Stealing Summer, Hunter

by Lexi Blake

  “Who is he with?” Dev asked.

  But Danny and I were already sprinting for the road. Normally my most protective husband would be playing it safe, waiting until we knew more.

  It didn’t matter now. If our daughter was about to slip through our hands again, we would risk almost anything to try to catch her, to try to have even one moment with her.

  “Hey,” Kelsey yelled as we brushed by her.

  Daniel managed to avoid Kelsey’s grasping hand.

  We made it to the road as the sleek motorcycle-like vehicles shot past us. There were four of them, one towing a container behind it.

  “Summer!” I yelled so loud I knew my throat would hurt later.

  Daniel yelled beside me but to no avail. The bikes were gone in a second.

  Tears pierced my eyes. “Dean, could you tell if Summer was with them?”

  “Marcus would never leave Summer willingly,” Kelsey said.

  Dean stared down the path the bikes had taken. “I don’t know. I only caught Marcus, and I got out of his head as fast as I could. It went poorly before.”

  I couldn’t lose her again. I couldn’t. I took off running down the path.

  It was ridiculous. I couldn’t keep up, but I had to try. I realized in that moment that I would run until I dropped, and then I would get up again and try to follow her.

  I ran around the curve in the path.

  “Momma?”

  The bikes had stopped, and my daughter slipped off the back of the one she’d been riding. She dropped the helmet she’d been wearing to the ground and stared at me for a moment.

  The world went watery and infinitely softer and kinder than it had been seconds before.

  “Zoey, those men have guns,” Kelsey called out.

  “My goddess, we don’t know who she’s with.” Dev had almost caught up to me.

  I didn’t care. I raced to my daughter and threw my arms around her.

  “Momma?” Summer’s arms tentatively encircled me.

  “Summer, I missed you. I missed you so much. Baby, I love you. I never forgot you.” I struggled to speak, but I had to tell her. I didn’t know if we were about to be arrested. I couldn’t be sure someone wasn’t going to pry her out of my arms and take her away again. She had to know. “You’ve been in my heart since the day you were born. Please forgive me for letting you go. I should never have let you go.”

  She hugged me tight. “Momma. Momma, I missed you.”

  Years of longing burst from me in a wild cry as we wept together. My baby. My first baby. My lost baby.

  Found.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Summer

  I looked to Marcus as Taggart was handing out gear. I’d been on a hoverbike before so I knew about the helmet and all the tech that would keep our small caravan together. We were at the door to the Refugee plane, and it appeared Taggart had even more pull than Dante did.

  “You can change your mind about going with them. I can make sure we get away.” Marcus looked deliciously solid as he loomed over me. Like me, he’d changed into the nanite clothing Taggart had insisted on. It looked like leather but was far stronger and would protect his skin from the high speeds we would be traveling at.

  I wanted to run away with him, but how long would it be before one of my enemies caught up with us? How long before I dragged him down with me? Could I even survive in a world where I cost Marcus his life?

  “If they know what’s happening, then I need to find out,” I said resolutely.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to stop at your home?”

  I’d thought a lot about this while we’d made our way here. While Taggart and Dante had bickered endlessly about how to handle my transport, I’d been thinking about what to do with my Fae father and Kelsey. “I think we should go alone. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know if the Seelie kings are planning on talking to me or putting me down.”

  Those magnificent fangs of Marcus’s showed up, and he growled low in his throat.

  I wish that didn’t do something for me, but it totally did.

  “His fangs are bigger than yours.” Kaja had shut down all conversation about staying behind, though a regal-looking consort had shown up with a bunch of bodyguards and whisked Daniela away. I’d been amused when I’d heard Kaja tell her mother-in-law she would have to reprogram the vacubots due to Daniela’s shedding while in her wolf form. I’d been touched by how she’d held her daughter for the longest time.

  I felt the loss in my soul in that moment, thought about what it would mean to have my mother’s arms around me.

