by Lizzy Ford
To save her, he’d have to do what he didn’t want to – go to Damian and ask for help.
“I know someone who can help her,” he said and scooped her up. “Get everyone back to Miami.”
“Ikir, do you need –”
“No. Just go!” Jonny Traveled before he confirmed Charles would obey.
He went to the one place he never hoped to go to talk to the one person he hated to negotiate with. His heart pounded hard and fast in his chest as he materialized in front of the gates to Damian’s headquarters in Texas. Immediately, every ward was tripped and every alarm blaring. Guardians lined up along the walls with weapons he knew weren’t going to make much of a difference if he truly wanted in.
He waited instead, tense and all too aware of Ashley dying in his arms. “Stay with me, Ash,” he whispered, his pulse flying.
“What the fuck, Jonny?” Darian was the first to appear outside the walls to confront him.
“Send out my sister,” Jonny told him.
Darian’s gaze went to Ashley.
The strongest Healer ever known, his sister Bianca lived on the compound with her mate, the adopted brother of Damian. She had once turned Charles from a vamp into a human. If she could do that, she could save Ashley.
“You better have a good fucking reason to be here,” Damian said, materializing a moment later.
“I do,” Jonny said. “Bianca. Now.”
Damian studied him briefly before tossing his head towards the compound in a silent order to his brother. The Grey God disappeared.
“I don’t do favors for you,” Damian said.
“It’s not for me. You want leverage against Xander? This is it!” Jonny snapped. “If she dies, it’s on you, Damian.”
“I’m not the one who got her into this mess.”
“She made a decision.”
“I don’t give a shit. You want our help? You turn her over after she’s healed. You clearly can’t protect her like we can when you’ve got all this shit going on.”
Jonny clenched his jaw hard enough that it popped. If Ashley weren’t about to die in his arms, he’d consider refusing. He didn’t think Damian would let her die if Jonny left her at the feet of the Guardians and Traveled home.
But he couldn’t just … leave her. No part of Jonny wanted to let her go right now, not until he knew for sure she was going to live through this. Damian was right, though. Until this mess was over, Ashley was safer with the White God than she’d ever be with him.
And for the first time in several years, he felt raw and vulnerable. He hated not being able to harness his power or control his vamps enough to protect someone he cared about. He hated not being enough for what he had to do. Emotions he fought to block began to trickle free, fueled by his vamp hunger and the weight of Ashley’s warm body in his arms.
“Jonny?” Bianca’s soft voice sounded sleepy. “What happened?” Darian brought her and her husband, Dusty. They materialized behind Damian, who was still glaring at Jonny.
“Hey, B,” Jonny greeted her. He glanced at Dusty, the steely-eyed former leader of Damian’s assassins he had personally charged with Bianca’s safety under the threat of death if Dusty let anyone get within an inch of her.
“Bianca only,” Damian directed the three behind him.
Jonny had long since gotten use to the wariness of the White God and his brothers. He’d never do anything to hurt his sister, but the others assumed the worse about him.
He lowered Ashley to the ground gently and crouched beside her. Bianca knelt on the other side and reached across to give him a quick hug. With long, curly black hair, caramel skin like his and large, brown eyes, she was naturally beautiful and the sweetest person he’d ever known. Her Natural healing skill had put them both on the radar of the Guardians and vamps after he fell in with the wrong crowd. Dusty had found her first, and the two fell in love shortly after meeting.
“I’ve missed you,” she whispered with a quick smile before her attention turned to Ashley. She wore a sweatshirt over boxer shirts and looked as if she’d just been woken up.
“You, too,” he replied. “Can you heal her?”
Bianca placed her hands on Ashley, one over her heart and one on her forehead. She closed her eyes. The air around her began to glow blue, the color of her healing magic. It was soothing and gentle, and Jonny felt some of his worry start to dissipate under her influence.
“Yeah,” Bianca said finally. “But it’s going to take some time, Jonny. I need to get her inside.”
Jonny hesitated, not wanting to give up Ashley, especially not to the White God.
“I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t absolutely necessary,” Bianca said and touched his hand. “Trust me, Jonny. Okay?”
He studied his sister and nodded finally. “Take care of her, B.”
“Anything for my little brother.”
Every once in a while, it was nice to remember how close they’d been since the death of their father several years before. The ache of loneliness was always stronger when he saw his sister and recalled all the reasons why they didn’t see each other more frequently.
Jonny rose and stepped back, knowing the Guardians were leery of him being anywhere near one of their own.
Bianca motioned to her blond haired, blue-eyed husband, who moved forward to lift Ashley.
Jonny watched for another long moment before turning away.
Ashley was safe. Despite Valon’s attempt to kill her, she was going to pull through.
As he Traveled back to Miami, rare fury filled Jonny. He wasn’t immediately certain what angered him more: the fact he’d put her in danger or the idea Valon had fucked her up on purpose. He’d dangled her from the ceiling like a piece of meat and left her intact rather than handing her over for his vamps to drain. Calling off the ambush was another clue that Valon was sending a message.
