No Time to Cry (Nine While Nine Legacy Book 1)

by Stasia Morineaux

  He stopped and looked back at me.

  “It’s not so bad here, is it?” I asked pleasantly.

  “A little louder than I prefer.”

  I caught his gaze and he smiled ever so slightly, it danced around the edges of his mouth, before going back into hiding. I smiled at him, letting it reach my eyes. Willing him to feel what I was feeling. Please please please feel it…see it.

  “I guess I can cope with it for a little longer.” He heaved a sigh.

  Was that playfully? Oh, how I loved his voice. Have I said that before?

  “What’s on your mind?” He narrowed his eyes at me almost suspiciously. I guess I couldn’t exactly blame him for that—since I was usually in a rush to get away from him, or causing some sort of complication for him. I’d never asked this of him before, to stay.

  I shrugged. “Nothing special.” Wow! How untrue that statement was, since my mind was consumed with thoughts of him. “Just think you could use some fun.” I looked at him over the rim of my glass. He still wore the same expression. He wasn’t buying it. “Do you ever go out Gideon? Or is it always work for you?” There was a hint of jest in my tone.

  Was I being flirty? I didn’t want to come across as flirty?

  “I have things I like to do. Places I like to go. Both are quieter.”

  I tilted my head. He was doing it to me again, already.

  I was lost in him. I could feel his energy floating over to me. I don’t even know if energy was the right word. Essence perhaps would be better. Whatever I was feeling was such an integral part of him. Was I sensing his mhésen?

  “Hmm.” I nodded. “Like what?”

  “I enjoy museums. Bookstores are very nice. Restaurants. Quiet restaurants. I like walking at night.”

  “Very quiet.” I smiled. He was so near. I just wanted to reach out and touch him again. I wanted to know what his lips felt like. Wanted to taste the wine on them. I wanted it real, not dreamed.

  He spoke, but I missed it. Partly from being momentarily lost in those images dancing through my psyche, partly because the music had become louder. Okay, so he was right, it was pretty loud in here. Must be that time of night where they really cranked it up, as patrons became more intoxicated and louder themselves. Conversations at his coffee house, and the Snug, were much more audible.

  “What?” I leaned in closer to him. So, the loudness did have a perk. He leaned in to meet me, his face gliding to within kissing distance. Stop it! I scolded myself. He was close enough that I could feel the heat from his cheek against mine. The warmth of his breath against my ear as he spoke.

  “You look lovely tonight.” The warmth of his skin, his breath, those words—those words from him. And that’s all it took. My stomach took a steep dive, I couldn’t breathe; I couldn’t think straight, I couldn’t swallow—my throat suddenly the Sahara. I could feel that amber warmth spreading out around my heart, through it, throughout me, reach out of me. It was strong enough to force my eyes closed with sudden weakness. My heart rate notched up. And I was immobilized there, nearly cheek to cheek. This was different than on the dance floor. I felt it reach out for him, move around him softly, felt his breath against my ear catch and then speed up in unison with my own. Neither of us could move, nor speak. Just breath and feel. Feel what we’d both denied since first setting eyes on each other that very first time at Elysium. I was drowning in the feeling, drowning in his scent, the spice, the smoke the earth of it. I could feel him, feel him breathing, hear him breathing as though no music blared around us, as if we were cocooned. If I were to just turn my head a bit more to the right, brush my lips against his skin, what would he do? Oh, what would he do?

  I had to end this, couldn’t take it any farther, where I wanted with every ounce of my mhésen to take it. Rejection from Liam was terrible; rejection from Gideon would be utter destruction.

  ‘”I couldn’t hear you, it’s too loud.” I laughed softly next to his ear.

  “My point exactly.” He laughed lowly, near my ear. Paused a moment then added, his voice holding a poorly hidden frayed edge. “It’s time for me to go. I have things to finish up before tomorrow.” His cheeked grazed mine as he spoke, the stubble scraping lightly in the most pleasing way, an electric rush rippled through me and for just a second I felt my spine collapse. Then he pulled away. And all I wanted was to pull him back.

