by Tina Folsom
While Manus had no qualms about seducing the women in his care, Aiden didn’t enjoy the bitter aftertaste such an affair left behind. Yes, he sought sexual adventures outside the compound, with mortal women, but without pretense, never sleeping with the same woman twice, confining himself to one-night-stands in order not to lose focus on his mission or get emotionally involved.
He rarely had any downtime during which to involve himself in a relationship that went beyond the usual wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am method. Not that he was complaining. He wasn’t interested in a relationship. And sex? He could always get sex when he really needed it, but lately even the thrill of a quickie with a virtual stranger couldn’t chase away the emptiness he’d started feeling in his gut. He wondered whether it was the coming change that caused these odd sentiments. He was nearing his two hundredth birthday, and with it what Cloak Warriors called rasen, mating season. His hormones surged to find a mate, yet there were few choices.
The reason so few female Cloak Warriors were available for mating was the dominant male gene, which favored producing males rather than females of their species, tilting the equilibrium in their world. For centuries now, male Cloak Warriors had to look in the human world for their mates. The entire undertaking was fraught with danger: should a Cloak Warrior choose a human as his mate, rather than one of the few female Cloak Warriors, they were both in danger of losing their lives. Only a love pure of heart made a union between a Cloak Warrior and a human possible. Aiden didn’t believe such love existed. Could a Cloak Warrior ever love a creature so inherently weak?
And if the love wasn’t true and pure, the ritual mating, which bound the two lovers together, would rob them of their lives. Their death wouldn’t be instant, but knowledge of it would be. A Cloak Warrior’s immortality would drain away like sand in an hourglass. Just like his mate, he would wither away in a few short months, enough time to regret his actions and see his own death coming. Hamish had almost entered such a union, and only by sheer luck found out in time that his intended mate had been a plant by the demons.
The success rate for finding a mate was thus low, with few single female Cloak Warriors available. He’d practically grown up with Enya, who lived in the same compound with him, and he regarded her as a true sister. There was no physical attraction between them. He knew most of the other female Cloak Warriors in the US, because they were rare, but none stirred him the way a woman should tantalize a man. Maybe he was simply not meant for a relationship.
Aiden knew what was expected of him, and he didn’t want to disappoint. But pleasing his mother and father as well as their community wasn’t in the forefront of his thoughts. He was a warrior first and foremost; finding a mate and helping his race procreate was a distant second. Maybe he could suppress the urges rasen forced on him. He was strong-willed—those damn hormones had nothing on him.
“Warrior,” a voice called him. “The council will see you now.”
The attendant, who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, stood in front of the door to the council chambers.
“One moment,” he requested, “please place all your electronic devices here.” He pointed to a carved out indentation next to the door.
Aiden did as he was asked and then allowed the attendant to swipe a wand up and down his body. It was a security measure so that no recording devices could be smuggled into the council chambers since all undertakings within were kept secret.
As Aiden finally walked inside, the door closed behind him with a loud clunk.
“The council welcomes you, Warrior,” Primus’s voice greeted him.
Aiden looked straight at him to acknowledge his welcome. He bowed his head. “I thank the council for receiving me, Primus.”
With the formalities behind him, it was time to give them the news. He couldn’t stall this any longer. “I bring bad news. My last assignment ended in a loss. My charge succumbed to the demons. I had to eliminate her.”
Low mumbles went through the assembled.
“As much as we regret this incident,” Geoffrey piped, “it is hardly a matter to bother the council with. You’re not the only one who’s lost a charge in the last few weeks. Reports have—”
“I’ve heard of the reports,” Aiden interrupted impatiently.
When Geoffrey and several of the other council members gasped, he knew that he’d acted against protocol by interrupting him. However, enough time had already been wasted. He couldn’t stand on ceremony.
“And what I have to tell you might be related to it.”
When Geoffrey tried to speak, Primus held up his hand. “Let him talk.”
Taking an extra breath, Aiden recounted what had unraveled at their compound.
“Hamish has disappeared. At first we thought he might have been ambushed, but then we traced his cell phone and found his things.”
“Meaning what?” Primus asked curiously.
“We found his cell phone in a dumpster, together with all this clothes. Neatly folded.”
Several eyebrows rose. Deirdre spoke up. “What are you alleging?”
Aiden swallowed away the bitter taste in his mouth. “When I was on my last mission, outnumbered by the demons, I called for Hamish. He was my second. He didn’t show. I have reason to believe that he deserted us.” The next words hurt to speak. “I believe he’s gone over to the demons’ side.”
He wished he was wrong, but everything pointed to it.
Outraged gasps filled the council chambers.
Cinead rose from this seat. Aiden had always liked the Scotsman and knew he could expect a just ruling from him. “Those are serious allegations, Aiden. Hamish is a valued member of our society, a fierce fighter. I don’t believe him capable of treason. He’s strong of mind, one of the least likely warriors to be influenced by the demons.”
