ImmortalIllusions: The Eternity Covenant Book2

by Immortal Illusions (lit)

  Silence greeted her.

  “Uncle Hugh? Are you still there?”

  He cleared his throat. “Yes. I’m always here.”

  The weird comment caught her off guard. She didn’t know how to respond.

  “Trust no one, Raine,” he said, somewhat hushed. “Watch your back.”

  Then he hung up.

  She stared at the phone in disbelief. Had the whole world gone mad? Or was it just her?

  A knock at the door startled her out of the spiral of thought.

  “It’s Havers,” said the voice on the other side.

  The disappointment that it wasn’t Jack was as strong as the relief. “What do you want?”

  It came out harsher than she planned. She thought she heard a snicker.

  “Lunch is ready.”

  Lunch? Raine looked at her phone again. It was one p.m. Half the day was gone. And she was all of the way gone, and no longer in Kansas.

  “Let me shower. I’ll be there in a few.”

  No answer returned, but her stomach started to growl like a starving wolf. She was rapidly becoming the sum of all her urges, jumping from one to another with so little forethought, it disturbed her. She hit the shower, going for cold, hoping to shock her system into some kind of normal state. But afterwards, when she found her way to the dining room and saw Jack sitting there in faded jeans and a dark blue cable sweater, her pulse jumped into overdrive, and she knew nothing in her life, or system, or anything else she touched would be normal again.

  Even Hugh, her uncle who never changed, had altered. She dismissed those thoughts immediately. She didn’t want to think that cornerstone of her life, the one thing she thought she could count on not to change, had caved on her.

  Jack glanced up from his paper. His look was surprising to her, wary and hopeful. Maybe he’d been swept away too? Had he planned to go that far, or was he as much victim as her? Raine found it hard to fathom the legendary bedroom bad boy would feel just as uncertain as she did about what had gone on between them. But down the rabbit hole, the rules were all ass-backwards, so who knew? She decided to brazen it out.

  “Good morning.” She strolled in, and poured herself a rich cup of coffee from an urn on the sideboard.

  “Is it?” he asked, hesitantly.

  She took her time adding pure cream into the coffee. “Is there a reason it shouldn’t be? We have the information we set out to get. And we managed to assist in securing an unsanctioned objective without compromising the primary mission.” The familiar jargon was comforting. She settled into it like a favorite pair of jeans. “What’s the fallout level from the hostile casualties?”

  “Scale of one to ten, about thirty-five.” He moved the paper, making room for her to sit beside him.

  She accepted the challenge, placing her cup next to his. She found it interesting that he sat in the middle of the large dining table, instead of at one of the ends. “Will it screw up our primary objective?”

  “Maybe.” Jack moved a silver tray of hearty sandwiches her way. “Bet you’re starved.”

  If you only knew. She helped herself to a thick roast beef on rye. She slathered on stone-ground mustard with a silver butter spreader. His scent drifted to her, summoning up a vivid memory of his head pressed against the apex of her thighs, while his tongue sent her into oblivion. What exactly was the morning-after protocol for this situation? She found her courage faltering.

  “So, what do we do today as an encore to yesterday?” And what would it cost?

  “I’d like to try some retrieval if you’re up to it.”

  She tucked into the sandwich, barely tasting it. She swallowed the bite, took another, as she considered what, if anything, she was up to. And then there was Hugh’s cryptic warning. Trust no one. Watch your back. She finished the first half and wiped her mouth with a clove-colored linen napkin. “What do I have to do?”

  “Sit there and relax while I hold your hand.”

  Touching him would lead to no good. She knew it the moment she set eyes on him. And that hadn’t changed. Who knew no good could feel so incredible, though? “Isn’t there another way?”

  “We could sit within the enchanted confines of a circle. But that would require a greater degree of magical usage. Holding hands might be—”

  He broke off mid-sentence and shrugged, conveying volumes in the Gaelic movement.

  “Yeah, right. I agree. Hands it is.” Way safer. She polished off the second half of the sandwich, then washed it down with a shot of coffee.

