“And you’re here because…?” Reggie ventured.
The thought had tempted him, to follow her up and help her lather up, to watch the water and soap suds roll down her body, but fears of hurting her restrained him. He’d been her first and, as his brothers had kindly pointed out, he’d been with enough virgins to know just how sore she must have been this morning. Besides, they had forever together. Missing one shower with her wouldn’t kill him. He promised to have her there soon enough.
Octavian frowned at his brothers. “None of your business.”
Gideon flicked a chip at him, but no one pressed him.
“Have you thought anymore about what you’re going to do in two days if the Summit decides to rule against you?” Reggie asked.
Octavian shook his head, all amusement leaching from the air. “None. I thought about sending a letter out to Mortlock, ask him if he’d take Riley under his coven, but even if he does, she’d have to go live with them and I can’t leave here and he certainly won’t have me there. Then I thought about taking her to some church and marrying her, hopefully that would appease the Summit, but I can’t take her out right now, not when she can’t control her thirst. I even thought about running, just taking her and—”
“Don’t you dare!” Gideon shot him a glower. “You’d break Mom’s heart, not to mention deserters get tracked down like dogs and we’d have to hunt your ass down.”
“I didn’t say I was going to,” Octavian muttered. “I said I considered it. I can’t do that to Riley anyway. The punishment for her would be even worse if we’re caught.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what else to do except sell my soul and at this point, I’m willing to even do that.”
“We could find Jackamo,” Reggie offered.
“You don’t want to go making bargains with Djinns,” Magnus said. “You can’t trust them.”
“Well, there are tons of Trader Demons prowling the Underworld, we only need one,” Reggie said.
Gideon shook his head. “Making bargains with demons is usually a really bad idea. There is always a catch and it’s never in your favor.”
Octavian slumped back in his chair, rubbing a hand over his face. He squeezed his eyes closed as emotion threatened to embarrass him.
“I can’t lose her,” he said to no one in particular.
“You’re not going to,” Magnus said with so much confidence that Octavian couldn’t help feeling a spark of hope that maybe the other man had an idea. But he was staring down at his lap with a deep look of contemplation. “We’ll find a way.”
The kitchen door opened then and Riley shuffled through, bare-foot and clad in flannel bottoms and one of his long sleeved shirts. The thing fell past her knuckles and hung nearly to her knees. Her hair fell in wet curls around her shoulders. Her skin glowed, scrubbed fresh and pink. She must have fed recently; there was a flush in her cheeks and in her lips. Octavian felt emotion swell up inside him all over again, a feeling of desperation, panic and crippling fear. It took all his willpower not to do something reckless and stupid, to force his facial muscles to relax.
“Feel better?” he asked as she made her way over to them.
She nodded, slipping into his lap rather than taking another seat.
He welcomed her there, wrapping his arms around her middle. He nuzzled her hair, inhaling the scent of her floral shampoo and of soap and her own fragrance dusting her skin. She smelled warm and inviting.
“Did I interrupt important man talk?” she asked, smiling, but there was uncertainty in her eyes.
“Uh no, I was just beating the pants off Reggie,” Gideon said, flipping another card down on the pile. Octavian had a feeling no one was paying attention to the game anymore, or Reggie would have noticed he’d won.
“Oh,” she said, leaning back against Octavian’s chest.
He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against her shoulder. She set her hands over the ones he had folded on her abdomen.
No. There was no way he’d survive if something happened to her. She was the reason his entire world was still in one piece. The reason he’d lived so long. It had nothing to do with immortality. He’d been waiting for her. The thought of losing her was a fate worse than death. He couldn’t even imagine the possibility without being paralyzed by an overwhelming surge of rage and grief. There was no doubt about it. He would do anything, kill anyone, to keep her alive and with him.
“I’m going to Baron.” The words blurted out of him before it even registered that he’d been thinking it.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Gideon roared.
“Octavian, no!” Riley gasped, twisting her body in his lap to peer into his face. “I won’t let you.”
He captured the hand she’d rested on his cheek and brought it to his lips. He kissed the heel and looked into her eyes. “There is no other option. He’s the only one who can keep you alive now.”
“No!” Fear darkened her eyes. “You can’t trust him. He’ll ask for your pelt and I won’t give it. I won’t. I don’t care if I die.”
Desperation and self-loathing at the sight of her tears clashed through him. “He’s our only hope,” he said harshly, needing to remain firm about this. “He’s the only one left that can…” With a growl he nudged her off his lap and shot to his feet. He paced several feet away, stopped, whirled around to face the eyes watching him. But it was Riley he saw, only her and the terror in her wet eyes as she clutched his pelt to her chest. “I can’t think of anything else because there is nothing else. It’s him or nothing and if they kill you, Riley, they’re going to have to kill both of us because I’m not living a single day without you. Call me stupid and selfish, but there it is. I will die for you. I will kill for you. I will do whatever I have to, right or wrong, to never lose you and I’m doing this. I’m going.”
