A Life Of Shadows

by Kristen Banet

  “You aren’t going to teach me star charts and shit?” She narrowed her eyes on him, and he shook his head.

  “No,” he chuckled, and she clenched her jaw at the sound. Fucking god damn it. He just had to be slightly attractive after torturing her. “I think you’re fine.”

  “So, two weeks,” Sawyer sighed. “I finished in two weeks. Thank fuck.”

  “For now.” Quinn walked over and used his magic to have the earth devour her fire. She sighed and watched her hard work disappear. She didn’t like the ‘for now,’ but she wasn’t going to let that dampen her happiness that she wouldn’t be playing in the dirt for a little while.

  “Can I go back to the house?” She asked, looking at the sun that had come up.

  “Actually, I wanted to show you something,” he said, holding a hand out to her. She grabbed it and let him pull her up. “Follow me.”

  “Where are we going?” She asked as they walked on a trail she had never used.

  “You’ll see,” was all he told her.

  They walked for nearly thirty minutes before she heard the water. The property had a stream running through it, that much she knew, but what she saw wasn’t what she’d expected.

  “This is our swimming hole.” He waved to it and then started pulling off his shirt. “You can come out here whenever you want. I figured you would like to know about it.”

  She eyed the area with barely restrained happiness. A couple of streams fed a clear, deep-water pond. One of the streams went over a rock face, making small waterfalls. The same rock face looked like the perfect place to jump in from and had several dry rocks that were probably amazing to lay out on.

  “Is this where the guys disappear to sometimes?” She asked as Quinn unbuttoned his pants.

  “Yeah.” Then he dropped his pants and she let out a strangled noise. He wasn’t wearing underwear. Of course, he wasn’t. “I’m going swimming, but you can keep standing there like a weirdo if you want.”

  With that, the beautiful nude ass of Quinn’s dove into the water. Fuck. She watched him surface, his long hair out of its ponytail. He stopped paying attention to her as his wolves jumped in after him. She turned back to the woods and wondered if maybe she should just make a run for it. Life was officially just too much. Screw it all, she was going to combust if she didn’t figure out what to do with her… needs.

  She looked back to the water, where Quinn was wrestling with Shade in a shallower portion. His head came up from the activity, and he met her eyes. His hair cascaded around his face, slick and perfectly straight from the water. He was just stunning, and her heart tried to stop when he smiled.

  “You can head back if you want, but I thought you might like a day being lazy.” He straightened his spine, and she took a deep breath at the sight of water dripping down his chest. He would probably kill her if he knew she found him attractive. The fact that he was being nice to her today was already throwing her for a loop, and then he got naked.

  “I, uh, don’t have a swimsuit,” she called back, shrugging. “I’ll just go lay in the sun on one of the rocks.”

  “Whatever works,” Quinn watched her walk over to the rocks. She turned her back to him when she got there. She didn’t want a farmer’s tan, so she pulled off her shirt and looked down at her pants. Did she dare? She considered it and finally undid them and slid them off. She was fine with a tan in her underwear, she could even it out later in the summer.

  When she turned back around, Quinn was still watching her, his eyes more intense than before. She ignored that and laid back on one of the large, smooth rocks next to the small waterfalls. She let the sun warm her, and, soon enough, her eyes were closing a little. Now this definitely made up for the shitty morning of being dragged out of bed.

  She didn’t pay attention to the time, rolling over when she felt like she was getting too warm. She frowned when something blocked her sun.

  “Well, ain’t this a sight?”

  She sighed heavily at Elijah’s voice.

  “Drink it in,” she said quickly. “It’s the closest to naked you’ll ever see me.”

  “I highly doubt that, but we all have our delusions,” Elijah chuckled, and she rolled her eyes behind her eyelids. “Why aren’t you swimming?”

  “No bathing suit,” she told him, wiggling her butt for him to notice the simple grey boy shorts she had on. Stupid thing to do.

  “Shake it a little more, I need material for my spank bank,” Elijah joked, toeing her butt. She turned her head and looked up at him out of the corner of her eye.

