I held my tongue as long as I could, which was basically long enough to swallow my saliva and take a breath. “Where the hell are we? And why aren’t Hellion and the others here?” I locked my trembling knees and ran a hand over my face. “You need to tell me you didn’t abandon him to fight your fight alone, Micah.” Silence. “Where is Hellion? Answer me before I go Justice Dealer on your ass and provoke you into lighting up.”
He spun on his knees. His face blazed with holy light, his eyes the colors of rich cognac in the sunshine. Rising to his elevated height of seven-plus feet, he towered over me. “Did I leave him?” He pursued me slowly as I backed away from him. “I did. Do you want to know why, Madeleine Niteclif, last of her line?”
The wall crept up on me, stopping my retreat with jarring force.
He stopped in front of me and leaned down.
I held my ground and went toe-to-toe with him. “There’s not a reason good enough.” My voice shook with rage.
“I’ve waited for you for over fourteen hundred years. You were the reason I fell to Earth, so enamored was I of being your familiar and becoming part of the revered justice that was dealt in this world. My divine nature is to determine paths, both those to come and those already taken, so I would be useful. But that’s not the only reason. I saw you, a glimpse of you in the Creation Sphere, and it was enough. I wanted you, Maddy, enough to become Nephilim. I—” he pounded his chest, “—I want to father the next line of Niteclifs.”
“The next line of Niteclifs?” My words sounded pulled, like I was working with not the English language but instead with cooled taffy—slow, difficult, labored.
“Here is what we didn’t finish due to Agares’s arrival. You are the One True Niteclif, evidenced by your Evolution.”
“I am.”
“As an only child, Madeleine, you have no siblings or heirs of the same bloodline.”
“No, I don’t.”
“As such, it is your duty to bear the next generation of Niteclifs. To facilitate your breeding, you are releasing pheromones that are drawing men to you.”
“Wait just a damned minute here!” I started, but Micah wasn’t finished.
“Furthermore, your child, a son, is destined to take over the High Council by force, displacing and killing the current ruler. There will be war and internal conflict, but your line will emerge victorious and will continue to be Justice Dealers for all known time.”
“I don’t want any of this. I made my choice when I chose Hellion. Don’t you understand that?” I sidled away from him, sorely tempted to knock the holy shit out of the messenger. “And I don’t want kids for a while, a long while—as in maybe never. And what about the other prophecy?”
“It’s been fulfilled,” Micah said.
“No, it hasn’t. I chose Hellion, remember? Time stopped and I knew he was the one. And Odin said we’re supposed to have an epic love.” I clutched his sleeve and pulled on his arm fiercely as he tried to turn away from me. “It hasn’t had time to happen yet. I just…I just… Doesn’t any of this matter to you?”
“Your playing field has just been opened up, Maddy. Yahweh’s edict trumps those of his Nephilim and their finite kingdoms.” He pried my hand from his arm and flung it away. “You don’t have to pick from only the two men anymore. You’ve served your purpose for the first prophecy, setting the new leader into place and putting into motion those things that must come to pass over the next hundred years. This is from the source of all gods, and it must be adhered to. I’m sorry.” He started to walk away and it triggered something violent in me.
“Don’t you walk away from me, you son of a bitch!” I took off across the room and, for the second time, performed a successful flying tackle. We went to the floor in a flailing tangle of limbs as we pushed and shoved and, okay, there was a little hair pulling, until I pulled my signature move and grabbed him by the balls.
He roared and I swear the windows shook. “Release me!”
“Uh-uh. No way. Not until you tell me what this means.” I squeezed a little tighter and he grinned, setting me back. I wasn’t sure what to do with a sadist.
“You truly want to know what it means.” His eyes lit up with that glorious internal light, and he said, “One kiss and I’ll prove to you what I’m saying.”
“I’m not kissing y—mph!”
He homed in on my mouth like a missile and struck just that fast. He kissed me fiercely, all teeth, lips and tongue. He was everywhere.
