by Mayburn, Ann
“I want you to try to extend your power out and make my hands move.”
He waited, and nothing happened. Eliana had her eyes squinted shut hard, and she bit her lower lip. Minutes ticked by, and he ran trace energy over her shield. Solid and slippery as ever.
“Picture your energy pushing out of you like a big balloon that's being blown up fast.” Nothing. Her shield was still a foot out from her and not budging.
An hour later, they were both frustrated and tired. She was panting and had a thin sheen of sweat on her face.
“Why can't I do this? Move you stupid shield, move!”
He shook his head then stood, cracking his neck and stretching out his back. “This isn't working. Maybe we should take a break and try something else.”
She squeezed her eyes tighter as she clenched her fists. “Dang it.”
Helping her stand, he patted her back. “Don't let it get to you. You're doing great. Everyone's energy is as different as they are. We have to find the right way to approach yours.” He paused and smiled brightly, stepping closer to her. “Do you notice anything different?”
She shook her head and blotted her face with the edge of her T-shirt, exposing more of her tanned stomach. That glimpse of flesh made his mouth dry with desire.
“Can you smell me anymore?”
She frowned and leaned closer to him, smelling his shirt. The frown faded to a curious quirk of her eyebrows, and she leaned up on her toes to smell the edge of his neck where it met his shirt. She lingered there, her warm breath washing over his skin. His voice came out rough as desire moved through his body. “Stay there a moment. I'm going to drop my shields so you can see the difference.”
He stood stock-still as she placed her hands on his chest and balanced herself as she breathed on his neck. He was sure she could feel how hard his heart was beating and how badly he wanted to pull her tight against him and jerk her hips against his cock. Idiot! What are you doing! his mind shouted at him. His body told it to shut up.
“Now lower your shield.”
Closing her eyes, she lowered her shields and gave off a soft gasp. This close, their energies rolled across each other like two cats rubbing cheeks. His muscles tensed while her aura touched him, caressed him, teased him. She moaned softly and brushed her lips against the banging pulse in his neck, then gave him a gentle lick that almost broke him.
He shuddered against her and threw his shields back up swiftly. In many ways, exchanging energy was more intimate than sex, and more dangerous. If he had allowed her much deeper into his aura, she would have felt the slight edge of what he was feeling. And right now, he was feeling as though he wanted to rip her jeans off and fuck her right here, right now.
He stood and strode over to a rack of bamboo practice staffs. With his back to her, he said, “I think we're done for today. Practice your shielding and work on trying to extend it. We may have to work to find your trigger.”
She started to take a step toward him and stopped. “I guess I'll see you in class tomorrow then.”
He nodded, not turning around as he balanced a bamboo staff on his palms. “Remember to keep it casual in public. Stay in groups. Don't go anywhere you'll be alone.”
His cock was very unhappy with him at the moment, actually every part of him was unhappy about sending her away, but he had to face the simple fact that right now he wasn’t strong enough to keep his hands off of her.
“Okay, I have a ton of homework to do after class tomorrow, and I work tomorrow night. Can we meet again on Tuesday?” Her husky voice held an edge of confusion.
Feeling more in control of himself, he turned around and leaned on his staff. “Sounds good. I have some things to do in the morning but I can see you as soon as I’m done. Can you come over Tuesday afternoon without arousing any suspicions?”
“Sure, I'll tell Chrissy I'm going to the library to study.”
He accompanied her out to the foyer, his hands twitching with the need to grip her curvy ass as she walked. “You did well today, Eliana. I'm proud of you,” he said in a quiet voice as he held the door open. She stared at him, holding his eyes for a long moment, then nodded and left.
Watching her drive away, it required all of his willpower not to call her back to the house. His brush with her aura had revealed to him glimpses of an honest heart, a wish to make people happy, and a deep well of strength. Add to that her quirky sense of humor and killer body, and she was hard, no impossible, to resist.
He sighed at the injustice of it all and wondered how he was going to wait for her to be Chosen so he could claim her as his forever.
