by JL Madore
“That sounds like Linsale,” a female said.
They all turned toward the door and Zander threw Bo a W.T.F. glare. He’d not only brought his traitorous female into his home, now he was bringing her into his war room?
“Hear her out,” the Viking said, escorting her into their inner sanctum. “Please, Zandros.”
“Why? What’s changed.”
Bo’s mate stood tall, which honestly still left her at almost a foot and a half disadvantage. She strode into the center of the space, now surrounded by nine Nephilim warriors, and their little brother, Ringo. He gave her props. She didn’t wet her pants and he didn’t smell fear.
“For those I haven’t met, I am Layne, second sister to the Djinn Master, Gheil, and bonded female of your brother, Bo.”
“Hey,” Seth said, raising a glass to Bo. “She acknowledged that, and it didn’t even sound like a curse. You’re making progress, my brother. Congrats.”
Layne offered the Egyptian a smile. “I’m sorry for many things—my words, actions, and behavior. I extend my apologies to each of you, your wives, and your children. Zander told me I was a naïve child, and he was right. I will do better in the future, I swear.”
She paused there, making eye contact with each of them. The only one who gave her a break was Danel—which was bizarre. The Persian was the most unforgiving asshole of their bunch. Man, Ronnie had worked some kind of magic on him.
“I’m not expecting a pass,” Layne said, facing him directly. “I’m asking for a chance, and patience. I’ll tell you what I know. I’ll go undercover. I’ll help in any way I can.”
Bo chuffed, his hair brushing his shoulders as he shook his head with feeling. “Hells to the no, you’re not going undercover. You’re not going anywhere near those bastards.”
She squeezed his wrist. “Let me do this my way.”
“Why,” Zander said, crossing his ankle over his knee. “Why now? Bo said you didn’t know about the attack on the household, but it seems mighty convenient that you figured it out right in the nick of time. Maybe you’re still fucking with us. You’re exiled. You’re caught. Why not play the ‘reformed female in love’ card? You’ve got nothing to lose.”
“Z, come on,” Bo said, hurt plain on his brother’s face. “Save the chest-thumping bravado for our true enemies. She’s trying here.”
Layne stepped away from Bo and stood before Phoenix. “I’ve felt your power twice. You can verify my information and my intent. I swear you won’t find any duplicity.”
Bo cursed. “Kona, you don’t have to do that.”
“Yes, she does,” Zander said, gesturing to the couch opposite him. “Have a seat and we’ll begin. Phoenix, you’re our polygraph. Bo, check your bleeding heart and throbbing dick at the door. In this room, you’re a soldier of this garrison.”
Layne sat on the plush black leather and was swallowed up by its massive dimensions. She couldn’t reach the back and she couldn’t reach the floor. Did furniture stores have super-size for sale? There couldn’t be too big a market. There weren’t that many males like the Watchers.
And thank the Dark Prince for that.
“All right, Layne,” Zander said, leaning back and resting his wings across the back of the opposite couch. “Start with who you know, and then we’ll move into what you know.”
She nodded, flinching slightly with the intrusion of the Egyptian warrior, Phoenix’s power. “We met weekly in the crypt of the Toronto Necropolis.”
She went on to tell them everything she knew, had noticed, and had guessed. She named the players, described the ones she didn’t know by name, and agreed to work with the young Asian kid, Ringo, on drawing them up.
Her head pounded with the strain of invasion so soon after fighting the demon in the stables. Still, she sat upright and held Zander’s gaze, even though the room was spinning in a steady roll.
Phoenix signed something and Bo jumped out of his seat.
“All right, that’s enough.” He scooped her off the couch and into his arms. “You’ve got plenty to go on for now. Layne’s tapped out.”
He whisked her out of the man cave and down the corridor to a massive open concept country kitchen. After setting her at the head of a long, harvest table, he opened the fridge and got busy heating her up a plate.
“What did Phoenix say?”
