“You damned voyeur! Do you really think it’s not ‘working out’?”
“I must admit I’m impressed, but—”
“Out, Darius. Just leave, and don’t you ever mention this again. Ever.”
He inclined his head toward me and flashed to the door, pulling it open and shut in one seamless movement.
Hellion stepped out of the bathroom, his head cocked to one side, his eyes roaming the room. “Who were you talking to, Maddy?”
“No one. Shower ready?” I asked with forced cheerfulness as I crawled out from under the covers.
Hellion watched me carefully before looking around the room one last time. He grabbed my arm as I tried to sneak by him and I flinched. “I’ll not hurt you, but I’ll ask you for the truth. Did I cause you harm?”
Thanks to all the appropriate powers. I thought he was going to push about my behavior. Instead he was worried about whether or not I was okay. I smiled and reached up to tuck a stray strand of hair behind his ear. “I’m fine. I’ll undoubtedly be sore tomorrow, but it will have been well earned.”
He looked down bashfully, long eyelashes rimming guarded eyes. “So you aren’t too sore now?”
“Now? No, not really. Why do—”
He swept me up, hooking one arm behind my knees and one behind my shoulders and carried me into the enormous bathroom. “Then there’s a load of time before tomorrow gets here. Come, Maddy,” he whispered, stepping into the steaming shower. And I did. Repeatedly.
The morning light crept across the bedroom floor, lighting first a sock, then a pair of pants, and, eventually, the rest of our clothes as they had been strewn with enthusiastic abandon across the hardwoods and antique rugs. Fresh light played hide and seek with the shadows and coaxed dust motes into a lazy, uncoordinated dance. And for all its cheerfulness, I watched the creeping of the light with an unexpected sense of foreboding ambiguity, as if the coming day was nothing more than an exercise in frustration and dubious plotting by a person, or persons, unknown.
Too true, I thought.
The bed shifted as Hellion rolled over, but I didn’t move. His breathing settled back into an indolent rhythm, and I eased myself out of bed. I needed to walk a bit, to have a few minutes to myself. I picked up my dress and slipped it on without undergarments, only holding it together until I was out in the hall and could tie the sash appropriately. I wandered down the long hallway, stopping now and again to mindlessly admire some relic or another, or to peruse a painting, eventually finding my way back to the main hall and the doorway to the family room we’d used last evening. Stepping inside, I located my boots and fetched them, noticing in passing that the glass had been cleaned up.
I exited the room through the nearest French doors and stepped into the breezy morning. The partly cloudy sky felt like a game of roulette—it could go either way. We could end up with a lucky spin and sunshine or the more predictable outcome of rain. I wandered down toward the waterside, thinking back over the clues and my decision to both organize and formalize my thoughts about Bahlin’s potential involvement in the crime. It was so frustrating to realize that the dragon himself had planted a kernel of doubt. How could he abandon me when I needed his help and he’d promised to always be there for me? How could he abandon me period? I’d been so convinced I was falling in love with him, and I’d rushed headlong into that mess, agreeing to marry him when I still had my reservations. I’d never make that mistake again. Never.
I picked up a flat stone the size of my palm and chucked it out across the water, watching it skip across the agitated surface several times before sinking away. I ran the clues back through my head, summarizing what I knew to be true. First, the killer was right-handed. I began to walk along the shoreline, paying little to no attention to where I was going but, rather, doing my best not to twist an ankle on the rocky terrain.
Second, the killer was using a weapon of some type that had a wickedly sharp, smooth edge. It could be a knife, or it could be a claw. The cuts had been clean, though, so we knew with relative certainty that whatever wielded the weapon had both the experience and the strength to get the job done.
Third, the killer was attacking at night. I rolled my head around my shoulders, feeling the muscles knotting up already. This third point was a real sticky issue for me. I couldn’t count the number of times Bahlin had emphasized to me that he couldn’t use his cloaking skills except after the sun went down. So if he was hiding from, or stalking, a potential victim, nighttime was the time for him to be most effective.