  “They’re not that much bigger,” Dante argued with a frown.

  “Maybe they’re bigger than yours.” Taggart seemed determined to put his two cents in. “Mine are right at that size. I’m probably closer to our primal selves. Adam, did you get the cord? I can’t have my Charlie falling off.”

  And we were bringing Mrs. Taggart with us despite the fact that she was still unconscious.

  “You will all find out exactly how much damage my fangs can do if anyone attempts to harm my consort,” Marcus announced. “And that includes the kings of the Seelie.”

  Taggart held up his hands, conceding. “Dude, I’m not coming between you and your consort. I’ve got my own, though I have to admit Summer is incredibly bright. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a brighter consort, but all that light comes with a shit ton of baggage. I’m going to see you safely to Tír na nÓg and let my Charlie share her findings with the court. That’s it. If I don’t have to fire a shot, I’ll consider it a win.”

  “Sure you will,” Adam said under his breath.

  Taggart shook his head. “No, man. I’ve fired enough shots today and dealt with way too many bodies. Well, Thea’s going to have to deal with the mess Levi made and she’s not going to be happy about it. Dude’s leftovers were all over the place. It’s cool. I left her a note.”

  “How are we going to get through the gate?” Marcus asked. “Mr. Dellacourt was worried that we wouldn’t be allowed through the gate that leads straight to Tír na nÓg.”

  “The Tír na nÓg gate is on the other side of the state. It would be difficult to get there before it closes,” Taggart explained. “It’s also much more closely guarded since it leads to a populated place, and we have contracts with the Seelies about how we can move on and off the plane. The one we used yesterday is far less guarded because only morons who think they want to find out what nature is like use it. What they usually find is that nature likes to eat them.”

  “Also, our company took the contract to guard this gate two years ago,” Adam pointed out as he looked down at his tablet. “So we’ll be waved through no questions asked. However, we should go because the gate opens soon. I’m calculating a course that will avoid most of the more dangerous places.”

  “Summer has lived there for months,” Marcus pointed out.

  “Yeah, I kind of picked it because no one goes there anymore,” I replied. “The village we stay in is perfectly secure with Erna’s wards in place. Kelsey and my father should be safe there. Dean knows his way around, and he won’t let them stay in the forest at night.”

  “We’ll switch to our new hoverbikes.” Taggart pulled gloves over his hands. He was dressed for the sun, though it would be going down on the Refugee plane soon. “They’re fast. We’ll move through the dangerous nature plane and spend some sleep time on a safe plane I know. We should be in Tír na nÓg in thirty-six standard hours. Unless Dellacourt here wants to contact his cousins and have them work some diplomatic mojo.”

  “I might have been able to do that if Summer here didn’t have five different warrants out for her arrest.” Dante ran a hand over his hair in a gesture of obvious frustration. “It’s why I didn’t go to her in the first place. If any of those civilizations find out she’s on Tír na nÓg, the fight for who gets her will be on.”

  Sometimes it sucks to be popular.

  “Or we could find the door back to my home
plane and I will take Summer and her problems with me,” Marcus offered. “I will collect my friends and we will bother the outer planes no more.”

  “No can do.” Taggart had crossed his muscular arms over his chest and looked like he was ready to physically block Marcus should he try to take off. “According to what Charlie’s found, that would simply take the convergences to the inner planes. Most of our scientists believe our planes are dependent on the inner planes being stable. If we’re having problems now, they would be tenfold if the Earth plane started experiencing convergences. I get it. You want to take your consort and hide away, but she’s got problems and you can’t have your happy fun time until you solve them.”

  “Marcus, I can’t go to the Earth plane if the convergences are following me.” I didn’t say what I was truly worried about—if I was causing them. All of my life I’d been told that I was different, that I was unique. And though my foster mother had tried her hardest to keep it from me, I’d heard the other things they said about me. I heard that I was unlucky, that my magic couldn’t be contained in such a flawed form. There were some in my tribe who believed I would be the death of them, and I’d proven them right.