  “Ready?”

  She faced him. “You’re eager.”

  “We’re short on time.”

  “Time’s an illusion,” she said. It was a phrase popular amongst the higher-level mystics and Wardens, and slipped out without her thinking.

  “So’s immortality, but you’re on the hunt for that.”

  “I’m on the hunt for an appointment into the Order. If I earn those spurs, I’ll serve however I’m asked.” Or would she? Now where had that thought come from? She shook it off. “Are we going to do this? If not, I’d like another sandwich.”

  “We’re going to do it.”

  He covered her hand with his incredibly skillful fingers. They’d brought her to the moon and back, had her coming harder than she’d done with the best of her past lovers. Or any of her favorite toys. She warmed between her legs with the insidious memory.

  Jack’s eyes closed, and she was glad, because she was certain her other hunger, the one for him, was stamped all over her face.

  “You’ll make a great knight,” he said. “But you’ll be wasting your Gods-given talents, Raine. You’re meant for bigger things. Better things.”

  Her hand grew warm, then that warmth spread up her arm and throughout her body.

  “There is no better thing than service in the Order.”

  “What about saving those children last night? Or slaying scumbags like Gia? There’s no obvious glory in it. They’re clandestine actions, unsanctioned ones at that, but they were the right things to do. And you can’t tell me it didn’t feel good.”

  “Being a knight isn’t about feeling good.”

  “It isn’t about doing the right thing, either. It’s about following someone’s orders on the road to self-righteous glory. And that’s that.” He took a deep, restful breath. “Like I said, you’re meant for better things.”

  She was about to rip into him about taking moral high ground, but her vision blurred, and when it cleared, it was to rapid pictures of nothing that made any sense to her or her brain. Her head hurt as the pace of visions sped into a blinding rush. Information passed rapidly through her mind at the same time, numbers, names, places, dates, none of it having any overt rhyme or reason.

  “Don’t resist,” Jack said. “Let it happen. Step back, and watch. Look for the pattern in the madness. It’s there.”

  “No. It’s a mess. That’s all.” She didn’t want to step back. It was one thing to analyze data in the office. Sort through it all, files and folder and field reports. It was another thing to connect with Jack’s consciousness, and trip out into the ether, picking up all the flotsam and jetsam that drifted on currents beyond the barriers of the normal register. “I don’t see anything.”

  “You will. Be patient. Timing is everything. Let it flow.”

  The calm, steady tone of his voice pulled her out of the vortex of visions, whether or not she wanted to be pulled out. She separated from the swirl, it slowed, and then it was like he said. She was outside of it all, not seeing the individual images, not understanding the individual bits of data, but taking them in as a whole, seeking unity of some kind. It was like finding Waldo. The silly thought almost broke the concentration and connection, but Jack’s hold was strong, and he kept her in place and on task.

  “Do you see it? That house? It’s familiar.”

  It was, though she didn’t know why. The imaged wavered. “I’ve seen this house,” she said. Then came a word. “Troy.”

  “Upstat
e New York.” Jack broke the contact.

  Her eyes flew open.

  They stared at each other for a long moment as charged energy raced between them.

  An address popped into her head. She rattled it off aloud. “It shouldn’t be this easy, should it?”

  Jack’s face was a study in elegance and sadness. “When you have it, Raine, really have it, yes, it is that easy.” He pulled out his BlackBerry, and had at the key pad. “Let’s see what we’ve won today.”

  While he input information, she considered his words. He’d had “it” once. This ability to move like light speed through the psychic morass and extract what he needed to get the job done. Through her, he could do it again. But the skill was now lost to him. Because of someone’s error in judgment. Not someone, she corrected herself. Kerr. And, as his paladin, her uncle Hugh. And the mystical edge wasn’t the only thing he’d lost.

  The power from last night, that had been his birthright, no doubt as natural to him as breathing. Now it lay hidden inside of him, always beyond his grasp. What once seemed no big deal to her as punishment she now knew was barbaric. No wonder he wanted revenge.

