Leopard's Kiss (Shadow Guardians) (Shadows Guardians Book 1)

by Stephanie Rowe

  “Wait.” He held up his hand. “Mailing bread? What does that mean?”

  She stared at him in surprise. “You don’t know what bread is?”

  He scowled. “I know what bread is. I just haven’t heard of anyone mailing it at a post office.”

  “We bake bread. I mean, we baked bread. I mean, I baked bread. God. It’s just me now. I forgot. I hate it when I forget.” She stood up, pacing away from him. “It’s my comfort thing. I make bread. I have a small online business, and I ship anywhere in the world.”

  He frowned. “How do you have an online business if you’ve lived on the run?”

  “Believe it or not, there are kitchens in most houses.” She rubbed her hands together, her stomach rumbling at the mention of food. “Baking grounds me. Not that it matters, right?” She turned toward him. “I don’t know who my mom and Marjorie were running from my whole life. They wouldn’t talk about it. I have no idea.”

  “What about your dad?”

  She bit her lip. “I don’t know anything about him. I wasn’t allowed to ask about him.”

  He raised his brows. “Didn’t you find that unusual?”

  It was difficult not to gape at him. “Do you think I’m a complete idiot? Of course I knew it was unusual. What was I going to do about it? She wouldn’t talk about him, and I learned not to ask.” She ran her hand through her hair, trying to smooth it. “Listen, we were in a warehouse in New York City. We’d been there two days. Nothing was different. But when Julia and I came back, it was burning up. We saw the fire from three blocks away, and we knew it was our place.”

  “The warehouse was on fire?”

  “No, just the part where we were living.” She paced away from him, hugging herself. “Fire trucks were on their way, but we beat them there. When we got inside, the place was a disaster. It looked like there had been a fight. Everything was tossed, and my mom and Marjorie—” She swallowed at the image that flashed through her mind, the one she’d tried so hard not to think of since that night.

  He leaned forward. “They were what?”

  She looked at him. “They were dead. They…” She hesitated, not sure whether she should tell him.

  He raised his brows. “They what?”

  Oh, hell, what did it matter if he thought she was crazy? Or if he figured out the secret they all shared? It wasn’t as if he could hurt her mom or Marjorie now. “It looked like they’d been attacked by a wild animal, like they’d fought for their lives, and lost.” Teeth marks. Throat torn. Eviscerated. Torn to shreds while she and Julia had been out shopping.

  He didn’t even react. He just nodded, as if he encountered that every day. “Did you stay around to see what you could find out?”

  His ease with her description made her relax slightly. She shook her head. “The sirens were close,” she whispered, hugging herself. “We knew we couldn’t stay. We couldn’t be found. So, we grabbed what we could reach, and then ran.” She looked at him. “We left them there, Slade, alone. We didn’t even give them a proper burial. We just lost everything in that one second.” Grief ached deep in her heart, the agonizing pain of a past that could never be changed, no matter how much she wished it.

  “She didn’t want a burial,” he said gently. “She wanted you safe.”

  “I know.” She wiped the back of her hand across her eyes and took a deep breath, trying to settle. “I know that, but I still think of how she looked, laying on that concrete floor, so alone—”

  “Not alone. She had you, even in death.” Slade took her hand, squeezing gently. “What happened after that? Did anyone contact you? Did you get any more information on what had happened?”

  “No. The papers didn’t even report anything. It was like someone buried it.” She looked at her hand in his, almost unable to comprehend the fact he was offering kindness to her. “We stayed off the radar for six weeks. I didn’t even bake bread. Then, one day, Julia left our hideaway to get food. She never came back. I followed her path, and her scent ended at the grocery store. She just disappeared.”

  “Her scent stopped?” At her nod, he narrowed his eyes. “No other trace at all?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing.” She managed a smile. “But if they’d killed her, then they would have left traces, right? So, I think she’s okay.”

