by J. R. Ward
After all, only he knew that he wasn’t going to hurt her—
Hadn’t she said the same thing to him? He couldn’t remember. Everything seemed like the blurred landscape rushing by the vehicle, indistinct and out of his control.
In the glow from the interior lights—which included a screen-like TV in the center of the console showing a badly imaged extacto-map of their location—her concentration was so fierce it bordered on violence, her jaw set with aggression, her eyes sharp as blades.
Like she expected a lesser to roll up onto the hood and shatter the windshield.
From time to time, she jerked her head around, but not toward him. She looked the opposite way, at the side-view mirror mounted on the outside of her door.
He wanted to ask her if anybody was coming after them, but he held off. For one, Chalen wouldn’t be so obvious if he’d sent them on the mission for his beloved. For another, enunciation of any words was going to be too close to a feather on the back of his touchy throat for him to keep the contents of his stomach where they needed to stay.
Assuming he didn’t want to mess up her back seat—
“Pull over,” he choked out.
“What?” She twisted around. “Why?”
“Pull over—”
“I’m not stopping—”
“Put the window down then!”
There was a heartbeat, and then a rush of thumping air that reminded him of getting splashed in the face with water from a well-thrown bucket. Lunging toward the opening, he squeezed his shoulders out just in time.
As he gripped the door’s edge, his gut spasmed, a great fist vising up and ushering out everything that was inside of him.
She let off on the gas as if she were being kind, but he was too busy to care.
Everything hurt, and that got worse as the sickness continued. It was as if his senses, lit up and excited by all the stimulation newly available to them, couldn’t discriminate between the pains in his body and the environment he was in. Everything was too loud, too much, too intense: Wind tunneled into his ears. Rain pelted him on one side. His throat burned like fire.
His eyes watered.
Duran told himself that last one was because of the speed at which they were going.
Some things just didn’t bear closer inspection.
When he finally retracted himself back into her vehicle, he was a shaky, cold-sweat aftermath, and he drew his legs up tight to his chest, wrapping his arms around his knees and lowering his head onto the tripod they created with his spine. He’d always been a big male, and there wasn’t enough space for all his height and weight in this position, and that was the point.
The tight squeeze made him feel like he was being held.
And not by someone who enjoyed his pain or created it as part of their fucking employment—
“Here.”
At first, he didn’t notice he was being addressed. But then a water bottle tapped him on the shin.
“Thank you,” he said hoarsely.
Cracking the top, he brought the opening to his lips, prepared to wash the taste out of his—
Cool, clean . . . clear.
It was the first uncontaminated water he had had since he had been hit on the head in his quarters at his father’s facility and woken up in Chalen’s castle of horrors.
Laying his head back against the seat, he closed his eyes and tried not to weep.
7
AHMARE KEPT CHECKING THE back. At first, it was to see if they were being followed. But then it was equally about the prisoner.
After he threw up outside of the SUV, she closed the window a little to cut the thunderous roar of air current. When she looked again, he was sitting all compacted, like a banquet table folded up for storage, his head back, the long column of his throat working as if he were about to vomit again. Hoping to help, she took a bottle of Poland Spring and gave it to him—
The scent of tears was such a shock, her foot let off on the gas once more. She couldn’t afford to stop, though. Every instinct she had was screaming, Run! Run! GTFO!
“Are you okay?” she said.
The question was a stupid one, but the words were what little ease she could offer him, a way to reach out without touch, a connection that didn’t require her to get too close.
The distance wasn’t just because he was a dangerous stranger: She didn’t have to be a genius to know Chalen was more likely to screw her and kill her brother than be a stand-up gangster and keep his side of their new bargain. Still, she had to work with what they’d agreed to, and he wanted this “weapon” of his back.
The last thing she needed was to bond with another source of chaos, pain . . . mortality. And yet this “caged animal” she’d been so terrified by wasn’t looking very “animal” anymore. He was coming across as incredibly mortal . . . and fundamentally broken. Fragile, in spite of his incredible physical strength.
The fall-apart happening in her back seat was a shock. She’d assumed she’d have to be one eye on the road and one eye on the prisoner, playing a game of Bad Idea Blackjack between whoever Chalen sent on their tail and the predator in her car.
Not where she’d ended up. And probably the only surprise so far that didn’t work against her.
“I need to ask,” she said more loudly. “Where are we going? You’re going to have to tell me.”
The prisoner put an arm over his face and made like he was wiping sweat off his brow even though they both knew that wasn’t what he was doing. He was getting rid of the tears. Then he leveled his head. As his grim stare met hers in the rearview, she looked to the road and hoped she had some sign to focus on. Maybe a deer to swerve around.
Those bloodshot, watery eyes of his were like a black hole sucking her in.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“Damned if I know,” she muttered as she looked at the nav screen.
That wasn’t exactly true, but apparently her brain decided to answer that one on an existential level.
“The highway’s not far,” she told him. “You’ve got a choice of north or south.”
