Wounded Pride

by Kaye Draper

  Fae. Something about that word tugged at my consciousness. But I let it go, like a fish nibbling at the line. I didn't want to remember what I should be upset about. I shuddered.

  The blond mage sighed. "Aaand…she's in shock." His words meant nothing to me.

  He glanced down at Con. "Let's get your boy upstairs, shall we?"

  He shuffled around, getting his arms under Con and rolling the limp human into a bridal carry. He looked ridiculous trying to carry the taller man, but he managed.

  I followed dully up the stairs, almost tripping over some holes in the staircase as sirens started blaring in the distance. My stab wound had stopped oozing as my body knit back together. But I still felt like I was bleeding out.

  Chapter 14

  I stared at Oswald as he waved his hands and flapped his jaw. I didn't hear a word he was saying. But his face was a fascinating shade of red above the ugly tan color of his police uniform.

  "They took him," I muttered, still not quite comprehending what had just happened. What I had let happen.

  Oswald ignored me and continued to pace in front of the desk in my office, where I had taken shelter from the swarm of police who arrived after the fire was put out. "And here I am saddled with your mess again," Oswald was yammering, "...even know how fast this whole block would go up in flames if that fire had spread through to the next shop?"

  I shuddered at the memory of Oisin's defeated green eyes. I'd never seen anyone look so utterly devoid of hope, of life.

  "But of course, you don't fucking care," Oswald was saying, "because you're in White's pocket just like everyone else around here!" He waved his hand toward the hallway as the Vanhelsing mage came down the stairs. "His damned mage got here before the real law officers even did!"

  I stood up calmly, gripped the edge of the desk, and heaved, flipping the massive oak piece over, sending computer pieces and papers everywhere and nearly squashing the banshee officer in front of me. "They fucking took my mate!" I growled.

  And I was damned well going to go get him back, not sit around here listening to some asshole ramble about laws while the man I loved was being drained of his life. Oswald righted himself and stared at me in shock. I pushed past him, nearly sending him sprawling on his ass again. "Where the hell do you think you're going? Gryphon! You can't just go into fae lands and start a fucking war!"

  He knew me so well.

  I growled as I spun back to him, ready to rip his throat out for even thinking of stopping me from getting Oisin back. The fae had started a clan war the moment they touched my mate. A red haze beat at my temples, and I had trouble finding the human part of me. The gryphon was taking over. We needed our mate back. We needed to hunt, to fucking rend.

  A big, gloved hand clamped down on my shoulder and a jolt of foreign magic surged through my body like a zap from a cattle prod, making every nerve ending tingle and burn. It shocked me out of the red haze. "Your boy is awake," the mage said in his gravelly voice. "How 'bout you go check on him before you go rampaging. I'll see the nice officer out."

  I growled again but took the out he gave me before I murdered a police officer. Sitting my big ass in jail certainly wouldn’t do anyone any good.

  I took the steps two at a time, not breathing until I was in the apartment, surrounded by the familiar smells of my mates. Half of the bookstore was ruined. But the carnage didn't reach upstairs. I found Con and Kaimana in my room. Con was ensconced in the bed, buried in pillows and blankets, being thoroughly smothered by one very over-protective kraken.

  "How's your head?" I asked, sinking down beside him on the bed.

  "He's lucky he still has a head," the mage commented, leaning against the doorframe and regarding us with his stupid goggles firmly in place. I hadn't even heard him follow me up the stairs. "That spell must have just winged him. Otherwise his head would have exploded. Messy bit of black magic, that."

  I frowned at him. "Was the detail really necessary?"

  I turned back to Con, reaching out to smooth back his brown curls. "I'm glad you're okay, idiot. What possessed you to put yourself in danger?"

  He glared at me. "Oisin. He wouldn't have just hidden in a damned closet if the tables were turned."

  I swallowed down the ache of tears. I didn't cry. Crying was for weaklings.

  Con's brown eyes glistened with unshed tears of his own. "I'm sorry I wasn't more help."

  I had to clear my throat before speaking. "Me too."