  Slade studied her for a long minute, and she could almost see his mind working through the information. “Are you sure she didn’t leave on her own? Why do you think someone took her?”

  She frowned. “She’s like my sister. She wouldn’t have left me.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “How can you even ask me that? Don’t you have anyone in your life who would never walk out on you? Or someone who you would never walk out on? A bond that would stand through anything, no matter what?”

  Something flashed in his eyes, a pain so sharp she felt it in her own heart, but it was gone almost instantly. “No,” he said evenly. “I do not. That would not fit in my lifestyle, and it would be a liability. I don’t do liabilities.”

  He was lying. He had someone. Her heart sank. “Who is it? A woman?”

  His face became a cold visage of impenetrable steel. “There is no one,” he said again, an edge to his voice, that made her wonder whether she’d been wrong. She’d been so certain that he had someone he cared about. “I don’t like people enough to want to get that close. If you’re correct that Julia was taken,” he said, refocusing the conversation, “why did they take her alive instead of killing her like your mom and Marjorie?”

  “Because they fought back? Maybe whoever it was tried to take them, too, but they chose to fight to the death instead of surrendering.” A chill rippled over her at the idea. She knew her mom would have chosen death over succumbing to whatever horror had been hunting them for so long. “But Julia was taught to fight as well.”

  “Maybe they were ready for her. Maybe they underestimated your mom and Marjorie, and had upped their game when they went after Julia.”

  Her stomach dropped. “Julia was taught to fight. We both were. If they took her without a fight—”

  “They had a plan.” He sat back, clasping his hands behind his head. “What’s so important about your little clan, Anya? Your mom and Marjorie were on the run your entire life. What were they hiding from?” He leaned forward suddenly, a gleam in his eyes. “Unless it was you and Julia they were hiding, not themselves. Maybe you and Julia were the targets originally. Did anyone else try to get to you over the years?”

  “You think we’re the targets?” Fear leapt through her, and she turned away quickly, pacing away from him to hide her face. “It wasn’t us that my mom and Marjorie were hiding. We aren’t the targets.” But even as she denied it, she couldn’t keep her voice from trembling.

  “It is you,” he said softly, apparently being a master at reading body language. Bastard. “You’re the one they were hiding. You and Julia. Why?”

  There was no way she was giving him the answer that would betray her. Besides, she didn’t even know if it were true, at least for her. And if it was, even Slade couldn’t be trusted with the truth. No one could. “I don’t know if it was us,” she said evasively, “and I don’t know why. How would they have found us, anyway?” She turned to face him suddenly. “How did you find me? Who hired you?” She couldn’t believe she hadn’t asked that before.

  “I scented you, and I don’t know the name of the man who hired me. I never ask. They have no idea who I am, and I don’t know who they are.”

  “You scented me? What does that mean?” How could he go around killing people without doing research on who he was hunting? She didn’t understand how he could live like that. She knew it didn’t really matter what drove him, but she needed a distraction from the line of questions he’d latched onto.

  He didn’t take his gaze off her, as if he knew exactly what she was doing, and was plotting a strategy to get the information he wanted anyway. “I was sent a piece of fabric of something that belong
ed to you. Once I locked onto your essence through it, I could track you no matter how far away you were.”

  She frowned. “What fabric? Can I see it?”

  “I burned it, but it was a small piece of denim about two inches wide.” He narrowed his eyes. “Do you remember losing a pair of jeans?”

  “I left everything behind at the fire,” she said. “Including jeans.”

  He drummed his finger on his knee. “So, we start with the warehouse.”

  “Start what?”

  “The hunt for who is after you. I need to figure out what this guardian assignment means, and I’m guessing it starts there. I suspect Julia was taken by the same people who went after your mom and Marjorie.”

  “No, the warehouse was months ago.” She shook her head. “We need to find Julia. This woman I was supposed to meet had information—” She stared at him suddenly. “You can track people through fabric? What about a wig?” She ran to the couch, grabbed her jacket, and pulled the wig out of the pocket. “This was what she was wearing. Can you track her?”

