I made a point of not sleeping next to him, but I assumed he planned to do most of his actual sleeping on the couch. It had to be more comfortable than the thin office carpet.
He turned sharply as I walked in. His eyes looked dark to me where his face lay partly in shadow. Only one florescent tube still worked by the window on the far side of the room.
“What is this shit?” he growled. “Are you fucking with me right now, Allie?”
Sighing, I folded my arms.
It crossed my mind that maybe the walk up here hadn’t allowed him to cool off, but had instead given him time to get himself even more worked up.
“Are you going to explain this asinine plan of yours?” he said, still glaring at me. He folded his arms as well, mirroring my pose as he stared across the room at me. “Or should I save you the time and just tell you you’re fucking insane now?”
Clicking at him, I shook my head.
“We can’t let him reach China,” I said.
“Dragon? What makes you think he’s even going to China, Esteemed Bridge?”
I gave him a level look, my expression flat.
Studying my eyes, he exhaled in irritation, conceding my words with a wave of his hand.
“Fine. Why can’t we let him get to China?” he said.
“Revik’s in China.”
Dalejem’s gaze narrowed, studying mine openly. He looked about to ask me something, then shut his mouth, as if thinking better of it.
Frowning, he shook his head, clicking, then looked at me again.
“You think he’s going after Revik?” His tone grew more subdued. Confusion reached his words as he turned over what I’d said. “Why? Why would he do this?”
“I don’t know why. And yes, I do think that.”
“So why wouldn’t you just tell the others?” he said, exasperated.
“We have a mole, Jem,” I said, giving him an incredulous look. “I can’t tell them everything. You know that. And if I do this, I can’t have them involved. ‘Dori would understand that. He won’t like it because of the risk, but he’ll know why I did it.”
“I highly fucking doubt that––”
“Well, maybe you don’t know me and Balidor as well as you think.”
Dalejem stared at me. As my words sank in, his jaw slowly clenched. I felt a coil of harder anger leave his light and flinched, more than a little shocked to feel jealousy there. Not a small amount of jealousy, either––enough that it coiled hotly through my light, pulling on me.
He didn’t give me a chance to comment on that, either.
“So you’re just going to leave?” he said, his voice colder. “Go after a telekinetic seer who already kicked both of our asses, Allie… without breaking a goddamned sweat, I might add.” Clenching his jaw, he seemed to be preventing himself from saying more. He threw up a hand. “Why the fuck do you need me there? Or is this meant to be some kind of suicide pact? Because that’s pretty kinky, love. Even for you.”
I rolled my eyes. “He didn’t kill us.” Seeing him about to explode on me again, I held up a hand. “He didn’t kill either of us, Jem. He could have. Easily… like you said. So he must not want us dead.”
Clicking harder under his breath, Dalejem gave me a disbelieving look.
“Alyson, you know damned well how meaningless that is. We have no idea why he didn’t kill us that time. You can’t extrapolate his motives from that, much less what he’s likely to do the next time we––”
“We’re not going to get ahead of Shadow this way!” I broke in angrily. “We’re not. You know it! You said as much the other day. Now Dragon’s out there, and we don’t know anything about what he wants, only that it has something to do with me and Revik. Brooks’ people have her behind a fucking wall… and you know there are still people in her government who would love any excuse to pull the trigger on Beijing. I have no way to warn Revik about either of those things––or to get him out of China before that thing tracks him there––or Brooks’ people bomb them back to the stone age!”
Feeling my throat close, I averted my gaze, tightening my shield.
I felt Dalejem’s light react to that, too.
“Look,” I said, taking a breath. “I can’t bring the whole group with me, even apart from the mole. We’re too conspicuous. And I need the majority of our people controlling the situation here. I need to go on my own. Now. The window is closing, Jem. I can feel it.”
Dalejem bit his lip, staring at my face. “How would you even find him? Dragon?”
“He told us how to find him!” I snapped. “Don’t pretend you don’t know that!”
