Merrick leaned against the wall by the door, in his usual spot; his hair was shaken down over his face and wildly mussed. His eyes glittered, peering out from under the shelf of darkness, and he looked, quite frankly, like hell. He was back in his weapons harness, the sword hilt riding his right shoulder; it was habit with the Watchers to take their weapons everywhere. At least he wasn’t wearing his coat. Still, the smell of leather was faint in the air, and that citrus scent, too. He’d been in here for a while, and the smell was . . . comforting.
Caro let the door drift half closed while she hung the towel up and rescued her comb. “Bathroom’s yours,” she said, finally, emerging into the main room. Her skirt swirled around her ankles; Theo always got them a little too big. It’s that aura of yours that makes it difficult to tell your size, the green witch would say with a wry smile. Your mouth makes you seem taller than you are, Elise had piped up. “I’ll make you something to eat, you must be star—”
He barely seemed to move before he was in front of her, his hands curling around her upper arms. “Are you all right? Why didn’t you wake me up? Are you hurt? What happened? Are you hurt?”
He was shaking. It was the most emotion she’d seen from him, and the rapid-fire questions were so utterly unlike the laconic Watcher she had begun to know her jaw threatened to drop. “Merrick!”
She hadn’t meant to yell, but gods above, he looked furious. His eyes blazed and he looked like he was developing a tic in his scarred cheek. He shut up, but he didn’t let go of her arms. His grasp didn’t hurt, but it was uncomfortably tight. He twitched, as if he wanted to shake her. There was a shadow of stubble on his cheeks, even the scarred one, and she wondered how long he’d been at her bedside.
I haven’t done right by him. He’s a Watcher, he’s all but helpless. If something happens he’s going to be in terrible danger.
It was ridiculous to think of him as helpless, but feeling him shake through his hard grip on her arms convinced her. He was in a dangerous mood, anger fueled by frustration and fear, the worst kind of tangle for a Watcher to get himself into. Once, Vincent had been driven to anger by something she’d done, something idiotic, and he’d trembled like this. In the middle of the swirling haze of emotion, she felt a curious comfort.
Caro took a deep breath. He was locked down so tight she could almost feel the air hardening around him. Despite that, a complex welter of dark fury and anguish she shuddered to feel trickled out, staining the edges of his aura. “Calm down,” she whispered, looking up at him. “Just calm down.”
“Calm down? Calm down?” His green eyes were incandescent, and she wondered if she was going to be the first witch in the history of Circle Lightfall to be burned by a Watcher’s eyes.
That’s ridiculous. He wouldn’t hurt me. “Yes.” Her voice shook. “Please. Just calm down.” She did the only thing she could do, simply reached up and laid her fingertips against his cheek. He didn’t stop her, but his hands didn’t loosen either.
He went still, so motionless he seemed to have turned to a statue. She was touching his scarred cheek, the smoothness of long-healed tissue under her fingertips, He felt feverish. Watchers usually ran warm, their metabolisms higher than normals, but he was so hot she had a sudden uncomfortable mental image of smoke threading up from his clothes.
Her practical side reasserted itself with a vengeance. Give him something else to think about, a question to answer. Keep him talking. He won’t hurt me, but he’s upset, and a Watcher in this state is dangerous. Not to me, maybe, but to himself.
“You brought me out. How long was I gone?” She heard the snap of command in her voice, winced against it. Do you have to be so bossy, Caro?
Oddly enough, that seemed to defuse the tension. His hands relaxed still further, though he didn’t let her go. Even his face softened slightly. “Four days.” A slight rippling shudder went through him. “You were gone, Caro. Your brother finally persuaded them to let me track you.”
Her eyes widened. She could feel them practically start out from her head, a prickling cold fear touching her nape, her hair trying to rise. “Four days?” It was a shocked whisper. “But—gods above, I shouldn’t have lasted more than six hours.” And I should be half dead with backlash!
Merrick’s throat worked as he swallowed. A deep rumbling growl lifted from him, his cheek turning to iron under her touch, muscle standing out under his T-shirt. Well, that was probably the wrong thing to say to him, she thought, and felt a lunatic desire to giggle rise up in her and fall away.