  Our eyes met briefly while we were still close and all I wanted was him. To go with him.

  But instead I said, “Okay, see you tomorrow.” As if nothing had just passed between us. I sat back in the booth.

  I watched him leave. And said not another thing to bring him back. Everything in me weakened by him, his closeness. Melancholy gripped my heart. Damn, this was excruciating, and frustrating.

  We’d had a total movie moment, where you want to yell at the screen, ‘Just kiss already, you fools!’ But this wasn’t a movie, this was my new, confusing, slightly messed up life. And this situation was far from normal. I was a Coimhdeacht, a member of the Rúnaigh, and he was my boss, my protector, my Cerberus…my Cerberus.

  That meant something to me now. I remember being so incensed when he’d first said it to me, now it’s all I wanted. His protection. Now, I wasn’t even sure I qualified for it, since I’d overheard him say that I may not belong with them.

  Gideon passed by Liam on his way out and I watched as they had a brief exchange of words then Liam joined me at the table.

  “You okay? You look a little…I don’t know…” he wiggled his fingers around his own face and grinned meaningfully. Had he seen what had passed between Gideon and me? “Flustered, or put out, or… something.” He helped himself to my cocktail and downed it in one swig.

  “I’m fine.” I ignored his somewhat snarky look. I glanced back at the dance floor. I was drained. I had Gideon on my mind. “I’m done for tonight. I need to sleep. I’m heading out.” Maybe at least in my sleep I could get that much desired kiss.

  “I think we’re staying for a bit longer. Are you okay to get home? Do you want me to call you a cab?”

  “I’m good. I’ll call one. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “You sure everything is alright?”

  I nodded in reply, smiled, and waved him off to Serena.

  No. I was not okay. I was far from it at the moment. I was going to make myself crazy.

  ~ Chapter Twenty-Seven ~

  My tattoo is warm, heating up, and zinging. I look down and it has a razor-sharp luminescence to it, all around the edges.

  I’m in the ballroom again, but I don’t feel like dancing this time, and there is no music this time anyway. And I’m looking for something. But I don’t know what. Uldwynah has sent me here. Said it was important.

  Wait! I know.

  The key! She said I had to discover the key. But I’ve been looking for so long now and I haven’t seen a single one.

  I have noticed though that every time I come near one of the mirrors or archways to an adjoining room my tattoo does this glimmering thing. But she said the key would be found here, so I keep wandering this huge room and have steered clear of going into one of the others. They’re dark, with no candles burning in their chandeliers or sconces, the only light reaching into them even so slightly comes from the room in which I’m standing.

  I already searched the desk and only came up with a book, which of course I couldn’t read, but it did make my brain itch, as if I should be able to do so.

  Maybe she’d been mistaken. Maybe I’d misunderstood her. Nothing was here; it had to be in another room.

  I rub my tattoo; it’s really prickling and making the rest of my flesh feel crawly, like when you have a really severe sunburn. It was getting annoying. I look down and it’s iridescent. How can it do that? Special ink? Like the recent influx of glow-in-the-dark tats?

  I’m walking and looking at it glimmer, and it abruptly brightens, flares…the closer I get to the archway.

  It’s connected.

  I stop at the thresh
old, I don’t see anything special in there, it’s pretty empty too. Might as well check it out though. As I pass over the brink, where the black and white marble change over to green and black, the edges of the archway flicker, brighten, become incandescent…as does my tattoo.

  I look back up and the second ballroom has disappeared. In its place is the forest I’d seen before, when I had been here before, in this room. But last time I’d seen it when the mirror had shifted. The mirror had rippled, shifted, altered to a window or door, when my arm…my tattooed arm had passed through what should have been a solid surface.

  I walk through the glowing arch…and into a forest veiled in the violet blue of dusk.

  I can hear the birds, crickets, forest creatures. My senses are alive. I can smell the earth, moss, pine needles, wet leaves, sap. The air is sweet and refreshing, uncultivated and invigorating. This place is real. I touch the tree closest to me; feel the roughness of the bark beneath my fingertips, the softness of the lichen.