Fourth were the gold coins, and they posed a real problem for me. Bahlin surely wasn’t the only individual in the world to have those same coins. Think, Maddy, I chastised myself. Who else would be a prime candidate? It could be his mom, or even his little brother, Aiden. What had Bahlin told me? Something about a dragon’s parents making an initial contribution to the young dragon’s treasure cache when he or she came of age, and then the young dragon had to amass his or her own fortune. Bahlin’s gold coins had been given to him by his father. So realistically, I was going to have to focus on Bahlin’s family as the source of the coins because he would have given Bahlin’s brother and dead sister deposits in the same currency. Shit.
Pausing in my list making and my leisurely morning stroll, I grabbed a handful of stones and began throwing them, one at a time, as hard and as far as I could. I made it through a half a dozen throws before I had to reach for more stones. Settling in to continue tossing the small rocks, I kept on with my mental compilation.
Fifth, the killer was targeting women who looked like me as he, or she, tracked my movements around London. Bahlin had known where I was at all times. It would have been a matter of simple deduction to determine I was with Hellion after we disappeared from the fall together.
Sixth, the blue string tied around the hair—
A hand dropped onto my shoulder and I screamed, spinning around and striking out at my assailant as my boot heels dug into the rocky soil and dumped me on my ass. I was unable to stop my right hook before it glanced off Hellion’s chin and snapped his head back.
“Bloody hell!” he shouted, grabbing the side of his jaw and slowly shaking his head. “What was that for?”
I sat on the ground, the water from the lake’s shore seeping through my dress, and I looked up at him. It suddenly struck me as funny, and I began to laugh, trying to get my feet under me so I could stand. I finally ended up taking my boots off before being able to get vertical again, albeit with Hellion’s proffered hand as help.
“Sorry,” I hiccupped, wiping at the tears that had leaked down my cheeks. “Oh, you should have seen your face.”
“Likewise,” he said, a smile lurking in his voice under the frustration and mock anger. “What in the saints’ names were you thinking of that had you so—ah, murder. Don’t I feel foolish?” We walked hand in hand back toward the house. I was surprised I’d come so far. “I’ve always felt this was a good place for thinking. Did you come to any profound conclusions out here on the water’s edge, then?”
“No.” I pulled him to a stop and he turned to face me, effectively blocking out the sun. His hair was slightly wild this morning, loose and blowing in the breeze, and the light created a nimbus of gold around his head, making him look like a fallen angel. Why fallen? Because no angel could do what he could do in a bedroom and maintain their holy standing. No way. I blushed and looked down, remembering last night and early into the hours of this morning.
He chucked me gently under the chin and said, “And why does it embarrass you, what we shared last night?”
My head snapped up and I asked, “How in the world did you know what I was thinking?”
“Nothing makes you blush except sex, Maddy, and it’s usually either right before or right after the main event that leaves you most vulnerable. So really, it’s just a matter of deduction.”
“And you didn’t think you were a detective,” I muttered, turning to walk back toward the house. “I was thinking about
last night and…” I paused, unsure how to say what I really wanted to say.
“Are yeh hurt, then?” His voice barely carried over the sound of the wind and I was forced to stop and turn back to him. He hadn’t moved with me as I continued on toward the manse.
“Not really. What I wanted to say was thank you.” I held my head up and met his gaze despite the heat I could feel crawling up my neck and staining my cheeks. “I asked you for memories and you gave me just what I wanted.”
He tilted his head to the side, and a strange look passed over his face. He turned to face the water, sticking his hands in his pants pockets and looking out across the water. “You make it sound like it’s the last we’ll be together.” He didn’t look at me.
“No, that’s not what I meant.” I took a couple of tentative steps toward him and stopped, unsure of his reserved mood. “Is something wrong?”
