by Lisa Edmonds
The thought of food made my stomach churn. “I’m really not hungry. I need to use a healing spell and then rest if I’m going to be able to do anything later today about tracking down that cuff.”
I expected him to argue, but he didn’t. He touched my hand and recoiled. “Why are you so cold?”
“Occupational hazard when working with ghosts.” I headed up the stairs.
Sean followed me to my room and stood quietly while I changed into pajamas and a tank top. I washed my face, got my first aid box from the drawer in the bathroom, and returned to the bedroom.
Sean was sitting on the bed. “I have to use a blood magic healing spell,” I told him, tracing runes on the lid of the box and opening it. “It’s going to be painful.”
“I know.” His voice was gruff.
I selected a strong spell in a blue crystal, closed the box, and put it on my nightstand. “I’d rather you didn’t watch.”
“I’d rather you not go through it alone.” He rose and moved to my side, taking the hand that didn’t hold the spell crystal. “That’s what this is about, you know: not having to face anything by yourself. I can ease your pain; I’ve done it before.”
He’d used his alpha shifter magic to take away my pain on several occasions and had even been able to relieve my cravings for Black Fire after I’d been exposed to the drug.
“Don’t make me stand by helplessly while you’re hurting.” He squeezed my hand. “It was damn near impossible when we first met after you’d been burned. Now I won’t be able to bear it.” The growl in his voice told me his wolf was close to his skin and very unhappy.
“All right.” I climbed onto the bed as he moved to the other side and lay down facing me. “Don’t touch me until I tell you the spell is done,” I reminded him as we settled in.
“I remember the rules.” He leaned over and kissed me. When he withdrew, his eyes were bright. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes.”
A rush of golden shifter magic rolled through me, taking away the pain in my back, arms, and legs.
I lifted my tank top, pressed the crystal to my stomach, and invoked the spell. “Helios.”
Healing magic pulsed through my body. Instead of the agony I was used to, the pain was distant, muted by Sean’s magic. I locked my eyes on his and lost myself in their glow. Sean’s jaw tightened as the strong healing spell rolled through me in waves.
I lost track of time in the haze of magic. When the last of the pulses faded and the spell crystal was empty, I dropped it on the bed. I was dazed and shaking, but not nauseous or hurting except for a dull, distant ache.
Sean’s shifter magic dissipated. He touched my face. “Alice?”
“Why didn’t you tell me my pain became yours?” I asked, my voice tight.
He set his jaw. “I’m an alpha. It’s part of my role. I take pain from a new wolf who’s learning to shift, from a mother giving birth to a child, from a pack member who’s grieving or injured.”
My stomach knotted. “Every time you’ve done this for me, you’ve suffered? When you took away my cravings for Black Fire, they didn’t just go away? You felt them instead?” The need had been so terrible, and he’d taken it. The thought of him suffering on my behalf made me feel sicker than any healing spell had ever done.
His eyes darkened. “Alice—”
I started to get up. I don’t know why or where I intended to go, but he caught my arm and held on. “Stop, please. Don’t run. Hear me out.”
I pulled away but sat on the bed, my arms wrapped around my knees. “I’m listening.”
He leaned against the headboard. “I don’t feel the pain or the addiction as badly as you would, but that’s not the point. Even if it was ten times worse, I would still do it. I do it for my pack because I am their alpha. For you, I do it because I can’t bear to see you hurting.” His eyes searched my face. “If that’s not enough to convince you, I can tell you it would hurt me more to see your pain than to take it for myself. You are worth that much to me.”
“You should have told me,” I protested. It was surely the height of hypocrisy for me to fuss at him for holding things back from me, but I couldn’t help it.
He didn’t point out my double standard. “If I had, would you have let me do it?”
“Maybe,” I hedged.
