by A. J. Menden
I waited for him to speak. He watched me, not commenting.
I sighed. “That was probably the last time. You would think a whole country was big enough to avoid the one person you want, but you’d be wrong.”
Cyrus shook his head. “Nope, you’ve been that happy again. I’ve seen you smile like nothing else could make you happier.”
I cocked my head. “Really? When?”
“When you’re playing with Emily. When she first sees and yells for you.” He laughed. “You get a look like I imagine you had on that boat.”
I was pleased but didn’t want to show it. Instead I said, “Potential. When you get to be as old as I am, potential is endlessly amazing. Children are nothing but pure potential.”
“That’s probably true, but there’s more to it.” Cyrus narrowed his eyes at me in concentration. “It’s motherhood, isn’t it? She probably reminds you of a child you had and who’s now probably old enough to be my great-grandmother. Or maybe with the guy whose death wrecked you?”
I stared at him, surprised both that he had picked up on how badly Andrew’s death had affected me and that he assumed I’d been someone’s mom.
Seeing the look on my face, he turned shame-faced. “Shit. Now I’ve stepped in it, reminding you of that guy and the kids you’ve had who’ve aged and died while you haven’t.”
I shook my head. “You’re way off base, Cyrus. I never had a child.”
He gave me an incredulous look. “Please. After all of these years, you never had a kid? There’s no way you’re the oldest virgin of all time, and there’s no way you could have mastered birth control that well. Especially not back in the dark ages when they were using sheep intestine.”
It was my turn to give him a look of disbelief. “Mastering birth control is pretty easy when you just can’t have children.”
His expression helped soothe my pain. He looked absolutely miserable. “I’m so sorry. I’m . . .” He trailed off. “I’m a stupid asshole.”
I gave him half a smile in acceptance of the apology. “Guys don’t normally think about stuff like that.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “That you can’t, I mean.”
I shrugged. “It is what it is. By now I’ve dealt with it.” With my usual coping method of repression and displacement. Very healthy. “The universe doesn’t want my unique blend of crazy genetics passed on.” I donned a fake smile. “Besides, can you see me as a mother? Not everyone has the instinct, you know.”
He saw through me. “Oh, I know. My ex is definitely missing that gene. But you’re not.”
I bit my lip but said nothing.
“I think you would have been a good mother,” he continued.
I ducked my head so he wouldn’t see what that meant to me. “Thanks.”
Neither of us seemed to know what to say next. What was there to say? I shook my head ruefully. “God, I won’t blame you if you want to cut all of this short. I won’t even blame you if you avoid me entirely after this glut of information.”
He chuckled. “I don’t want to avoid you.”
“Are you sure? In the space of one night you’ve found out I’ve got scary powers of invulnerability, can’t have children and apparently keep having bad sex, since I didn’t immediately list it in my life-changing happiness category.”
Oh. My. God. Why the hell did I just say that last part? My cheeks were actually burning with humiliation. And I never blush. This cinched it. I was going to have to do something to put my strange attraction to Cyrus to rest forever. I just had to figure out what that would be.
“And now you’re thinking I’m crazy,” I muttered. Maybe I was.
He met my gaze calmly, like I hadn’t said anything potentially humiliating. “That’s not what I’m thinking at all. I was actually thinking maybe it’s time I finally settled my curiosity about the one thing I’ve wondered since the day I met you.”
I shrugged. “Why not? This evening’s been strange and humiliating, so here are the answers you probably want to know: Yes, they’re real. And no, those rumors are not true, I wasn’t having an affair with that president, nor did I kill his mistress in a jealous rage and cover it up by making it look like she overdosed on pills. I never met either one of them.”
He shook his head, laughing softly. “None of that, though, thanks for the information. No, since I’ve met you, I’ve always wondered”—his voice dropped to a low, throaty growl—“what it would be like to kiss you.”
I stared at him, not sure I’d heard right. “Yeah, right. Because hearing about my lousy past is such a turn-on.”
“Maybe it is.”
He moved forward slightly, looming over me a bit, starting to invade my personal space—in a good way. My heart sped up and my breath quickened in anticipation.
He stared into my eyes and I felt like I was drowning in them; there was no way for me to look away. “When I first met you, I thought you were incredibly hot. You know that. Everyone thinks you’re incredibly hot. But you changed my mind with your attitude. So harsh, so angry. Always trying to lord your sex appeal over us. But right now you’re not wearing one of those over-the-top outfits. You’re talking about your lousy past, talking about a guy you loved and lost, which means you’re taking a chance and actually letting down a bit of that huge wall you always keep up. And you’re doing it around me.” He reached out with a hand to brush my hair away from my cheek, his fingertips tracing my jawline, tipping my face up to just the right angle. “That is a big turn-on.”
My heart was crashing in my chest. I didn’t know if he was playing me or not. But I knew one thing: I had to get this sexual tension out of the way so I could concentrate around him again. He had my entire world spinning.
More importantly, I wanted to satisfy my own curiosity of what it would be like to kiss him.