“He told Z it was time to end the interrogation. You were suffering and risking yourself to prove your commitment.” Bo opened the cutlery drawer and frowned. “Don’t do that. Zander’s mistrust and caustic attitude, I can handle. You hurting yourself to match his stubbornness, I can’t.”
She accepted the plate of chicken and veggie pasta in a white sauce, and smiled up at him. “I’m fine.”
“Don’t lie to me either. Phoenix also said you’re not healed from saving Sunshine.”
The male had chatty hands.
“All right, I’m not fine—but I will be. Make yourself something to eat and join me. I’d like to lie down after that, and maybe you could join me for that as well.”
Bo piled a mountain of food on a plate and put it in the microwave. “A nap is a wonderful idea. I will sleep with you, but I won’t have sex with you. Not until Phoenix says you’re fully healed.”
She rolled her eyes and regretted it, pain shooting in her head. “Are you always this overprotective with your girlfriends?”
Bo’s smile faltered. “I failed Gyda. It was a very long time ago, but I know you know about her. I’m not that naïve boy anymore. I know the dangers of this world, and I will protect you with everything I have. You are my soul, Layne, and I love you. Caring for you, is caring for me as well.”
“Well,” she said, chewing another forkful of creamy ambrosia. “Hard to argue with that.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Bo stood at the prow of the longboat, his fur cloak heavy on his shoulders, his tunic and britches blowing in the evening breeze. Accompanied by his eight Nephilim brothers, Tanek via cam and comm, and Rayvn, he had ten males to stand by him, as was his custom.
The long bellow of the hunting horn across the water had them casting off and his heart racing. Each stroke of the oars closed the distance between him and his bride.
“Put some muscle into it, my brothers. I’m anxious to wed my mate properly.”
Zander and Kyrian sat on the first benches, left and right, chuckling as they matched the other’s pace. The wooden oars caught in the water, tugging them forward in a smooth glide toward Centre Island.
“You wouldn’t be so anxious if you hadn’t abstained the past week,” Zander said, his comment bringing a round of male grunts and laughter forward.
He was so damned thankful Zander was giving Layne a chance. He didn’t want to be at odds with the Sumerian and thanked the gods that he’d come around.
As a sign of solidarity, the males with hair long enough—Zander, Tanek, Brennus, and Rayvn—had each shaved the sides of their heads and pulled back their hair into a braid down their nape like him.
They might look like the most rag-tag bunch of Vikings ever, but he wouldn’t have had it any other way.
“If you’d given in to your urges,” Danel said, rowing one-handed with Ringo as his partner, “you’d also likely have come here with a spank new pair of wings.”
He didn’t care. His transition would come. He and Layne had done things backwards. They’d started with the wild sex and had to work back to the attraction and loving one another.
But they were in the zone now.
As they drew closer to the shore, he saw Austin, Ronnie, Sunshine, and the rest of his family standing with the other guests under the white lights of the restaurant Gheil rented for the occasion. The outdoor deck sparkled under a hundred strings of lights and he felt the magic deep in his chest.
He was so blessed.
They rammed the dock more than landed the ship, but he didn’t know whether to blame that on his brothers not being males of the sea or the hours of mead and mirth they’d
shared.
Laughing, they pulled themselves together and got to the dock without looking like total fools.
Then he saw her.
In all gold, her midriff bodice was silk, embroidered in black, her bottoms the gossamer pants one would expect from a genie. She wore a black, velvet cloak, a gold veil covering everything below her eyes, and her hair was tied back with two small daggers used as pins to hold it in place.
The moment he stepped foot on the deck, his Mark burst bright gold. He looked to her guests, but none of them seemed alarmed. Likely, Austin had warned them he’d get emotional. When she winked at him, he knew she had.
Gheil stepped in front of Layne and raised a hand to hush the crowd. In royal blue silk, and with a black line painted over his eyes in a band from ear to ear, the Djinn Master was truly transformed from the modern businessman to an ancient leader.
Bo’s beast hated to be deprived of seeing his female, hated that this male thought to push her to the background when Layne should be the shining star of everyone’s sky.