Jonny had exposed a vulnerability he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge, and Valon pounced.
“Ikir,” Charles said the moment Jonny materialized.
Jonny drew a breath to keep from exploding at his battered second. Charles had been patched up by their vamp Healer and was limping but still on his feet.
“What is it?” Jonny asked with rare impatience.
Charles held out a familiar talisman, and Jonny picked it up. “This is how they know where to ambush us,” he said, surprised. “They had one, too.”
“Not anymore,” Charles said. “I grabbed that from one of their Trackers.”
“Let’s hope they don’t have another one,” Jonny said, considering it. “How many did we lose tonight?”
“Ten from my location. None from the other teams. Over a hundred of his vamps were there waiting for us.”
Jonny handed back the talisman. “Then we have four more teams ready to go out again. Send out a Tracker. Any hit he gets, dispatch a team. Keep up the pressure as long as we can maintain it. I’m done with this shit. The second anyone spots Valon, I want to be notified.” He started away, needing an outlet for his anger.
“Ikir,” Charles called. “How is the Natural?”
“She’ll survive, but she’s not coming back here.”
“Very well, ikir.”
“Send me the first location the Tracker finds,” he added. “I’m going to start dealing with these assholes myself.”
Charles didn’t respond. Jonny knew his second didn’t agree, but this time, he was quiet, sensing Jonny’s anger.
Jonny resisted the urge to return to the Guardians’ compound in Texas and stand over his sister while she worked on Ashley. Instead, he paced on the beach, his mind on Valon and the confrontation he knew was coming. Their cat and mouse game was costing him too much. It was time to take the fight directly to Valon and end it once and for all.
His toe hit something more solid than sand, and he knelt. The strange knife Valon had given Ashley was half buried in white sand. He picked it up. Without the knowledge of thousands of years of history to guide him, he had no way of figuring
out what the weapon was, or why it was allegedly capable of disabling him. Faint, cool magic tickled his fingertips. It didn’t feel strong enough to take on a god, but neither had the locational talisman the Others used.
He tucked it into his pocket, not about to let something so simple be the reason Valon defeated him.
“Time for our one-on-one, cabron,” he whispered to the night.
Chapter Twenty
“Am I a prisoner?” Ashley asked, arms crossed as she stood in the kitchen doorway of the White God’s sprawling ranch house located on the compound containing his headquarters. She was weak and tired but healed. She recalled nothing about what happened from the time she began getting her ass kicked until she woke up in a quiet guest bedroom in a place she didn’t want to be the next day.
“Can you cook?” asked the athletic blond man at the stove.
She snorted. “No.” Dusty was at the top of the food chain, someone she’d met because of Xander’s importance but never spent time with.
“Then I guess not,” was his cool, surly response. “No one else in this fucking house can make a decent paella. Gotta do it myself.”
Ashley gazed at him quizzically.
“You hungry?” he asked.
She nodded and sat at the breakfast bar. “You’re Jonny’s sister’s husband, right?”
“I am. I’m also Damian’s ops officer. I recruit, train and manage the Guardians in the Western Hemisphere.” Dusty scooped out paella and poured it into a bowl with rice. He set it on the counter in front of her before returning to the stove.
Ashley said nothing, suspecting she knew why he was the one talking to her this morning. She stirred the paella to help it cool.
“I hear you’ve developed your skill pretty well,” he added when she was quiet.
“Yeah.”
“You interested in joining up?”
“Not really.”
“Let me rephrase. How hard will you fight being conscripted?” he asked and sat down two seats from her at the breakfast bar.
She gave him a sidelong glance, suspecting the lean man knew more about her than he was letting on. “Pretty hard,” she admitted. “I like being a college student and doing my own thing.”
“That shit’s not an option.”
“Why not?”
“Because you fucked with Jonny. Whether or not you wanted to pick a side, you’re stuck choosing now.”
She took a bite of food. “This is good,” she said after swallowing. “I hate Jonny and he …” She drifted off. He didn’t hate her but neither was he really interested beyond the physical relief she provided.
“He saved your life. Brought you here to Bianca.”
“I’m sure he had a reason,” she said.
“It’s the first time he’s ever asked us for anything.”
Ashley’s heartbeat quickened. She didn’t have the energy for the emotions starting to boil. “Oh, god,” she said and dropped the spoon. “Brandon!”
“We’re helping on that front,” Dusty said.
“You know where he is?”
“No but we’re going to work with Jonny to find him.” He met her gaze. “Like I said. He’s never willingly asked us for anything before. There’s something more going on than you being mauled by vamps if he’s willing to approach us for help, I think.”
“What is it with you people and interrogating me over the dinner table?” she retorted without heat. “Xander always does this.”
Dusty gave a faint smile and returned to eating. “So that’s a yes.”
“I was with Jonny to find Brandon, and Valon, the ring leader of a the rogue vamps, decided to kick my ass because I was killing too many of his vamps. That’s it.”
“Good.”
She waited for him to say more. Dusty was silent. Xander had tried this on her, too, peaked her interest then dropped something, knowing she’d ask.