  Kai wrapped an arm around my shoulder, squeezing me tight. Suddenly it was just too much.

  I stood and paced toward the door. I had to go. I had to move. The mage blocked my way.

  "Why are you even here?" I demanded.

  He shrugged. "Waiting for orders."

  I shoved past him. I didn't have time for this shit.

  Hisashi stumbled into the hallway from his bedroom. The bruise I'd put on his jaw was gone. But his eyes looked haunted. He got his bearings, met my eyes…and turned away from me, stumbling back into his room. That whole end of the hall radiated cold, creepy energy.

  I heaved a sigh and followed him, even though my chest was throbbing with every beat of my heart.

  Hisashi was still half-shifted and his tails waved around him as he stood looking out his window, one big hand clenched to his chest.

  I paced closer.

  "I'm sorry!" we both blurted at the same time.

  We stared at each other for a moment before Hisashi sagged and went to his knees. "God's, Gesa I'm so damned sorry I failed you."

  I blinked. Strong people didn't cry. Crying was for weaklings. Crying cracked you open and let the pain seep in. I needed to be numb.

  Ice-blue eyes stared up at me, rimmed in silver and overflowing with tears as Hisashi sobbed his broken heart out. "I fucking failed him too. I failed you both. All because I’m not smart enough to actually use this fucking curse that lives in my veins. He’s right. I’m a fucking child."

  I stared at him, my teeth clenched against the pain as his magic flared and sputtered out, unsteady and broken.

  I wanted to run after Oisin. I wanted to save him the way he'd saved me from my own foolishness so many times. But...there wasn't only Oisin to think of. Con was lucky to be alive, and he was still recovering. Kaimana had no home without me. And Hisashi...was broken.

  I sank down in front of him, my knees kissing the hardwood floor with a heavy thud. "I failed too," I whispered. "It seems like that's the only thing I'm good at these days."

  Hisashi reached for me and I went, letting him enfold me in his long arms. He held on to me as if I was the only thing anchoring him to earth—and hell, maybe I was. I clutched him right back, as my heart finished cracking in half. He smelled like fresh fallen snow and incense. Hot tears fell against his soft t-shirt. We didn't speak, both of us understanding the other's pain.

  Oisin was gone. He was fucking gone, and we had failed him.

  Finally, Hisashi pulled back. His deep voice cracked as he tried to stop crying. "I should have told you," he whispered.

  I stared at him, waiting for the knife to finish stabbing me in the back. "Told me what?"

  His eyes met mine, filled with regret and sorrow, and so much fucking love...all of it nearly too much for me to handle. "He knew."

  I closed my eyes. He knew. Of course he fucking did. The only thing Oisin did better than flirt and fuck was lie.

  I let out a bitter laugh. Looking back, it was obvious. He had been saying goodbye to all of us. Our moment with Con, with Hisashi, with Kai. His quiet worry. His refusal to tell me what was wrong.

  "How?" I whispered, knowing better than to ask.

  Hisashi dropped his hands from around me and clenched his fists on his thighs. "I had a nightmare. A...vision."

  I swallowed down a fresh wave of rage and despair. "So, you knew too."

  His long throat worked, his Adam's apple bobbing convulsively as he met my eyes. "I begged him to tell you. To let us prepare. He...made me promise not to say anything.
He said he would handle it. He said that you...."

  I clenched my fists. "That I'd do something stupid. Because obviously I’m too weak to protect anyone."

  He shook his head. "He wanted you to be safe, above anything else."

  I felt a tickle on my hand and lifted it to see blood running down it where I had punctured my palm with my own talons. I didn't feel a thing as I retracted my nails back through my flesh.

  "You should have told me," I said calmly. If he had told me, we could have planned. All of us. Together. Instead, he and Oisin had kept secrets like a couple of children, and now Oisin was probably dead.

  Hisashi took a breath and held it, then let it out in a rush. "Maybe you’re right.”

  He reached for my hand and squeezed it, ignoring the blood that stuck our palms together. “Or maybe he was right and telling you would have gotten you killed instead. Maybe you would have died trying to stop it and he would still be gone, and I'd lose you both. You and the others." He flickered in and out of reality.