  Slade’s eyebrows went up, and he took the wig from her. He held it in his hands and closed his eyes, and went still, so still that she couldn’t even tell if he was breathing. He didn’t move for almost five minutes, but he finally opened his eyes. “Got her.”

  Her heart leapt. “Really? Is she near? Let’s go!”

  “Hang on.” He balled the wig up in his hands, folding his hand over it until it was completely covered.

  “What are you doing?” Smoke suddenly burst from between his fingers, and flames glowed. She lunged toward him and tried to pry his hands apart. “You’re burning it? I need that! What if we can’t find her your way?”

  His arms were immovable. “My essence is on there now. It has to be destroyed. I can’t leave any evidence of my existence behind.”

  “Damn you, Slade!” Frantically, she slammed her foot into his shin, but he didn’t even flinch. “Stop it! That was my only connection to her!” The scent of burning polyester filled the air, and she coughed, pulling her shirt over her mouth as the smoke burned her eyes. “You’re such an arrogant bastard!” Oblivious to the flames burning her palms, she pried desperately at his hands, but it was like trying to claw through steel with her bare fingers.

  “Stop.” His voice was soft. “I will find her. I never fail.”

  She sat back on her heels, tears in her eyes as she stared at him, feeling utterly lost. “How could you?” she asked. “How could you be such a bastard? You’re so concerned with protecting yourself that you don’t even care about how your choices affect anyone else?”

  He met her gaze. “I never fail.”

  “And what if another demon rips out your heart? What if you die? Then what do I do? Pry your brain out of your dead body and use it like a GPS? You bastard. Open your hands!”

  He did as she instructed, but they were empty. He’d literally incinerated it into dust so fine it had dissolved into the atmosphere. No ashes. Not a single shred left of the one tie she had to Julia. Anger burned through her, a feeling of helplessness. She lunged to her feet and shoved at his chest. “I don’t care if you’ve lived in isolation since you were a baby,” she snapped. “This is no longer about only you. It’s my life, and I’m the one you’re supposed to be protecting. You don’t get to make unilateral choices like that just to protect your precious reputation. Damn you, Slade! This is my best friend who’s in danger!”

  He stared at her for a long moment, and said nothing. Nothing. Like he was some arrogant prima donna who didn’t have to explain himself.

  She paced away from him, struggling for control. She couldn’t walk out on him now. He was her only link to the woman who knew where Julia was. “Was that why you did it? So you could control me?”

  “No.” He braced his forearms on his thighs, watching her. His eyes were tracking her every movement, and she suddenly felt like prey being hunted again. “I did it because survival matters. I’m going to be with you. If I can be tracked, then you can too. How long do you think until the assassins find you again? My guess is that there are several of them pacing the street outside, trying to figure out why our trail ends so abruptly.”

  She snapped her gaze to the walls. “They’re outside?”

  “I assume so. They can’t see the entrance unless I am in their minds, but I have no doubt that they’re close. We’ve been here a long time, long enough for them to track you.”

  Her heart began to pound, and her palms became clammy. Assassins hunting her? She was in so over her head. “Crap.”

  A small smile twitched at the corner of his mouth. “I am very, very good at what I do. I never fail. I want my life back, and the only way to do it is to see this guardian assignment through, so that is what’s going to happen. Trust me.”

  “Trust you? So you can get back to your life of assassinating people, including me?” She shook her head, keeping her voice low, suddenly afraid that the demon could be on the other side of the wall, listening, planning, knowing exactly where she was. “I don’t trust anyone, Slade. It’s stupid to trust people, especially assassins!”

  He cocked his head, studying her. “Yes, this is true.”

  She leaned her head back against the wall, suddenly too overwhelmed to think. “I can’t do this,” she whispered. “I can’t defeat assassins. Three of them? I bake bread, for God’s sake. What am I going to do? Shoot yeast in their eyes and blind them?”

  “You’re going to trust me. You have no other choice.”