With a groan, he unpacked his proverbial suitcase, unfolding arms and legs and sitting forward to focus on the screen. Her body moved itself away, pressing into her door, and even though she tried to hide the shift, he must have noted it because he backed off a little, giving her room.
God, he was so damn big. Then again, she had been working around humans at various gyms for the last two years and even the larger males of that species weren’t anywhere near his size. Was he of aristocratic blood? The Scribe Virgin’s breeding plan, the one that had created the Black Dagger Brotherhood and the glymera, had mandated matings between the strongest males and the smartest females—and even though that had been eons and eons ago, remnants of it still walked the earth.
And threw up down the quarter panels of Ford Explorers.
“We want west,” he announced. “So stay on this road.”
“How far do we go?”
“I’ll tell you. Do you need gas? I can’t tell by all that stuff on your dashboard.”
She glanced at the tank reading. “We have just about three-quarters.”
“That’ll be enough.” He sat all the way back. “Is there anyone behind us?”
“Not that I can tell. But who knows.”
“He’ll send guards. He’s been trying to find this destination for—” The prisoner frowned. “What year is it? I know you told me, but I can’t remember what you said.”
When she gave him the answer again, he looked away, to the darkened window beside him.
“How long did he have you down there?” she asked.
She would have preferred not to go there. She wanted to use him for what she needed, get that female, and go back to Caldwell with Ahlan safe. Details were bad. Connection was bad. Seeing him as anything other than a tool was bad.
He was not her business or her problem. God only knew why he was down there, anyway—
“Twenty-one
years,” he said quietly.
Ahmare closed her eyes and mourned for the stranger in her back seat.
They were on a different rural route now, one that the prisoner had told her to get onto about thirty minutes prior. The fifty-six miles an hour Ahmare was able to crank out made her feel like they were making some progress, and still no one was following them.
At least not in a vehicle. She wouldn’t be surprised if members of Chalen’s guard were dematerializing at regular intervals, tracking them through the dense, vine-consumed forest that choked the road’s ribbon of asphalt.
She glanced at the clock. Dawn was coming soon; they only had another hour at most. And that was going to be a complication for any bloodhound guards on their tail, and also for her and the prisoner. The fact that they were going away from the sunrise cut them a little slack, but not much.
“How did Chalen get your brother?” the prisoner asked.
It was the first time he had spoken since he’d given her the direction to get on this road.
“Ahlan owes him money.”
“If you bring the conqueror’s beloved back, it’s priceless to him. Your brother better be into him for millions.”
“I don’t get it.” She focused on a passing sign. The town it announced meant nothing to her. “If Chalen’s a conqueror and his female’s this close, why doesn’t he go and get her himself or send his guards?”
“Because torturing me for the precise location for two decades didn’t get him anywhere.”
Ahmare felt the urge to apologize, but reminded herself that his suffering wasn’t anything she’d caused—so there was no basis for the I’m-sorry. Still, twenty years? She felt like she’d lost two full calendars of her life since the raids and the deaths of her parents. Multiplying that times ten was a time span she couldn’t fathom.
“That must have been . . .”
As her words died off, she had a thought language was like a photograph of reality, something two-dimensional trying to capture that which had mass and movement: It was destined to come up short, especially when more than the basic who, what, and where, the surface details, really mattered.
“We’re getting close to the turnoff.”
“Okay. And then how far?”
“I’ll let you know.”
Ahmare twisted around. “We’re in this together, you realize.”
“Only as long as you need me, and if you know where you’re going, I become dispensable. Forgive me, but survival is my very best skill thanks to Chalen.”
She had never considered that mistrust might be a two-way street between them. With his superior size, she’d viewed herself as the only possible victim if they clashed. Looking at it from his point of view? She was in control of his collar, wasn’t she. And Chalen was running the show for the both of them.
“Plus I have someone to protect,” the male said.
“Who is that?”
“A friend. Or at least she used to be. We’ll see if that’s changed.”
They fell silent after that, and the country road just kept going, rising and falling over slight hills, the heavy-topped trees forming an arch of leaves above the pavement. As she looked at the clock again, she noted that the canopy overhead was thick enough to block out the night sky, but not even close to being a tunnel capable of shielding them from the sun.
“We need shelter soon,” she said. “We don’t have much time—”
“Up here, take that right.”
Ahmare frowned through the front windshield. “What right—”
She almost missed the gap in the tree line and slammed on the brakes. Her seat belt caught her, and the male put out a hand to stop his weight from getting thrown forward.
The dirt lane was tight as a soda straw, more like a pathway through the kudzu than a real road, and as she penetrated the dense leafy tangle, vines scratched at the sides of the Explorer and everything went green in the headlights. After some distance, a clearing of sorts presented itself.
“Stop here,” the male said.
She hit the brakes. There was no structure that she could see, only a semi-absence of anything that had a trunk thicker than her pinkie or taller than her shoulders. Bugs and moths, attracted to the headlights, seizured and sideswiped among the undergrowth, gathering as if by siren call to dance with the grace of computer programmers.