  “That’s disgusting.”

  “You should be happy I’m being honest about it.” Elijah grinned down at her and she eyed him. He was only wearing boxer briefs and his fucking black cowboy hat. She filed that image away into her own ‘spank bank’. She put it right next to the image of Quinn’s nude ass.

  “Forgive me if I don’t give you the same curtesy,” she laughed, rolling over onto her back again. She put her arms behind her head and blatantly checked him out. He lifted his arms away from his body and let her. He even did a turn for her. How kind of him.

  “How’s that?” He winked at her, and she gave him a thumbs-up.

  “Perfect, all filed away.” She grinned at him, and he bowed to her.

  “Now about this bathing suit problem.” His grin turned devious, and she narrowed her eyes. “I think you are sorely mistaken, if you think you need one.”

  She tried to scramble away from him, but was too slow. She screamed as she soared through the air and fell into the cold water.

  “Ass!” She roared when she surfaced, glaring at the now hysterical Elijah. He turned and shook his own and she glared at it. That fucking bubble-butt mother fucker.

  She was climbing back onto her rock when she was hit in the face with the last shred of clothing he had on. He laughed as she pulled them off her head and tossed them into the pond.

  “No!” He tried to sound dismayed, but the laughter in his voice was obvious. She stood up and stole his cowboy hat next, while he wasn’t paying attention. He turned to her and she kept her eyes on his face. Had to keep looking at the face. “Now, you wait a damn minute.”

  She grinned at his more serious tone now that she had the hat. She took off, climbing farther up the rocks as he tried to grab her. She put it on her wet hair and listened to him fire off a string of curses that would have made a sailor blush.

  “You ruin my hat, and I’ll end you, little lady,” he growled.

  “Try me, tough guy,” she taunted, leaving the cowboy hat on her wet head.

  She’d forgotten about Quinn during the exchange with Elijah, so she was surprised when the hat was stolen from her head while Elijah grabbed her ankles. She was pulled down from her spot into his arms. She caught a glimpse of Quinn jumping down next to them as Elijah threw her back into the pond.

  “Damn it!” She gasped for air when she got back to the surface. “Cheaters!”

  She stopped talking the moment her eyes cleared though, eyeing the man meat on the rocks. Elijah was grinning, and she inadvertently got a look at the cock that screwed her when they met—and not the way she had wanted to be screwed. Quinn brushed dirt off the hat and handed it back to Elijah, who hung it carefully on a low hanging branch.

  Both were just as great from the front as they had been from the back.

  “What’s wrong, Sawyer? Cat got your tongue?” Elijah dove into the water after that and Quinn followed.

  Fuck, now she was stuck with them between her and the sunning rock she’d claimed. She was thirsty as fuck, and that wasn’t helping her. She needed about three hours of alone time, if she wanted to make it through the day without losing her mind. She also needed to get the fuck out of the water, she realized, as Elijah swam over to her.

  She dove down and let her feet touch the bottom. She pushed off, going underneath Elijah before he could grab her. She stayed under until she reached the rock and climbed out as quickly as possible.

  “R
unning scared, darling?” Elijah called over to her. She looked over her shoulder at him and raised an eyebrow.

  “I’m going to sun-dry, and you are going to leave me alone. How’s that?”

  “Whatever you say, little lady,” he chuckled, splashing water at Scout, who jumped in to play some more.

  Sawyer laid back out on the rock, letting Shade lay next to her. He must have been out of the water for a little while, because he was already dry. She ran a hand over his fur absentmindedly.

  “May I?” Quinn’s voice cut into her peace, and she opened one eye to look at him. He was pointing at the rock. “Lie up here and dry off?”

  “Go for it,” she yawned. Shade was between them, so she didn’t much care anymore. And if he was lying down, she wouldn’t have to see the erection he was sporting. Hopefully.

  She stopped thinking for a moment. What? Why the fuck was Quinn hard?!

  She groaned and put an arm over her eyes, trying to banish the image and the thought. Thirsty. She was a woman living in an oasis, dying of thirst.

