by Kat Adams
He brought up his hands. “I was only kidding. Jeez.” I walked up and ripped the tie from his facial hair, taking a few whiskers with me. “Ouch! Shit, Montana. I thought this was a booty call. I didn’t know I’d be abused.” He rubbed his chin where he was now missing a couple of whiskers.
If I were in the mood, I would have already attacked him. The outfit showed off his tight, muscled physique. He knew how much I loved it when he wore tank tops. Freshly showered. Wearing something that totally turned me on. His green eyes were unusually mirthful tonight too. Yep, he definitely thought this was a booty call, and, if he played his cards right, it might turn into one.
But first, I needed answers.
“Which one of your parents is the infectious disease scientist?”
“Talking about parents really kills the mood.” He pouted as he sat on the foot of the bed.
“Well?”
“Neither. Mom is a forensic anthropologist, like Bones. My dad is a physicist. They study rare diseases, not infectious diseases. Big diff. Though, some rare diseases are highly contagious.” He removed his shoes, then his socks. “Why do you ask?”
“Would either of them know of any way to infect an inanimate object like a ward?”
He removed his tank top and tossed it aside, rendering me momentarily speechless as I stared at his beautiful body. Every muscle was so incredibly defined. Clay didn’t have a large frame like Bryan or Rob, but what he lacked in size, he more than made up for in other ways. And I wasn’t talking about a lack in size in every department. His manly bits were the perfect fit for my lady bits. We were a perfect fit.
And right now, he had my lady bits tingling.
“What’s on your mind, Montana?”
Right now? Or in general? Because both were the same answer: sex. But I needed… What did I need? Oh, right. Wards. “Cressida said the wards had a fever. I’m trying to figure out how an inanimate object can get sick.”
“That’s easy.” He unbuttoned his jean cutoffs and slowly lowered the zipper tooth by tooth, his sexy gaze dancing over me. “You sure this isn’t a bootie call?”
My attention dropped to his bulging groin, and I licked my lips. Damn him and his amazing, well, everything. “Inanimate objects, Clay. How do they catch the fever?”
He sat at the edge of the bed. “Did she say a fever? Or the fever?”
“I don’t know. The fever, I think. Does it make a difference?”
“Yeah, it totally makes a difference. A fever is what they’d say in her time if you felt warm. The fever is what they called it when you were sick, really sick, like you-weren’t-going-to-last-the-night kind of sick.”
“Oh, shit. That sounds bad.”
“They didn’t have any other words for it,” he explained. “Sick didn’t cut it. Diseased was more of a long-term illness. Virus wasn’t even around when she was alive.” He snapped his fingers and jumped off the bed. His cutoffs slid down his muscular legs and landed on the floor around his bare feet. He dropped his head. “Oops.”
“What? What is it?”
“I lost my pants.”
“You didn’t lose them. They’re just around your ankles.” And I was about to strangle him with a sock if he didn’t explain why he jumped up like that. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
His smile usually lit up the room. Right now, I was about to slap it from his charming face. When he waggled his eyebrows, I picked up one of my shoes and threw it at him. He laughed and brought his hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay. Jeez. Lower your weapons. I think she meant a virus.”
I lowered the other shoe in my hand. “Like a cold?”
“No. Like a computer virus.” He waited for me to get it. Nod enthusiastically. Throw him a parade. Something. Only, I didn’t get it, so he went on. “It’s code.”
“For what?”
“No, Montana. I mean it’s literally code. A computer virus is nothing more than code. It’s code attacking code. Whatever is infecting the wards has to be…” He shot me with a knowing look. “Another ward.”
Oh, shit my shorts.
“This has nothing to do with the ward I created,” I defended, though I wasn’t convinced and didn’t sound all that convincing either.
He called air and sent the shoe in my hand flying. It smacked against the wardrobe—the shoe, not my hand, an important distinction—and left a print. How was I going to explain that? It was five feet in the air. “You sure about that?”
Not even a little. “You heard what Leo said. It was a water ward.”