Jem’s eyes grew even harder. “Wow. So your master plan is to do exactly what he asked of you. Dragon. A seer we know fuck-all about, other than the fact that he’s probably batshit insane. Oh, and he likes to rape you.”
Tightening his jaw when I flinched, he let his voice grow angrier.
“…That’s brilliant, Alyson. Fucking brilliant.”
Ignoring his sarcasm, I gestured a sharp assent. “He left that map for us to use. So let’s use it, damn it! We’re just wasting time here. Brooks won’t even see me. I suck at this kind of negotiation, and the infiltration is leading us in circles.”
Seeing the incredulous look returning to Dalejem’s face, I dropped my arms to my sides, making another sharp, frustrated gesture with one hand.
“I can’t bring anyone else,” I said. “Since I’m reasonably sure the mole probably isn’t you, given the amount of time I’ve spent in your light––” He let out an outraged laugh, but I kept talking. “––and you probably won’t let me go without tracking me down anyway, I thought I’d save us both the headache and just ask you to come with me, Jem.”
The anger in his expression hardened more.
I saw the wariness there, too.
“What makes you think the others won’t do the same?” he said. “Your people seem unlikely to let you simply ‘wander off,’ Esteemed Bridge. Mole or not.”
“They won’t be able to track me,” I said, giving him an impatient look.
“Not even brother Balidor?” he said, skeptical.
“Not even him.”
He let out a derisive snort. “Then what makes you think I could?”
I rolled my eyes, clicking at him in real annoyance. Seeing the inscrutable look coming to his eyes, I made a flowing motion towards his body, anger pulsing off my light.
“Kali told me,” I said. “Don’t even try giving me that ‘I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about’ crap, Jem. She said you’re some kind of tracker-savant––and that you and she deliberately built a link to me when I was a kid. She said you could find me anywhere. It’s partly why they recruited you.”
Dalejem shook his head, anger pulsing off his light. “She shouldn’t have fucking told you that,” he said. “Gaos.”
“Well, she did,” I said, gesturing an oh well at him. “And even if I could shield well enough to keep you out…” I swallowed, rethinking my words.
Then I decided fuck it and said it anyway, making a vague gesture with one hand in his general direction.
“I don’t want to,” I said. “All right? I want you to come with me. Is that clear enough?”
“You want me to come,” he said, his voice disbelieving. “To go visit your husband.”
Clicking at him angrily, I shook my head. “That’s not what this is.”
“Then what is it, Allie?” His green and violet eyes narrowed. “He left you. Remember? He left you, along with his own goddamned daughter.” Gesturing sharply, he clenched his jaw, real anger reaching his voice. “My head still fucking explodes whenever I think about this, so I’m sorry if I’m being overly blunt. But I don’t fucking get it, no matter what he tells himself about why. I didn’t even fucking believe it at first. I thought it had to be some op the two of you were running––”
I flinched, staring at him in real disbelief, but he kept talking.
“––But then he sta
rts fucking his way across Asia, opening his light to every unwilling who agrees to suck his cock––”
Wincing harder that time, I averted my gaze, tightening my hold on my light.
Seeing something in my face, he cut himself off, clicking sharper under his breath.
After he’d stared at the floor for a few seconds, his light exuded regret. Still avoiding my eyes, he gestured an apology, deliberately opening his light.
“Allie.” Subduing his voice, he sent me a softer pulse of light. “Allie, please don’t take this as me being deliberately cruel. I’m not going to deny I have my own feelings about this, but I’m trying to be kind. Honest, at least. Are you sure this isn’t just you looking for some excuse to go after him?”
I stared at him, feeling the pain in my chest worsen. “Do you want Dragon to kill him? Revik?”
Dalejem blinked, staring at me. Then his frown hardened. “I didn’t say that.”
“Then what the hell do you suggest we do? Just sit here?”