Chapter
Following Rachel out of Aiden's class, Eliana gave a silent groan. She was in danger of failing because she found it next to impossible to pay attention to anything but her fucking hot professor. She spent most of the class trying not to moon over Aiden, who seemed oblivious to her presence. Whenever he spoke, she kept her eyes on her laptop and tried to take notes. When Professor Ventan was giving his portion of the lecture, she found herself daydreaming about Aiden and staring at his profile. Feeling pathetic, she waved good-bye to Rachel and made her way to her dorm room. Kyle was sitting in the foyer in the lounge area by the elevators.
“Hi, Eliana,” he said with a wide smile. Kyle placed a slip of paper in his book to keep his place and strolled over to her. “I hope you're feeling better. I tried to stop by yesterday to check up on you, but Chrissy said you weren't home.” Kyle leaned next to the wall by the elevator and looked at her with concern in his wide brown eyes.
“I'm feeling much better, thanks for asking. Sorry I flaked out on you the other night. I must have been allergic to something in the pizza,” she finished with what she hoped was a sincere smile. He seemed like a nice guy, and she didn't want to hurt his feelings. Especially after Michelle made it such a point to be mean to him. But he wasn't Aiden.
Kyle grabbed her hand in his. “I was wondering if you wanted to go out tonight and maybe see a movie, grab something to eat? We'll stick to something easy on your stomach this time.”
She gently extracted her hand from his. “Thanks for the offer, but I have to work tonight. Maybe some other time?”
Kyle's face fell, and his lips curved in disappointment. “Yeah, sure, no problem. I can take a hint.”
She sighed inwardly. “I really am sorry. I'm so busy with work and school. It's hard to keep up with both and have a life.”
With a nod of understanding he said, “Okay, I was beginning to get the feeling you didn't like me. Tell you what, give me a call by Friday, and I'll know you're interested. If you don't call, I'll know that we're going to be just friends.”
She nodded, eager to get ready for work so she wouldn't be late. “I promise I'll call you, but I've got to get going if I don't want to get fired.”
Hoping to ease his hurt feelings, she gave him a hug then hopped onto the elevator.
****
Eliana glared at Linda's back across the store. The redheaded bitch sat talking into her cell phone as she filled out forms at the manager's desk. It was cold and raining outside, so Eliana was stuck inside. Much to her and Linda's mutual disgust. One of the other employees told her that she’d overheard Linda telling one of the owners that Eliana had a bad attitude and that Linda suspected her of stealing from the registers. Eliana was furious, but couldn't go off accusing Linda without ratting out the other employee. Linda would deny it, and it would reinforce the rumors she was difficult to work with. Eliana silently fumed while she dusted and restocked row after row of ribbon.
As she was thinking of the different ways she hoped Linda would be fired, she jerked to a stop and glanced at her hand. The ring Jack had given her was pure black, showing a Destruction Chosen was nearby. Keeping still, she slowly lifted her head and tried to look casually around the store. A young woman was attempting to keep her toddler under control while she paid for a wreath and some silk flowers. Probably not her. Another middle-aged woman in a tweed skirt was so
rting through a rack of art prints. She didn't seem to be doing anything out of the ordinary, but Eliana made sure to memorize her face. She was glad she had her shields locked down tight; hopefully her training with Aiden would pay off and they would never notice she was here.
Her hand trembled slightly as she put a spool of white silk ribbon into its rack. What would she do if one of them recognized her and tried to hurt her? She could shield, but what good would it do if they knew karate? A man's voice from behind her startled her, and she let out shriek and dropped the box she was holding. A few spools of ribbon raced across the floor.
“Oh, I'm sorry,” he said apologetically as he helped her retrieve the ribbon. He was an older gentleman with soft blue eyes and a cheerful smile. “I didn't mean to startle you. I was wondering if you knew where they keep the wood glue?”