“If you say so. He never saw it. He’s only going by your description. Wards are finicky. One slight slip of the wrist and you’ve got yourself a counter ward.” He stepped out of his cutoffs. “Now, about that bootie call…”
“Get dressed.” That had to be it. I’d messed up and somehow created a counter ward.
He frowned and glanced down again. “That’s exactly the opposite of what I want to do.”
“Fine, go in your underwear.” I grabbed his arm to drag him out of the room with me.
“Go where?”
“We have to find the ward I created and destroy it. That’s got to be the virus attacking the barrier. Cressida is stuck in her human form because of it. I must have done it wrong or something.”
He stopped and pulled his arm free. “How long were you working on the ward before you actually created it?”
I stopped right along with him. “Working on it?”
“Yeah. All wards must be approved by a professor. I assume Professor Layden worked with you, right? What’s she got to say in all this?” When his question resulted in me blinking a rounded gaze several times, his frown deepened the lines around his eyes. “She did help you create the ward, right?”
“Not…exactly.”
“Don’t tell me you attempted to create one on your own.”
“I wasn’t on my own. My mom was with me.”
When he rolled his eyes, I wanted to poke them right out of his annoyingly carefree, handsome face. “Let me get this straight. You created a ward, having never created one before, and with the help of someone who’d just returned from hiding out in shadows for the past, what, six years?”
“She’s my mom.” And I’d defend her at any cost.
“She’s your mom,” he repeated. “Absolutely. She gave you life. She changed your diapers, taught you how to tie your shoe, walked you to your first day of school. She did a lot of mom stuff. I get it. You know what else she did, Montana? She left. Of all the decisions she could have made, staying and fighting for you, taking you with her before going into hiding, letting you know she wasn’t dead. None of those qualify as mom stuff.”
I blinked back the burning behind my eyes. Why would he take digs at my mom? What’d she ever do to him? I didn’t know whether to set him on fire to defend her or collapse onto my bed and curl into the fetal position over the truth to his words. Clay didn’t draw these types of emotions from me. This was usually reserved for Bryan. That guy knew how to go right for the feels. Clay usually kept it light. I never had to worry about a serious moment with him.
Until now.
“Why would you say something like that?” I asked, barely above a whisper.
“It’s called tough love, Montana. That’s what you do when the stubborn girl you are head over heels for can’t see how miserable she is trying to find something that’s not there.”
“What are you talking about?” I totally knew what he meant, I just didn’t want to believe it. I refused to believe my mom was anything but the kickass superhero I’d made her out to be.
Clay combed his fingers through his wild hair to pull it off his face. It didn’t work, so he gave it the golden Bieber flip. That did the trick. Now I had an up close and direct line of sight to his beautiful, fierce features, which I refused to admit were beautiful or fierce. At least at the moment.
“I’m not saying another word until you let me touch you.”
“Clay, this is not the
time—”
“Out,” he said, cutting me off. I frowned, not understanding. “I call timeout.”
“Huh?”
“It’s something my parents do. No matter what they’re talking about, no matter how heated the argument, if one calls a timeout, they both take a pause. It could be for an hour. It could be for a day. They always finish the convo, but taking a timeout lets them cool down and come back with clear heads.”
“We aren’t arguing.”
“If this is you not arguing, you suck at it.”
I called air to bring my shoe back. It landed in my hand. “And I’m not taking a timeout.”
To my shock, he used his primary to have the air slide me across the floor and push me into his arms. He caught me and held me close, our lips inches apart. With an intense look that hit me deep in my feels, he declared, “I need to touch you.”
“Are you seriously this horny right now?”
“No. I mean, yes. I’m a guy, so that’s like asking me if I’m hungry. But no. I need to touch you, push my control to you. Know why?” He circled his nose around mine, keeping our lips a whisper apart. I smelled the hunger on his breath. “Because you seem to forget how much power you have, Montana. I’m not just talking about the fact you’re a quint plus one. You’ve got an army of powerful elementals behind you. When are you going to learn to stop fighting your guys? I told you before. We made a pact to be with you, protect you together. It takes all of us. All five of us as partners. We can’t protect you if you’re not willing to let us.”