“As Jhaia and I planned this celebration over the past week,” Gheil said, “we found ourselves looking at it from the traditions of the Djinn: the blood oaths, the tributes to our Dark Prince, the exchange of family swords. That was wrong of us, and I apologize.”
Bo bowed his head. When he’d been informed they had arranged for a longboat and the journey over the water for him, he’d been more than a little touched.
Gheil tilted his head in response. “Tradition is who we have been. It’s our foundation. It’s our path. But in these days of change, when new alliances are being formed and new hope is being birthed, combining our paths has become the way to a new future.”
Jhaia stepped forward, a long, engraved box lying across her flat palms. “Our gift to you and your bride, Viking.”
Bo went over and raised the box. Nested in a bed of red satin lay two stunningly ornate, beautifully carved torcs.
“I considered having the bands crafted of solid gold,” Gheil said, “for my sister has always been worth far more than she realized. Instead, I chose platinum. Gold is flashy but soft. It draws attention, when our people seek privacy. It is common, when your union is rare.”
He lifted the larger of the two out and held it up. “As you accept my sister, I wish you the greatest strength, lives filled with private moments, and a rare binding love.”
Bo knelt before the Master. “I accept both your sister and your gifts. Thank you.”
The Djinn Master touched the torc against Bo’s throat and it magically latched around his neck, locked and sealed as tradition demanded.
“Viking, please place the other on your mate.”
Bo stood, lifted the smaller torc from the box in Jhaia’s hands, and smiled at Layne. “You ready for this, little Djinn?”
“Ready and waiting, Viking. Bring it.”
Bo chuckled and touched the platinum band to the hollow of her throat as Gheil had done with him. As before, the torc magically encircled Layne’s beautiful neck and sealed itself in an unending ring.
“Give me your hand, Viking,” said an old Djinn woman in a fancy silk jacket. “You too, child.”
He knew the moment she took their hands that she was the seer, Layne had told her about. As Neima smiled up at them, a montage of images and snippets in time passed through his mind—some his, some Layne’s.
Childhood memories. Hardships and triumphs. Coming into adulthood. The birth of their first child, the second, and then their third. Two sons and a daughter to finish their family. They would grow old together, centuries spreading out before them in a life rich with love and laughter.
Love swelled within him in such an incredible rush, he lost where he was and why. He pulled Layne into his arms and kissed her with all the hope and joy he’d ever had.
She was his life and his future.
She was the mother of their three beautiful children.
She was the heart and soul, and—
“Oh no,” he said, a stabbing pain cleaving his chest. “Not here. Not now.”
Layne’s eyes widened. He should have warned her. He should have given her a heads-up on the possibility.
“Zander?” he said, his legs buckling. He hit the wood of the deck, grappling at the belt of his tunic. “Z?”
“I’m here, my brother. We’re all here.”
“What’s going on?” Layne asked, the magic of their wedding shifting into chaos.
He couldn’t focus on that. His body was breaking from within. When the first bones snapped, he pressed his hands onto the deck and closed his eyes. The cracking ricocheted all around him, and he wondered if it sounded as bad to his guests as it did in his head.
The weight of his cloak lifted and then Layne was pulling his tunic over his head. “I’m here for you, Bo,” she said, lying on the fur cloak, blinking up at him. “Focus on my voice and not the pain. I’m told it’ll help.”
“It does,” he gasped, sweat breaking out over his entire body. Suddenly, all the mead they drank became a very bad idea. The night air was cold on his heated flesh and he shivered. “I’m ruining our wedding.”
“Nonsense,” Layne said, tears brimming in her eyes. “We needed a blood sacrifice to seal the deal. We just didn’t know it would be you.”
He laughed, but it was difficult.
“Here, Kyrian, we’re supposed to use these.” Pulling the two small daggers from her hair, Layne handed them off. “Focus on me, Bosse. Fight through it. Don’t let it control you. I’m right here with you.”
He fought not to curse. He didn’t want to swear in front of her family and friends. His back undulated, his ribs snapping to make room for the wings trying to push out his back like spring buds.