She apologized and showed him the correct aisle. Easing open the door, she ducked into the women's bathroom and checked the stalls before calling Aiden. After rapidly, and a tad frantically, explaining to him what was going on, Aiden told her he was on his way. He wanted her to hide in the bathroom until he arrived, but she wasn't going to give Linda an excuse to fire her. Who knew what lies Linda would make up about what she was doing in here? Potential Chosen or not, she needed this job.
Looking into her eyes in the cloudy mirror she thought, Colleen Shay did not raise her daughter to hide in a bathroom like a scared rabbit. Now go put on your big girl panties and get out there before Linda decides to come looking for you. She took a few minutes to compose herself, splashed some cold water on her face, and sucked in a deep breath before exiting the bathroom.
The ring on her finger remained a steady black, and she tried not to stare at it. As she made her way back to the ribbon stand, she saw the radioactive red glow of Linda's hair going into the storage and receiving room. Well, at least she didn't have to worry about Linda yelling at her for spilling all the ribbon or taking a long bathroom break.
Standing with the box of ribbons in her arms, she noticed the middle-aged woman in the tweed skirt was still looking through the art prints. Heart hammering, she turned so it didn't look as though she was watching her, but she could see the woman's reflection in the metal stand of the ribbon display. The minutes ticked by, and the store got progressively quieter while the rain poured outside. People didn't want to leave the warmth of their cars and homes to run through its icy blast to buy some crochet supplies and the store rapidly emptied.
Her shoulders got tighter and tighter as the woman in tweed stayed at the bin looking through the pictures for at least the tenth time. She started to murmur something, and Eliana noticed she had a hands-free cell phone device in one ear. Maybe she was talking to someone and wasn't paying attention to what she was looking at. Or maybe she was telling her superiors about Eliana and was arranging a hit squad of magically trained chinchillas to come kill her.
Using humor as a refuge, as she often did in times of stress, she imagined what a ninja chinchilla would look like. Maybe it would be a samurai chinchilla with a little kimono. Would they be trained in martial arts or just how to use guns, and how would one make a gun small enough for a chinchilla?
The sound of screeching tires made her whip her head around as two big black trucks with the words Temple Guard Tactical on the side slid to a stop in front of the store. Her jaw dropped as the woman in tweed opened her coat to show a badge and jerked out her gun yelling, “This is the Temple Guard, everyone ON THE GROUND NOW!”
Eliana stood there with her jaw hanging open for a minute until the gun swung in her direction. She dropped the box of ribbons and lay flat on her stomach, her heart thundering as a stinging sweat broke out all over her body in a hard surge of adrenaline. A couple more spools of ribbon spun past her head, unraveling as they went.
Well, at least I won't have to hear Linda complain about the ribbon, I'll blame it on the Temple Guard.
Fifteen minutes later, she found herself sitting alone in the break room waiting to be interrogated. The ring on her finger no longer burned black, instead reds and oranges swirled across the surface of the stone. She clasped her hands in her lap and tried to keep as still as possible. Through the open door, the woman in tweed gestured toward her and talked to a man with Temple Guard emblazoned on the back of his body armor. He still wore his helmet with the visor down, but he was massive. The Guards had surged through the store with pounding feet then out into the rainy garden center and around the back. Obviously, whatever they had been looking for was not here, and the general mood she was picking up from the Guards was one of anger.
She resisted the urge to fidget as the guard came in and closed the door behind him. The conversations outside the room were muted as he approached her at the table. He was a big man, not extremely tall, but heavily muscled. His broad shoulders seemed huge in his uniform, and his hands were callused and scarred. He reached under his chin and removed his helmet, setting it on the table that held the old microwave and the World War II era coffeepot.
The first thing she noticed was that he had his black hair shaved into a tight military cut against his tanned skin. The second thing she noticed was his eyes, an amazing teal blue surrounded with thick black lashes that a woman would kill for. With its high cheekbones and square jaw, his face was masculine, but softened by the most sensual lips she had ever seen on a man. Currently his full lips were thinned in anger, anger directed at her.
He sat in the folding chair next to her and placed a thin stack of papers on the table between them. From what she could tell by glancing at them, they were invoices for the store.