With a sob, she closed the distance between them at a run and threw herself into his arms. She held him so tight, he couldn’t breathe, but he didn’t care. He scooped her into his arms, lifting her off the ground and crushing her to him.
“I love you,” he growled into her shoulder. “And I swore that I would do everything in my power to protect you.”
“Well, you won’t be alone,” Magnus said, getting to his feet. “If you’re going, I’m going.”
Gideon shot to his feet. “Underworld road trip! I’m so in.”
Reggie tossed down his cards. “I guess I’m in.” He looked up and grinned. “Someone has to keep you jackasses out of trouble.”
Sniffling, Riley pulled back. She wiped her eyes with the sleeve of his shirt. “I’m coming. I’m coming!” she said louder over the shouts of protest. Her red eyes bore into his. “If you think this will work, then I want to be there with you.”
He touched the side of her face and smoothed his thumb over the curve of her cheek. “It won’t be safe for you.”
Her eyes narrowed, flashing with warning. “If I don’t go, you don’t go.”
Chest swelling with pride, he kissed her. “How can I refuse an offer like that?”
She smiled, touching the side of his face with the back of her knuckles. “You can’t.”
Chapter 51
“What’s going on, Octavian?” his father asked as they all gathered in the parlor. The bar was closed, the last applicant gone for the night. His parents looked exhausted, but curious as they watched their eldest pace in front of the fireplace.
“You’re making me nervous,” his mother said, reaching for his father’s hand.
Octavian stopped and turned to the group. “I’m going to make a bargain with Baron for Riley’s life,” he said firmly. As he’d expected, his parents took this about as well as a normal parent would if their child told them they were dropping out of school and joining a motorcycle gang. But he silenced them with a single raised hand. “I’ve already made up my mind. It’s the only way I can protect her.”
“You can’t trust Baron,” his mother said, as white as a sheet. “He’ll take more than w
hat he’s giving. Please just wait—”
“I can’t wait,” Octavian said. “Riley only has one more day and we all know the Summit will not agree to let her live. She goes against the treaty and they will use that excuse to annihilate her. I need to have something in place to stop them when that happens.”
“Riley? What do you say about this?” his father asked, turning his eyes to the quiet figure sitting in the armchair facing the fire.
“I think he’s insane,” she said, eyes shadowed by sadness. “He won’t listen to reason.”
“Octavian, please,” his mother pleaded. “Liam, say something.”
His father studied Riley for a long while before he shook himself to respond. “I understand.”
“What?” his mother exclaimed, horrified. “Liam—”
He took her hand and rubbed it lightly between both of his. “How can I ask him not to when I would do the same were I in his position? She is his mate and we can’t ask him not do what he can to protect her.”
“Yes, but—”
“It’s going to be okay, Mom,” Reggie said from the sofa. “We’ll make sure he doesn’t do anything too stupid.”
His mother’s eyes widened. “We—?”
“Would you like me to join you?” his father asked.
Octavian shook his head. “I need to do this alone.” He waved an arm towards his brothers and Riley. “They refuse to listen to reason.”
“Look who’s talking,” Gideon said.
“Be careful,” his father said. “Listen to every word he says carefully before you answer and give him nothing you’re not willing to pay.”
“Gideon?” Riley took Gideon’s arm as everyone filed out of the parlor. “I need to talk to you.”
Octavian turned, puzzled as Riley and Gideon walked away from the group, heads close together. But he let them go. He had his own preparing to do and he would ask Riley later.
They made the trip just before dawn when the rest of the world was still steeped in shadows and dreams. They kissed their parents goodbye, piled into Octavian’s Lexus and drove through the deserted streets in the direction of what may wind up being their doom.
In the seat next to him, Riley sat huddled in her bulky coat, a scarf fastened tight around the lower half of her face, a safety precaution, she’d said. Afraid she might lunge out of the moving car at the first hint of human flesh, Octavian hadn’t argued.
He reached across the console and rescued her wrist from the anxious rubbing of her fingers. Gently, he rubbed the fingers even if there was no circulation.
“All right?” he murmured, never taking his eyes from the road.
She seemed to sink lower into her seat. She shook her head. “No.” It was barely a whisper, but he heard it.
“It’s going to be okay,” he told her, needing to believe he wasn’t making the biggest mistake of his life.
She turned her hand and laced her fingers through his. She raised it and brought the back of his to rest against her cheek. She said nothing else.
He pulled the car over in front of a bricked building with gleaming bay windows and an aura of evil all around it. He cut the engine, but remained in the car. He turned in his seat to face his brothers in the backseat.
