Dangerous Lovers

by Becca Vincenza

  He ran his fingers over my wrist then trailed them up my arm. His strong hands led chill bumps as they ascended. My chest rose and fell. I was sure I’d lost my poker face.

  “No, that’s not what makes you special,” he said, in a hushed, deep voice. “You’re brave and strong. You care for others more than you care for yourself. You risk your life for what you think is right, and you would willingly die for those you love. That’s what makes you special.”

  I flicked my gaze back up to his, and what I saw there made my breath catch in my throat. I could tell that he was struggling with something, and if I hadn’t known better, I would say it was desire. For a moment, I thought that he might kiss me.

  He didn’t.

  Instead, he stood up rather abruptly. I slumped back against the couch and rubbed my hands over my face. This was all I needed, falling for a guy who obviously did not want me in that way.

  I exhaled slowly. “I need a cigarette.”

  He looked over from where he was now standing by the fireplace.

  “You smoke?”

  I nodded. “Don’t suppose you have any?”

  He grew thoughtful for a second, and being the smoker that I am, my eyes lit up with hope.

  He laughed at my expression. “No, I don’t. But… I guess we could go get some, even though I don’t think you should be smoking. Those things will kill you.”

  I rolled my eyes. Never heard that one before. “Doubt it. I’m pretty sure that something else is going to kill me long before the cigarettes get their chance.”

  He laughed at my morbid statement, and the sound of it warmed me. I loved his laugh. I loved making him laugh. I was definitely losing my mind.

  When he looked back over at me, I put on what I hoped was a charming smile. “Um… please?” He narrowed his eyes and I grinned. “Oh, come on. It’s okay for me to fight men twice my size, but it’s not okay for me to have a cigarette?”

  He muttered something and shook his head. “Okay, but we have

  to be careful. I’m not sure if it’s safe out there yet.”

  I jumped up and threw my arms up in triumph. “Yes!”

  He shook his head again and laughed at my stupidity. “There’s a small store just outside of the forest. I think we can get there without being seen.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The man at the store didn’t even charge me for the cigarettes. When he saw the marks on my arm, he just gave them to me, saying something about how he was just grateful I had finally arrived.

  Kayden was sitting on the back porch of his cabin with me as I smoked.

  “What was that about?” I asked, blowing out a cloud of wonderful poison.

  He shrugged, eyeing my cigarette with mild distaste. “There are some who believe you have come to serve as their savior.”

  I thought back to Scar’s words to me just before my fight with Daniel. Who knows, you may be the one who will save us all.

  “Why would they think that?”

  He was silent for a moment before saying, “Who knows?”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. I was pretty sure he knew something that he wasn’t telling me. His expression had turned guarded, though, so I decided that I would definitely be looking into this later.

  I groped for a change in subject. “So what do we do now? Was it the queen they were trying to kill, or was it me? And why would someone try to kill me? I just got here. I doubt I pissed anyone off enough… yet, to warrant a dagger to the head.”

  His expression went dark. Unsurprisingly, it made me think he was even more attractive. I was seriously deranged.

  “I’m not sure,” he said. “But I’ll find out.”

  I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts of Kayden-filled fantasies. I needed to concentrate. This was no time for daydreaming. Alarm shot through me as I realized that I hadn’t even thought about Nelly the whole time I’d been here. This worried me. Nelly was always my biggest concern, and I hadn’t even checked to make sure she’d gotten out of the Council building safely.

  “Do you have a phone I can use?” I asked.

  He stood up and went into the house. A few moments later he returned and held out a cell phone. I reached out to take it, but he pulled his hand out of my reach.

  I gave him a confused look. “What?”

  “Who are you going to call?”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Ghostbusters?”

  He didn’t laugh, but I saw a smile behind his eyes. Instead, he just waited for my answer.

  I sighed. “Jackson, why?”