I moved forward, leaning forward just slightly to bring my lips closer to his. But I couldn’t close the gap. I wanted him to be the one to initiate the kiss, because he wanted to, not because I forced it on him. I just stood there, helpless, waiting to see what his next move would be. Would he kiss me or not? It was a strange experience for someone so usually in control.
He closed the distance. Lowering his mouth to mine, he brought his other arm around my waist to crush my body to his. I melted into him with a sigh of pleasure.
All of my senses were heightened by the contact. The sound of our quickened breathing was impossibly loud, the cotton of his shirt as my fingers tightened around it incredibly soft. The scent of him was indescribable yet would be forever burned into my brain as Cyrus. The taste of his lips and tongue against mine was faintly like cinnamon. His mouth was a firm pressure on mine, but yielding as well. All this mixed together into one forgone conclusion—there was no way in hell I was going to be able to concentrate around him now.
But then he was pulling away. I was involuntarily moving toward him, trying to follow. Stay with me, I practically pleaded. Make love to me. Show me how life-changing happiness feels.
“My phone,” he said against my mouth.
I pulled back and opened my eyes, reality rudely settling in. “What?”
He seized the distance I’d relinquished and moved away enough to fumble in his pocket. “My phone’s ringing. No one calls me at this number unless . . . That was quick.” He pulled the contraption out, and now I heard the tinny sound of some recorded song that someone other than me might recognize as more than screeching guitars and pounding drums. “Hey, Chad.”
“Cyrus, what the hell have you gotten me involved in?” the person on the other end of the line practically shrieked. I jumped at how close he sounded.
“Chad? What’s going on?”
The only response was a loud screech, one that caused Cyrus to drop the phone and me to back against the wall. It might have been my imagination, but I could swear a wisp of something curled up around the phone, like magical smoke. It went silent.
“What the hell?” I gasped.
“Can y
ou transport us over there?” Cyrus asked.
“If you know where we’re going.”
“I can track him.” He punched buttons on his phone, whispering something that sounded like an endless repetition of zeroes and ones. I recognized it as a techno mage spell, but I didn’t know enough about such magic to know what he was attempting.
“Coordinates.” He punched more numbers into the phone, and then showed me a tiny map with a dot on the display. “Can you go here?”
“It’s a good thing I always carry the right components for this. Hold on.” I nodded, pulled a small leather pouch from my pocket and began to cast.
We disappeared from the street and appeared again in a small, cramped apartment. Chad lay at its center, body still twitching, a chair half-under him like he was sitting and got knocked down. His eyes were focused hazily on the ceiling, almost like he was looking through it. There was a burned smell, something metallic, and a cell phone was still clutched in his hand.
There was also a weird feeling in the room, and every hair on my body stood on end. It took me a moment, but I finally recognized what the sensation was: the spiritual residue from a very powerful spell. The room still felt charged, which meant the magic had just been cast.
I knelt next to Chad, feeling for a pulse. He still had one, though it was erratic.
“Can you hear me?” I called.
He didn’t blink, just continued to stare up at the ceiling.
I closed my eyes and tried to work a tracing spell; the magic here was so freshly evoked that I might be able to follow it back to its caster. What I got for my trouble was the annoying feeling of trying to recall something just beyond my grasp, like trying to remember the name of an old aunt you were introduced to at a family party twenty years ago.
“Someone’s running interference,” I realized. I said to Cyrus, “A confusion spell. Someone besides the first magic-user is helping. He’s making sure no one finds out who’s casting these spells. It’s someone very powerful.”
Cyrus frowned. “More powerful than you?”
I was uncomfortable admitting it, but: “Maybe.”
Standing up from where he knelt by his friend, Cyrus pointed to the computer. “Well, they might be able to block us magically, but let’s hope they can’t hacker-wise. Chad was on his computer when this happened. He must have stumbled across something he wasn’t meant to see. Let’s hope whatever magic took him didn’t damage his system beyond repair.”
He picked up the boxy rectangle that was the blond-haired man’s computer and gave it a glance. “It might take a bit of time and work, but I just might be able to find out what he wasn’t meant to see.”
There came a pounding on the apartment door, and Cyrus and I both jumped. “Circuit breaker popped again,” we heard from the other side. “Chad? You home? I need to come in to fix it.” We heard the jangling of keys.
Cyrus yanked the computer free of its cords. “Get us out of here now!” he whispered.
I nodded and worked the spell. We were disappearing just as an older man came through Chad’s door . . . and then we were back in the building of the Elite Hands of Justice headquarters, standing next to the elevator bank downstairs.
We stood in silence for a moment, not sure of what to say next. Everything had happened so fast.
“I’ll see what I can do with this,” Cyrus said, indicating the computer with a slight lift.
“I’ll go back to my bar, see if anyone comes in. Maybe they’ll have information,” I said. “You never know when someone’s going to decide to brag or have heard someone else bragging.”
He nodded. “I’ll let you know if I get anywhere.”
“I’ll do the same.”
But neither of us left. We seemed to be silently circling the kiss and trying to figure out the best way to respond to it.
“Weird way to end the night, huh?” Cyrus finally said.
“Weird ending for a weird night,” I agreed quickly.
“Yeah.” Cyrus cleared his throat. “Just so you know, Fantazia . . . it exceeded expectations.”
