by Becca Andre
He braced a hand on the doorjamb, drawing her eye to the play of muscle in his arm and chest. He leaned closer and she noticed his musky scent.
“Did you sleep well?” he asked, his voice a little rough.
She looked up and caught him eyeing her, too, though his gaze returned to her face. His attention was fully focused on her, the predator on display in those deep green eyes.
“Best I’ve slept in a long time,” she said.
“I helped you?”
“Yes,” she admitted. “What about you? Did I keep you awake?”
His lips curled. “Not because you were sharing your soul.”
She smiled in turn, her heart beating faster. It had been forever since he had teased with her like this.
“So,” she said. “Are you headed out to work?”
“No. I told Rowan I’d be staying here for a while. If that’s okay with you. Grams offered me a guest room.” Had he already talked to her grandmother about it?
“And you accepted?”
“Do you want me to stay?” he asked. He continued to watch her, but no longer with his predator’s stare. Now, he looked uncertain, as if he feared she’d refuse him.
“I thought you were avoiding me.” The bitterness of the past month resurfaced.
“I’ve never wanted to avoid you, only to avoid harming you.”
“And now?”
“Now, I’m starting to wonder if I had it all wrong. I have the ability to heal you. Helping you last night validates it even more.”
“I don’t understand that,” she admitted. “Sometimes, you make me feel better than animating entire cemeteries, and at other times, it just hurts.”
“Which times did I help?”
“Last night and when I woke after the coma.”
“Both times, you slept while sharing your soul.”
“Huh. I guess so.” And the other times had been brief exchanges. “So you’re saying I have to sleep with you to gain the full effect?”
He grinned. “Far be it from me to deny you any help I can offer.”
She laughed. “You’re so considerate.”
He shrugged, the movement drawing her eye to his nice shoulders.
She chewed her lip. “So, you’re just going to hang out around here?”
“I have a class this afternoon, but I can skip it.”
“Or I can go with you—if you don’t mind.”
“Why would I mind?”
Abruptly, he straightened and looked toward the stairs. A moment later, Livie stepped up onto the landing. She saw them and stopped.
“Um, Grams asked me to let you both know that she would have breakfast ready in fifteen minutes.”
“Guess I’d better go get ready,” James said. “I don’t want to be late.” A smile, and he walked away.
Elysia watched him go, admiring the way he moved—and his great ass. She glanced over to find Livie grinning at her.
“Yes?” she asked her cousin.
“You look good this morning. Do you feel better?”
“I do.”
“Being out in the rain yesterday didn’t give you a cold?”
“No. I’m fine.”
“And your magic? You fell asleep on the couch and didn’t visit the cemetery.” Livie stepped closer. “Is James helping?”
“Very much.”
Livie wrapped her in a tight hug.
Elysia hugged her back. She had been so overwhelmed by her own pain that it hadn’t occurred to her until this moment how much Livie and Grams were suffering.
“I’m sorry, Livie.”
“For what?”
“Putting you through this.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“I know, but I still feel bad.”
Livie gave her one more squeeze, then released her. “So, what’s up with you and James?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Things looked promising a few minutes ago.”
“Yeah, they did.”
Livie grinned.
“I’m going to shower. Let Grams know I’ll be down shortly?”
“Will do.” A quick smile, and Livie hurried away.
Elysia closed the door and leaned against it. Livie was right. She and James had quickly fallen back into their playful ways of old. She hoped it could continue.
Chapter 11
Elysia stood in the living room of James’s Athens apartment and took in the familiar surroundings. She hadn’t been here since that first week after she met James. Stopping beside the end table, she noticed the candid shot of the Elements and Addie in front of a Christmas tree. The first time she had seen this picture, she hadn’t known anyone in it. Now she knew everyone well.
Her gaze settled on Cora’s smiling face, reminding Elysia of her visit with her yesterday. She still had mixed feelings about how the adoption had turned out.
A soft sound behind her made her turn to see James leave the stairs. He was dressed in his typical distressed jeans, black T-shirt, and boots.