Ahmare put the Explorer in park, but did not turn off the engine. The isolation of the site made her think of horror movies.
“We get out at the same time,” the male said. “Do not make any sudden movements. Put your hands over your head and any guns or knives need to stay in the car.”
“I’m not leaving my weapons.”
“Yes, you are. If you get out with one in your hand, she’ll kill you before I can explain. As it stands, she may shoot us anyway.”
Ahmare turned around to him. “Where are we and who the hell are we meeting? You’re going to tell me or I’m turning this SUV around and—”
“How long do you think your brother’s got? Realistically.” When she cursed, the prisoner shifted to her side of the SUV and put his hand on the door release. “So, on three, we get out at the same time and pray to the Virgin Scribe that she’ll let me speak before she pulls her trigger. One . . . two . . .”
“I’m taking this.” She held up the collar’s device. “You could be double-crossing me, and—”
“Three.”
He opened things up and slid out, holding his hands up and leaving the door wide as if he were using it as a shield.
Ahmare cursed again. She was getting really goddamn tired of being out of control.
Reaching for her own door, she popped the seal and extended her leg. The night air was so humid, it was like breathing water, and the stench of rotting vegetation made the suffocation worse.
This is where they find the bodies of missing human women, she thought as she shifted her weight out and rose to her full height.
Putting her hands up, she sifted through the sounds of tree frogs for approaching footsteps or—
The laser sight’s red beam hit her high thoracic area, on the flat plane of her upper chest . . . an impact target that would drop her like a corpse.
Glancing over her shoulder, the male had an identical glowing red dot above his sternum.
“Surprise, surprise,” a dry female voice said from within the trees. “Duran back from the dead. Assuming that is you under all that hair.”
“I was never dead.” The male kept his arms right where they were. “And all I need is what I left here.”
The red spot circled on his torso like the potential shooter was considering other sites to bury a bullet in. “You dump your shit on me and then disappear for two decades. When you do come back, it’s buck-ass naked with another female. And you expect me to give you anything but a grave?”
“Come on, Nexi—”
“Want to introduce your friend before I put a lead slug in her chest?”
The prisoner looked over. “What’s your name?”
Okay, fine, so they hadn’t been properly introduced. Like that had been on her radar.
“Ahmare.”
He looked back in the direction of the voice. “This is Ahmare. I’m taking her to go after Chalen’s beloved.”
There was a pause, like that news flash was a surprise. Then the laser sights lowered. “How romantic.”
A tall figure walked into the clearing, but stayed just outside the direct beams of the headlights. In the glow, as mist from the storms gathered around her, it was obvious the female knew what to do in a fight. She was built not unlike Ahmare herself, with a body honed by practice—but in her case, you had the sense she’d seen actual conflict because of how calm she was.
Her skin was dark, her hair was black and in a hundred braids, her guns were matched.
Her green eyes flashed like they were backlit, peridots in moonlight.
Holy shit, she was a Shadow.
“So where are your clothes?”
the female demanded of the prisoner.
“I lost them a long time ago.”
The female’s eyes traced his body, clearly noting the scars. “You’ve added some skin art,” she muttered.
“Not by choice.”
There was a long silence. “What the fuck happened to you, Duran.”
8
NEXI HADN’T CHANGED.
It was a relief and a complication, Duran thought. She clearly remained a killer, a straight talker, the kind of female you didn’t bullshit. But she also still did things her way or no way.
“I just need my stuff,” he said. “And then we’ll be out of here.”
“I’m not giving you shit until you tell me where you’ve been.”
This was not jealousy talking. At least . . . he didn’t think it was. Their relationship had never seemed to him to be the sort that grew that kind of tangled green vine. Maybe he was wrong, though. Her anger seemed misplaced unless she cared more than he’d thought.
“Answer my fucking question,” she demanded.
“Working out.” He shrugged. “Night school. I started a lucrative business selling recycled plumbing equipment—”
“He’s been in Chalen’s dungeon,” the female—Ahmare—said. “He was released only so he can take me to the conqueror’s beloved.”
Duran glared at the interruption. “Shut up—”
“Dungeon?” Nexi said in a low voice.
“For twenty years,” Ahmare added.
“Christ.”
“More like hell,” Duran muttered as he looked way.
Nexi wasn’t one for emotion except for anger. She rarely showed anything else, being more interested in exploiting the feelings of others for her own purposes. Then again, after what the two of them had been through, she had learned the hard way that giving people insight into your heart and soul was like loading a gun and handing it over to an enemy.
No reason to believe the intel wouldn’t be used against you.
It was, he realized now, why he’d agreed to help her all those years ago. He’d figured someone like Nexi wouldn’t get attached to him and that meant he was off the hook for being responsible for anybody but himself. He could go his own way after they were out of where they’d been, the split clean so he could take his revenge on his father.