  Marcus stepped in front of me and made sure my jacket was zipped tight. “All right, then. We will do what we must, but you have to know I will not be parted from you. Not in any way.”

  Before I could argue with him, he dipped his head down and caught my mouth with his in the sweetest kiss. It was swift, a casual intimacy that made me long for more.

  “Are we sure we should take the unconscious chick?” Dante had his helmet in hand and stood looking down at the redhead still lying in the back of the hovercraft Taggart had driven.

  “Miss Charlotte is breathing and her heart is beating,” Kaja assured him. “He will not leave her behind any more than you would leave me in the same situation.”

  “But I was think…” Dante stopped at the sight of his wife’s expression. “You’re right. Absolutely, babe. Wouldn’t ever leave you behind for safety’s sake. Gotta take my beloved into danger with me.”

  “Yes, you should since your beloved is far more savage than you.” Kaja went on her toes and kissed her husband.

  Taggart hauled his wife into his arms and started moving toward the bikes. “I’m not leaving her behind. Your wife might be more savage than you, but mine is way smarter than I am. We need her. Dellacourt, I’m going to assume you know how to drive one of these things.”

  “I can drive one in my sleep,” Dante assured him.

  “Excellent.” Taggart passed off Charlotte to Adam before hopping on his big hoverbike. The engine purred to life as Adam eased Charlotte in front of her husband and strapped them together. “Someone show the newbie how to get on. I’ve got the second bike tethered to mine. Vorenus, all you have to do is not fall off, and don’t let your consort fall off. Adam will take the lead and the Dellacourts will watch our backs. The helmets have comms if you need something.”

  Adam handed me one of the helmets as Ian was fitting Charlotte with one and putting on his own. “Make sure the visor is down before we open the garage. You do not want a taste of the air down here.”

  It went easily over my head, adjusting to fit me perfectly.

  “I noticed there was significant pollution as we moved toward the ground,” Marcus said. “You are not environmentalists here, I take it.”

  “What’s good for the environment is usually bad for profits,” Adam said with a sigh. “We’re not a perfect society. Far from it. You’ll have to tell me about the Earth plane when we bunk down.”

  “I assure you, we’re far from perfect, too.” Marcus settled the helmet on his head, held out his hand, and walked me to our bike. He mounted it with grace and I got on behind him, wrapping my arms around his waist.

  It wasn’t more than a second before I heard Marcus’s voice in my ear.

  “Did I tell you how sexy you look in those clothes, bella? They fit you like a second skin and make me think you could be very naughty.” Just the sound of his voice made me want to melt. “And when we sleep tonight, you should understand that you will be with me. I won’t care that we’re out in the open. I’ll be discreet, but you will understand that I will never let you go.”

  “Will you care that everyone can hear you, buddy?” Taggart asked. “The comms are all connected.”

  “Hush. I like a little romance,” Kaja said over the line. “Please continue, Mr. Vorenus.”

  “Call me Marcus.” He chuckled and I could feel him moving against me as the hoverbike lifted into the air. “And I think I shall keep my words for my beloved’s ears alone. Please lead the way. I want to get this over with so we can properly begin our lives.”

  “Says the two-thousand-year-old male,” Adam joked. “I think your life already began.”

  “You would be wrong,” Marcus replied in a serious tone.

  I held on as the garage door came open and Taggart began moving through the thick fog that covered the surface.

  “You begin to make me feel better about my plane,” Marcus remarked as we moved into the dense pollution.

  The helmets immediately went to work, filtering out all the toxic particles.

  “No one lives below the tenth floor,” Taggart explained over the headsets. The bikes moved carefully through the fog. “And it’s only like this in the cities. There are still some places where you can walk the surface. Of course, no one tends to go there. We’re not real big on traveling that doesn’t involve business.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Kaja said. “I prefer the time we spend in Tír na nÓg. The forests are beautiful and I can run.”