“I don’t need anyone to protect me.” And I didn’t appreciate him making this about our bond as a unit. This was about him saying something I didn’t appreciate and now attempting to cover it up with some shit about a timeout. I tried to push out of his hold, but he tightened his embrace. Then again, I didn’t try all that hard.
“That’s where you’re wrong. You’re so, so wrong.” He nipped at my lower lip. “You need it more than you know.”
“If this is another sexual reference, I’m kneeing you in the jewels.”
“God, you are so sexy when you talk about my junk.”
I couldn’t stop the stupid giggle from bubbling out. Dammit. There went any credibility. “Okay, fine. We’ll take a timeout. But we’re not done talking about this.”
“I totally expect you’ll find a way to win the argument. You always do.” He stole a quick kiss before releasing me and went for his clothes, reluctantly dressing. “Although, technically, we weren’t arguing. I said shit about your mom you didn’t like. Period. The end. It’s not like I said anything untrue.”
Oh, no he didn’t. Them’s fighting words. “Time in.”
He paused, one foot halfway into a sock. “Huh?”
“You called timeout. I’m calling time in.”
Shaking his head, he snapped his brow—which still wasn’t beautiful or fierce, for the record—into a frown. “You don’t get to call time in. Only the time outter gets to call the time inner.”
“How’s that fair?”
“Who said anything about fair?”
“Oh my God. You are being so childish.” I stomped my foot.
“I’m being childish?”
“Yes.” I took a step toward him, ready to defend my stance. “She’s stubborn, sure. It runs in the family. She knows what she wants and commits. She doesn’t give two shits about what other people think. It’s her life to live. To hell with the people who don’t get it.”
Clay stared at me for several seconds. I dropped my gaze when the contact grew too intense. “Are you describing your mom? Or you?”
“I…” didn’t know how to answer that. No, that wasn’t true. I knew how to answer that, I just didn’t like the answer. Since suddenly returning to my life, my mom had been more focused on how to better her position with the Council than how to reconnect with her only daughter. She’d pushed me away, avoided me whenever possible, and was never the one to initiate contact. It was always up to me to reach out to her, never the other way around.
I jumped my attention to Clay’s face. Which—again, to my point—was not beautiful nor fierce according to my brain, despite how many other parts of my body disagreed. The realization that I had begun treating my guys much the same way my mom had been treating me destroyed me.
The rage of emotions consumed me, overwhelmed me, and physically knocked me back. I stumbled and grabbed the chair behind me to keep me upright. “Oh my God. Oh my God! I’ve turned into my mom!”
“Mirror, mirror on the wall, we are our parents after all.”
I turned to the mirror, watching as the expression slowly melted from my face, followed by my color. When my mouth fell open, a little squeak escaped. What did you say when you wanted to apologize for everything you’d done since the day you’d first met someone? Sorry wasn’t enough.
“Is everything okay?” Clay stepped into the reflection and rested his hands on my shoulders. “Montana?”
“No,” I said quietly, my tone flat. This was the proverbial straw in my armor. Was that the saying? “Everything is not okay. I’m not okay. The way I’ve been acting… The way I’ve been treating you guys.” I dropped my head. “It’s not okay.”
“Look at me.” He waited until I did through the mirror. His beautiful green eyes pulled me in. His dazzling smile held me captive. He moved in, resting us cheek to cheek, and gently tickled my face with his beard. Chills danced across my skin. “I’m all in. All of us are all in. So, you’ve been a little distracted lately. It’s not like you’re out saving the world or anything.”
I laughed through the defeat crushing me and making it hard to breathe.
“How about we do a little exercise?”
“Exercise?” I wasn’t the type to wiggle into workout clothes and go bouncing around a gym. My workouts were more along the lines of training for the next attack. “Like jumping jacks?”
“No. Not physical exercise. Mental.”
