by Abigail Owen
He paused and looked down at her. “With anyone?”
She shook her head.
“Ever?”
She glanced away. “I guess you could say I’m saving it for my forever, not just one night of passion.”
A single finger under her chin tipped her gaze back his way. “I won’t say I don’t want it, but I get it.”
“You do?” She’d expected the ego she knew lurked behind that easygoing exterior to rear its head.
“I had what I thought was forever once. For an entire year. So yeah, I do.” He went from seriously sweet to heart-stoppingly intense in a nanosecond as he gave her a wicked grin. “Besides, I have lots of other fantasies where you’re concerned.”
“I may have a few of my own,” she murmured, body humming.
“Like what?”
She toyed with the hair at the nape of his neck. “Like…can demigods really go all night long?”
She sent out a pulse of wicked pleasure and grinned as the result became obvious against her hip.
Dimples flashed as he grinned back. He was doing that more and more. Smiling.
“Let’s find out, shall we?” he asked.
Leia squealed as he spun fast, showing a small hint of the extra strength and speed demigods often inherited.
Chapter Twelve
She needed to recharge her system.
With that sole need in mind, she tossed back the covers and tried to stand up, only to be stopped by an arm curling around her waist and dragging her back into bed.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Castor nuzzled her neck.
She laughed. “You’re insatiable, and I need a shower.”
He didn’t let her up. “I wasn’t the only insatiable one.”
She giggled, then sobered, teasingly serious. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He grunted his amusement as she peeled his arm from her. Not bothering to cover up, she padded across the room naked.
“I could get used to that sight in the mornings.”
She didn’t respond to his mumbled comment, pretending not to hear. Reality wasn’t something she was ready to face yet, and those words came under the heading of later.
Once she was in the bathroom, she decided a shower wasn’t going to cut it. She needed water immersion. With a flick, she turned the knobs for the oversize spa. Once the tub was filled, she lowered herself in and leaned back, closing her eyes with a sigh, and letting the magical properties of the water seep into her skin. In an instant she was transported in her mind. Rather than bathwater, the pristine water of a warm spring surrounded her, the air fresh and clean.
“What have you done?”
The whispered words were barely audible. Leia sat up with a jerk, sloshing the water over the side of the tub. “Calliadne?”
But her sister wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
Must be more tired than I thought. She lay back in the water.
“What have you done to us, Leia?”
Her eyes flashed open. This time the voice was unmistakable. Calli was trying to talk to her.
Leia sank beneath the water and waited. “I’m here, sister.”
A shimmering version of Calli’s face swam before her eyes, iridescent and rippling with the water. “You’ve brought destruction on your own people.”
Leia shook her head. “I knew what I did last night wouldn’t make you happy, but I did it for the right reasons.”
“Your actions have brought death upon us.”
Leia gripped the sides of the tub hard. She hadn’t hurt anyone last night. Stirred them up and pissed them off, sure. “What are you talking about?”
“Kaios. When you first lost your spring, he warned us to stay away. Now he’s brought a warlock.”
Why? Why attack the nymphs? “But you had no part in it. I made you react to me.” Calli’s image wavered and faded. Seconds later, pain exploded through Leia, like a shard of ice being stabbed into her brain and down her spine. She curled in on herself and screamed in agony, the sound gurgling out into the water still clear as day to her nymph’s ears. She knew this pain. It could mean only one thing. One of her brethren was dead.
Arms plunged into the water and scooped her out. “Leia?” Castor’s frantic voice penetrated the haze of pain.
She pried open her eyes. “My people are under attack,” she gasped out.
“What are you talking about?”
Through sheer will, she swallowed down the acrid taste of bile and forced the pain from her body. A couple deep breaths and the agony wasn’t gone but pushed back. “Put me down.”
He stood her up, and she ran to the bedroom and started pulling on clothes—whatever was at the top of her suitcase, which happened to be jeans and a black T-shirt.
He followed. “What are you doing? What’s going on?”
“Kaios is attacking the nymphs by the chapel in the woods. He has a warlock. I have to help them.”
Castor didn’t ask more questions. Instead he started pulling on his own jeans and T-shirt.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Coming with you.”
“No—”
“Demigod.” He pointed at his chest. “And your…” She held her breath for whatever else he thought he was to her. “Boss,” he finally said. “I’m coming with you.”
She didn’t argue. In silence they finished dressing, she pulled her hair back in a quick and messy ponytail, and they rushed from the room. Castor pulled out his cell phone. “Marrok. We have a problem.”
He quickly explained the situation to the wolf alpha, then hung up and put his phone in his pocket. “They’ll be right behind us. With help.”
“No help.”
“Why?”
“If their people find out the sign from the gods was a lie, it will ruin everything.”
“You sure?”
No. But the last time she had tangled with Kaios she had lost everything, and everyone, dearest to her. She didn’t want to risk the two alphas. “Yes.”
He pulled out the phone and handed it to her as they reached the car. “You call them. I’ll meet you there.”