  How I missed Tír na nÓg. As we moved along the surface, toward the gate, I held on to Marcus and couldn’t help but think about my home.

  Thinking about where I spent my childhood inevitably led me to thinking about how I’d been born.

  I remembered the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes. Her face staring down at me, and I felt a wave of sadness come from her. Not sadness at me, but at the situation. She’d had plans, and my existence changed them. Like many mothers, my own had to rethink everything, had to sacrifice for her child.

  My mother had put her soul on the line so that I could live.

  It’s an odd comfort to see her face in the mirror, to think of the life I could have had if I’d been a real baby. I think about it a lot. I think about what would have happened if I’d simply been an accident in human form.

  Not that it would have been possible. Daniel Donovan couldn’t have fathered a child. He’d been a vampire. I was unique in all the worlds.

  And that is a burden to bear.

  I heard Taggart tell our caravan that we were approaching the gate and to be prepared, but my mind was on my parents. My father had been asleep when Momma had found me in the box, but I’d felt him. Even though he’d been in the sleep that most earthbound vampires had to endure during the day, I knew he’d felt me, too. He’d been panicked at the thought of what would happen, then resigned, then excited. I’d felt his excitement at the potential of me.

  I’d heard some of his thoughts because I wasn’t good at staying out of people’s heads then. He hadn’t understood what I was, but he’d known I was different.

  He hadn’t wanted to leave me either.

  Up ahead, a brilliant light split the gloom.

  “That is a sight, bella.” Marcus’s head was up.

  It was the door opening at its appointed time, a crack in the veil that separated our planes. Daylight flooded my sight as the fog from the Vampire plane attempted to invade the Refugee plane.

  “Tír na nÓg is even more beautiful,” I said with a sigh. I wished I could take him to the shining seas and show him why they called me Summer of the Gentle Winds. When I stood on the cliffs, the winds always came for me. At first they’d thought it was coincidence, but soon they realized the winds gathered and gentled at my approach.

  “Then you will be my guide,” Marcus said.
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br />   “Hold on.” Taggart’s voice came over loud and clear. “We’re moving now. We’re going into haul-your-ass mode.”

  I felt the bike rev beneath me as it prepared to go super fast.

  “How safe are these things?” For the first time Marcus sounded slightly unnerved.

  “Very safe,” I assured him. “Though I prefer to walk. They’ve got a guidance system so we won’t hit anything.”

  My breath caught as the bike took off and we were through the door in seconds. One minute we were on the cloudy, desolate streets of Vampire and the next we were racing through a faery forest with massive trees reaching to the blue sky above.

  There was a path that led from one door to another. It had become overgrown through years of disuse. There was evidence that once it had been a maintained path, but now I could feel weeds and plants brush against my legs.

  “Will this path take us close to the field where we met?” Marcus asked.

  “Yes,” I replied. “It should also go by the village where my brugh is, but we’ll be going so fast I doubt Erna or Dean will notice.”

  “Your witch might not notice, but I assure you Kelsey will.” Marcus had relaxed a bit as though he’d come to the conclusion we weren’t going to die in the next few moments.

  “She won’t be able to catch us, and honestly, it’s best I do this alone.”

  “You aren’t alone now. If it is up to me, you won’t ever be alone again.”

  There was a sigh over the line that sounded far too feminine to be from Marcus.

  “Dante, you never say such things to me anymore,” Kaja said.

  “No, I’m too busy running after our daughter and praying I survive her childhood,” came Dante’s reply with a chuckle.

  I will be happy when we’re alone again, bella. Marcus reminded me that we could have some privacy.

  I caught the sight of something out of my peripheral vision. It was nothing but a flash, but I could have sworn I saw Dean’s shock of white hair and a woman standing next to him who could only be Kelsey.