“Merrick.” She used her schoolteacher voice, the one that could stop a giggling group of young witches in their tracks and return them to a boring theory lesson. “Stop it. I’m right here, I’m all right, and you’re not going to do any good by going all overprotective on me.”
His eyes found hers, and Caro swallowed dryly. He didn’t look merely grim. No, his eyes burned, his scars flushed, and he looked lethal.
He leaned down, shaking free of her fingers on his face, and Caro only had time to take a short shocked breath before his mouth descended on hers. He kissed her, his breath flavored with male and the spice-taste of city night, neon, and cold wind.
Fire. Liquid heat slid down her skin, slammed into her belly, crackled between her nerves. Her hips tilted forward, her hands tangling in his hair, and she drowned in the wave of velvet-spiked oil until he took a little pity on her and broke free. Her lips felt bruised, almost swollen, and she was suddenly extremely aware that he was taller than her, still holding her shoulders, and she had her fingers twisted in the rough tangled darkness of his hair.
What the—
She couldn’t seem to catch her breath. She wasn’t inexperienced—one of the good things about learning to control her abilities was the opportunity to carry on a semi-relationship with a normal man, especially once she had refused to have a Watcher. Unfortunately, a relationship with a psychic wasn’t something most men could handle. It was hard to be affectionate toward a woman who could read your mind and had to be home by dusk, not to mention one who sometimes disappeared at the drop of a hat for an emergency. Even casual encounters had been a little difficult. And none of them had ever, ever felt like this, drowning in fire, her nerves torn apart with heat. She was damn near ready to pull his head back down and find out if he could do it again.
Caro! The short, sharp voice of her conscience jolted her. She untangled her fingers from his hair, let her hands drop. For God’s sake, control yourself. This is no time for hormones. You have work to do. And your first task is calming him down.
He pulled her forward, wrapping his arms around her, and said something she couldn’t hear because it was muffled by her hair. He was still shaking, a knife hilt jabbed her right in the ribs, and he smelled like leather. She was suddenly, incredibly, acutely aware that her hair was wet and she probably had coffee breath because she’d taken the cup into the bathroom with her.
Great, Caro. Lovely. What the hell is wrong with you?
But she knew, didn’t she. Witch and Watcher, they were a bonded pair. It was the most natural thing in the world for her to . . . react to him. Did other witches feel this way too? They should have told her. Someone should have warned her.
This is going to make everything even more difficult. Wow. Where did he learn how to kiss like that?
Quit it. You shouldn’t be thinking about that. You should be thinking about getting the rest of the files memorized and looking for a connection, any connection, anything.
Sure. In a minute. I’ll get right on that.
His heartbeat thudded under her cheek. One of the straps of his weapons-harness pressed into her chin. Her own heart was racing, pounding in her throat, racketing against her ribs. He took a deep shuddering breath, and the tension in him drained away.
He raised his head a little. “Take my knives if you want,” he said harshly, as if he was being strangled by the words.
What? If she could have, she would have tried to look up, see his face. As
it was, she wasn’t likely to be going anywhere. His arms were still gently but definitely around her, and she knew how strong a Watcher was. She settled for sliding her own arms around him, felt him stiffen reflexively. The hard edge of one of his guns pressed into her hip. “What the hell are you talking about? Why don’t you use teensy words and go real slow so I can follow you? I’m not feeling up to my usual speed, you know.”
A few moments of silence stretched around them. The safehouse hummed to itself, the walls singing their slow song of protection, and she felt the unease swirling through the halls. Had she really been out for four days, walking in the space-between? Why wasn’t she more backlashed?
“Duty.” Merrick shivered. “Honor. Obedience. You’re my witch, Caroline. Mine. And I’m bloody well going to make sure nothing happens to you. If I have to violate my oath of obedience, so be it. I will not lose you. You will never, ever, ever do anything like that ever again, do you hear me? If I have to hold you down or sit on you to keep you out of trouble, I will.”