“You okay?” he asked, perhaps picking up on her concerns about the adoption. He tended to be observant in that regard. Of course, she had shared her soul with him, so that might give him an edge.
“I was thinking about the adoption.” She crossed her arms, her gaze drifting to the picture. “I really do appreciate Cora adopting him, but…” She didn’t know how to explain the emptiness she felt.
James stepped up beside her and pulled her into his arms.
She hugged him back, squeezing him tight.
“Addie will cure you, then the baby will be yours. Cora sees this as temporary.”
She knew that Cora wasn’t adopting the baby for selfish reasons, but knowing that she would be filling the role that Elysia had planned for herself still made her envious, and if she was honest, resentful.
“Why must my magic take everything from me?”
“I rather like your magic,” he said against her ear. “Will you be okay while I’m in class? The pain is coming back, isn’t it?”
She leaned back to look up at him. He really was observant. “There’s a cemetery a few blocks from where your class is held. I could wait for you there.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’ll be fine. Good thing I still had a pair of those brown contacts.” She waved a hand at her eyes. She had picked up the contacts after Neil had used a potion to try to stunt her. The colored contacts had hidden her white irises then, just as they hid them now.
James cupped her check, rubbing his thumb beneath one eye. “They’re not as pretty as your natural shade.”
“Thanks.” She didn’t want to dwell on what her magic was doing to her. Instead, she glanced at the clock on the DVD player. “We’ll need to hurry so you’re not late.”
He dropped his hand, his expression sad. “Okay.” He walked to the coat rack beside the front door.
She watched him pull on a black leather coat. On anyone else, she would have said he was trying too hard with the bad boy look. But on James, it fit.
He picked up a backpack she assumed held his books and slung it over his shoulder. “I envy the dead in that cemetery.” James opened the front door and held it for her. “They get to spend the afternoon sharing your soul while I solve for X.”
She trailed her fingers across his stomach as she walked past him, facing him once on the porch. “And I envy X.”
He gave her one of those predatory grins that made her knees weak, then followed her outside.
Elysia wished she had worn a wristwatch or had a phone. Two hours seemed to stretch forever when she had no accurate way to tell time. Maybe James would get out of class early and she wouldn’t have that long a wait.
She tried to occupy herself by walking around the small cemetery and reading
the headstones over the bodies she was animating. It was unsettling how little they seemed to bleed off her power. She needed a bigger cemetery.
After reading every headstone, she retreated to the weathered bench near the lone mausoleum on the other side of the cemetery. It wasn’t far from the wooded area bordering the graveyard and offered a bit of privacy from the busy street near the entrance. Perhaps she could doze a little in the warm spring sunshine. She leaned back and closed her eyes, but she couldn’t relax. She wanted James. Maybe Ian had been right to deny her him. Goodness knew she had certainly become addicted to him in less than twenty-four hours.
The bench creaked and shifted as someone sat down beside her. She thought she caught a faint whiff of James’s cologne, but the only death she sensed was in the graves around her.
She straightened and opened her eyes. A man sat on the bench, watching her. One look into his hazel eyes and she didn’t need to notice his camo clothing or the large hunting knife strapped to his hip to know who he was.
“George Huntsman,” she said.
“Elysia Mallory.” He gave her a smile that made her skin crawl. “I see you really do live in Athens.”
She frowned, not sure what he meant. Unnerved, she started to rise, but he captured her wrist.
“Stay,” he said. “We have much to discuss.” His hair was lighter than James’s—brown instead of black—but she could see the resemblance between them. He certainly favored James more than Henry, though Brian had looked the most like James.
“I suppose you’ll tell me that I’m in your brother’s sights if I refuse? Are you two taking turns?”
His expression darkened. “I no longer have any brothers. Hunter brothers.”
“But I saw Henry not two days ago.” Oh God, what if the PIA had found him and killed him. That would leave James with only one link to the mortal world: the man sitting beside her.