  His face went back into that unreadable expression that I was beginning to hate. I realized that I had gotten used to him being a little more open with me over the short couple of hours I’d been here. I also didn’t miss the fact that when I’d mentioned Jackson, something else flashed behind his eyes. For a brief moment, I thought it might be jealousy. Then it was gone.

  “I just want to make sure he and Nelly made it out of there okay.

  But, if you’d rather I just go and check on them myself…” He handed me the cell phone.

  I punched in Jack’s cell number, and he answered on the first ring.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Jack, it’s me.”

  “Oh, thank God! Alexa? Where the hell are you? Nelly and I have been so worried.”

  I glanced over at Kayden to see that he was staring straight ahead.

  What was his problem?

  “I’m… somewhere safe. Where are you guys? What’s going on?”

  “All the students are on lock-down in the dorms until the Warriors can sort out this mess. Everybody’s really freaked out. Here.

  Nelly wants to talk to you.”

  “Alexa?” Nelly’s voice was full of relief. I felt bad for not thinking to call earlier.

  “What’s up, Nell?”

  “Oh, thank god! I’ve been so worried. Where the heck did you go? I looked for you when we made it out of the Council building, but I couldn’t find you. Then Gavin told us to return to our rooms. He said he’d look for you, but he hasn’t come back yet. Jackson and Daniel stayed with me because I was freaking out. Where are you?”

  I looked back over at Kayden, who was now staring at me. “I’m… safe. I’ll head back soon. I was checking to make sure you were okay.”

  “Okay,” she said, slowly. I could never fool Nelly, she knew I was keeping something from her. But, she trusted me, and I was thankful when she didn’t push for more details. “Okay,” she repeated. “But hurry up, you’re not the only one who worries about people, you know.”

  I told her I would be there soon and then hung up. Kayden was still staring at me. I looked down at the cell phone in my hand to see if it had a camera on it. I flipped it to that setting and snapped a picture of myself smiling stupidly.

  I handed it back to him. “There. Now you can look at me whenever you feel the need.” When he just kept staring, I raised both eyebrows. “What? What’s your problem?” I didn’t mean to sound rude, but his gaze made me feel a little self-conscious in my form-revealing black dress. I felt somehow inadequate.

  I waited for an answer that never came. I stood up and stretched, completely aware of his eyes on me the whole time. “Fine, forget it,” I said. “We need to head back to the dorms. I think it’s okay now. Apparently, they’ve got everyone on lock-down, and Gavin is looking for me.”

  “Not anymore,” said a gruff voice near the side of the house.

  Kayden and I both turned to see Gavin standing about twenty feet to our left. He was wearing his black warrior uniform and had an expression on his face that said he wasn’t too happy.

  I broke the silence first. “Hey, Gavin. What’s up?”

  His face remained unchanged. “I would ask you the same question, Warrior,” he said, darting his eyes from Kayden to me.

  I propped a hand on my hip. Who did this guy think he was—my father?

  “Obviously, not what you think is going on,” I replied.

 
Before Gavin could respond, Kayden spoke up. “Someone tried to kill her. I brought her here to make sure she was safe.” He said this very matter-of-factly.

  “How noble of you, Wallace,” Gavin said, his tone dripping sarcasm. “I see you’ve taken good care of her.”

  He was looking at my hand, and I glanced down to see that I was still holding my cigarette. I brought it up to my mouth and inhaled deeply. Exhaling, I said, “No one needs to ‘take care’ of me. And you can stop with the accusations because he’s telling the truth. You’ve found me, good job, but I was just heading back anyway, and I’m pretty sure I can manage the walk without getting killed.”

  I knew my tone was clipped, and I had even grown to like Gavin, but I was not about to let him stand there and accuse me of something that I didn’t do. Just because I might have thought about it didn’t make me guilty. Even if I had thought about it a lot.

  “I’m quite sure that you can,” Gavin replied. “Because we’ve found the assassin.”

