KICK ASS: A Boxed Set (3 Powerful Heroines, 2 Complete Novels + Bonus Novella)

by Julie Leto

  He managed a nod and tugged her along when he crossed the room. The mosaic started just above the fireplace, so they had to stand back to take in the full picture.

  “This is my village. This is my home.”

  The surprise and wonder in his voice caught her off guard. “I thought you’d been in Rogan’s castle before. Wasn’t this mosaic always here?”

  “Yes, I believe so.”

  He shook his head, as if breaking the hypnotic draw of the artistry in order to speak with her. “The mosaic did not have such detail. Not that I remember. However, Rogan was still having work done on it the last time I visited him. I refused to enter his house long before it was completed.”

  “Why? Because of Sarina?”

  Rafe turned away from the wall and flexed his fingers open and closed. He noticed the nervous gesture immediately and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I knew about Sarina’s infatuation long before my brothers, but no, that was not the reason.”

  “You and Sarina were close,” she provided.

  He nodded. “We shared our Gypsy heritage. Our playground was the forest and caves of Valoren, not prim English gardens. We had a mother to raise us, not nurses. We loved our brothers, but we were often separated from them. They spent months at a time in England. Damon studied abroad and tended to our father’s holdings. Aiden, Colin, Paxton and Logan each went to school away from Valoren, leaving Sarina and me to play with the other Gypsy children.”

  “The Gypsies were your family, too.”

  His gaze drifted back to the mosaic. “Not all of them.”

  “I thought Rogan was a nobleman of some sort.” Rafe lifted an eyebrow. “Are the two mutually exclusive?”

  “In most countries, yeah.”

  “Rogan kept his roots hidden well. He preferred that men of power and influence, such as my brother Damon, or my father, consider him royalty of some small Slavic country. But he was Romani. I saw it in his eyes the first time we met.”

  “Why would he hide his bloodlines from your father? I thought the earl loved the Gypsies. Your mother was Romani. And wasn’t your father the one who came up with the idea to colonize your people rather than imprison them in London? Or worse?”

  Rafe frowned. They’d discussed all this before, but she knew he struggled with his feelings about his father just as she had fought her emotions for hers. And her mother. And her brothers. And Ben. She’d pretty much had issues with everyone she’d spent prolonged periods of time with.

  Watching Rafe tussle with his own emotional demons made her anxious to say the words she’d never imagined she’d speak. But she hesitated. Rafe’s eyes glazed as he stared at the mosaic—as he stared at his past.

  “My father cared for the Gypsies, yes. But he mistrusted Rogan from the moment they met. I doubt his revealing the carefully guarded secret of his lineage would have engendered faith or confidence. Rogan needed my father so he could have access to the Gypsies, so he could build this massive castle on promises of bringing wealth and security to the colony. Before we had a single hint of his magical abilities, he had enthralled the entire encampment with his charisma. He was a nobleman who paid homage to our Chovihano upon his arrival and who brought flowers daily to my grandmother—buds that did not grow in the valley and yet stayed fresh for days on end. He charmed us all.”

  “Including Sarina?”

  “Worse,” Rafe said. “He completely enraptured my Irika. If I had not married her, I might have lost her to him forever.”

  Twenty Six

  Emotions Rafe had thought he’d cleansed from his soul long ago came raging back. Jealousy and guilt battled for dominance. Rafe had loved his wife. He’d loved his sister. But in the end, he’d lost them both.

  Mariah ran her hand along his shoulders. Her sympathy caressed him, and he needed the sensation too desperately to shut her out. He’d already told her about his inability to save Irika, and he’d confessed how he’d failed to discourage his sister’s affection for the sorcerer whose magic had led him here. But he had not shared how his own actions had helped create both tragedies.

  But he could no longer deny his past. Not if he wanted to live again.

  “Irika was very beautiful,” he said.

  “To have the handsomest man in the village—that would be you—and a powerful nobleman both desire her for their own,” Mariah said, her voice soothing, “she must have been stunning.”