She frowned even as she reached for the phone. “How—?”
“I’m a lot faster than any car.” Right. Demigod.
She dialed as she got in the car and strapped in. Marrok picked up immediately and she told him the same thing she’d just told Castor.
“I’m still coming,” Marrok insisted. A female voice sounded from another room. “So is Tala.”
“Okay. But no one else.”
“Agreed.”
She hung up and headed into war.
Chapter Thirteen
“Kaios!” Castor bellowed.
He had made it to the chapel, which appeared peaceful except for the dry-as-a-bone lake and riverbed. Finding no one there, he’d made his way down the path and across the bridge, into the forest. There chaos reigned, and the scent of ill-used magic hung heavy in the air.
He bellowed Kaios’s name again.
No answer amidst the harshness of screams and shrieks. At the side of the river, he found Calli curled into a ball with her hands clasped over her ears. Blood was oozing from her eyes, ears, and nose.
He grasped her by the shoulders, and she flinched, but otherwise didn’t respond. “Where is he?”
She couldn’t answer. The rasp of her lungs told him she might be inhaling blood as well.
“Calli? No!” Leia appeared at his side. He didn’t ask how she’d found him.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“She needs water.” She pulled a bottle from her backpack. He hadn’t even realized she had it with her. She poured half the bottle over Calli’s face, then tipped it to her lips. The nymph gulped it down as fast as she could. The bleeding s
topped and her breathing improved.
“How’d you know?”
She glanced at him. “It happened to me when I lost my spring. Nymphs are used to being in their element most of the time.”
“And yet, you manage.”
“I’ve gotten used to going without for long periods. I take lots of baths and carry water everywhere.”
“Help the others,” Calli choked.
“Is there any water left?”
Calli shook her head.
Leia turned to Castor, her face pale and pinched with fear. “I can’t help you.”
“What if I can get you water?”
Hope speared through Leia at his words. “Can you do that?”
Every protective instinct hammered him to fix this now. “Son of Zeus. Remember?”
She searched his face and he knew exactly what she was thinking. If he could bring down rain…
“Do it.”
Castor stood, his feet planted wide, his hands balled into fists at his side. Leia visibly shivered as a cold wind whipped through the trees. The previously fluffy white clouds above gathered, forming a massive thunderhead that grew black and heavy with rain.
Castor raised his hands, and lightning illuminated the sky. In a rush of sound, a deluge descended on them, and in seconds they were soaked to the skin.
In Leia’s arms, Calliadne sucked in a grateful breath and sat forward.
“We have to fight,” Leia told her. Her sister nodded.
Together they stood and clasped hands.
“Keep it coming,” she called to Castor. He didn’t break his concentration to acknowledge her words, just kept the rain coming, drawing it forth.
As he watched, Leia and Calli manipulated and directed the water. Raindrops banded together to coalesce into first a pool at their feet, then a raging river, and finally a wall of solid water.
“Hold on to something,” Leia warned Castor. He wrapped his arms around the trunk of a massive tree, his fingers digging in as though the thing were made of butter instead of hard pine.
Together, the two nymphs sent the wall of water crashing through the trees, taking out everything in its path. Nature in full force could be a real bitch. So could a pissed-off nymph or two.
With a roar to rival a tornado, the torrent slammed up against the mountainside as far as a mile away, frothing up the granite walls only to turn back on itself.
Castor held on, still clinging to the deeply rooted tree, until the water receded. He spat out a wad of leaves and pine needles. “Did you get him?”
Leia shut her eyes and seemed to listen, her brows drawn low, mouth tight with concentration.
She gasped, her eyes springing open. “No. He’s going after the Hyleoroi, forcing them out of hiding.”
She crumpled in on herself as though she could feel her brethren’s pain. Hyleoroi, the nymphs who were watchers of the wood, started screaming.
“Castor!” Leia screeched.
Fury took a back seat to physical pain, like razors over his skin at the sight of his nymph in such distress, electricity building inside him to toxic levels.
He had to fix this. Now.
And there was only one way he knew how. With determination, Castor settled, closed his eyes, blocking out Leia’s moans, and waited. He’d learned to detect the feel of power being used around him, like a tickle at the back of his neck, just as Zeus had taught him after claiming him. Searching for power in use was a trick he’d never fully mastered, but he’d try anything now to help Leia. If a warlock was involved, he’d leave a signature.
There. In his mind’s eye, he could see a bubble at the center of the woods. A murky gray color, it pulsed with each spell the mage cast.
“Stay here.”
In a flash Castor sprinted to the location. The speed with which he could move made him almost invisible to the naked eye. To him, the forest flew past in a blur of greens and browns with patches of white snow still at the base of some trees. Before the wizard knew he was there, Castor slammed into him. With the might of his strength, he threw the man into the side of the mountain, knocking him out cold.
The screams hushed and silence settled over the area like a thick blanket had been placed over them, muffling any noise. Not a creature dared move or even breathe in the wake of the madness.
