by I. T. Lucas
Fates, he sounded like a chick.
Bhathian wanted to laugh. What a role reversal. He looked like a guy who could lift up a truck, which he could, while Eva looked like the personification of everything that was soft and feminine. Her hair was long and always styled in soft big curls, and she rarely wore pants, preferring long, light-colored dresses. On the inside, though, she was hardened steel. Strong and unbendable.
Was he fighting a losing battle?
Maybe this was all she had to give?
It wasn’t enough, but he could live with it, provided she promised him exclusivity. Not only because he couldn’t tolerate the mere thought of her having another man in her bed, but because being her lover could open the way for more. Eventually, she would grow fond of him. He would make sure of that. Once that was achieved, crossing the distance all the way to love shouldn’t be too difficult.
Eva shifted in his arms and yawned. “How long was I asleep?”
He kissed her forehead. “Not long. A couple of hours.”
“It’s quiet here. Did the kids go to sleep?”
“Yeah. Except for Nick. He’s in his room, watching porn.”
“You can hear that?”
“Yeah.”
She pouted. “Your hearing is better than mine.”
“Not all immortals are the same. We all have varying degrees of skills and enhanced senses.”
As Eva closed her eyes and snuggled closer, Bhathian offered silent thanks to the Fates. This was progress. Maybe she would let him stay the night.
“Are you hungry?” she asked, and his heart sank.
That was how it always started. She’d ask him if he was hungry, and regardless of his answer, she would have him get dressed and go downstairs for a snack. Twenty minutes later, tops, he was out the door.
“Trying to get rid of me already?”
She had the decency to blush. “Do you want to stay the night?”
“You know I do.” He smoothed his hand over her silky hair.
“Okay. But I really want to grab a bite.” She extended her tongue and licked his nipple, pulling a hiss from his lips and a twitch from his cock which was still erect despite their marathon lovemaking. “Rigorous exercise always makes me hungry.”
After that tease, Bhathian would’ve skipped food and gone back to lovemaking, but if his mate was really hungry, he needed to feed her first.
“How hungry?”
She laughed. “I need to refuel. After we eat, I’ll see if I have enough energy for another round.”
“Deal.”
They ended up having that additional round in the shower.
After he dried her with a soft towel and carried her back to the bedroom, despite her protests, Eva put on a long nightgown with a matching robe over it.
Always so feminine… if one didn’t know her. Eva was proof that looks can be deceptive.
Down in the kitchen, Bhathian sat on the same wooden chair next to the same wooden table as every other time, but his mood was much different. Eva letting him stay overnight was a huge step. They were making progress.
And just as all the other times, she pulled out boxes of leftover takeout food and put them in the microwave to warm up. That was another thing they had in common, neither knew how to cook.
Eva had told him that when she was married to Fernando, he’d done all the cooking, so she’d never bothered to learn, and Bhathian just didn’t. He wasn’t finicky and ate anything as long as someone else prepared it.
“I hope you like Thai food.”
“Love it.”
Eva tilted her head and smiled. “You love everything. I’ve never heard you say you didn’t like something.”
He shrugged. “That’s true.”
Eva pulled out a bottle of wine from the fridge. “Sharon opened it for lunch. We need to finish it.” She brought it to the table and went back for two wine glasses.
Bhathian held his up for Eva to fill up, then waited for her to fill hers before taking a sip.
“Tell me something,” she asked. “Are you as undiscriminating with women as you are with food?”
A loaded question if he’d ever heard one. “Not at all. There is only one woman I want, and she’s sitting in front of me.”
“I mean before.”
Bhathian stretched his head and smiled sheepishly. “You can say that I had a type.”
She lifted a brow. “You did?”
“Yeah, still do. I like brunettes, about five feet seven inches tall, with amber eyes and cupid-bow lips that are begging to be kissed.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m serious.”
The microwave beeped, and Bhathian got up to bring the boxes over. Eva pulled out a couple of paper plates and plastic forks. Another thing they had in common. Neither liked washing dishes.
“Me too,” he said. “There have been a lot of lookalikes, but none came even close. There is only one female in the world that matches that description perfectly. You know who she is.”
Eva scooped some rice from one of the boxes and chicken pieces from another, then poured the sauce from the box over everything. “I’ve never met anyone like you,” she admitted. “You’re one of a kind.”
That was the best compliment Bhathian had ever got, even though he wasn’t sure it was one. “I hope you mean it in a good way.”
She laughed. “Of course, you dummy. Has no one ever told you how handsome you are?”
“The term I hear most often is ogre.”
Lifting her fork like it was a weapon, she mock-frowned. “Tell me who it was and I’ll beat them up.”
He put his hand over his heart. “I’m touched that you’d defend my honor like that.”
For the next few minutes they got busy eating. Bhathian liked watching Eva eat. She did it in such elegant and refined way.
“Why are you staring at me?”
“I’m admiring your table manners. You’re such a lady.”
She snorted in a very unladylike fashion. “Right…”
“You are. Tell me one thing that you do that is not ladylike. Except for that snort, that is.”