I was lost, confused at my primal desire to respond. I closed my eyes and raised a hand to Micah’s face, my fingers sliding along his stubbled jaw. Consciously and subconsciously I recognized that this wasn’t my lover’s face. That was all it took. I pushed away from him, startled at the raw arousal I felt between my legs. I scrambled to my feet and glared at him.
“You sorry son of a bitch.” My chest heaved, and I rubbed my lips without thinking.
“You liked it.” His grin was all male pride. Micah was grace personified as he rose, the sun picking up highlights in his hair and—what the hell? His shadow showed an outline of enormous wings.
My mind blanked completely. “Stand still.” Tentative steps carried me around him in a wide arc, disrupting the sunshine and chasing his shadow away. I stepped forward and, with only my fingertips, touched his back. His shoulders twitched but nothing else happened. There were no lumps, bumps or oddities that accounted for what I’d seen. Shaking my head I stepped back. This fascination had to stop. I floundered about as I mentally hunted for my anger. It was important that I capitalize on the tools at hand, and anger was handy.
“If you don’t help me find Hellion right this second, I’m walking out that door and leaving you alone. I’ve found my way around this city before and I’ll do it again.”
“Let me explain one thing and then I’ll take you back to the house.”
“You’ve got sixty seconds.” I looked down at my watch. “Go.”
He shrugged. “You have to produce the next heir to the Niteclif legacy, and more than one would be beneficial. The pheromone you are releasing will increase in strength the longer you serve. This pheromone will draw males to you. They will desire to mate and bond with you, though they won’t understand why they feel pulled as they do. You must provide an heir.”
“Fine. I’ve got Hellion. We’re happy to fuck like sheep, er, rabbits. It’s taken care of.” I had completely forgotten to keep time. “Can you Ascend now?”
“No, Maddy. I told you. I’ve been waiting for you. I volunteered for the job before I fell. I’m the man who will father your child.”
The last thing I remembered was thinking it would be great if it was soft landing, because I was going down and out.
I woke up with Micah holding me across his lap and gently patting my face. “Ah, there you are. You were out longer than I would have suspected, though I knew it would be a shock.”
“If you don’t get your hands off of me, I’m going to elbow you in your baby makers and there won’t be any further need for this discussion.”
He helped me sit up and, when I managed that, to stand.
“Take me home. I’m not discussing this with you until we have the plan for Agares agreed upon and implemented.” I walked a few tentative steps away and turned back to face Micah. “You will not, under any circumstance, relay this information to anyone. Do you understand me? If you don’t respect me enough for this, just go now. I will not allow you to hurt anyone in my inner circle by starting some kind of competition between them. I demand we stay focused on the tasks at hand. We’ll sort this out…” I wanted to cry. I wanted to go home. But most of all, I wanted Hellion.
“Maddy, I—”
“Take me home, Micah, if you want the continued protection of my man and his resources. Did you hear me? My man.”
“One thing,” he interjected stubbornly.
“You had your ‘one thing’ and that’s all I’m willing to give you at this point.”
He shook his he
ad and stood firm. “One more thing and we’ll go. You must know that the pheromone works on all men, but specifically supernatural creatures.”
“Son of a bitch. That’s why I’ve been getting the weird reactions from men. Okay, how do I turn it off?”
“I told you. You either bond to a single soul, and it must be a good and true bond, or you get pregnant and form the same, or similar, bond with the child.”
“That’s it?” I demanded. “All this magic mumbo jumbo and what it boils down to is a bond and a baby, or a baby and a bond?” My voice had risen with each word until I was yelling.
“Let’s get you home.” Micah held out his hand.
“Then you humor me and let me reiterate that you will tell no one, no one, about this. I will see you cut free and left defenseless, Micah. It may not be my first instinct to abandon someone in need, but I’ll do it this time.” Even if I begin to fade. The chill in my voice was cold enough to produce frost.