If he was about to give me a pop quiz, I’d set the damn test on fire.
“Let go.”
I cocked my head to the side, frowning. “Huh?”
“You’ve got serious Mommy issues, Montana. Don’t look at me like that. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. That baggage, along with all the other things going on inside that beautiful head of yours that’s holding you back from being the prophecy I fell in love with… Let that shit go. Your mom is back, which is great. That doesn’t mean you have to change who you are to force a relationship with her. You are Katy fucking Reed, and you have zero fucks to give about the stuff out of your control.”
When I didn’t react to his pep talk, he turned me in his arms and pulled our bodies together, teasing me by biting at my lips without fully kissing me. “Say it with me. Zero. Fucks.”
I pulled back and searched his gaze. “You want me to say what?”
“Zero fucks. Come on, say it with me. Zero fucks.”
“Is this what you do? You blow off anything serious by convincing yourself you have zero fucks to give?”
He bit at my lips again. Instinctively, I bit his right back. He chuckled and sucked my lower lip between his teeth. “Zero fucks, Montana.” Nibble, nibble. “That’s how many fucks you have to give about everything else. Do you care that you and your mom aren’t besties?”
“Well, yes.”
“No,” he countered. “You already have besties. You have four besties. That’s three more than most people can say they have. She’s your mom, not your friend.”
“Can’t she be both?”
“Is she? If you two weren’t related, would you be friends with her?”
I didn’t want to admit it out loud, though I was pretty sure the truth had already settled into my expression. The short answer? No. The longer answer would require therapy and years of unraveling my Mommy issues.
Clay was right. I needed to let this shit go. If I didn’t, if I allowed the doubt and anxiety to continue to rule my thoughts, it would e
ventually consume me. I had enough on my plate. I didn’t need to invite more things to stress over into my life. Samantha Reed was my mother, and I was beyond thrilled she wasn’t dead. Maybe we’d eventually become friends again. Maybe not. But I couldn’t let the fear of her disapproval drive my actions.
There was still that other thing nagging me, distracting me from enjoying the moment. “What about the ward?”
“It will still be there in an hour.”
“But Cressida—”
“Will still be there as well,” he cut me off, trailing soft kisses along my neck. My skin peppered with goose bumps that tickled my scalp. “One hour, Montana. You don’t need to be on every second of every day. Let yourself go. One hour of zero fucks to give. That’s all I ask.”
It was wildly inappropriate for me to stop my search of the counter ward for a booty call, and it didn’t surprise me that Clay blew it off because that was what he did, but if I didn’t get a handle on my control, the instant I got anywhere near the barrier, my hand would light up like a Christmas tree. Clay was right. I needed to let go, if only temporarily.
“Zero fucks,” I said with conviction.
“That’s my girl.” He pulled back, and I caught that wicked glimmer in his green gaze, now darkening with the same hunger I had to have in my eyes.
It was so freeing to focus on something other than the doom and gloom I called my life. With a teasing smile, I purred, “I actually do have one fuck to give.”
I launched myself at him, the momentum propelling us backward. He caught me as our lips united, and we hungrily consumed each other. Clay tripped over the desk chair and knocked it on its side. It broke our contact, so he kicked it as he found my mouth once again.
My foot tangled in a lamp cord, pulling it off the desk. It crashed to the floor, so Clay kicked that too for getting in our way. He turned and walked us toward the bed, missing it completely and smacking his knee on one of the nightstands hard enough to upend it.
Laughing against his lips, I fumbled at the hem of his tank top as we staggered around until I had enough of a grip to yank it over his head. It got stuck, and we banged our heads together. He lost his hold on me, and down I went, landing with a bounce on the corner of the mattress. I couldn’t catch myself and rolled onto the floor. I jumped to my feet, not realizing the bedspread was wrapped around my ankle. When I tried to step toward him, I tripped and grabbed for purchase before I fell, taking the rest of the bedspread with me. It slid off the bed and covered me as I landed with a grunt back on my ass.