My heart sped up. “Oh?” I said noncommittally.
“Yes, and it made me curious about other things.”
But before he could say anything else, the elevator doors dinged open. Wesley stood there. As soon as he saw me, his face changed to a mask of mixed hurt and pity. “Fantazia—”
“I’ve got to go,” I said quickly. “See you, Cyrus.” And I teleported myself home as fast as I could.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
It seemed prudent to avoid my father for a bit after my meltdown. Heck, I needed to avoid all the members of the EHJ. God knows Wes probably told Lainey about what had happened. If he told Lainey, chances are good that she told Selena and Mindy, her two best buddies. And if Lainey told Mindy, Mindy definitely told Paul, being one of those women who feels the need to tell her husband everything. One of them probably told Toby, who probably turned around and told his boyfriend the politician, which meant chances were good the whole United States government knew I’d cried because Daddy replaced me. Granted, I wasn’t likely to meet any of the government, and I doubted they really cared, but I didn’t look forward to walking back into EHJ headquarters and getting looks of pity. Better to let a little time pass, let the heroes get wrapped up in their squabbles and their crazy villains of the week and have all thoughts of me go away. Just like usual.
I wasn’t sure how to act around Cyrus either. We’d shared that hot kiss at the end of a very bizarre and emotionally trying day. Maybe we’d both been a bit out of our heads, in our own particular dramas, and now that a little time had passed we would both feel a bit awkward. Or maybe we had just gotten the sexual tension out of our systems and could move forward as uninvolved acquaintances. At least, I assumed he felt one of those two ways. He hadn’t spoken to me since that night and it had been a few weeks.
I was sure he’d been busy. He was supposedly working on that computer of Chad’s, trying to unlock what exactly it was the poor guy saw before his brain got fried and his magic stolen; unsurprisingly it had been the exact same type of attack as took the Brothers of Power. And I’m sure if the EHJ needed someone extra for one of their battles he was called out of his hidey hole to go play the big hero, just as he seemed to enjoy these days. But we were supposed to be working this case together, damn it. Shouldn’t he have come to my bar by now to discuss our next move?
Okay, I’ll admit it. If I was really that into the case, I’d have hauled my little bum down to headquarters and barged right in. I wanted the magic thieves caught, sure, mostly for the sake of Emily. But this was really more about whatever was going on between myself and Cyrus. While I don’t have a lot of use for romance, I like it when a guy chases me. I like it when a kiss isn’t enough and he has to come back begging for more. On a rare occasion, I’d submit. I like to be the one with all the power. Throughout my past, it’s always been like that. This time, things just didn’t seem to be adding up.
I didn’t sit around on my hands and just wait for him to come back, though. I don’t wait for any man when it comes to business; never have, never will. I did a little investigating my way. I listened closer at the bar, to the whispers and the rumors. There still wasn’t much to go on, but an increasing number of stories were turning up of magic-users being attacked. This put me in a unique position. Just like usual, the lesser mages began coming to me for help. I did what they couldn’t with wards of protection, magical amulets and the like, all in return for their help. Now they were the ones scouring the city, tracking down rumors and innuendo, going to the sites of the attacks and trying to find the pattern.
Cyrus calls himself lazy? I’ve got him beat. But I get results.
Unfortunately, whoever was casting the confusion spell was doing a damn good job. The attacks were virtually untraceable; it was also impossible to find out where all of the power and the will were going. It had to go somewhere, but I’d be damned if I could figure out where. Seemingly n
othing was being done with that power, so they were doing it for no apparent reason. All I was coming up with was these few facts: Someone was casting the magic of the attacks. Someone else—definitely a separate entity—was covering it up. I could only hope that Cyrus was further along. Of course, I wouldn’t know because he hadn’t come to see me and I was too stubborn to go to him. Especially not at EHJ headquarters.
Nope, I wasn’t going to the EHJ. Not now. I couldn’t bear to hear another stammered apology from the Reincarnist about how he’s forced to live multiple lives with multiple families. I know he feels guilty, but it seems more guilt at not caring as much as he should, like he knows he should regret hurting me more than he does. Not just me either, but all of my other half siblings. My father gets a fresh start every time. The rest of us don’t.
Intellectually I understand where he’s coming from. Hell, truth be told, maybe I’m a bit jealous that he gets an easy way out. He gets to age and die and start over again without any links to his past except his intellectual expertise. I don’t get that luxury. I have to remember everything that’s happened over my long life, and that includes Andrew, the guy I loved and couldn’t save, and Victor, the guy I loved that couldn’t handle my never growing old—those and every single other person I let into my heart only for them to inevitably leave.
My father, too. It’s a simple fact that with each passing life I become less and less of a family member and more and more just someone my father met a long time ago. Over the years, as his appearance and personality change, he becomes less and less my father and more of a guy I kind of knew way back when. If only that stopped those times where the little girl in me rises to the surface and, seeing that Daddy has moved on with his new family, just wants him to notice her again. He’s all I’ve got. I’ve lived so long there’s no one else left. The Reincarnist, no matter how forgetful or removed, is at least some link to the past. He sort of cared once.