  She gave him a skeptical look. “Would you trust yourself if you were me?”

  “If I gave my word, yes. My word is my bond. I never go back on it. Everyone knows my reputation.”

  “Really?” She pushed off the wall and walked over to him. “You haven’t made any actual promises to me, Slade. What is there to trust?”

  He ground his jaw, and she could tell she’d caught him. She already knew him well enough to know that he was a loner, and the last thing he would ever want to do was bind himself to the well-being of another, or to owe anyone anything. If his word was truly binding to him, then to give it to her would be more than he would be able to do.

  Finally, he said. “I accepted the position as your guardian.”

  “That’s a deal you made with someone else, not a promise to me. Neither of us even know exactly what being my guardian means, except that it probably doesn’t mean killing me.” She gave him a challenging look. “Make me a promise, Slade. Promise me that you won’t stop until Julia is saved. Promise me that you’ll keep me alive. Promise me that you’ll take on my hunt for Julia as your own. Then I’ll trust you.”

  For a long moment, he said nothing. Then he shook his head. “I don’t know what I can promise you at this time,” he said. “I don’t know enough about the situation.”

  Damn him. She turned away, pacing across the room. “Can you at least promise me you’re not going to kill me? Ever?”

  He ground his jaw. “No. I can’t. I don’t have any immediate plans to kill you, and at the moment, my intention is to be your guardian, whatever that entails, but I can’t promise that it won’t change in a week, or a day, or in the next thirty seconds.”

  Her stomach dropped at his honesty, and fear rippled down her spine. She’d been feeling safe with him, and his answer was a terrifying reminder of what she was facing. “Then how can you ask me to trust you? Trust you to do what?”

  He finally shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess nothing.” He stood up. “Don’t trust me. You’re right.” He held out his hand. “You ready?”

  She stared at him. “You want me to go with you after you just said not to trust you?”

  “You might not trust me, but you still have to make a choice. I have a lock on the woman who wore the wig. I’m going after her. You can come, or I can drop you off somewhere. But it’s time to leave, because there’s a demon outside that’s getting too close.”

  Her heart stuttered, and she looked at the steel walls. He
was her only link to finding Julia, now that he’d burned the wig. There was no decision to be made. “I’ll go with you.”

  He nodded, giving no outward sign of whether he liked her decision. “Your choice,” he said. “What method would you prefer for ensuring you can’t reveal this location to anyone? I can blind you temporarily as we leave so you don’t see where this safe house is, or I can wipe your memory of this location and everything about it. I always wipe memories, but for you…” Something shifted in his voice, a hitch that was barely noticeable. “I’ll give you the choice to remember.”

  She suddenly recalled how he’d looked at her while they were kissing, making sure she knew he was the one kissing her, and her heart softened. This was a man who lived in absolute isolation, wiping the memories of everyone who knew he existed. He was invisible…except, he was willing to let her keep the memories. Allowing her to remember every detail about him was against every code he lived by, and yet he was making that offer. She realized that, despite his isolation and his life choices, there was a part of him that still burned for that human connection, just as she did. He wanted to be remembered. He wanted there to be someone in the world who remembered…and he’d chosen her.

  The tension fled her body, and she knew then that although he was a man who didn’t trust, he’d trusted her with the most important thing he had to offer…his existence. Suddenly, she knew what he didn’t even know, that he would never, ever be able to kill her, no matter what.

  She realized suddenly that she had no memory of arriving at the building. The last thing she remembered was agreeing to go with him, and then sitting on the couch. “Did you wipe my memory when we got here?”

  He nodded. “Your shields go down when you sleep.”

  “Did you wipe it of anything else? Other than getting here?”

  “Just the trip here.” He glanced at the wall. “We need to go.”

  “Blind me.” She said it without hesitation. She didn’t want to lose a moment of memory. Being blind would make her completely dependent on him until she could see again, but she knew now that she would be safe with him, no matter what he thought.