  I had just told him he should have chosen between the two people he loved. It wasn't fair.

  Then I realized...he had chosen. He had chosen me. At the cost of the other half of his own damned heart. And by doing so, he'd mortally wounded us both. It wasn’t fair. But I didn’t give a shit. Hisashi and Oisin—my pride—had kept this from me. They hadn’t trusted me to call the shots. Or to protect them.

  "You're so fucking stupid," I whispered.

  He dropped his head and his deep voice cracked. "I know."

  I stood. It felt like I carried the whole fucking planet on my shoulders. “Don’t go anywhere yet, nine-tail.” I said, heartless in my grief. “You fucked up, so you stay around to fix it before you float off wherever the fuck you decide to go.”

  He didn’t lift his head from his knees, but I saw the slight flinch at my words. “Of course,” he whispered.

  I wanted to hold him and tell him I didn’t blame him. That it would all be okay, and I loved him anyway.

  The trouble was…I did blame him, just as much as I blamed myself. And it wouldn’t be okay because without Oisin, I was missing some vital part of my soul.

  Chapter 15

  My whole body trembled as I tried not to crush the phone I held in my hands. Too slow. It was all moving too slow. By the time I got rid of the fire department and the police and got a chance to call my sister, I was nauseous with the thought of all Oisin's father might have accomplished.

  He's dead by now, a voice whispered in my mind, intent on utterly destroying me.

  "There has to be something you can do, Gabs," I growled into the phone.

  My sister heaved a sad sigh. "I'm sorry Gesa," she said, a growl in her own deep voice. "But you know I haven't got the council fully subdued yet. No way are they going to let me engage our clan in a war against the fae, which is what this would come to." She heaved a sigh and her voice dropped to a broken whisper. "I would do it if I could," she said fiercely. "But Gesa, you know even if we did send in our people...we'd lose. And the whole purpose here is to save our clan from extinction. Not rush them toward it."

  I snarled and threw the phone across the room, not caring if it smashed into a million pieces.

  Supes in general were careful not to piss off the magic users among us. But Oisin's clan was apparently one of the most powerful clans of magic users out there, aside from the mage guild.

  Fucking fantastic.

  I checked my gun and knife for the thousandth time, making sure they were still firmly strapped to my hip. I had booked a flight to the summer lands. I thought that was where Oisin's father would go—it was a magical intersection of lay lines and ancient structures that channeled power. But it would take hours to get to the Montana megaliths by plane, and the only flight I had been able to find didn't leave until tomorrow afternoon.

  I tugged at my hair in frustration. Oisin could be drained by then. And I couldn't physically get there any fucking faster.

  A soft sound made me lift my head, a growl on my lips.

  Black was regarding me from the doorway, his blue eye still glowing from the juice he'd taken in the fight. "A visitor for you, Miss Lionheart," he whispered. Then he darted away, flowing up the stairs before I could respond.

  The moment he left, I saw why.

  Derek fucking White.

  The man oozed into my office, pausing to pick up my phone and place it on the desk. "Quite the remodel you're doing out there," he commented as if he was talking about the weather.

  I growled at him, the buzzing in my chest taking the edge off the pain.

  He slipped off his sunglasses and I saw his black eyes were rimmed in that creepy fucking red. "Where is that lovely little fae of yours, Miss Lionheart? I didn't see him smirking at me anywhere."

  I swiped a hand across my newly re-ordered desk, sending papers and the already cracked computer monitor to the floor. I couldn't even form words at the moment. I felt like I was losing my mind. It was a struggle to stay human-shaped.

  White righted the wingback chair usually reserved for visitors and sat, as if I was acting perfectly normal.

  I had never felt more adrift and out of control.

  "Do calm down, gryphon," he said with a wave of his hand.

  I suddenly felt...calm. Sleepy even.

  I sank into my desk chair and stared at him. "They took him," I muttered. "You said he was safe here. In your city. But they took him anyway." Panic was starting to edge back in around the eerie calm, and I clenched a hand over my heart.