  “Got room for one more?” Elijah chuckled. He didn’t wait for her to respond, only collapsed onto the rock directly to her left. She gave him a look, trying to figure out why the hell he was laying buck-ass naked right fucking next to her.

  Then Shade got up and moved away, and she groaned. She turned to the left and saw Elijah grinning at her. She rolled onto her right side, only to find Quinn on his back with eyes closed.

  “You guys are killing me,” she mumbled angrily, sitting up to leave.

  “I have no idea what you are talking about,” Elijah laughed. She turned towards him and got another eyeful of the nude cowboy.

  “You know exactly what I’m talking about,” she hissed.

  “I don’t,” Quinn sounded confused and she looked over to him. He had one eye open.

  “She’s having a hard time with us being nude,” Elijah continued to laugh. “She doesn’t want to see it.”

  “Why not?” Quinn frowned, and Sawyer closed her eyes and massaged her forehead. “It’s not like you haven’t seen a nude male before.”

  “Oh hell,” she groaned. “It’s not that.”

  “No,” Elijah chuckled. “It’s that she’s got an itch to scratch and won’t accept the open invitation I’ve given her to have it scratched.”

  “Huh,” Quinn didn’t say much after that, and they all remained silent for a moment. “Why not?”

  “It’s complicated,” she sighed, slapping Elijah on his abs for bringing it up. “I’ve got other things to worry about.”

  “Well,” Elijah grabbed her hand and pulled her down slowly. She playfully glared at him, but couldn’t bring herself to fight him. The idea of being nearly on top of him was just too good to pass up. It was just too easy to flirt with Elijah, it really was. “When you’re done worrying about those other things…”

  “Like Axel trying kill me?” she reminded him, raising an eyebrow. “You mean after that?”

  “Sure,” Elijah let her go, still smiling. “After that.”

  “Fuck between you and…” She stood up, shaking her head.

  “Jasper? I heard him talking to Zander yesterday,” Elijah chuckled. “When do I get a kiss, darling?”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she mumbled with a small smile. “You’ve already gotten one. You know. The night you put handcuffs on me?”

  “Yeah but no one got a happy ending that night and,” he gestured to himself, but she didn’t let her eyes follow the hand, “I could use one. You probably could, too.”

  “I’m going back to the house. I’ll find my happy ending there, alone.”

  “Have a good walk,” Elijah called out to her as she grabbed her clothing and threw it on.

  “Walk?” She grinned at him. “The walk is going to suck, but masturbating while you’re stuck out here saving your hat is going to be amazing.” She grabbed his hat from the branch and tossed it into the pond.

  “You are a witch,” he snarled, diving into the pond. Quinn was actually grinning at her when she looked over at him and winked.

  “You should run,” he said as she pulled on her shoes.

  “I know.”

  And she did, laughing as she heard Elijah cursing over his wet cowboy hat. It was easy in moments like these to forget she was a prisoner in their home, waiting to be found and killed by a man who thought he’d already done it once before.

  20

  VINCENT

  Movie night. Vincent narrowed his eyes on Elijah, wondering where this was going.

  “You think we should have a movie night?” Vincent sat up in his chair, eyeing the grinning cowboy. Zander was snickering next him, and that didn’t bode well for Vincent. When these two decided something, he knew he was in for trouble.

  “Yeah, to relax.” Elijah sounded like it was all set. Simple as that.

  “Tonight, in the next hour or so,” Vincent continued, as if Elijah hadn’t said anything, “when we should be preparing to go to Atlanta in two days.”

  Vincent rubbed his temples at the thought. They would be in Atlanta fighting with Jon over their assignment with Sawyer and Axel. He needed to focus, not… watch movies.

  Jasper would understand Vincent’s concerns; but considering Jasper wasn’t in the room and Zander was, Vincent felt like he was missing an ally in this argument. Jasper was probably already setting everything up for movie night, the traitor.

  “There’s nothing we can do except go,” Elijah laughed while Zander sat down across from Vincent and kicked his feet up on Vincent’s desk. Vincent glared at the mud-covered boots on his desk. Zander was purposefully pissing him off. “You look like you’re about to have a hernia, you need to relax. We used to do them all the time. It’s been months! Come on!”