“Ms. Shay, I'm Captain Devon King of Mentu's Temple Guard,” he said in a deep voice. “Let's cut the shit now and save us both time. I know you're working with the woman calling herself Linda Brant. I want you to tell me where she is and what her plans are, and I want the information right now.”
She gawked at him, at a loss for words. “W-w-what?” she stuttered out.
Devon gave an impressive growl and leaned forward. He was a physically intimidating man as he clenched his hands into fits on his thighs and she shrank back from him as much as she could in the chair. “Your name is all over the invoices for the fertilizer, Ms. Shay. You signed for them and managed to hide the extra orders Linda made from the owners.” She gaped at him, and he continued with a sneer. “We have a handwritten note from Linda, addressed to you, which we found in the manager's office telling you to keep to the outside cashier's booth. Is that so you could direct the trucks to come when no one was looking?” His low voice rumbled out the last words in a scary growl.
She continued to stare at him, dumbstruck. What the hell was he talking about? What did fertilizer have to do with anything? And, most importantly, where was Aiden? She gathered herself enough to say, “I have no idea what you're talking about, but I've never signed for any orders. That's a manager's job, and I'm not a manager. I'm a cashier!”
Devon leaned in ever closer, invading her personal space now. “Don't think the dumb coed routine is going to save you, Ms. Shay. Linda, or whatever her real name is, left you high and dry holding the bag. Cut your losses now and tell us what we want to know, and you may be able to get a deal with the DA.”
“I don’t know anything.”
His jaw clenched and the menace rolling off of him made her desperate to confess something, anything, just to get him to leave her alone.
The microphone on his jacket squawked as a woman said, “Captain King, a man named Aiden Klemenson is out front demanding to see you. He says it's important.”
Never taking his bright teal eyes from her face, he said, “Show him in and tell him I'll be with him in a moment.”
She’d opened her mouth to say she knew Aiden when Devon leaned into her. She stiffened with shock as the smell of dark spices and sandalwood filled her senses. He's a Chosen, she thought for a brief moment before his energy overwhelmed her, trying to crack her shields. His eyes grew wide, and fury filled her.
&n
bsp; Here she was, trying to survive attacks by Destruction Chosen, pass school, and earn enough money at her job to save for rent, and this asshole, who wouldn't listen to her, was trying to force the truth out of her with magic. As her shield cracked the tiniest bit, it caused her real pain; a sharp slice burned across her chest. With white-hot anger making her bare her teeth, she used both hands and pushed Devon back with all her might.
To her horror, he sailed out of his chair and hit the back wall with a thump that rattled the windows and made the coffeepot fall off the table with a crash. Devon stood and shook his head, muttering, “flowers and candy” as hands pounded on the door and voices asked what was going on. He stared at her before limping over to the door and opening it, stepping outside.
She groaned and rested her head on the table. She was done for sure now. She had assaulted a Temple Guard. Even if he was a pushy, stubborn bully of a Chosen, she had punched him across the room. How she had done that she had no idea. The guy had to weigh at least two hundred pounds, way beyond her ability to move with a push. She had enough time to imagine having to call her mother from jail before Devon came back in the room with Aiden.
To her embarrassment, she found herself crying at the sight of Aiden. It had been such a shitty day, and finally here was the one person who would understand and help her. With a concerned look, he came over and hugged her. “Hey now, it's okay. Stop crying, honey,” he soothed as he ran his hands down the hair over her back.
That only made her cry harder, and a chagrined looking Devon handed her a wad of napkins from the coffee station with an uncomfortable look.
“For a Mentor, you're doing a pretty crappy job of protecting her, Aiden,” Devon said while he swept up the shards of the coffeepot and dumped them in the trash.
Aiden growled and moved between Eliana and Devon. “How was I supposed to know a Destro Chosen was here? When I came to visit her, Linda—or whatever her real name is—wasn’t here. I never caught a glimpse of her, and her shielding was strong enough that I couldn't sense her either. Do you think I would let my student come to harm?”