  White gave a tsk of displeasure, and I thought that was maybe the first real anger I had ever seen him express. "Fae. Arrogant fuckers. I knew they would eventually get around to violating our agreement."

  He leaned forward, elbows on his suit-clad knees. "Tell me, Miss Lionheart," he said with a scary smile, "that you have whiskey in here somewhere."

  I opened the bottom desk drawer, letting out a relieved sigh when I saw that the bottle of Macallan I'd smuggled from my mother's house during our last visit hadn't been smashed in my hulk outburst. I opened it and chugged straight from the bottle.

  When I slammed the bottle down on the desk and gave him a defiant glare, White raised a black eyebrow and picked up the bottle, taking a chug himself, savoring the rich burn before he set the bottle back down.

  "Why are you here?" I demanded, a little of that false calm still lingering.

  He lifted one shoulder in a shrug. "Me? Why I just came to check in on my secretary, of course. I had no idea that you were going through such a...crisis."

  I narrowed my eyes at him, and he tilted his head to regard Black, who was out in the hall reading the riot act to some guy who looked like a reporter. I watched as the usually reserved man put an ungloved hand on the human's neck and propelled him forcefully back out the front entrance, which by the sounds of it, Hisashi and Kaimana were boarding up with a temporary plywood door.

  "Just look at him," White said proudly. "So confident." He winked at me. "I knew spending time here would be good for him."

  Black drifted back to the office and stepped inside, clearly making an effort to lift his head and meet our eyes. "Sir," he said to White.

  White's mouth drifted upward into a sickening half-smile. "Did you get everything you need?” he asked the scarred beauty.

  Black nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  White’s smile grew. “Good, good. Pack your bags, Mr. Black. I find myself in need of a secretary. I've some business dealings that need immediate attention."

  The incubus bowed his head and turned to leave.

  I raised an eyebrow. "You could have just taken him home weeks ago, asshole. And just what was it he needed?"

  He shrugged. "He really did betray my trust, you know. And...he needed to have someone else show him what I've been trying to get him to understand for so long."

  I tapped my fingers impatiently on the desk. "Which is?"

  He took another sip of my whiskey. "His own worth."

  I r
ubbed my head and waved him toward the door, even though I knew that was only a partial truth. "Fine. Whatever. Bye-bye."

  He didn't make any move to go. "As you so astutely pointed out, that fae lord knew your pretty redheaded mate was under my protection. In my territory. I can't just let that slide, Miss Lionheart."

  I stared at him, suspicion and hope warring inside me. "Well, if you want to be all fucking offended because you for some reason consider people your property, I'm not going to argue with you this time, asshole. Because I can't even get a flight to the fae lands until tomorrow. Meanwhile, I'm pretty sure that psycho is using mage magic to drain the life out of my fae as we speak. So...I don't know what the fuck you want from me or what in the name of the Gods you are doing, but this time, I'm all ears."

  I would rather die than make some sort of unholy pact with White. But I would rather anything than lose Oisin.

  "Orion told you what he was." It was more of a statement than a question.

  I nodded anyway.

  White smiled at me. "Good. Then you will understand what I mean when I say I brought him with me when I left our homeland."

  I swallowed. Oh, fucking hell. Literally.

  White regarded me with one lifted brow. I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.

  "I am building something here, Miss Lionheart," he said with a wicked, animal grin. "And I won't fail." He steepled his fingers under his chin and regarded me with blood-red eyes. "You and your pride belong to me. And I will not let anyone take what is mine." He sighed. "The rules of the game say I can't interfere directly. But...I will give you my resources to use as you see fit, my dear. Don't squander them."

  My hand shook as I picked up the whiskey. I didn't even taste it as it burned its way down my throat. "Game?" I said on a breathy exhale.

  He shook his head. "Not now. Maybe someday I will explain. When you’re in any sort of condition to listen."

  He stood, pulling his suit straight. "I’ve enjoyed our little chat, Miss Lionheart. As usual. A jet will be waiting to take you to the fae lands in ten days’ time. Be ready. I am expecting you to do this job for me and get my property back, gryphon."