  His gaze swept the mosaic for any sign of Irika’s long, dark hair and penetrating eyes. Instead, he spotted the old woman who painted intricate landscapes on thimbles. Cinka. Cinka Dobravich. Nearly blind, she could not see to greet a visitor from across a yard, but her talent in miniature had been striking. And near the center of the display, he caught sight of the strapping young lad, one of four sons of Ivo and Esme, who’d so often disrupt Stefan’s naps by drumming on the fence outside their cottage. In an upper corner, nearly out of his line of sight, he saw a gray-haired man in a bright red shirt who wore the thoughtful, determined expression of the Chovihano, right down to the mole on his left cheek and the downward curve of his lips. Belthezor wore a bundle on his back, which was odd, but otherwise, he could practically feel the man’s gentle gaze as if he stood right beside him.

  “I don’t see her,” he said.

  “These are actual people?”

  “Yes,” he said, equally amazed. Why would a man as self-indulgent as Rogan have this intimate masterpiece in the most public space in his castle?

  “What did she look like?”

  Mariah stepped back, her stare lost in the collage of faces. The scene was the village viewed from atop one of the mountain cliffs. Colorful vardos and festooned, ramshackle homes anchored a portrait brimming with action. The tiles on the communal fire at the center of the mosaic glittered, picking up the light from the chandeliers in the dining hall. Pieced together with expert care, the representations of children and animals evoked movement, even when they were entirely still. The artists had captured the weary, hunched shoulders of the butcher and the sprightly step of his much younger wife. But no sign of Irika. And no man at all who looked like him.

  “Dark skin and hair,” he explained, hoping to find her—to know that something, however small, was left of the woman he’d loved. “Slim and almost fragile. She was a storm cloud hovering above, but never producing a single drop of rain.”

  “Whereas I’m thundering all the time,” Mariah cracked.

  He laughed, but for only an instant. Irika and Mariah existed on opposite ends of the world of women, but he suspected that it they’d met, they would have liked each other. Even Mariah’s rough edges would not have frightened Irika, who had been born with an angel’s soul.

  “And you never saw this mosaic before tonight?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “After Irika and I were married, we avoided invitations into Rogan’s inner sanctum. I did not flaunt temptation in front of a man such as him.”

  “Didn’t you trust her?”

  “Irika? Implicitly,” he said, surprised by her question. “But Rogan? No. When he heard of our marriage, he presented us with a generous gift—a house, solidly built up against the mountainside.” He scanned the mosaic and found his home, surprised to see the windows dark and the yard where he’d once raised goats entirely empty—dead, whereas the rest of the mosaic overflowed with life. He pointed at the structure for Mariah’s sake. “There.”

  Mariah levered up on her tiptoes. “And you took it?”

  “Irika’s father insisted,” he complained. “He thought it unwise to insult Rogan. But we stayed away from any gathering that forced us inside his domain. I remember talk of the great mosaic, but I do not recall knowing that the villagers would be represented?”

  Thinking back so far was a futile exercise. It was hard enough to remember all the major events, much less the minutiae, after two hundred and sixty years.

  Mariah’s hand slipped down his arm, her fingers tangling with his. He could not miss the shiver of un
certainty that preceded her question. “Were you already promised to Irika when Rogan came to town, or did she pick you over him?”

  Rafe slipped his hand free of Mariah’s and continued searching the mosaic, recognizing the woodworker, Lazar, and his wife, Natasha, surrounded by their trio of daughters. He did not want to feel Mariah’s insecurity when asking about his past. He had enough doubt of his own in providing the answers.

  “Irika and I were promised to each other at birth. A marriage between the son of the governor and the daughter of the Chovihano ensured good relations among the Gypsies and their jailer.”

  He expected her to contradict his classification of his own father, but she did not. He gained some measure of comfort by unburdening his conscience while in such close proximity to the mosaic, which seemed to emanate the same emotional warmth the village had provided when it was thriving and alive.

  “Irika and I played together as children, knowing that someday we’d wed. We loved each other long before we exchanged promises with the blessings of our families.”