“Is there any chance you’ll stay in the car?”
With snorts, they threw open their doors and rolled out. Octavian sighed as he followed suit. Riley was on the sidewalk already when he rounded the car to her side. She stood studying the loopy, gold font embedded into the window.
“Baron Legal Office,” she read out loud. “He’s a lawyer?”
Gideon moved to yank open the glass door. “Even demons need to make a living you know. A demon and a lawyer aren’t so far apart on the career spectrum.”
Riley just shook her head as she followed everyone into the dark office. Octavian moved to stand behind her, eyes narrowed for even the slightest movement.
Magnus took lead, working his way around the neatly furnished office with its single sofa in cream, glass coffee table lined with magazines and water paintings of the ocean and sailboats hanging on the wall. They bypassed a metal desk towards the narrow hallway behind it. It was lined with three doors. One was a bathroom, one was a storage closet and the third one opened into an enormous penthouse apartment overlooking the city. Everything was a blinding, white which made the wall to wall windows and the blue skies beyond it, a harsh contrast.
“Well, I’m officially creeped out,” Gideon said. “Nothing says Hell like white.”
Everyone ignored him as they shuffled deeper into the apartment.
There was a small sitting area on the right and a bar/kitchen on the left. Everything else sat on a curve, like the apartment was actually designed in a circle. Octavian didn’t know what to make of it, nor did he have time to sort it out when the shuffle of feet had him going for his angelic blade strapped to his belt.
The woman who flounced out in towering red heels was stunning with blonde hair pulled up in some fancy knot on top of her head. She wore red glasses that were shaped like cat eyes and scarlet lipstick that matched her glasses and her shoes. The rest of it was a knee length black skirt and a white silk blouse with black polka dots. She held a clipboard in one hand and a pen in the other.
“Five to see Mr. Baron?” she asked in a no nonsense tone as she took them in with cool disinterest.
“Uh…” Gideon glanced at his group, glanced back at the woman who was clearly a she-demon judging from the long, red tail poking out from the slit in her skirt. “Yeah, I guess so.”
She scribbled this down on her clipboard. “Follow me please.”
Exchanging glances, they followed her and her swaying and twitching tail towards the bar and around the bend towards a door. She knocked twice before reaching for the doorknob. She turned it and poked her head inside.
“Mr. Baron, there are four Casters and a strigoi here to see you.”
“Yes, thank you, Jacinta. I’ve been expecting them. Please show them in.”
Pulling her head back, she opened the door the rest of the way and stepped back, giving them room to step through.
Octavian glanced at Gideon who gave him a nod. All amusement was gone from the blond’s face as he stepped in behind Octavian to take Riley’s side. Magnus did the same to her other side as Reggie took the rear.
The room was lavish with an enormous white desk taking up most of the space. The wall of window behind the desk overlooked a beach with white sand and waters so blue, it was painful to look at. Filing cabinets and giant, puffy plants took up the rest of the place. The green of the plants the only color in the room except for the seemingly harmless man seated behind the desk.
Baron eyed them as they stepped through the door. Jacinta shut it behind them once they were all in, trapping them with the monster.
Baron waved his hand and three more chairs materialized from thin air alongside the two already there on the other side of the desk. “Please.” He motioned them to sit.
They started to when he stopped them.
“Riley, please sit with your mate. Here.” He pointed to the chair on Octavian’s left.
Riley shot Octavian a quick glance before moving to do as she was asked.
Baron smiled. “Better.” He straightened in his seat to observe them better. “I was beginning to wonder when I would see you again. It has been a while. I hear congratulations are in order, both on your transformation and on your nuptials. Married life suits you,” he told Riley.
Riley dampened her lips. “Thank you.”
Inclining his head to her, Baron turned his attention next on Octavian. “I know why you are here, Caster. You want me to save your mate.”
Octavian gave a nod. “I do.”
The swerving chair creaked as Barn leaned back on it. “And what would I get in exchange?”
It took all his willpower not to fidget, not to sneer. “My soul.”
Next to him, Riley sucked in a sharp breath. His bargaining chip was no
t one they’d discussed while making their plans simply for that reason. He knew she would not have agreed.
“You seem surprised,” Baron told her. “Were you hoping he would offer something else?”
Riley said nothing, but her fingers tightened around the armrests.
“I only accept souls,” he told her. “However, fortunately for you.” He pointed at Riley. “And not so fortunately for you.” He gestured to Octavian. “I’m not in the market for a Caster soul.”
Octavian gritted his jaw. “What then? What do you want?”
Baron’s eyes narrowed as they jumped from Octavian to Riley. “What I want doesn’t seem to be in the room.” His gaze fixed on Riley. “Not wearing your lover’s pelt tonight, my dear?”
Octavian's Undoing (Sons of Judgment) Page 50