She’d never heard a Watcher say anything remotely like this. “I’m all right,” she soothed. “We’re both alive. Why don’t we just have a—”
“I mean it, Caro. If you want to take my knives and shun me, do it now. Right now. But even if you do, I’m not leaving you. I will not let you put yourself in danger again. If I have to damn myself to protect you, I will.”
Oh, for heaven’s sake, I need more coffee before I can handle this. Caro took a deep breath, felt the high voltage running through him. He was serious. Taking a Watcher’s knives meant that the Watcher had lost his chance for redemption, had done something so awful the Lightbringers had cast him out. In all the history of Circle Lightfall, it had only happened twice, and one of those times had only been temporary. It was the worst thing that could happen to a Watcher, and if Merrick thought she was going to do that he might well work himself into a frenzy and hurt himself.
“Nobody’s going to take your knives.” I wish Theo was here. She can calm anyone down. I’ve never been known to be soothing except with a patient. “You haven’t done anything wrong.”
“I’m about to.” But the dangerous staticky sense of a thunderstorm about to strike lessened. Caro was aware of sudden stasis—was the entire safehouse holding its breath? No, just her. “Never, ever do anything like that again, Caro.”
A Watcher telling me what to do. Yeah, like I haven’t heard that before. But even Vincent never said it quite that way, like a command instead of a request. Her chin would have lifted stubbornly if she hadn’t had her face buried against his chest. “I did what I had to. You’d have done the same thing.”
“I’m a Watcher, Caro. I’m supposed to do the foolish, suicidal—” He was working himself up again. The way he said her name—the faint possessive inflection stronger now, the vowels shaped differently through his accent—made her heart pound again, as if she’d just run a marathon. I won’t have to take aerobics if this keeps up. I’ll get all my exercise just listening to him talk.
“Shut up.” And miraculously, he did. His heartbeat settled, his aura closed around hers, and she closed her eyes, breathing him in. “Listen to me.”
He was quiet. She moved slightly, pushing a knife hilt aside to get more comfortable. Finally, he drew in a deep shuddering breath. “I’m listening,” he whispered.
All right, I’ve got his attention. “You’re my Watcher,” she said carefully. “If you’ll be careful, I’ll be careful. I don’t want you hurt—”
“It’s my job,” he interrupted, again. All this time he says almost nothing, and now I can’t get a word in edgewise. “How would you like it if someone told you not to Mindheal because it was too dangerous?”
That stopped her. Damn the man, he had a valid point. “But—”
“I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” he hissed out between clenched teeth. “You don’t know how capable. The only thing that’s going to get me killed is if you keep making it harder for me to do my bloody fucking job!”
She had nothing to say to that. What if he was right? “What do you want me to do?” Her voice wavered on the edge of tears. Good one, Caro. Show how tough you are by being a weepy little whiner. Damn it, why can’t you ever learn to buck up and be strong?
“Just let me do what I’m meant to,” he whispered. “Everything’s going to be all right, Caro. I promise, I will protect you. I swear it, on my Name and my knives.”
That made the tears spill over, she could feel them soaking into his shirt. It was the most solemn oath a Watcher could swear, the most binding. There was nothing else to say. The room ticked and sang its slow song of wood and drywall heating up and expanding for the day, even on such a gray and rainy day as this. He gradually stopped shaking, simply held her, the smell of leather and male enclosing her. She had never been able to lean into someone like this, feel someone else providing a little shelter. Even Vincent had never touched her. For all her life, Caro had been the strong one, never letting down her guard, never letting Trev or anyone else see her indecision, her fear.
She could have stayed there far longer, but a sudden knock at the door made her jump, half-guiltily. Merrick’s arms fell away, he looked down at her. The tension of half a dozen things she wanted to say to him stretched between them, just like a rope knotted around her waist.
“I promise,” he repeated, then went past her, leaving only the guilty heat in her cheeks and the bruised feeling in her lips, and the smell of leather and a very big, very careful man who had pulled her—how?—out of the space-between.