Then a bird’s cry pierced the air and life returned to the forest, almost as if every living thing around him sighed with relief.
Tempted to toast the guy with a bolt of lightning, Castor slung the warlock over his shoulder, sack-of-potatoes style, and ran back to where he’d left Leia and Calli. Their eyes still glowed bright blue, the way Leia’s had the night before at the mating ceremony when she’d used her powers—the sight both eerie and sexy as sin.
“Is that the mage?” Calli asked as she washed away any remaining blood in the river, which now flowed peacefully. Only pieces of limbs floating by gave any indication of the horrors wrought only moments ago.
The trees still dripped with water from the earlier dousing, sounding like a sprinkle of rain, and the ground squelched beneath his boots. He was glad he’d brought clothes other than his nice suits, although he hadn’t anticipated needing them for this reason.
“Yes,” he answered the nymph.
“Where’s Kaios?” Leia asked.
“No sign of him.”
“Damn.” She turned to her sister, taking Calli’s hands in hers. “I’ll make him pay, if it’s the last thing I do.”
Calli’s lips flattened. “We all will. No one’s attacked us like that before. He’s more dangerous than we realized.”
A grim sort of anger thundered through him. “I see. So you’ll let him ruin one sister’s life, but not all of you?” Castor couldn’t hold in the bitter question. The unfairness of how they’d treated Leia, shunning her, had his blood pounding in his ears with impotent wrath.
Leia, for her part, shook her head at him. He dumped the mage on the ground, uncaring of how he fell, and crossed his arms—unrepentant.
“You’re right.”
He raised his eyebrows at Calli’s words. “Of course I am.”
Leia rolled her eyes. “That’s enough out of you, Superman. Let’s not worry about the past.” She faced Calli. “Can you get the word out to everyone? I’m worried he’ll try something else.”
“I’ll talk to them.”
“As a werewolf, our ancestor and here because of our mating, he’s our responsibility.” Marrok and Tala appeared in the clearing. Tala sported a baseball-size bruise on the side of her face.
“What happened?” Castor asked.
“We ran into Kaios in the parking lot.” Tala touched the welt and winced. “There’s a reason he’s stayed alive this long. We couldn’t stop him.”
Damn their luck. “Why not?”
Tala glared at Marrok. “Because someone was too busy trying to protect a woman who didn’t need protecting.”
Marrok said nothing. His jaw working wasn’t a good sign, though.
“So…what next?” Leia asked.
Castor made a split decision. “We call Delilah.”
“Good idea,” Leia agreed. “She takes care of all manner of supernatural issues. I’m sure she’ll have an idea. And I’m sure she could arrange additional protection for the nymphs here, in case he comes back.”
“I think you’re right,” Tala said. “She’s a resource we can use.” She turned to Marrok. “We might want to make a call to the Alliance before we have dragon shifters involved.”
Her new mate nodded. “Agreed.”
“In the meantime, let’s tie this mage up and gag him. Calli?”
The nymph glowered at the unconscious man on the ground. “We’ll hold him here until you come for him. Arrange protection for Leia, as well.”
“Why?”
“He’s hated her for a long time.”
Marrok’s eyebrows winged high. “He didn’t come for the mating ceremony?”
Leia shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe he doesn’t like the idea of two alphas mating. It’d give your packs too much combined power. He’s not a rational man.”
Guilt weighed heavily on Castor’s shoulders. He had put Leia in this position. He’d brought Kaios’s wrath down upon her by bringing her here with him and getting her mixed up in this. If he’d left her in Austin, none of this would have happened.
“I think he’d already found me,” Leia said.
Castor snapped his gaze to her. “What?”
She gave him a look he couldn’t interpret. Regret maybe? “I don’t have proof, but I think someone broke into my apartment. Twice. In the last month. I was…going to resign.”
That’s why she was going to resign. “I saw the letter.”
She blinked. “You did?”
He nodded. “And now that I know the reason for it, like hell I’m letting you go.”
Leia opened her mouth only to close it. “Let’s talk about it later. We should go.”
Regardless of how they’d gotten in this situation, he’d be damned if that werewolf got anywhere near her this time. Castor waited while Leia gave her sister a hug and whispered something in her ear. Something that sounded like, “I’m so sorry.”
He hated that she felt she had to apologize. If her sisters had supported her to begin with, Kaios wouldn’t have been the threat he was. Biting down on harsh words, he placed his hand at the small of her back—he needed to touch her, reassure himself she’d come through this okay—and walked back to their cars with her, Marrok, and Tala.
“You’re soaked.” Leia made the observation when they were about halfway back to the hotel.
He grinned. “I’ll tell anyone who bothers to ask that you dunked me in a river.”
She chuckled. “I guess it has an element of truth. Why did I do that?”
“Because I needed a cold shower?”
That surprised a laugh out of her. The husky timbre of it went straight to his groin. How he could be turned on after what they’d just dealt with, he had no idea. She drove him to reactions that weren’t normal. “It won’t be far from the truth.”