“I don’t know,” he said, raising his voice. “Maybe find a way to send him a fucking message, Alyson? Or some other slightly safer way to warn your ex-husband besides engaging directly with the sociopathic telekinetic who’s already obsessed with you?”
Pausing when I only stood there, not speaking, he exhaled.
“You have a mole, right?” he said, gruffer. “What makes you think Revik needs a warning by now? That person would have told his people, right?”
I gave him a direct look, clenching my jaw harder.
After a few seconds, understanding bled through his light.
“D’gaos… of course.” Shaking his head, he clicked at me, his voice holding that same understanding, but equal parts annoyance. “That fucking meeting. That was for him––Revik. You and brother Balidor staged that to transmit intel behind the lines.”
“Yes,” I said, impatient.
“And what?” Dalejem said. “It wasn’t enough?”
“He’s still in fucking China,” I said. “You heard the reports.”
“Maybe he knows something you don’t,” Dalejem retorted. “Did you ever think of that?”
“Of course I did.” I frowned, fighting impatience again. “But Revik doesn’t have the map, Jem. We do. The most he would know is that we’re probably going after Eddard. And Eddard’s location has changed at least a dozen times since we started this.”
Shaking my head, I let my voice grow cold.
“I’m going, okay?” I said. “Tomorrow. I’m not going to argue with you, Jem. I’m just telling you that I’m going. You can come with me or not.”
He stared at me, a confusion of emotions twisting his light.
I watched him think about my words, his anger worsening then ebbing, his face growing taut, then confused as he stared out the long window of the room.
Watching him look out at the beginnings of the sunset through that same window, I found myself thinking he almost looked sad.
“Come here,” he said, his voice gruff.
“Jem,” I said, clicking at him in annoyance.
“Come here, goddamn it,” he said, his voice harsher. “…Please.”
Rolling my eyes, I approached him. When he wrapped his arms around me, pulling me against him, I sighed, looking up to meet his gaze.
“You know,” I said. “The ‘goddamn it’ kind of negates the ‘please.’”
“Only for humans,” he said.
His voice remained distracted, his eyes studying mine as if he was only half-there. “I want to fuck now,” he said. “We’ll talk about this more after.”
“Jem,” I said. “Jesus. Can you just for once––”
He didn’t let me finish.
Lowering his head, he kissed me, gripping my hair in one hand and wrapping his other arm around my back. He didn’t wait, but moved with me at once, still kissing me as he steered me over to the couch. By the time we reached it, he was already yanking buttons open on my shirt, pulsing light at my chest as he brought me down roughly to my back.
His weight on me made my light react sharply, even before he sat up, yanking my pants down my legs once he had those unfastened, too.
Pain coiled through my lower belly from his light, shocking in its intensity, even as he opened more. I saw him watching my face as he did it.
His fingers slid inside me, his jaw hardening when I arched up against him.
“Open your fucking light,” he said, his voice rough.
“No,” I said, half a gasp as he slid his fingers deeper inside me.
“Why are you staying the Virgin Mary for him?” Anger pulsed out of his aleimi, even as his green eyes darkened. “Open your fucking light for me, Allie.”
I glared up at him. “No.”
“I’ll go with you if you open your light.”
I gave a half-laugh, staring at him in disbelief. “Wow. That is just… desperate, Jem.”
Instead of laughing, his dark, sculpted mouth hardened. His eyes caught the sunset light, flashing a near gold in the reflection from the window.
“I’m serious,” he said, his voice gruff. “If you want me to risk my neck––not only against Dragon but against your goddamned husband now––then I want more from you, Allie. A lot more.”
I stared up at him, speechless.
For those few seconds, I was sure I’d misheard him. Or maybe I was just waiting for the punchline, for him to laugh.
He didn’t.
His eyes narrowed as he watched me, verging on infiltrator-cold. He studied my face without moving, that clinical look sharpening in his violet ringed eyes.
“Why haven’t you ever asked me about him?” he said, blunt. “Revik?”