“Almost there, my brother,” Zander said, somewhere behind him. “A little slice to clear the way and we’ll set those bad boys free.”
Kyrian knelt beside him. “In the immortal words of Zander when I was transitioning, ‘the next part truly sucks ass,’ Viking. Retreat into your beast and bear it. Pain with a purpose and all that.”
Bo did what he could, but he didn’t want to leave Layne’s voice or her touch. His breath caught in heaving gasps, the entire scene swirling like a top.
“Two boys and a girl,” Layne said, staring up at him. “That’s a lot to look forward too.”
It was. He wanted to start right away. Tonight even.
If he lived.
Then, like the sudden calm after the storm, his wings broke free and the pain eased. He gave himself a few heartbeats to catch his breath and then forced himself to his feet. His brothers caught him when he swayed, and yep, his guests look horrified. “Please, excuse me for one moment.”
With Zander on one hip and Kyrian on the other, he had his brothers take him back down to the water. Kneeling on the grass behind the screen of the boat, his stomach unloaded three hours of drinking.
“Such a lightweight,” Zander teased. “I thought you Vikings were supposed to be able to handle your liquor.”
Bo chuckled, the heat of the blood dripping down his back giving him chills. “That really fucking sucked.”
Kyrian squeezed his shoulder. “Look at the bright side, Viking. Z and I both passed out. You at least didn’t plank it in front of the in-laws.”
Austin waited for them halfway up the hill to the restaurant, a bundle in her hands. “Are you okay, sweetie?”
Bo nodded. “Sunshine didn’t see that, did she?”
Austin shook her head. “No, Ronnie and Danel took her inside to get her something to eat. And here, hon, I brought you something.”
She extended her hands and he accepted the clothing. Ronnie had mastered the design of the over the head, pinni-styled shirts. He zippered each side from his hip to his armpits and felt far less exposed. “How did you know, cowgirl?”
“I know you, sweet man. Now, get up there and enjoy your ceremony. Your bride is holding down the fort on her own and you’ve only been married for twenty minu
tes.”
Bo kissed Austin’s cheek and headed up to the party, his strength bolstered every step he got closer to his mate.
Hours later, Layne snuggled against Bo’s chest, his massive fur cloak draped over her, as the longboat glided back to the city proper. It was late. Some of the guests had wanted to travel like this and the Watchers rowed back and forth, over and again, without complaint. It was magical, the sound of oars dipping into water, the pull of their exertions, and then the silent glide as they shot forward. The moment struck her as something Bo would’ve experienced eight hundred years ago. It was something she’d remember the rest of her life.
“I’m proud of you, Layne,” Gheil said, his voice thick with drink and exhaustion. “Zander told me you’re now part of the solution. Trusting in this future was the right choice. I am relieved to see you so happy. It’s a good first step to making amends.”
She smiled over her shoulder at her Viking. Whether Gheil lifted her exile or not, she had a home. Bo made her feel safer and more accepted than she ever imagined possible. She couldn’t wait to get him alone. They were headed to the loft for the night . . . which might roll into two or three nights.
“I am happy, and by the look into our future, it’s only going to get better.” She saw the cloud of sadness in Jhaia’s eyes and sighed. “We have a lead on Taid. I’m helping the Watchers track down the males from that warehouse. I promise, we won’t stop until those bastards pay for what they did.”
Jhaia smiled, but it didn’t touch the sadness in her eyes. “I’ll never understand the males who do such things.”
“Madmen rarely make sense,” Bo said behind her. “All they do is hate and breed more hatred. We’ll find them. With Layne’s help, I have no doubt we’ll be bringing you news soon. We’ll break the cycle.”
Layne smiled as the lit up spire of the CN Tower grew closer. For the first time in her life, she looked forward to her tomorrows. She’d glimpsed what her life would be and she was ready to make it a reality. Running a finger over the Djinn carvings encircling her neck, she marveled at how content she felt belonging to someone else. They were bonded and bound for life.