  “You say that as if you’re sorry,” Mariah observed, her head tilted quizzically.

  Rafe closed his eyes, remembering the day he’d stood beneath a canopy of colorful scarves, exchanged bites of bread doused in salt and vowed to remain faithful to Irika until death.

  “I am not sorry I loved Irika, but I will never forgive myself for rushing our marriage. Once Irika was my bride, Rogan turned his charms on my sister. She was so young. He was a man of the world. And I was not there to protect her.”

  Mariah stepped away, her arms hooked behind her back. He knew instantly that she was about to say something he would not want to hear.

  “Sarina might have been young, but I’ve never heard you say she was foolish.”

  “She was not,” he replied. “Just… innocent.”

  Mariah’s eyebrows lifted, as if she doubted any woman, young or old, could be quite as guileless as he professed. He supposed that in this century, the notion would be difficult to accept. But he knew his sister. He knew Irika. Neither could have fought off Rogan’s charms for long.

  “Women of my day were not like you or Catalina,” he explained. “Even the puri grandmothers who possessed the sight did not see Rogan for what he was. Not, at least, until it was too late.”

  “I’m not denying that he was a scary guy,” she said. “Anyone who could devise the magic he did that trapped you for all this time had a seriously warped outlook on the world. But I don’t think you’re giving your sister much credit, and you’re taking too much blame for yourself. Maybe Rogan truly cared for her. Maybe he was trying to make a good marriage, too. Sarina was the daughter of the governor, and you said he wanted a position of power in the village—”

  “Yes, but ask yourself,” Rafe interrupted, “why did he care about Valoren? Why settle in the village of Umgeben when he could have resumed his travels to the far corners of the world? Our village was small and remote. What had we to offer him to make him want so desperately to stay that he’d erect this monstrosity?”

  He gestured at the castle, but Mariah did not follow his hands. Her eyes bored straight into his and held him captive.

  “Love,” she answered simply.

  “He knew not how to love,” Rafe snapped.

  At this, she glanced aside. “Okay, then. Maybe just the company of people who shared his blood?”

  He shook his head wildly. “My people had been in Valoren for over two decades when Rogan arrived. For all those years, we survived, but we chafed under the laws that kept us from wandering the land, making our lives wherever we saw fit. He changed all that. He took away the Gypsies’ desire to explore and travel and control their own destinies. Everyone… changed.”

  “Everyone?”

  “Nearly everyone,” he clarified. “But even Irika no longer spoke of leaving the valley. She wanted his house. His roots!”

  “Maybe it was your roots she wanted,” Mariah offered. “Something steady and predictable and safe. I’m no expert, but I hear that a lot of women find that very attractive.”

  She smiled, but Rafe could not see the humor.

  “You don’t understand. Rogan possessed magic unlike any ever conceived of by the Romani. He influenced them all. Changed them all. You saw what Farrow Pryce could do with just the sword and a half-wit’s knowledge of how to use it. With the skills he possessed, Rogan could have taken over the world. But he didn’t. Why?”

  “His motives don’t matter anymore,” Mariah reminded him. “You have to let go of the past. If there’s one lesson I’ve learned recently, that’s the one.”

  Painfully, Rafe tore his eyes away from the mosaic and the loss it represented. Hatred and fury surged inside him, as if he’d just conjured something massive with Rogan’s tainted power.

  “How can it not matter?” he asked. “He set my fate in motion. He insulted the king, who sent the army, who killed my wife. His magic ensnared me, prevented me from helping her. He forced me to watch blood stream from her neck and…”

  Before Rafe knew it, his vision blurred and his face was wet. He slashed at his tears, tempted to gouge out his eyes if he thought the act would erase the torturous images from his brain. But he knew it would not. Nothing would assuage this agony. Not as long as he remained here, in Rogan’s lair. Not as long as he was tied to Rogan’s cursed marker.

  Mariah slipped her arms around his waist and pressed her cheek to his chest. “What happened doesn’t make sense. Murder never does. But Irika’s death was not your fault.”

  “What of Sarina?”