“Caro?” Trev’s voice, muffled by the door. “Caro? Is that you? Open up!”
Oh, God, she thought, feeling her cheeks burn with heat, what next? Please, not another crisis. Not now.
Twelve
“Two days,” the boy said, watching his sister’s face. “Then you slept for another two while we all took turns shoving Power into you, which is probably why you’re not feeling backlashed.” He pushed the plate toward her. “You need to eat. Look, it’s my famous curry chicken. I’ve turned your kitchen into a disaster area again.”
“Mh. Look at this. Most of the attacks have a seventy-two hour cycle. The—yes, the normals, not the psychics. Now why would it be seventy-two hours for the normals and—”
Merrick’s witch chewed her lower lip, frowning as she stared at the papers spread out over the table. There were no pictures, for which Merrick was grateful. He didn’t want her to see dead, brutalized bodies. Quite frankly, he’d had enough of Caro seeing awful things. A tendril of chestnut hair streaked with gold fell in her face, she blew it back irritably and his heart leapt, throbbed in his wrists and other places, too. He should have taken an ice bath. She was dangerous to his self-control, and he’d had just about enough of the look don’t touch, no matter how damn thoroughly he didn’t deserve her.
He’d had enough of her rushing headlong into danger, too. There was a long list of things he’d had enough of, and if he wasn’t careful he would end up doing something indefensible and being cast out. It made him wonder what would happen if Caro took his knives and he still stayed around to protect her. Would the other Watchers become his enemies? Would they exterminate him as just another piece of Dark, without the obedience and honor that made a Watcher one of the good guys?
I don’t care. Merrick leaned back against the wall, his heartbeat finally slowing down. He had forced himself on her, but he couldn’t have stopped himself even if he’d wanted to. Just the remembered feel of her in his arms was enough to make his pulse spike again. It was a feedback loop, her skin against his and her mouth opening shyly to him. He’d tasted morning coffee and the flavor of her, salt and spice and something too sweet to be called bitterness but too bitter to be truly sweet—his own failure. He’d broken the central law of being a Watcher, and nobody had realized it yet. The next time Caro tried to throw herself into peril, he was going to handcuff her if he had to and keep her locked up in the safest corner he could fin
d. His heart couldn’t take this.
“A seventy-two hour cycle?” Trev dropped into the chair to her right, slanting the Watchers a meaningful, indecipherable look. “Keenan, Merrick, get your plates. This won’t stay hot forever.”
Merrick, startled, scraped himself off the wall near the door. He was getting very used to the way the pretty blue room looked from that angle. It was better than kneeling at the side of Caro’s bed and fighting to track her through a shifting waste of mist and weird internal ballrooms while his chest felt like it was being torn in half. He now understood why a bonded Watcher didn’t survive his witch’s death. How could a man survive when his heart and soul were torn out and carried away? It wasn’t possible.
Christ, he’d never even known he had a soul until she had stood up, clutching her car door, and demanded just who the hell he was. Never even dreamed he had one. And if he had a heart left, it was sitting at the table, murmuring to herself as she paged through another file and made a notation with a precisely sharpened sun-yellow pencil.
Keenan handed him a plate as soon as he made it into the kitchenette, but the younger Watcher didn’t let go when Merrick tried to take it.
“Got a second?” Keenan’s tone was a warning in and of itself. The kitchenette was tucked behind a half-wall, and there was precious little space to hide them, but Trev was chattering at Caro far enough away that a private conversation was possible.
Merrick was hard-pressed to stop a guilty start. Had he been found out somehow? He’d learned to keep his face impassive, and the scars helped, but even his breathing might have given him away. “What’s on your mind, mate?”
“Had a chat with Oliver.” Keenan’s eyes turned even darker, his pupils fading into the irises and giving his gaze a Watcher’s intensity. “Asher Green woke up and started talking.” He took a deep breath as if steeling himself, his coat creaking slightly. “The Crusade caught him and the witch. They beat them both, and Asher fought as hard as he could—poor bastard, says it wasn’t enough. You know.”
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