  That shut me up. That was not what I’d been expecting him to say. The pleased smirk on his face told me that he knew he’d caught me off guard. I shot a look at Kayden, who had a suspicious look on his face.

  “You’re sure?” he asked.

  Gavin raised an eyebrow. “Quite. He’s admitted to it.”

  When I remained silent, he continued, “Your sister was quite worried about you, Warrior, so I told her I would look for you. When I noticed Wallace was missing as well, I decided to come check his cabin, on the off chance that you two might be together. Seems it wasn’t too far off.”

  I gave him a smirk of my own. “Seems like.”

  Beside me, Kayden whispered, “Watch it, Alexa.”

  I shot him a look that I hoped conveyed my frustration. Turning back to Gavin, I asked, “Who was it?”

  He grinned. “Let’s go see.”

  Chapter Thirty

  We headed to an area that I assumed was reserved for prisoners, because it was barren and held only one building. The building lacked all of the extravagance that seemed to drown the rest of the city. It was made of gray stone and surrounded on all sides by a black iron fence, on a hill far away from any of the other structures.

  We had taken Gavin’s car to get there, and I looked over at him sitting in the driver’s seat next to me. “Is this the prison?”

  “No,” he said. “That is not some place I would take you. It lies far beyond our walls. This is our Warrior headquarters, but it serves as a holding facility as well.”

  “Oh.”

  We parked the car and headed into the building, where we were greeted by multiple guards. They all wore the black uniforms and nodded to the three of us as we passed. We headed down a hall where four more guards stood in front of a door. Next to the door was a large window looking into a room.

  We came to a stop in front of the window. The room it looked into was plain and sterile; all white with a metal table and three chairs. Two of the chairs faced away from us, and on the other side of the table, sat a man chained to the third chair.

  He wore a bright blue suit and had his eyes closed. As I stared at him, his eyes popped open, and I jumped back from the glass.

  Gavin laughed and patted my back. “Don’t worry, Warrior, he can’t see you. This is a one-way mirror.”

  I was still staring at the man in the room, staring at his crystal blue eyes. Kayden must have sensed something was up, because he laid a gentle hand on my shoulder. I felt better having him there, but I was still pretty shocked. Not really scared, just… shocked.

  “You recognize him,” said Kayden.

  It wasn’t a question so much as a realization. Maybe I was spending too much time with him. He was starting to read me just as well as Nelly.

  I nodded. “Yeah.”

  Gavin turned me so I was facing him, forcing me to pull my eyes from the man in the room. “From where?” he asked.

  I told them about how I had met him in the foyer of the Council building just before the ceremony had taken place, and how he had shown me his fangs. They didn’t like that one bit.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Kayden asked.

  Gavin raised an eyebrow at Kayden. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. I kind of had a lot on my mind at the moment. Besides”—I gestured at the man—“he didn’t strike me as dangerous. What’s the big deal? Don’t all of you have fangs?”

  Kayden sighed. “Yes, but we don’t go baring them at young women. It’s considered highly inappropriate.” Gavin raised an eyebrow again, but Kayden continued as if he didn’t notice. “We usually only show them to someone when we are challenging them. It is considered a threat.”

  I looked back at the man in the room. He still didn’t look threatening to me. Actually, he just looked kind of pathetic. If he hadn’t just tried to kill me, I would have felt sorry for him.

  I shook my head slowly. “What do you mean ‘usually?’ Because I don’t think he was threatening me. I think he was expressing… other interests.”

  Gavin and Kayden exchanged looks that answered my question for me. I’m not sure why I wanted to do what I suggested next, but for some reason, I felt like I had to. Maybe it was those instincts my mother had always talked about.

  “Let me talk to him,” I said.

  Gavin and Kayden replied almost simultaneously. “Absolutely not.”

  I shot looks at both of them. “Why the hell not?” “Because it’s not safe,” Kayden replied.

  “He’s dangerous,” said Gavin.