For some reason his innocent compliment seemed to bother her. “What I do for a living. A private eye does a lot of things that are neither gentlemanly nor ladylike.”
“I thought you liked doing what you do.”
She shook her head. “I’m good at it. Doesn’t mean I like doing it. I get to witness humanity’s ugly underbelly. I’d rather not. Ignorance is bliss.”
He couldn’t argue with that. That was the downside of being a law enforcer or a fighter. Even though their services were crucial and appreciated, job satisfaction wasn’t part of the rewards. Bhathian often envied those who had other talents. Like Dalhu. The guy had transformed himself from a killer into an artist, from a destroyer into a creator.
The thing was, someone had to do the policing and the fighting. And those people needed to be good at what they did.
Like him and Eva.
Chapter 46: Eva
In the silence that followed, Bhathian seemed lost in thought. Was he thinking about his own job as a Guardian, or was he trying to imagine what her work was like? What bothered her about it?
The detective part was okay, though she hadn’t lied about seeing the ugliness she would rather not. But it was small potatoes compared to her “hobby.” Eva felt dirty and evil. And it wasn’t only because of the killing. Worse than that was getting exposed to the atrocities the scum she eliminated had committed.
“You shouldn’t feel bad about what you do.” Bhathian pulled her out of the morbid place her mind had taken her. “I would’ve loved to have some other ability besides fighting. But that is what I’m good at, while others are not. It’s my responsibility to defend those who can’t do it for themselves, the same way the creative types create things for me that I cannot. Those are the gifts we were born with. Not much we can do about them. Besides, it’s better than having no gifts at all. Imagine if you couldn’t do detecti
ve work.”
“I don’t need to imagine. For years I was stuck at Fernando’s café waiting tables because I couldn’t bake or cook if my life depended on it, and then after the divorce I was stuck selling clothes at Nordstrom. I hated every freaking moment of every freaking day.”
It had been such a stressful time in her life. Eva had divorced Fernando but couldn’t leave Nathalie yet. She had to hang on until her daughter became an adult, going through her days terrified that someone would see through the heavy makeup and the baggy clothes and realize that the sixty-year-old woman she needed to look like had the body and face of a twenty-something-year-old.
“Why did you stay there? You could’ve found another job.”
“Not really. I was a woman in her sixties, and my work experience was good for nothing. As a retired DEA agent and a waitress, I didn’t have much to offer. Nordstrom paid commission and I was good at telling men what to wear. The pay was decent, and together with the government pension, I saved up enough to later open my agency. I needed to buy a new identity, I needed to get a license, and I needed some money to live on until my business took off.”
Bhathian looked impressed. “You’d been planning this for years.”
“Yes.”
“Good for you. You rose like the Phoenix from the ashes of the old Eva and made a new life for yourself.”
She sighed. “I had no choice. At some point, the pension checks were going to stop coming, and I needed to find a way to support myself for years to come while keeping my identity secret. The detective agency seemed like a perfect solution.”
“And it was the kind of work you’ve been trained for.”
“Exactly.”
It felt good to talk about herself without resorting to the necessary lies and omissions. Not only that, Bhathian understood her and the hard choices she’d had to make. He didn’t blame her for abandoning her family, didn’t look at her as if she was some kind of monster. Sharing her story with him lifted some of the heavy guilt that had been her companion for so long.
Bhathian refilled their glasses, emptying the rest of the bottle. “I think doing a job that you’re good at is satisfying no matter what it is. I’m sure there are days doctors hate their jobs, especially if someone they were trying to save dies. And yet most wouldn’t want to do anything else. It’s a calling. Not everyone can be a doctor, just as not everyone can be a cop or a soldier or a detective.”
She nodded. “God has a purpose for each of us. I was given the powers I have so I could use them to make the world a better place.”
Bhathian reached for her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I wouldn’t go so far as divine intervention. People put too much stock in fate.”
Chapter 47: Bhathian
Eva’s eyes blazed as she lifted her head and pulled her hand away. “Really? So explain to me how I came about. I’m a dormant, a rarity, who encounters not one but two immortal lovers who are even rarer. One activates my dormant immortal genes, and the other knocks me up, even though I’m practically infertile. Coincidence? I don’t think so.”
He couldn’t argue with that. But seeing divine purpose in corporate espionage and gathering evidence on cheating spouses was taking the fate thing too far.
“I don’t want to belittle what you do, I’m sure catching cheating husbands or wives and dishonest business partners is very important to the people who hire you, but it’s not the kind of stuff that will change the world for the better or worse.”
As Eva frowned and reached for her wine glass, then took a long sip, Bhathian wanted to bang his head against the wall. What a dumb-ass move for a guy who was trying to win over a woman. Like questioning her beliefs and making her lifework seem insignificant would get him anything other than a kick out the door.
She put her wine glass down. “That’s not the only thing I do.”
“I apologize for what I said. That was stupid of me. What you do is important.”
Eva shook her head. “Don’t. I want you to always be honest with me. And you were right. But as I said, there are other things I do that I can’t talk about.”