“Then explain to me why he didn’t come to my aid, why we found his clothes and cell phone. He got rid of everything that would have made it possible for us to trace him.” Aiden lashed an accusatory glare at Cinead. Maybe the council member didn’t want to believe that a fellow Scotsman was capable of such thing. “Why did the demons find my charge when I had cloaked her? Only Hamish could have known where we were.”
Ian raised a hand. “Ah, not entirely true, I’m afraid.”
Aiden lifted an eyebrow in question as several heads turned to the council member who’d spoken.
“As you all know, everybody who sits on this council is aware of any assignment that is handed out. Each one of us could have known the whereabouts of your charge. Are you calling us traitors too?”
“No, of course not!” he hastened to answer.
“Then you might grant your fellow warrior Hamish the same courtesy. There could be a myriad of reasons why he disappeared. Maybe he was captured.”
“Since when do assailants fold clothes they strip off their victims?” Aiden grumbled under his breath. Only Hamish himself took such care of his beloved designer clothes.
Cinead nodded at Ian. “We’ll send out warriors to search for him.” He waved toward Geoffrey. “Can you notify the emissarii? They might be able to help.”
Geoffrey gave a nod.
“I want to be on the search team,” Aiden requested.
“I don’t believe that’s wise. You’re too emotionally involved,” Cinead declined.
Aiden shot a pleading look at the head of the council. “Primus, I appeal to you.”
The slow shake of his head quashed any hope that he could get to Hamish before anybody else and wring the truth from him.
“Father, I implore you,” he insisted, hoping by emphasizing that he was not just his Primus, but more importantly his father, he could be reasoned with.
He and his father exchanged a long look. The older man’s dark hair showed a few errant strands of silver, and his angular face was full of laugh lines. Brown eyes studied him from beneath dark lashes. Aiden knew that he’d inherited many of his father’s features, and side-by–side, many would have thought them br
others rather than father and son.
Like all Cloak Warriors, his father aged only fractionally compared to humans. While the offspring of Cloak Warriors aged in the same way human children did, once they reached their twenty-fifth birthday, their aging slowed to the speed of a snail. Even the oldest man of their species, a Cloak Warrior of over 1,500 years of age, looked like a man in his late fifties. Time was good to their kind.
Finally, Primus shook his head. “I’m afraid, son, that’s not possible. You’re needed elsewhere. We have an assignment for you.”
FIVE
In his cloaked state, Aiden paced outside of Inter Pharma’s facility. After leaving the council chambers, he’d looked at the manila folder containing the details of his assignment and read it cover to cover. He’d formed his opinion on this case by the time he reached the last page, secretly questioning the council’s decision. Given the details laid out in the report, he would have decided on eliminating the human in question. It would be the safest and only reliable way of ensuring that the demons wouldn’t gain access to this dangerous drug.
However, when he’d pulled out Dr. Cruickshank’s picture, which had been tucked into an envelope and placed in the back of the file, his gut had instantly made a curious flip. He’d expected her to be different ... older ... and not so ... beautiful. But it wasn’t only her beauty that created such a physical reaction in him. It was the determined look in her eyes that the camera was able to capture. What he read in them attracted him most of all: strength. A human woman who was strong and determined, not weak and impressionable, not easily seduced. Would she be strong enough to resist the demons once they found her?
He turned, annoyed at himself for letting a picture sway him in his conviction. What she looked like didn’t matter. It would not influence at all how he treated her: with utter professionalism. Just as he treated all the others. And should it become necessary to kill her, he wouldn’t hesitate.
Aiden’s gaze drifted down the street. The area was a mix of residential and commercial buildings. The shops had long closed, but a couple of the restaurants farther down the street were still open. Some of the windows in the nearby office buildings were illuminated, and in the apartment buildings he saw people go about their lives, cooking dinner, watching TV. He always felt like a thief when he watched others like this. Yet it had become second nature. All Cloak Warriors did it.
Curiosity had always been one of his traits. Even early in his training, he’d liked to watch humans, observe how they lived. In many ways it was so different from his own life of duty and service. Inside those apartments he gazed up at, people loved and lived. They raised children, had careers, shared laughter and tears. And one day, they died.
While his life at the compound afforded him the same comforts humans lived with, life was very different there. For starters, he spent very little time at the compound, and it was rare that all inhabitants were there at the same time. One or the other was always on assignment. Birthdays weren’t celebrated, neither was Christmas, Easter, or any other holiday. Every day was the same. There was no weekend where people relaxed and unwound. Demons didn’t rest on Saturday or Sunday, and neither did Cloak Warriors. Danger was always awake. It never slept.
Aiden tore his gaze from the apartment building and continued surveying the area. Few cars passed. A bus stopped on the next block, dropping off a woman with a small child. In the distance, a door closed and another opened. Normal sounds of a neighborhood.
But his senses were only partially engaged, his thoughts going back to his new charge, Leila. He would follow her home tonight and assess where she was most vulnerable to an attack by the demons. Not that he believed that they would mount an outright attack: they wanted what she had, the drug. They were more likely to find something in her life to make a bargain with.