  I looked at both of them like they were stupid, because really, they were being stupid. I crossed my arms. “You’re kidding me, right?” I continued before they could answer. “You think he is capable of hurting me? I’m a trained fighter and he’s all chained up. Hell, I’m more dangerous than he is right now.”

  They seemed to be considering this, so before they could make a decision, I added, “I think I have a right to speak to the man who almost took my life.”

  I could see Gavin’s decision written on his face before he spoke, so I had to work to keep the smile off mine. “Fine,” he said. “But Wallace is going in with you.”

  I gave a small nod. I wasn’t happy about that, but I had to take what I could get. Gavin had the guards unlock the door, and Kayden and I stepped inside.

  The man at the table looked up at me and smiled. Once again, his incisors elongated. Next to me, Kayden stiffened.

  “It’s good to see you again, Warrior,” he said.

  “I can see that,” I replied dryly. “So… you tried to kill me?”

  I know that sounded stupid, but all I knew was that I wanted to talk to him, that didn’t mean I knew what I was actually going to say.

  He looked down at his hands and then back up to me. “I already answered that question,” he said. “I would assume you already knew that.” “Why?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Why not?”

  I grabbed Kayden’s arm so that he wouldn’t attack the man, who was lucky that I could move fast enough to catch him. I didn’t let go until I felt him relax beside me.

  “Because you don’t even know me,” I replied.

  He smiled that creepy smile again. “Everyone knows you, Warrior.”

  “Bullshit. Why would you want me dead? Why would you want to kill your queen?”

  This made him laugh, and this time, Kayden had to grab my arm. His touch made me calm down a little, but I was still pretty angry. “I don’t see what’s so funny,” I said through gritted teeth.

  He stopped laughing and looked at me with those icy blue eyes. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I saw sadness flash behind them. “No, you don’t. Because, really, none of this is very funny.”

  I furrowed my brow in confusion. This guy was definitely off his rocker. “Don’t patronize me,” I said. “I don’t think you’ll like my reaction.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it, Warrior. You, you are a Wolf. Me? I’m just a sheep, a goat, if
you will. I wouldn’t dare mock you.”

  I didn’t know what else to say, so I just stared at him. He cringed a little under my gaze and I gave a smug smile. Kayden gently took my arm and began urging me toward the door. “Come on,” he said. “He’s crazy. You can’t trust anything he says.”

  I nodded and turned to leave, as the door opened, the man called out to me.

  “He’s right, Warrior, trust no one. Everyone has an ulterior motive.”

  The door closed behind me and I walked right past Gavin and the other guards, with Kayden following on my heels.

  “What did he say?” Gavin called to me down the hall.

  I kept walking, but called over my shoulder, “Nothing. He’s crazy.”

  I didn’t realize Kayden had followed me until I stepped out of the building. He grabbed my arm and pulled me to a stop. “What is it? What’s bothering you?”

  I wanted to answer him truthfully, really, I did. I wanted to believe I could trust him more than I had ever wanted to trust anyone in my entire life. He was so magnificent, so strong and wonderful and I wanted to believe in him so much that it made my heart ache. But as I stood there considering it, the man’s words came back to me. My mother’s words came back to me. Trust no one. Everyone has an ulterior motive.

  “Nothing,” I said, without looking at him. “I’m just really tired.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Kayden walked me back to the dorms and we didn’t say a word the entire way. When we got there, he pulled me to a stop once again. I knew that he knew I had lied to him about what was bothering me, and I prepared myself to do it again. Even though I felt like I was lying to myself in doing so. I had to watch myself around him, had to make sure that I didn’t let my infatuation and that wonderful feeling he brought me make me let down my guard.

  To my surprise, he just pulled me into a hug. I wrapped my arms around him possessively because I couldn’t help it. My body just moved instinctively to embrace his, and the scent of him filled my senses in the most pleasant of ways. It felt so right to be in his arms, so natural. I felt like nothing in the world could hurt me when he was holding me. I felt complete and balanced. I felt happy.