  “Yes!”

  “You found it?”

  “The house belonged to the same psycho mage that tried to use the Buckle of Isis.”

  Her shoulders sagged. It was a dead end. “We already know the location of that artifact. We need to find the others.”

  “I think we’ve found at least one.” He crossed his arms. “Tell me the number.”

  “Number?”

  “The number. It’s there. Kept repeating.”

  “It’s all just white noise to me.”

  “I can’t believe you’d turn your nose up at your incredible gift. And people call me mad. Number two. He purchased two jars. One held the Buckle of Isis. The other one must still be stored at his old house. He probably didn’t know which canopic jar was the right one for him at first, then never got rid of the dud after finding the one he wanted.”

  “Everyone searched that house, from Covenant to local Section Seven officers. No one found anything.”

  “I didn’t search the place. Neither did you.” He stood. “Care to try your luck?”

  “Will it be a replay of last night if I do?” The words flew out of her mouth before her brain could engage. This was happening way too much. Ever since that damn awakening. She had no impulse control, and she didn’t seem to care, either. Was this who she really was, beneath her carefully constructed front? Raine liked to think she was more than the sum of every fear she harbored about her Elven ancestry, but the evidence so far said otherwise. “Sorry.”

  Jack took a deep breath and released it. He placed his hands on his hips. “The beads have a stronger enchantment. They should be able to better contain the energetic bleed-through. That might help, ah, curb the urges a little. And I’ll keep my hands to myself this time if you want. Scout’s honor.”

  Jack? Keep his hands to himself? The thought was amusing, and then depressing. She realized she didn’t want those talented hands kept away, not after knowing what they were capable of. He was offering her a way out gracefully. She could chalk up the night to magic-induced lust, and go back to being who she was yesterday morning and every day leading up to that moment in time. Except you don’t want to go back, whispered that voice inside her head. The future is in front of you, not behind.

  They locked people up for listening to voices, didn’t they? Raine rapidly assessed her choices. Walk away, no harm, no foul. And no more bliss at the hands of a master lover. Or, go forward. Enjoy the best sex she’d ever had, and most likely would ever have. And, possibly get close enough to suss out if Jack really was a viable target. It worked for Mata Hari. It might be her only shot at getting past his masks and barriers to figure out if he was the true threat Hugh and Kerr believed him to be.

  Rationalizing. It was almost as dangerous as all those bargains she’d been making. “I appreciate the forethought. But it wasn’t just the magic to blame. It was me, too.”

  That appeared to throw him for a moment. “I could have Havers whip you up something in the lab for that. She’s a reformed necromancer, and full of all kinds of useful recipes.”

  “I think I’ll try my luck instead. See where that takes me.”

  Curiosity lit his stunning eyes. “That’s a big risk. You sure you’re ready to play with those stakes?”

  She was ready to play. And win. “I’m good for it.”

  “Okay. I’ll take the bet, then.” He stood. “The whole East Coast is under an etheric storm. I normally travel with the Were guides, using mist tunnels where ever possible, but the storms are bad and the guide’s guild has issued a high-level travel advisory. No one will run the tunnels until it’s lifted. We’ll have to head upstate the old-fashioned way. I have a private jet that can have us there in an hour or so.”

  More time in close confines with temptation. Great. “That should give us time to go over the intel Salazar gave us. Maybe we can pick up a lead someone else missed.”

  Havers ducked her head into the dining room. She’d changed hair color again. This time it was magenta. Up close the tattoos were even more brilliant. “Jack, we have visitors. Got a minute?”

  “Sure. Raine, enjoy the rest of lunch. I’ll be back in a few minutes and we can get going.”

  Raine helped herself to another sandwich, which she finished along with the coffee. She heard voices in the distance. Sounded like an argument. She moved to the opening and was able, to pick up the words.

  “Can’t stay here. Unacceptable.” That was Jack.

  “It’s too hot outside. That’s all on you, brother. Couldn’t you have done something other than kill Gia?”