He nodded.
I took his hand like I was handling shit. “Now take me home.”
The master bedroom was empty when we arrived. I ran to the window that looked down on the front of the house and found the lawn and drive littered with police vehicles. Shit. I looked over my shoulder at Micah, who was examining the bed. “Where’s Hellion?”
“I’m not sure.”
“If those wraith things took him, I’ll go to Sheol myself and get him back,” I snarled at him, “so figure it out.” I turned back to the window and watched the activity. “We need to get out of here before the police find us up here.”
“Too late,” said a voice from the doorway.
I whipped around and found Inspector Tranter leaning against the doorframe. “Something you want to tell me, Ms. Niteclif?”
“No, but I’ve a question for you. What’s happened to my…Mr. Markalon? Is he here?” My voice quivered and I hated it. It felt like that alone revealed a couple of the cards in my hand despite my best efforts to keep things close to my chest.
Micah moved up next to me and pulled me close to his side, and it was probably the worst thing he could have done. Tranter’s eyes became hyper-focused as he watched us together and the wheels began to turn.
He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes, tapping the case before pulling one out.
“Please don’t smoke in the house.” It wasn’t my house, but I knew Hellion was fairly health-conscious and wouldn’t appreciate it.
The inspector tucked the cigarette in his mouth but only played with the lighter, rolling it about his stubby fingers. He spoke around the cigarette with practiced ease. “So what do you suppose has happened to Mr. Markalon, Mr.…?” His gaze roamed over Micah with clear curiosity, assessing him from head to toe. An eye twitched when he got to Micah’s bare feet.
“I truly don’t know, Inspector,” Micah answered. He was totally calm.
“Want to tell me what happened?”
I stepped in, determined to stick as close to the truth as possible. It would leave less to sort out later. “We were in the library discussing…Mr. Markalon’s affairs, when the sound of another explosion rang up the stairs. Mr. Markalon ran downstairs and…” I choked up, “I…I… There was this man, he was standing in the doorway and they began to fight. I was, um, taken to a safe room to avoid the conflict. Then you arrived and I have no idea what happened to Hellion in all the flurry of activity.” My voice broke and I pinched my lips together to keep the sob from breaking loose. I was terrified to lose it in front of this mundane officer as he trespassed much too close to our secrets. I just wanted him and his people to leave. All of them.
“So where is this safe room then?” Tranter asked and I watched as his eyes surveyed the room.
“It’s inside one of the closets,” I answered stiffly.
Inspector Tranter strode to the closets and knocked on each door, swung them open and shut, visually appraised the contents. “Mr. Markalon appears to like nice things,” he said snidely. He slapped a door and I jumped. “Seems like a normal wooden door to me. What made you think you’d be safe here, Ms. Niteclif?”
“Hellion said I would be.”
The inspector turned to Micah. “What’s your name again?”
“Micah Niphal.”
“You local?”
A snort escaped me before I could stop it and Inspector Tranter looked at me hard. “Something funny?”
“No, sorry. It’s just Micah’s home is quite far from here and I thought you’d recognize the fact he’s got no accent.” I was grabbing at straws.
“True,” Micah responded before he drew me even closer.
I stiffened at his touch and Tranter’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. I patted Micah’s arms before I wiggled out of them. Each man wore a disgruntled look. “What?” I demanded. “I’m declared to Hellion. I appreciate Micah’s affection, but it doesn’t feel right, and I definitely don’t want you getting the wrong idea, Inspector Tranter.”
“And what idea would that be, Ms. Niteclif?”
“That there is anything untoward happening between Micah and myself.”
“Fair enough.” He tucked his lighter back in his shirt pocket, the unlit cigarette bobbing as he talked. “So where should I begin to look for Mr. Markalon?” Tranter moved to look out the bedroom window. “Anywhere you might suggest?”
“He couldn’t be more than a few moments away,” Micah answered sincerely, and that was when I remembered he couldn’t lie if directly questioned. He could be vague, but that was it. Crap.