  I found Gideon here before…or more like he found me. I stand inside the circle of the trees, waiting, appreciating the absolute beauty of this place.

  The bobbing lights catch my attention and I begin to follow them, trailing after them through the ferns and over the leaf strewn path. Then I see him and my heart jumps, my stomach drops. Gideon. He’s standing just a slight ways up ahead of me. He turns and sees me. My step falters. His expression isn’t one of pleasure, as it had been previously, but instead anger…no not anger…it is annoyance, or maybe frustration. He turned too quickly, moved away too quickly to tell exactly. But joy to see me, it was not.

  Why? Last time I was here, he’d kissed me. He keeps walking away. I hesitate, then follow. He stops, turns to me, looking bemused, but also irritated. Why are his emotions so torn? He continues on his way. And again I follow. I lose sight of him when the trees grow thicker and obscure my line of vision.

  We’re near the pool—it’s even more magnificent tonight, set aglow by the underwater path of stones in its center that I can see now leads to, or from, a waterfall—when I see him again. He’s not alone. He’s with a woman.

  Something tightens around my heart. I don’t like seeing him speaking so closely to another woman. Why do they need to stand so close?

  I traipse closer, staying shrouded behind the screen of the foliage, willing myself invisible to them. I want to hear them. I’m afraid to hear

  “…mistake…”

  “…different…and more so with every passing day. She’s so extremely unique. Exceptional…”

  “…supposed to be something else, designed for…

  “…the Gceannas ar Chruthú. The Charge of Genesis…was…

  “…the key is…”

  The key? Something about the key.

  I wish I could hear everything they were saying, catching only parts of it was worse than hearing nothing at all. Were they speaking of the key I was supposed to be looking for?

  Twigs snap underfoot as I steal closer. An owl hoots and then takes flight overhead. The woman vanishes. She just disappeared into nothingness. Gideon looks to me. Why does he wear such a grim expression? Then he is gone in a blink too.

  I begin to move through the brush, but I’m no longer on foot, I’m astride Eyvindur. He moves into a trot and we begin to race through the forest. The wind rushing past us feels heavenly and erases any other thought from my mind. The violet tinged sky is darkening into a deep velvety blue, but the bobbing lights set the trails alight as they dance through the lower hanging branches.

  Behind us I hear the thunder of many more hooves, the baying of hounds. The chilling sound of a hunting horn can be heard reverberating throughout the woods. The sky was taking on a stormy appearance.

  I look behind me and I see closing in on us a group of nearly thirty riders on large black horses. They are all nearly identical to Eyvindur. In front of them, and running dangerously under their hooves, is a large pack of dark dogs, they too are exceptional in size. The riders are all dressed in variations of armor and sport bows and swords. I see that I am also. An icy chill courses through me, they are hunters. They are hunting me. At the lead is Gideon. My heart ices over. I urge Eyvindur on. Why is Gideon with them? From the brief glimpse I was able to get of them, they are all stunning. Heart-stopping powerful looking, both the male and female. At first glance I had thought that they were the ones from the roof top, from that very first dream, but those creatures were hideous and these are breathtaking. I almost want to stop running, but something in me urges me forward.

  “Milis Draghail!” Gideon has caught up to me and screams over the sound of the pounding hooves, the others hold back, I’m sure they could catch up easily if they wished, as has Gideon. He grabs Eyvindur’s mane with one hand, pulling, slowing his gallop. His free arm wraps around my waist, hauling me onto his horse with him, across his legs, and without a word kisses me roughly. My body responds immediately.

  The others cheer raucously and turn their horses away, towards the sound of the baying hounds that have moved on elsewhere.

  ~ Chapter Twenty-Eight ~

  Brom Tom wouldn’t stay in the courtyard. I took him back there three times before giving up and letting him follow me to the pub, Na Sciath Snug. Okay, he more like walked with me, right next to me all the way.