“Do they have anything to do with the mood you were in when I got here?”
She nodded but didn’t elaborate.
Whatever was troubling her, she needed to get it off her chest and not keep it there where it festered like a rotten egg.
“I know that you can’t tell me your clients’ secrets, but you can talk about it without mentioning names. It would help you deal with whatever it is that’s bothering you.”
“You wouldn’t understand.” She lifted the wine glass to her lips and took a tiny sip.
Funny how Eva didn’t realize her own hypocrisy, expecting him to lay it all on the table and at the same time keeping everything close to her chest. And it wasn’t only about her clients. She didn’t share much about herself either. Tonight had been the first time she’d let him have a glimpse into her past. For obvious reasons, she didn’t trust him, or anyone else.
Perhaps if he just went ahead and said what was in his heart, she would trust him a little more. Knowing how he felt about her should reassure her that he would never betray that trust. Problem was, it could also backfire big time.
“Try me.”
Without looking at him, she shook her head. “I can’t.” The incredibly sad tone of those two words tipped the scales.
He reached across the small table, took the wine glass from her and put it down, then clasped both of her hands. “Look at me, Eva.”
She lifted her head.
“I know you’re not ready to hear it, but I love you. I think I’ve loved you from the first moment I saw you. We are each other’s fated mates. And you know how I know it?”
She shook her head.
“Because for the past thirty-one years I was more dead than alive, and nothing other than losing my one and only fated mate could’ve caused that big hole in here.” He pointed at his heart. “You took a big chunk of my heart with you when you left.”
Eva laughed.
Out of all the responses he’d been expecting, Eva’s was the opposite. Would he ever get it right with this woman? If she was his destined mate, shouldn’t he be better attuned to her?
“You love me? Do you even know who I am? You’re in love with an idea of that destined mate thing, not the real me.” She leaned forward, all vulnerability gone from her expression as if it never been there. The hardened steel was back. “I’m not a good person, Bhathian. If you knew the real me, you wouldn’t be spouting rainbows and butterflies.” She chuckled. “Bats and spider webs are more my thing.”
It was his turn to laugh. “Then I’m the right guy for you. Do you think my life is all nice and pretty, or that it ever was? Do you have any idea what I’ve done? I’m over three hundred years old, Eva, and I’m a fighter. Do the math.”
For once, it seemed that he’d said the right thing. Eva’s eyes held his as she asked, “How many?”
He didn’t need to question her meaning. “I stopped counting after the tenth.”
“Was it in wars?”
“Some of it. A lot of it was during skirmishes with bands of bandits who wandered too close to our stronghold. At those times it was kill or be killed. We protected our own.”
There was respect and approval in her expression. “As you should’ve.”
“We see eye to eye, you and me. We have much more in common than you think, Eva. You can talk to me and your secrets will be safe. Unless what you do or did has anything to do with the safety of the clan, there is no way I’m going to share it with anyone else. Ever.”
Eva pulled her hands out of his and leaned back, but her hard calculating gaze didn’t waver. Neither did his. He held her eyes.
Another moment of silence passed, as Eva lifted her wine glass and emptied it. “I’m a murderer.”
A chill ran down Bhathian’s spine. Eva? A murderer?
For a split second, he entertained the disturbing notion that she might be a
contract assassin and not the private eye she claimed to be. But then he dismissed it. The only way he could imagine Eva killing anyone was in self-defense. There was another possibility. Unaware of her strength, she might’ve killed someone accidentally.
“I’m sure it wasn’t premeditated. You think I don’t know you, but I do. You would’ve never killed someone in cold blood. It was either in self-defense or an accident.”
Eva smiled that chilling smile of hers. “The first one was. The next four were not only premeditated but investigated and planned for a very long time.”
“Are you a hit woman?” In his gut, he knew she couldn’t be, but he had to cross it out for sure.
“No, I’m not doing it for personal gain. I’m a vigilante.”
That was more fitting for the woman Bhathian knew Eva was. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “Tell me the whole story.”
She walked over to the fridge and pulled out another wine bottle, then refilled their glasses. “Swear to me on whatever you hold dearest that what I tell you stays between the two of us.”
He put his hand over his heart. “I swear on the lives of my daughter and granddaughter that unless you give me explicit permission to share what you tell me, I will take it to my grave.”
She nodded. “You may also disclose what I tell you in the event of my death. I’m not ashamed of what I do. But I’m breaking the law.”
“Agreed.”
“The first time the killing was accidental. It was during a corporate stint assignment, but unrelated to it. I seduced the guy I needed to pump for information and stayed the night.”
Bhathian heard himself growl. She was using sex to spy on people?
Eva chuckled. “Don’t get all puffed up, Bhathian. It wasn’t part of the deal, and I’m not in the habit of sleeping with my targets or my clients. That was a one-time thing. The guy was single and decent-looking, and I was due for my monthly hookup.”
“What the hell is a monthly hookup?” Was Eva saying that she had sex only once a month?