“And why is that, Mr. Niphal?”
“The fight occurred and we disappeared, but he wouldn’t have left Ms. Niteclif alone for long.”
I sighed in relief. “No, he wouldn’t have left me.”
“Yet you both abandoned him.”
“It wasn’t like that!” I said sharply. “I wasn’t any use to him in the fight, so I wanted to make sure I wasn’t a distraction—”
“And that,” Tranter said with a smile, “is where your story has its largest whole.”
“How so?”
“Because the house staff claims you weren’t here.”
I sagged a little, unsure how to get out of this.
“She’s telling the truth.”
I spun around and sprinted for the doorway as Hellion walked through. He opened his arms to me and I leapt into them, so damned grateful to feel them tighten around me. He whispered into my hair, “Are you all right?”
“You’re here, thank the gods you’re here. I’m fine.” I ran my hands over his face, kissed his eyes, his nose, his lips. “I’m just fine. You?”
He set me down without an answer and continued into the room. I stuck to him like static to polyester and he reached back and took my hand, lacing our fingers together.
“Inspector Tranter, is there something I can do for you?” Hellion asked, his tone dismissive.
“I’d like to speak to each of you alone,” the inspector answered. His hands clenched and unclenched before he wiped them on his pants and started the process all over again.
Hellion looked at him with that cool indifference backed by money and the caste system.
Tranter’s jaw knotted up. He drew himself up to his full height. When he realized I had picked up his tells, he shoved his hands into his pockets and froze. Apparently we made the inspector a little uncomfortable. Considering the recent events where Hellion had pulled lust out of him while stealing his memories, it only made sense that his subconscious warned him away from us.
Hellion’s arm tightened around my shoulders and his nostrils flared. “We’ll be glad to provide individual statements as soon as my solicitor arrives. Until then, we’re under no obligation as we’ve not been charged with anything and I’ve not reported a crime. Am I correct?”
“There’s reasonable suspicion, wouldn’t you say?” Tranter’s low rumble was malicious. He reached up and snatched the cigarette from his lips, crumbling it in his fist. Tobacco leaves floated
to the rug and the tang of the natural tannins was pungent. “You’ve been violently attacked twice in as many days and in one of London’s finest neighborhoods.” He shook his head and dropped the paper and filter to the floor, wiping his hands together. “I’d say that’s grounds for me to question what’s going on.”
Hellion’s voice was cold enough to chap skin when he answered. “The fact that I have a housekeeping staff does not give you cause to create unnecessary work for them.” He pointedly looked at the cigarette remains and slowly raised his gaze back to the inspector, arching a brow. “I’ll kindly ask you to pick up after yourself on your way out.”
I looked up in time to see Tranter’s jerky movements as he swiped up the cigarette papers and intentionally ground the leaves into the rug as he strode to the door.
He paused, jaw clenched and back rigid as he clutched the door handle. “Be sure you use your time to coordinate your statements. Assure your solicitor I’ll be looking for the weak spots, Mr. Markalon.” He slammed the door behind him. Furious footsteps echoed through the marble hallway, and I could hear his booming commands ordering officers off the second and third floors of the house.
“Baby,” I whispered into his chest as I wrapped my arms around him. He bent to kiss my neck and I felt him smile against my skin.
“You’re okay, then?”
I nodded, breathing in the warm scent of his skin and the familiar spice of his cologne, both of which I equated to comfort and safety.
Stroking my head, he lifted his face and I wasn’t sure to whom he spoke when he asked, “So where did you two go? I came back to look for you, but you were gone.” He was so tired he was swaying on his feet.
“I never got the chance to ask where we were, so I’m not really sure.” I looked over my shoulder. “Micah?”
“I tried to take her to my home in Italy, but we were somehow redirected to my home here.” He shrugged, unconcerned at the cosmic blip.
Vengeance: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 3 Page 10