The sound of footsteps and voices made him turn his head back to the building Inter Pharma occupied. Through the floor-to-ceiling windows that encased the lobby, he saw Leila crossing to the door, exchanging a few kind words with the night watchman. The photo he’d been given didn’t do her justice. In reality she looked even more enchanting than on the black and white picture. His stomach tensed at the sight, giving him a visceral reaction he was unaccustomed to when dealing with a charge. She was so unlike anybody else he’d ever had to protect.
Aiden attributed his reaction to the fact that this woman was extremely dangerous: if the demons were to ever seduce her over to their side, they would have a brilliant scientist working for them. He’d gathered that much from the dossier on her. Who knew what other little serums she could invent, maybe one that rendered Cloak Warriors powerless? Yes, he reasoned with himself, what he felt in his gut now had everything to do with the knowledge that a brilliant mind like hers was trapped in a human body that would eventually succumb to the demons, because despite the strength he’d seen in her eyes, she would never be strong enough to resist them.
And his reaction to her had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that he found her more intoxicating than any woman he’d ever met.
Leila smiled at the security guard before exiting into the crisp night air. It was September, but the day had been overcast, and it was colder than normal for the season. She turned left and walked down the block.
Aiden followed her, remaining in his cloaked state, and mindful that even though his body was invisible, he could still be heard. His breathing, his footsteps, none of it could be disguised by his cloak. It was one of the reasons, he and all his fellow Cloak Warriors wore specially designed soft-soled shoes when on assignment. They absorbed nearly all of the sound of his footsteps on the pavement. In addition, he’d learned to tread lightly like a cat, or like a thief. If he stayed far enough back, his charge would never notice him.
Yet, he broke protocol and approached, walking a mere step behind her, close enough to touch her should he desire to. A faint smell of roses surrounded her. It was so exquisite that for an instant it made him forget what he was there to do.
She wore a short jacket over her blouse. Her delectable behind, encased in those tailored slacks, swished from side to side in a tantalizing rhythm that could make any man turn soft in the head and hard in other places. Her hair was kept in a tight ponytail, and he wondered what it would feel like to release it from its confines and bury his face in it. Soaking in her scent, feeling the silken softness of her tresses, all while she writhed underneath him in obvious ecstasy.
He exhaled sharply at the unexpected thought.
An instant later, Leila spun on her heels. She would have crashed into him were it not for the preternatural speed his species was graced with. He rocked to a halt and held his breath.
Her eyes peered into the darkness, tension lines forming on her forehead, her lips slightly parted. He noticed the pulse in her neck twitch. Her hand reached into her shoulder bag, clearly gripping something tightly in her fist. A knife? A gun? But she didn’t pull it out, her eyes and her face relaxing slowly as she scanned the area. Her shoulders dropped, and she turned back, continuing in the same direction as before.
Aiden started breathing again. It was best not to concentrate on Leila’s enticing body, or incidences like these would keep happening. And next time, she might bounce into him and realize something was amiss. He couldn’t risk that, even though he wouldn’t mind knowing what her body felt like pressed against his, to feel her curves yield to his hard muscles.
Shit, why was he focusing on that rather than on the fact that she represented a danger to humanity? He wasn’t so starved for sex to forget that getting involved with a charge would only give rise to lots of problems. He had more control than that!
His eyes fell back on those curves she so innocently flaunted right in front of him without even knowing what she was doing. Would she reign in those swinging hips if she knew the effect those movements had on him? Or would she continue taunting him with her sinful body? Because taunting she was.
A flash of light suddenly made him jerk his
head away from her backside. With horror, he witnessed a car barreling toward her at the intersection she’d just reached. About to step into the crosswalk that showed a ‘go’ signal for her, Leila jolted backwards but her heel caught in a storm drain.
Aiden lunged forward, grabbed hold of her and yanked her out of the path of the out-of-control vehicle. Losing his balance, he tumbled onto the sidewalk, rolling into the doorway of a shop with Leila in his arms. His heart hammered in his chest, and his instinct kicked in, uncloaking him in a split second. Her surprised cry was muffled against his coat.
“Are you okay?” he managed to say as he caught his breath and tried to sit up without releasing her.
This incident clearly counted as an emergency, and revealing himself to her was therefore necessary. It didn’t mean she had to know who he was. She would never need to find out that he wasn’t human, and that he possessed powers that would scare the living daylights out of her. It was best for her not to know, because he didn’t know how she would react.
She seemed dazed and made no attempt to free herself from his embrace. Her body so close to his felt intoxicating. She smelled like a ripe fruit ready to harvest, her curves exhibiting the perfect combination of yielding softness and firmness that stood its ground. He savored the moment, knowing that once she’d recovered, she would push him away. After all, he was a stranger, it was dark, and there were few other people around. Instinct would tell her to be cautious, despite the fact that he’d saved her from being run over by a car.
Aiden glanced toward the intersection, but the car hadn’t even stopped. A drunk driver, most likely. Nevertheless, he couldn’t shake off the thought that this was no coincidence. He’d long stopped believing in things happening at random.
“I’m fine,” she mumbled, her hand pushing against him to steady herself.
As she managed to sit up and lift her head, she looked at him, assessing him as if to figure out if he could be trusted.