  “Zander,” Vincent tried to remain calm. “Get. Your. Fucking. Dirty. Boots. Off. My. Desk.”

  “Approve movie night and come relax,” Zander grinned at him, tapping one heel on the desk and causing a clump of dirt to fall onto Vincent’s pristine, organized desk. “I’ll clean that the moment you say okay.”

  “Fine!” Vincent snapped, standing up to push Zander’s boots off his desk. Zander had them down before Vincent could reach them. That was probably for the best, as Vincent had the urge to break the shithead’s ankle.

  “Temper, temper,” Elijah wagged a finger at him, and Vincent turned his glare on the man who was supposed to be his closest friend.

  “Get the fuck out. I’ll be down in one hour.”

  “Roger that!” Elijah gave a mock salute and grabbed his enforcer, Zander, dragging him out of the office.

  Vincent looked at the dirt and growled. He opened the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled out bleach and a roll of paper towels. He used a paper towel to grab most of the dirt and threw it away. Then he wiped off the rest carefully, so that none fell on the floor. He liberally applied bleach and scrubbed, making sure nothing was left.

  He hated dirt on his things. His things were expensive, and he believed that his property should be treated with a certain level of common decency. If there was nothing there to ruin it through normal use, then why go out of one’s way to do so? Zander could wreck his own shit, that was fine, but he and Elijah loved screwing with Vincent. He was going to strangle both of the trouble makers one day.

  “Oh, boss man?” Elijah’s head popped back through the door, and Vincent released a sigh, wondering when his suffering would end.

  “What?”

  “Can you get Sawyer? She’s been in her room for like, an hour, and no one else wants to bother her.”

  “I can’t imagine why,” Vincent said dryly. Only the day before, Elijah had walked into her room without knocking. Vincent could hear the scream in the garage. He didn’t want to know what Elijah had walked in on, but it hadn’t been good. Zander had to heal Elijah’s black eye later.

  “Please?” Elijah gave him a look that Vincent could only describe as a sad and half-assed attempt at puppy dog eyes.


  “Sure,” Vincent answered, secretly hoping he didn’t get the black eye this time. He wasn’t stupid enough not to knock though.

  He shuffled through papers to kill time. Elijah was right. He did need to relax, and there wasn’t much they could do about Jon except convince the mediator that everything was fine. He wished he knew why Jon was being such an ass, though. He put precious resources into investigating other IMPO agents, which just wasn’t done. He had no legal authority to look into Jasper and Zander without real cause, and that abuse of power pissed Vincent off.

  He finally gave up on trying to delay his requested duty. He sighed, walked out of his office, and headed toward the attic. It wasn’t that he was scared of Sawyer or didn’t like her. He was rather surprised with her. She was a quick study, with a sharp mind and an even sharper tongue wrapped up in a body that was made to kick ass and take names. He was enamored, and he could completely see why Axel had been as well.

  He sighed, there was the problem. Her little trick during their chess match gave him everything he needed to know. Axel was most likely the ex she’d mentioned who taught her to play, and that was probably why he wanted to kill her. Leaving him would be a death sentence. Vincent only needed to think about what had happened to Shadow to know that.

  As he reached the attic, he pondered the unanswered questions. He had no evidence that Sawyer and Axel had ever run into each other before the LA incident, which was why he didn’t bring up his suspicions. He wanted to know, but a deal was a deal. He wasn’t going to pry… himself. He had intended on manipulating all the guys into getting her to talk, but after a week, he’d given up. He’d felt guilty as hell for even thinking about manipulating his team like that.

  “Sawyer?” He rapped twice on the door and frowned when he heard a thump, but nothing else. “Sawyer?”

  It was only eight pm. He narrowed his eyes on the door. There was no way she was asleep. He grabbed the doorknob and began to turn it.

  “Open that door and I will murder you,” Sawyer’s snarled and strangled voice startled him into letting go. “I’ll be out in a minute.”