“Not wrong, per se. I was just curious why you saw fit to get out of bed without saying anything.” He turned to look at me, capturing his hair in his hands and holding it back from his face so he could see me without impediment. “I woke to find yeh gone, your clothes and shoes missing. No note, nothing. I suppose…” Now it was his turn to look awkward and uncomfortable. “I suppose I was concerned.”
“I’m sorry. It never occurred to me to leave a note or to wake you. Frankly I needed a few minutes to sort out the clues I’ve got, and I wanted to get out of the house to get some fresh air to do it. I’ve been cooped up inside since we left Ireland, and I wanted a little country air and some solitude.” I took the last few steps back to him and dropped my boots near his feet. I stepped into him and wormed my way under his arms, and they instinctively wrapped around me. “Thanks.” His shirt was still missing the buttons I’d ripped off last night, so I had access to his smooth chest. I nuzzled his skin and laid my head against his chest so I could hear his heart beating in my ear. “I’ll try to be more considerate.”
He tightened his hold around my shoulders. “And I’ll try to be more trusting.” He bent and kissed the top of my head, and I tilted my face back so he had access to my mouth. He kissed me tenderly and I relaxed into him, following his direction as the kiss morphed into a more serious moment. He broke from it first, and his eyes pulsed softly. “We’ve both had a hard go of it in the relationship department.”
I nodded, unsure what to say.
“All I want from you is the true opportunity to give this a shot. I’m not asking you for your confession of undying love, but do you think you can give me something? I’m ashamed to need the reassurance, but I promised you honesty, and there it is.” He laid his forehead against mine, his eyes closed and the fine lines more pronounced in this moment than in quite a while.
“I want nothing more than to be loved, to have a home, to belong to one person wholly and completely. I thought I had that.”
He flinched and began to pull away. I held tight.
“It apparently wasn’t real, so I’m naturally going to be cautious. But I can tell you this, Hellion. We want the same things, you and I. I’m willing to give this a shot if you are, so long as you don’t push me to commit in any way other than this.” I pulled his head down to me, meeting his lips as I went up on tiptoes. He was reserved at first, and I wondered if I’d blown it. He slowly gave in to my perseverance and I let loose a breath I hadn’t known I was holding.
Again, Hellion ended the kiss, pulling back to stare at me intently. “Tá grá agam duit, Maddy. I’ll not apologize for feeling as I do, and I won’t expect you to profess the same until you’re ready. But know that I’m here, and I’m waiting, and I will continue to wait so long as you need me to. I want nothing more than your happiness, and I only pray to Odin that you find it with me.”
Impossibly moved, I nodded, looking away. “I appreciate that.”
I saw him look over my shoulder toward the house, and his brows drew together. “What in the world is Mark doing?”
I turned to see the butler, who was also a member of Hellion’s coven, racing down the hill as fast as his legs would carry him. The totally irreverent thought crossed my mind that the Grim Reaper wouldn’t appreciate his message bearer to comport themselves with such haste.
I turned back to Hellion with a sense of impending doom. “Someone else has died.”
Chapter Nineteen
Mark was still shaking, his breathing shallow and too rapid. He’d reached us and delivered news we’d never expected to hear: Amaly was dead.
Hellion had sagged against me, nearly taking us both back to the ground. Only Mark’s quick reflexes had kept the large man from crushing me as he went to his knees. Mark had helped Hellion to the ground and I stroked his hair as he clung to my waist and wept. That man and the vision of rage in front of me now seemed worlds removed in a very short amount of time.
Hellion was a column of barely contained fury. His skin was pale and taut, his irises had expanded again and were pulsing furiously, and his movements were condensed and precise. A faint wind was generating around him without his awareness, blowing his hair about. The fourth time the wind blew his hair into his face he cursed, then retrieved a leather strip and tied his hair back with harsh but controlled motions. Pulling his hair back only revealed more of his savage countenance, and I wasn’t sure it was an improvement for me. He scared me a little bit.
He finally turned to Mark and said simply, “Tell me.”