  “You don’t even know that she died. She could have become trapped, like you and your brothers. But you need to accept that she had a mind of her own.”

  “She was running from him, Mariah. She was terrified.”

  “I know,” she said softly, but then spoke no more. What more could she say? They might never know what happened to Sarina. But Irika’s fate was indisputable. Rafe had not realized until now that time had not erased even the tiniest detail of that tragedy from his heart.

  “Perhaps I did not trust Irika’s love. If I had, we might have taken our time with our marriage. She might not have become pregnant so young and remained weak for so long afterward that she couldn’t—”

  “Fight the soldiers?” Mariah supplied, staring into his eyes incredulously. “Rafe, she wouldn’t have lived even if she’d been armed to the teeth and trained to fight. She was outnumbered. And even if you had been able to escape the stone, you would have died, too.”

  He jammed his hands into his hair, pulling the strands from the queue he’d tied at the back of his neck. He had no answers, only questions. Fortunately, Paxton came in behind them and cleared his throat.

  “What’s wrong?” Mariah asked.

  Paxton glanced behind him. “Ben went to go find Cat, but they’ve both been gone quite a while.”

  Mariah turned to Rafe.”Can you feel them? Are they here? Are they in danger?”

  He did not want to call upon Rogan’s magic, but the tug of the darkness was too powerful here for him to resist. He reached out as if with a thousand hands and felt the emotions surging through the atmosphere. Ben’s concern. Cat’s annoyance. Gemma’s confusion.

  “They are here and they are safe, but this place reeks with Rogan’s evil.” He opened his eyes. His brother now stood beside Mariah. “Paxton, you above all the others understand. You know what exists here. The vibrations darken me.”

  So unchanged from the unflappable older brother with whom he shared special abilities, Paxton patted him on the shoulder. “This old place can be a little creepy in the dark. But like it or not, it’s Rogan’s magic that flows through this place and through the stone that keeps you tethered. It can also set you free. If Ben and the girls are all right, then we need to get on with things.” He turned to Mariah, who stepped back at the fierce look in his brother’s stare. “The time is now.”

  Rafe saw the undulation of Mariah’s throat as she
swallowed, but he saw not a flicker of hesitation in her amber eyes. In fact, they softened, almost glossed as she took his hands in hers. The emotions flowing from her skin instantly battled with the icy cold remnants of Rogan’s power.

  “I love you, Rafe Forsyth. I want you to be free.”

  She didn’t give him time to bend his head to kiss her. Instead, she stood on tiptoe and crashed her lips to his. Love flowed like water, dousing him with a thousand soothing sensations.

  And yet, when he broke the kiss, he felt dry and parched, and the silken threads of her love snapped and fell aside.

  Twenty Seven

  Mariah waited, her breath tight in her chest, desperate for any sign that the curse had been broken. When Rafe stumbled back, she expected… what? Fireworks? Explosions? Beams of light dousing him from above? She didn’t know what she’d thought would happen, but she certainly expected something.

  “Rafe?”

  He gazed at her, his silver eyes so cold, they might have been forged from steel.

  She turned to Paschal, but the older man simply shook his head.

  “What’s wrong? I said the words,” she insisted, reaching for Rafe. “And I meant them. I love you. We’ve known each other for only a short time, but look at what we’ve accomplished together. I’ve let you into places in my heart I never knew existed. You’ve saved my life and I’ve saved yours. The thought of being without you for the rest of my life hurts more than being flung across a hotel roof or falling off a cliff. My fear kept me from seeing how much I care for you, how much I want to be with you. We’re connected. We have been since the day I touched the stone. Maybe it was fate. Maybe I finally earned some good luck. I can deny a lot of things, but I can’t deny that I love you with all my heart and soul.”

  No matter what she said, his expression did not change. Finally, he broke away from her and stalked to the fireplace. He gripped the mantel so hard, his knuckles turned white.

  “Leave me,” he ordered.

  “Excuse me?” She’d just opened a door more heavily guarded than any tomb in the Valley of the Kings and he was pushing her away without even looking her in the eye?