He shook his head. “I know you better than that. You’d have refused on principle and suffered. Or you would have given in to the cravings and found a Black Fire dealer.” His face was grave. “I could tell you were close to the breaking point several times. You had no choice about being exposed to the drug and you would have had little choice about whether to use it again. I could save you from that, and whatever discomfort I felt was well worth it to know that I’d never have to see you trapped in addiction. What was a brief sick feeling for me might have been devastating to you. I didn’t even have to think about it.”
I rubbed my face with my hands. “I know I said thank you for helping me through that, but now I realize how woefully inadequate that was. I can’t ever make it up to you.”
“Stop.” He took my hands. “You owe me nothing. Our relationship does not have a ledger of debts and credits. It never has and it never will.”
When I said nothing, he let go of my hands and sat back. “You’ve been keeping track, haven’t you? All this time, you’ve been counting up all the things I’ve done for you and you think you’re in my debt.”
I didn’t have to admit it; he saw it in my face.
He looked like he’d been slapped. “Damn it, Alice, I don’t care what kind of life you had before you came here, where no one gave you anything unless you earned it or offered you anything without getting something in return. That is not what love is. Love is taking care of each other and not keeping score. If you need me, I’m here. If I need you, you’re here. That is what this is. There are no ledgers.”
“It’s all I’ve ever known,” I confessed.
“I know.” He pulled me into his arms and pressed a kiss into my hair, then rested his cheek on my head. “There may come a time when I’ll need you to be my strength. I know you’ll be there when I need you because somehow, despite everything you’ve been through, or maybe because of it, you are a good and unselfish person. You put everyone else ahead of your own safety. I worry that you’ll give too much of yourself again, like when you sacrificed yourself to destroy the Kasten or used the Black Fire overdose to take out Spencer Addison and his wards.”
We sat quietly. Finally, he asked, “Can you bring up your cold fire in your hand?”
Puzzled at his request, I raised my right hand and spooled earth magic. Green flames appeared on my fingertips, then spread to engulf my whole hand. We watched the fire dance.
“Take our ledger and put it in the fire,” he told me. “Burn it. No more keeping score.”
I closed my eyes and envisioned the list of things Sean had done for me since the night we met at Hawthorne’s. It was a long list. I hesitated.
“Burn it, Alice,” he murmured, his lips against my ear. “Please.”
In my head, I dropped the list into the fire and watched it turn to ash. I snuffed out the fire on my hand.
“No more ledgers, no more keeping score,” he said. “No more owing. Take what you need when you need it and know that I am happy to give.”
I looked up at him. “Take what I need?”
“Whenever you need it.”
“And if I need something now?”
“Whenever you need it,” he repeated.
I kissed him with all my pent-up desire and he made that growly sound I liked, the one that made me crazy. I pulled his tight black shirt out of his pants and he slid it off over his head, tossing it to the floor. My tank top followed a second later.
I straddled his lap and cupped his face with my hands. “How much do you like these pants?” he asked me, his voice half-growl.
I shrugged. “They’re not my favorite.”
He tore them off, leaving me
naked. He toed off his shoes and unfastened his belt.
“How much do you like these pants?” I asked him.
“I thought you liked the way they looked,” he said, his eyes twinkling.
“I did, very much, but right now they’re in the way.”
Fabric ripped and the pants were gone. As I’d suspected, he hadn’t been wearing anything under them. I rose up on my knees and lowered myself slowly, teasing him until I couldn’t stand it anymore and slid down. I cried out and he groaned, pulling me down until I was full of him.
He held me still and looked in my eyes. “I love the way you feel.”
I kissed him deeply and rested my forehead on his. “I love how you know what I need, even before I do.”
He released my waist and guided me with his hands on my hips. Though it had been nearly two weeks since we’d made love—an eternity for us—we moved slowly, enjoying every moment, every touch, every little bit of sensation.
When I started moving faster, he slipped a hand between us and stroked me softly. I gasped, my head falling back as his gentle movements became more earnest and deliberate. My legs began to shake and he pulled me close to carefully bite my shoulder.