Mark was sweating and shivering, and I grabbed a small blanket off the back of the sofa as I walked past it, headed for Mark. Reaching him, I dabbed at the sweat running down his temples and then slung the blanket around his shoulders and tucked in the loose edges.
He tried to smile but his face couldn’t make the small motion. Instead his lips twitched and he said, “Thanks.”
I nodded. “Can you tell us what happened? And how did you find out?”
He cleared his throat, and I asked Hellion to pour him a small whiskey. “For medicinal purposes,” I said, encouraging him to accept the glass from Hellion.
He did, and sipped it slowly. The alcohol flushed his cheeks a bit and took the harsh edge off his movements. Of course, my mellowed observation wasn’t at all influenced by the two-finger shot Hellion had handed me that I’d thrown back like a seasoned bar patron.
Mark set his glass down and pulled the blanket closer. “I tried to call Amaly this morning to see if she’d had any luck with the tracers you left her. She didn’t answer.” He began to shake, and I reached over and pressed the glass back into his hand. He took a larger sip, bordering closely on a mouthful, and gasped as the liquid seared his throat and gullet going down. Eyes watering and voice a bit strained, he continued. “When she didn’t answer after the third phone call, I called the London house and asked Stearns to go over and see if there was anything wrong. He said that her front door was open an inch or so, and there were no signs of warding in her area. The second fact dawned on him only after the first fully registered. He called out for her and…” Mark downed the rest of the whiskey as a fortifier and choked, eyes streaming, but he didn’t complain. Hellion approached with the bottle but Mark just shook his head and set his glass to the side. “Anyway, she was on the floor in the living room, her throat cut and, and—” Mark began to cry softly. “There was blond hair scattered around her, sir, as if she’d been trying to use your hair for—”
“Hellion!” I gasped, a horrible possibility dawning on me. “The hair.“ The reality of the death hadn’t hit me because Amaly hadn’t been important to me at all, but Hellion, he was a different story. I looked at him over my shoulder and found him staring at me with something akin to horror on his face.
“We never tested it before we left,” he whispered.
“The killer’s a blond,” I thought aloud. “Blond, with long hair. That narrows it down somewhat.” I stood and paced the length of the room, the gentlemen watching me carve out a path in the enormous room. The only sounds were those of the men’s labored breathing, the soft slap of
my feet as they went from carpet to stone and back again, and the rustle of my silk dress moving over my body as I walked.
Blond hair, blond hair… Most of the dragons I knew were darker haired, browns and auburns and blacks. I didn’t know if I’d ever met a blond dragon. The dragons were darker… It meant it couldn’t be Bahlin’s hair. The invisible weight of guilt I’d been carrying since naming him a person of interest partially lifted off my shoulders as I realized that, while this wouldn’t completely absolve him from suspicion, it did remove a certain level of consideration from his person. Of course, I supposed he could have hired someone to do it; he didn’t like to get his hands dirty. And just like that, the guilt’s tonnage settled back over me like a saddled burden.
“I’ll find the killer and petition the Council to be the one to dispense justice,” Hellion growled, watching the play of emotions across my face. Undoubtedly he realized the mental gymnastics I was doing regarding Bahlin. “You’ll not ask me to refrain from vengeance on behalf of Amaly.” It was a question posed as a statement.
“Don’t ask this of me at this point, Hellion. You know I can’t answer you. Not now.” My voice was the firmest in the room, the most rational. If justice came down to the dragon and the wizard, I didn’t know what I’d do. Two men with one holding a little more than half of my heart. How would I choose where my loyalty would lie? You’d do the right thing, the honorable thing, and support justice, my internal voice said. I shivered at the thought. If one killed the other, whether in cold blood or in an act of Council justice, I wasn’t sure I’d ever forgive the one who delivered the killing blow.
Hellion stood watching me for a moment and then he was gone, dematerializing in front of me.
“He’s probably going to Amaly’s flat,” Mark said in a flat, toneless voice. “He’ll make sure there’s nothing for the mundane police to find before placing a call to alert them to the murder.”
Wrath: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 2 Page 22