  Strange cat. I was worried he might get hit, but he stayed sheltered to my left, in the shadows of the evening, and to the lawns and gardens of the homes along the way.

  “You can’t go in. You have to wait over in the garden. Over there.” I pointed away to the picturesque little area just off from the sidewalk that featured a pretty little wishing well. Oh my gods, I was talking to the cat like he could understand me. “Oh, just stay here. I have to go.”

  I went straight back to the snug in which I’d enjoyed a tucked-away dinner with Gideon two weeks before. I had made myself late by trying to get Brom Tom to stay home, so the only space left to sit was to Gideon’s left, the other side of the booth was taken. Erin was running behind also, so the meeting had yet to begin…lucked out there! I ordered a Guinness to match the others.

  Gideon was deep in a discussion with Michael, who sat on the other side of him. I never tired of his voice. I pretended to be reading on my tablet and just listened to him speaking with Michael. I loved the cadence of his voice, the deep, yet soft timbre, the soft rumbly edge. It could be tender and gentle; it could be fierce and dangerous. I could lose myself in his words—I often did, especially when they were speaking that language, entire conversations in that language— just soaking in the melody of his voice.

  I tried not to look at Gideon, flashes of that amazing dream refused to quit swimming through my mind.

  The way he’d pulled me from Eyvindur and onto him, the way his hands had plunged into my hair and dragged my face to his, my mouth to his.

  Thank gods my beer was cold.

  Erin arrived and wiggled in next to me, pushing me closer to Gideon.

  She didn’t notice. She burst into immediate jovial conversation with Liam, Halah and Nicklaus right after giving me a big hug.

  Now I was left, shoulder pressed to shoulder with Gideon. Thigh pressed to thigh…leaving me too much in the breathless-heart-racing zone.

  This was not helping make the sultry memories fade any.

  He stayed that way while he finished his discussion with Michael, not budging an inch.

  Was he completely oblivious? Because I sure wish I could be. I almost felt like laughing… it reminded me so much of the time with that boy, the ‘first kiss’ boy I’d told him about. At lunch after his ballgame we had sat this close at the picnic table. Our legs pressed together under the table, accidentally brushing our hands and arms against the other person every chance we got, playing it outwardly cool, when both of us—hormones firing like crazy, heat radiating off of our bodies like a sunburn—couldn’t wait to collide together unhindered by the on looking eyes of our friends..

  He looked at me with an expression
I wasn’t sure how to interpret. His eyes were fiery in that passion infused way, but his face was rigid, firm, conveying something different, it was almost… irritated?

  I attempted to move over, away from him…my ego more than just a bit bruised. He managed to shift over to his right enough to separate us. Well, if I was so annoying, he should have just done that to begin with.

  I turned my face from him. He was too confusing. And the dreams I’d been having about him didn’t help matters one iota.

  “I called a meeting early to pass out your schedules for the next two days.” He turned the pages in his small planner, removing six pages and dealing them out to us. “I’ll be away again for two days at the most. I’ll take it that I don’t need to remind anyone to do their jobs in a timely manner. And behave yourselves after hours.” He looked at Liam.

  Well, what do you know, for a change it wasn’t pointed at me. Nice change.

  “And you…”

  Spoke too soon?

  As he moved to look at me his thigh touched mine again. Such torture. “Try to stay out of trouble.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  Erin excused herself, freeing up more space and I took advantage of that. I didn’t need him noticing that my breathing was faster than normal. I downed the last of my ale, as Nicklaus rushed off to catch up with Erin. They were working together tomorrow. I hadn’t had to do that yet, pair up with the Breithiúnas. I had thought from the beginning that would be a tough one.

  “Well, I’m out too.” I slid out of the booth and said my goodbyes.

  I had only gotten as far as the end of the walk when Liam caught up to me.

  “Hey…are you alright. You seem agitated. Is it because of Serena?”

  Agitated? I would have gone with frazzled before agitated. “What? No.” I shook my head. “I told you, I’m fine. Whatever.” I waved his thought away. My head was swimming with Gideon…not Liam now.