“Fine. Why is that good?” she asked.
“Because you don’t belong with him.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “That’s not for anyone but me to decide.”
“Funny. He said the same thing when Damian came knocking at his door last week.”
“He’s right. For once.” She tapped her spoon against the side of the bowl. If it were true she had to pick sides, she wasn’t going to do it now, before she knew Brandon’s fate. The coordinates she’d memorized flashed through her thoughts, and she debated whether or not there was any use in going to them now that Valon had almost succeeded in killing her and knew she wasn’t going to hurt Jonny.
“If you want to find your brother, I’ll give you a team to do it,” Dusty said. “Unlimited support and funds.”
She stared at him. “Just like that. You’ll give me whatever I want?”
“Yep. I have a feeling Jonny needs help but isn’t going to ask for it.”
“What’s the catch?”
“After you find him, you work for me.”
Ashley thought only for a moment. It was a similar offer to what Jonny had given her without the blood sucking or sleeping around. She was beginning to think Xander was right to be suspicious of the Guardians. But to have her own team, to be in control of how and where she searched for her brother, was too much to pass up. Brandon was suffering as it was, and she didn’t want to know what Valon did to him after she pissed him off at the factory.
When it came to Brandon, there was never a choice.
“I have conditions,” she said reluctantly.
“What?”
“You don’t object to me working with Jonny to find Brandon. He has a way of tracking the vamps and Valon. Second, Brandon gets to make his own choice about whether or not to join up. Third, no questions asked. I get to go wherever I want with my team,” she said.
“Deal.”
Ashley blinked, expecting him to negotiate. Were they that determined to gain her support? Or was this their way of outflanking Xander, which seemed to be a goal of White and Black Gods?
“Okay,” she said. Secretly, she wondered how she was going to see Jonny again and not want to wrap herself in his arms. The thought of him made her lower belly warm and her pulse race. “Okay.”
“When do you want to start?”
“Today,” she said instantly.
“You up for it?”
“Does it matter?”
“You’re the boss.”
Ashley almost smiled. They were giving her the means to pursue Brandon without strings attached for now. It was too easy which meant, something horrible was probably in store with her. She pushed aside the sense of doom, urgent to locate her brother. Whatever happened tomorrow, she’d deal with it when it came.
“I have to find Jonny first,” she murmured. “He’s going to know where to hunt the rogue vamps.”
“I’ve got your team picked out.”
Uneasiness went through her. There was nothing to fear from the Guardians in a physical sense, but she also wasn’t quite willing to trust them fully. Their intentions were likely to be something other than they claimed them to be. Xander had warned her and Brandon many times against trusting anyone fully, especially when it came to something that affected their close knit family.
“Okay,” she said once more. “I need some clothes and stuff.”
“Taken care of. They’re in your dresser.”
She waited for him to notice how her hands trembled or the dark circles under her eyes and change his mind. Ashley finished eating quickly and retreated to the guestroom where she’d woken up. She looked around and imagined herself living there, on the compound.
For reasons she didn’t yet want to face, the idea was depressing. A key component was missing, even if she knew a relationship with Jonny wasn’t possible. He wanted nothing to do with her if he’d turned her over to the Guardians.
At the very least, he was going to help her find her brother. This much was non-negotiable.
Then why did she feel torn once again, more interested in seeing Jonny again tha
n leading her own team of Guardians?
She picked up the cell phone waiting for her on a nightstand and typed in the coordinates to see where Valon had wanted her to go. The result was a patch of green in the middle of the pacific northwest, far from any neighboring town or city with no direct roads she could see. Had she not memorized them correctly? Or was this where he intended to trap her?
She sat down, more tired than she wanted to let on. She wasn’t about to let Brandon suffer a second longer than necessary, no matter which devil she had to make a deal with. Ashley changed quickly before picking up the phone to send a text. Jonny had kept her and Brandon’s phones. She suspected he’d get her message if she sent it to both phones.
I’m going after Brandon. She tapped the send button and tucked the phone away. “I hate you, Jonny,” she murmured, conflicted once again. “Why do you threaten to crush my heart and then go out and save my life?”
Chapter Twenty One
She can’t handle fighting vamps!!!
Jonny reread the message from his sister. He didn’t know what Bianca was talking about, but he was relieved to know if Ashley was causing someone issues, she was at least alive. The White God wasn’t likely to let her out of his sight now that he had her on his compound even if Ashley’s last text seemed to imply she was going vamp hunting.
For once, Jonny breathed deeply after ceding one small battle to the White God. He hadn’t yet been able to suppress the fear he experienced holding her near lifeless body in his arms despite the long day spent planning with Charles and Tasha. Ashley in danger wasn’t something he could handle when he was looking at a confrontation with Valon.
“Ikir!” The cry came from down the hallway. “Come quickly!”
Jonny rose from his position kneeling for some light meditation. His stomach was empty and twisting, his normal sense of calm not quite coating his anxiousness about confronting Valon. Too much was at risk for him not to be worried, for him not to wish he had a little more time to strategize.