I frowned for real, averting my gaze. Shaking my head, I clicked my tongue. “Why the hell would I want to know anything about that, Jem?”
His took his fingers out of me and slid them into my hair, gripping me hard. He forced me to turn, to look at him.
“Ask me, Allie,” he said. “Ask me about him.”
“No,” I said, angry. I pushed off his hand. “Why are you being such an asshole right now?”
“You don’t want to know what he was like? When we fucked? You’ve never seen him like that before, have you? When he’s been penetrated like that?” Pain shivered through his light. His fingers and hands tightened on me. “Gods. It’s unbelievable, Allie. Mind-blowingly good. You don’t know what you’re missing.”
“Fuck off,” I said, meaning it that time. “Seriously, Jem. What is your damage right now?”
“He got so submissive, Allie. So, so submissive.” He let his pain coil through me, letting out a low gasp when I tried to free my wrist. Watching my eyes, he caressed my face with one hand. “…So goddamned open. He’d open all over. He gave me his light. His hands would fucking open, his body, every part of him. He’d turn into a fucking child, Allie. I’ve never had anyone do that with me before. Never. He’d make this sound. Jesus Christ…”
His pain worsened. He closed his eyes, pressing against me.
“Gaos.” Pain reached his voice. “I never lasted as long with him as I wanted. Never. Not once. I’d fucking lose it every time.”
I shoved at his shoulder, feeling my chest clench, pain sliding into my heart.
“Get off me, Jem. Now.”
“He gave unbelievable head. Unbelievable. He’d open his light that same way. He’d service me like it was a fucking religious experience for him––”
“Get off me, Jem!”
When he didn’t move, or let go of me, I hit him, hard, in the chest.
“Get off me,” I snarled. “Now, Jem! Right the fuck now!”
That time he moved, sitting up slowly.
I shoved his leg and arm out of my way as I climbed up off the couch. His eyes followed me as I regained my feet, his expression unreadable. I was already fastening up my shirt, my jaw hard as I got ready to leave the room.
“He’s doing that for someone right now, Alyson,” he said, cold.
“Right now, he’s lying there, his light open, making that fucking sound––”
I didn’t think. Turning, I swung, without even taking a breath.
I caught him in the jaw with a cross I’d been practicing for a few years by then.
The hit was solid. Fast enough and hard enough that he didn’t get his hands up in time.
He gasped in pain.
I’d already started to back away from the couch when he leapt to his feet, catching hold of my wrists before he yanked me towards him. I tried to free my arm, maybe to hit him again, but he lowered his mouth to mine, kissing me hard, hard enough for me lose my breath.
I don’t know why I kissed him back. I really don’t.
A few minutes later, he groaned against my mouth.
His light opened, making me gasp as I felt it coil hotly into mine. His hands and fingers tightened as he fought to get me to open my light in return––pulling on me until I pushed his aleimi sharply away.
He brought me roughly back to the couch, and I’m not sure why I let that happen, either. Then he was unbuckling his belt, one-handed, spreading my legs with his, panting as he held me down with his other hand. Once he got his cock free, he entered me without preamble, arching all the way inside.
He found the notch and extended, pain expanding off his light.
He let out a low cry once he had me there.
That time, the emotion in his voice shocked me, even as it caused me to gasp.
“Open your fucking light, Allie,” he groaned, looking down at me. “Goddamn it, stop hiding from this.”
I bit my lip, shaking my head. “I’m not hiding, Jem––”
“Bullshit,” he growled. “You say you’re doing this for him? That’s bullshit, Alyson. He’s nothing but a fucking excuse. You don’t want to feel this. You don’t want to feel anything right now. You sure as hell don’t want to admit he’s not coming back… or that you might actually give a shit about me, regardless of how you feel about your mate.”
Tears came to his eyes, shocking me again. He arched into me, hard, his pain worsening when I shook my head.
“Open goddamn it. Once. Just once. Let me help you with this.”
I clenched my jaw, looking up at him.
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