  “No.” Jack again. And adamant. “What about the safe houses?”

  “Compromised. They got one of us on a sweep last night.”

  A string of expletives followed. Havers that time. “The mercenaries are all in place, Jack. This place is safer than the Covenant core Council Chamber.”

  Raine set down the coffee. This was way too interesting to sit out.

  “We have no other choice,” said the strange voice. “If we did, I for damn sure wouldn’t be on your doorstep, Madden.”

  “You’re an asshole, Rafe.” Jack’s voice was louder now and tight with aggravation. “Havers, put them in the west wing, until we can figure out what to do with them.”

  Raine located the cavernous living room in time to see the strange procession enter Jack’s apartments. A mountain of a man with an angry face that appeared carved from stone stood toe-to-toe with Jack, one massive arm in a sling, the other carrying a sawed-off customized shotgun. A cluster of men and women filed in around the two, some humans, some Were. They all appeared to be soldiers that had recently seen the wrong end of hard combat. In the middle, other than Jack and the man she recognized as Rafe Earnshaw, were two women holding infants, and a teenaged boy holding the hand of a very young girl. She immediately recognized the half-breed children.

  Jack saw her first. “This isn’t what you think, Raine.”

  “Right.” Her heart warmed. “You’re not a hero anymore.”

  Before Jack could argue, the big man spoke up. “I’m calling in a marker. He has nothing to do with this.”

  “Relax, Rafe.” This from Havers. “She’s cool.”

  A smile cracked across his striking, craggy face. “In that case, Jack’s in it up to his eyeballs.”

  “You keep talking shit about me, Rafe, and I’ll drive you over to Malinov’s condo myself and give your sorry ass up.”

  Raine took in the rag-tag assembly. So few responsible for such destruction and heroism. It reminded her of the impact one being could have on fate. And, looking at the half-breeds, looking at Jack, she was reminded of the impact fate could have on someone’s life. Destiny cast from birth, and so hard to escape.

  “Anyone hungry?” she asked. “There’s lunch in the dining room.”

  The response from the visi
tors was wary, but held some promise. Jack put a hand to his head, like he was ready to faint. Or scream.

  Havers grabbed Rafe’s good arm. “Come on. I’ll show you guys the way.”

  The band of soldiers and kids filed past her, leaving her alone again with Jack.

  He shut and locked the door, then leaned against it and faced her. “I’m not a hero anymore. I’m serious. You need to get your head around that, Raine.”

  “I thought you didn’t care what happened to the kids? This does look like you’re up to your eyeballs in it, Jack.”

  He compressed his lips and appeared to be weighing a decision in his mind. “I help out the guy who helped me out a long time ago. Nothing more than a little payback every now and again. That’s all. I usually don’t get this…” he searched for a word, and settled at last on, “…involved. I front cash, trade info, that kind of thing. I always get something out of the transaction. Last night was no exception.”

  “I get it.” He was lying to himself as well as her. It made her wonder why. He was very obviously conflicted. He wasn’t touching her, but she was certain he was struggling inside that beautiful head of his. The connection they shared popped up at unexpected times, and tended to unnerve her. But now she found some comfort in it. “I’m going to finish my lunch. When you’re done convincing yourself you’re not a hero anymore, come get me, and we’ll head upstate and find ourselves one of our primary objectives.”

  Jack watched Raine leave. He should chase after her. Keep explaining until she understood. She was deluding herself. Seeing something in him that was long gone. Hell. What did it matter? They were in the thick of the game, and everything was one big illusion anyway.

  He started to cross the living room, and his cell rang. He pulled it out and checked the number, then answered.

  “Hey, Malinov. Thanks for a good time last night. Your sister almost got me fucking killed.”

  “Don’t jerk me around, dickwad.” Malinov’s heavy accent twisted up the words. Jack suppressed a laugh. He sounded like a cartoon vampire. “I’m going to kill you personally, and that trumped-up Covenant bitch you’re running around with. Bodyguard, my fucking ass.”