When the wave of bliss broke over me, he held me against his chest as I shuddered. A tiny sound that was almost a sob escaped and he kissed me, his hand cupping the back of my head. He moved his lips along my jaw to my ear. “My beautiful Alice,” he murmured.
He rolled us over so that he was above me and took control of our pace, his movements catching the last of my aftershocks and drawing them out until I trembled and gasped for air. He was tender and patient, exactly what I needed at this moment to feel whole again.
The healing spell had mended my cuts and bruises, but it was Sean who repaired my heart. I didn’t know how to say that, so I tried to show him with my eyes how much that meant to me.
He leaned down and ran his nose along my hairline, drinking in my scent. “I’m yours, Alice. Never doubt it.”
When we finally went over the edge together, I released my magic and it swirled around us in a gentle storm of green, white, black, red, and purple, with traces of golden shifter magic.
The release of energy helped me regenerate the magic I’d expended dealing with Vincent Barclay and helping Malcolm. Its return made Sean stronger and increased his alpha magic, which gave him more power to strengthen and lead his pack. It also brought a second wave of pleasure that we shared.
Beyond the practical benefits, Sean had confessed that he enjoyed seeing our magic blended together, and I’d realized I did as well. We watched the magic swirl around the bed, then held each other as it rolled back through us.
Afterward, I lay in his arms and listened to his heart. “I love the way you smell after sex,” he told me, nuzzling my hair.
I smiled lazily and poked him in the side. “Because I smell like you?”
He nipped my earlobe lightly with his teeth. “Because you smell like us.”
“What do I smell like normally?”
“Honey and vanilla and that body wash you use. And magic.”
“What does magic smell like?”
He thought about that. “It’s hard to describe. Sometimes it’s like how the air smells when it rains. When you’re angry, your blood magic smells like a high-voltage wire.”
I nestled deeper into his arms. “You smell like a forest to me.”
“I smell like a forest?” He sounded surprised.
“Like green leaves and shade and earth.” I rolled over and he curled around me, pulling me close with his arm around my middle. “It’s the most wonderful smell.”
He kissed my shoulder. “A forest. I didn’t know that.”
“A forest in spring,” I murmured, and fell asleep.
13
The man calling himself Joseph Kendall had been living in a 2,400-square-foot condo just north of downtown, in the trendy Castle View neighborhood. Apparently, being a con man and criminal mastermind paid fairly well.
At the moment, however, we were far from the condo and its posh uptown address. Instead, Sean and I were in his SUV, parked across the street from a seedy motel near the airport, watching the door to room 220. Light peeked through a gap in the curtains and the television was on, but we’d seen no hint of movement in the room since we arrived several hours earlier.
Phil texted me mid-afternoon to pass along a tip that Kendall/John Doe was staying here. A motel like this was a perfect place to lay low, but it seemed like such a step down from his Castle digs that I was skeptical. Still, we’d come to check it out.
Sean went into the motel office, showed John Doe’s picture to the clerk, and traded cash for a room number and some information. According to the desk clerk, who spoke to Sean from behind bulletproof glass, our shady mage had checked in as Tom Nelson last night and paid for three days in cash with the stipulation that housekeeping not enter his room. The clerk hadn’t seen him since. Sean returned to the SUV, where I’d waited under the watchful eyes of Mobile Team Two.
As the hours passed and we saw no sign of anyone moving in the room, it became increasingly likely the room was empty. We’d debated whether Sean should walk past to see if he could get a glimpse through the gap in the curtain, but decided to wait until after dark.
In the meantime, I looked through the phone records Cyro had sent over earlier in the day. In addition to the raw records from the cell and landline phone companies, Cyro had provided a report identifying the numbers that had called and been called from John Doe’s home, cell, and business lines. Sean loaned me a tablet so I could see the reports better than on my phone screen and highlight names and numbers of interest.
