their faces distorting even before they snarled at him. Then the side door of the van opened, and two more came out. Two he could handle, maybe even three. Four at once was going to push the limits of what he could do.

  He couldn’t wait.

  Ajax tensed his muscles in preparation, while he kept up the casual flipping of his blade.

  The first one to move toward him got a knife in the heart. The Chaolt fell to his knees, disintegrating into black dust as the other three rushed him.

  He was already in his groove—blades flying, slashing, biting—when Walker pulled up behind them in the SUV.

  These guys were most definitely going to be dust now. Which meant the challenge was gone.

  “I can handle this, Walker.”

  “Oh, I know,” he said, squaring off with the one closest to him. “But it’s not your shift, remember? No reason you should get to have all the fun.”

  Action made Ajax happy, while inaction made him crazy. The look on Walker’s face as he joined the fray told him maybe that was something they had in common. Still, he couldn’t resist a dig as he finished off another Chaolt and turned to the third.

  “I guess you can help then, old man.” ‘Old’ was relative term with them, having much longer than normal lifespans. But Walker was older, had been here longer, than any of them in the group.

  Walker’s grunt sounded distinctly irritated, and Ajax smiled as he knocked his Chaolt to the ground and buried a dagger in its chest. He turned just as the crack of a neck signaled the demise of Walker’s combatant.

  They all used knives to supplement their fists, but Micah and Walker seemed to prefer hand-to-hand. Or hands to neck, in Walker’s case. And when Walker slowly met his eyes above the slumping, dissolving body of the Chaolt, apparently still irritated at the ‘old man’ comment, Ajax couldn’t stop a tight swallow.

  Shit was going to get real if Walker ever found out his secret.

  He would have to make sure he never let Walker close enough to use his hands. And he’d need the element of surprise to get the upper hand using his powers. Knives were a last resort, because he’d have to get within arm’s reach of Walker. Elementals didn’t go down easy, and especially not Walker. He was a leader for a reason.

  Ajax looked away and wiped his blades on his pants before holstering them.

  Assessing Walker as an enemy, even briefly, made his gut churn in a way that had nothing to do with the thick smell of burning plastic in the air.

  “Ajax…”

  Just as he looked up and saw the suspicion in Walker’s eyes, another van drove up behind them and turned sideways on the road.

  Walker’s attention immediately went to the vehicle and Ajax took a quiet breath, turning to it too.

  This van was a dark gray, but the main difference was who was inside. All the doors opened and three other large Warriors got out.

  Silverthorn group.

  Or some of it, anyways. Their Air Warrior was in the back of the van, talking to and holding the hands of a tearful woman Ajax sensed was the Air Erratic. And if that wasn’t enough, her tangled blond hair, ragged clothes, and the bloody road rash on her arm said she was definitely the one who’d been dumped roadside.

  Walker began talking with the other Warriors as Ajax edged closer to the van.

  Both of them noticed Ajax’s presence and looked his way. The Erratic’s stare was glassy and blank. The other Warrior greeted him with a nod, eyes glowing with the same teal color his own did.

  After a moment of silence between them, the Warrior in the van said, “She’s going to be okay. I’m already draining her, she won’t remember much of this.”

  He’d misinterpreted Ajax’s uneasiness for concern.

  Ajax nodded at them both and turned away, a rushing sound in his ears. She was definitely powerful. Very powerful, for a normal Erratic. For the Chaolt to take her to a new location, and then to release her instead of using her, was strange indeed.

  The only way it made sense was if they’d somehow found a more powerful Erratic they wanted instead—

  Ajax inhaled sharply, a gust of wind rustling the trees above his head. “Walker, are we done here?”

  Walker stopped talking and turned his head toward him. “We still need to clear the trees and get rid of the van—”

  “But you and these guys can handle that, right?” Ajax looked pointedly at the Plant Warrior that Walker was talking to with vining glyphs on his arms. “Dickweed here can move the trees.”

  The other Warrior reddened, his jaw tense, and Ajax couldn’t even take any pleasure in his reaction because his heartbeat was in his throat.

  “Ajax—”

  “Not my shift, Walker. I did what you asked me to do, and now I need to go.”

  Walker’s look was hard and assessing, but Ajax turned away and headed around the downed trees. The wind followed him.

  A quick glance behind him confirmed that the other Air Warrior was staring at him, brow furrowed. There was no way he could have missed Ajax’s power leak. Ajax just prayed he didn’t mention it to Walker.

  He had to get to Emory and Jackson.

  As soon as he got in the truck, he dialed her. It rang all the way to voice-mail. But it was late, and he’d been gone longer than he intended. She’d probably gone to bed. He glanced at his watch… Four hours?! Four fucking hours he’d been gone. No wonder she’d gone to bed. He didn’t want to add waking her up to the list of things she’d have to be pissed about when he got back.

  He gripped the phone in his fist as he accelerated. She was just asleep.

  Her feelings would be hurt when he go
t back. He’d asked her to wait up for him, and then stood her up. Not on purpose, but hell.

  The sick feeling curled in his stomach again.

  She was just asleep. And she’d be pissed at him in the morning, but pissed he could deal with. He’d be honest with her, tell her what happened with Walker and why he had to go. Then he would make it okay. Everything would be okay.

  Cursing, he dialed her phone again.

  Emory awoke with a start, Jackson shifting in her arms at her sudden movement, but not waking. She looked down at him, his eyelids moving rapidly, his mouth suckling in his sleep. Not a nightmare. She rubbed her burning eyes. She couldn’t have been asleep long, only long enough to make her feel even more tired. She leaned back and closed her eyes again.

  In the foggy space between awake and asleep, she heard it. A low, rhythmic vibration. So out of place in the quiet house that it brought her fully awake again in an instant. She sat there still, listening intently. There it was again. What the heck was that? It was coming from the living room. Oh, her phone. It must be on vibrate. Ajax was trying to call her.

  But something was off. She smelled burning plastic. Carefully, she got up with Jackson in her arms to check it out. She stepped into the hall just as a shadow moved in front of the little window in the front door, and her steps froze as her heart pounded in her throat.

  But it had to be Ajax. Maybe he’d dropped his key in the dark or something, and that’s why he was calling her, to open the door. But she heard a new noise, and it didn’t sound like his key in the lock. A feeling made her walk up to the door and look out.