The report was a list of people who were probably clients and potential victims of John Doe’s crime spree. I wasn’t sure what good those names would do me, but I noted them anyway.
Since John Doe had been staying ahead of the law and anyone else who had been chasing him for so long, I had to assume he was meticulous and probably paranoid about leaving any kind of trail someone like me could follow. That meant burner phones, VPNs, and probably no paper trail, but a good investigator always did due diligence because even the best criminals made mistakes. I wasn’t seeing any so far, though.
As I picked up my coffee and drank the last of it, I glanced at Mobile Team Two’s SUV. “I hope Philip and Tom brought magazines or something. This might be a long, dull night if we decide to stick around for a while.”
“I hope they didn’t,” Sean said. “They need to be vigilant. You’re looking for signs of John Doe. They’re watching for Stevens.”
I propped my elbow on the door and rubbed my forehead. “This is driving me crazy.”
“Do you feel self-conscious or guilty because all of these people are focused on protecting you?”
“Yes,” I said reluctantly.
“You have to get over that. They’re doing their job. It’s what they love to do. Ask any of my people if they’d rather be doing anything else and they’ll tell you no. Protecting an asset is way more interesting than most of the other work they do. I know you think they’re over there bored out of their minds, but I can promise you they aren’t. They’re on alert, watching everyone and everything around us. This is a challenge for them. Most of them are adrenaline junkies. When I asked for volunteers for the mobile teams and told them what we were up against, I had three times more people wanting the gig than I had spots available. So relax; nobody’s here because I forced them to be.”
I stared at him. I hadn’t really thought of it that way. I’d felt like I was imposing on Sean and his people from the moment he showed up on my doorstep. How had he known that?
He put his hand on my thigh. “I think there’s some part of you that questions whether you’re worth all this.” At my look of surprise, he smiled. “I know a little bit about how you think.”
“Thanks,” I said softly. “That helps. But I’m never going to be comfortable being the center of attention.” Not w
hen my life depended on staying below the radar.
“I know.” Sean rubbed my leg. His touch felt good. “I wish I could make this go away, but I can’t. The best I can do is keep you safe while the vamps and the feds look for Stevens.”
“I wonder where he is. I wish he’d go after Charles again. It might even be worth it for Charles to leave Niara’s house and visit a couple of his businesses to try to draw him out.”
“I suggested that to Bryan Smith,” he said, surprising me. “He’s pretty certain Stevens won’t be able to evade the Hunters for much longer. If Stevens is smart, he won’t fall for an obvious trap. Hell, if he’s smart, he headed to another country after he missed Vaughan the other night.”
“He won’t run. He’s still here. He wants Charles dead. He wants Julie Day dead. Maybe…” My voice trailed off.
Sean’s hand froze on my thigh. “Don’t even think about it.”
“I could do it,” I argued. “I could go back to the hotel where Julie was staying. With your people around, and the vamps and the Hunters—”
“No. You are not going to offer yourself as bait.”
“You just suggested Charles do it.”
“Vaughan is a vampire. He can heal virtually any injury. Stevens can’t kill him unless he puts a stake in his heart or cuts off his head or drags him out into the sunlight. You…you, he can kill a hundred ways.” His eyes shone gold. “You are not bait, Alice. They’ll get him some other way.”
“If I’m not bait, I’m going to be a sitting duck. I don’t know how Stevens might figure out who I am, but if he does, wouldn’t it be better to have him find me when we control the situation, instead of waiting to be surprised? I could go back to the hotel or Mike Robinson’s house. We could arrange to have gaps in the security. He’ll never be able to resist coming after me and the Hunters will get him.”
Sean’s eyes glowed gold. “No,” he growled.
“You’re not thinking like a professional right now,” I accused him. “You’re letting your feelings for me cloud your judgment. If I were a different client—”
“I don’t care who you are. No client of mine is going to set themselves up as bait for a highly trained Marine.”