“I guess James didn’t tell you that he killed him.”
Elysia stared at him. “James killed Henry?”
“Slit his throat with his own knife.” A muscle flexed in George’s jaw. “Henry loved that knife.”
She skipped past the odd comment. “No. I don’t believe that. James would never—”
“Kill? He would. He has.”
“He wouldn’t kill his own brother. Now you’re all that’s left.”
George’s eyes narrowed as he studied her. “You know what he is.”
“Yes, I know he’s the grim.”
“He told you that?” His grip tightened around her wrist. “He’s not supposed to tell anyone.”
She gritted her teeth as he ground the bones in her wrist together. She longed to raise the bodies in the ground around them, but resisted the urge. It was the middle of the day on a crowded college campus. She would raise the dead only as a last resort.
“I can’t believe James really killed Henry,” she said.
“Believe it.”
She considered asking why, but doubted George would tell her—even if he did know the true reason. Had James tracked Henry down after he had tried to take her at the mall? Was that why James had returned to her? He feared that George would make a move next? If that was his reasoning, it appeared accurate.
“What do you want?” she asked George.
“I want my brother to complete the task he was created to do.”
“And that is?”
George lifted her hand to his face. She froze as he sniffed her fingers. How much animal was in these guys? She thought James was the one with the highest concentration of hellhound blood.
“What are you doing?” She tried to pull her hand away, but he didn’t let go.
He looked up, his eyes sweeping over her before returning to her face. “As beautiful as you are, and still he fails.”
“You lost me, buddy.” And people thought necromancers were nuts.
“The alchemist was cute,” he continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “but the mouth on that one.” He shook his head. “I had to restrain myself hourly from killing her.”
A chill crawled up her spine. He was talking about Addie.
He sighed. “It makes no sense. I’ve given him everything, and still he defies me.”
“Who? James?” That wasn’t the way she understood it, but it might prove useful to keep George talking. “What do you mean?”
“He threatened to kill me, too,” George said. “The crazy thing is, I think he intends to.”
Her heart surged. “I’m sure it was an empty threat.”
“No. If killing Henry hadn’t dropped James to his knees when the power redistributed, I’m sure he would have come after me. I could see it in his eyes.”
His answer made her sick. It also made her angry. James had ranted at her about giving up. Wasn’t this the same thing? She knew how much it bothered him that his brothers were cold-blooded killers, but hadn’t they all agreed that they needed to be captured and not killed? James had insisted on doing it himself because he didn’t want more PIA agents killed. Now she wondered if he’d had something a little more final in mind all along.
George rose from the bench, pulling her to her feet as he stood.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
“When the prey is dangerous, set a trap.”
“I won’t be your bait.” She reached out to the bodies in the mausoleum. They could free themselves more quickly than those buried in the soil.
“You won’t be bait for long.” He tugged her toward the wooded lot on the other side of the split-rail fence bordering this side of the cemetery.
She frowned, not sure what to make of his comment. Did he intend to kill her once he got James? She sent more of her soul into the bodies within the mausoleum, working faster.
A clatter of stone sounded and George stopped. “What was that?”
“What was what?” she asked. She could quiet the zombies’ moans, but not the noise they made when they busted out of their vaults.
Without warning, he seized her by the throat and shoved her against the side of the mausoleum. Her head connected hard enough to make her lose focus, and her soul snapped back, its return almost as painful as her head smacking the stone wall. Unfortunately, this side of the mausoleum wasn’t visible from the road, so there was no one to see his attack.
“Is he here?” George demanded, his face only inches from hers.
“What?” She sent her soul out once more, reestablishing the animations.
A whisper of metal on leather, and suddenly, the cold blade of George’s knife was against her throat.
Elysia froze as he pressed closer.
“Pay attention,” George said. “I really don’t need you. The alchemist will work just as well to get James to cooperate. Now, answer the question. Is he here?”
“In the cemetery? No.” She pulled in a breath as the knife bit into her skin.
“I don’t think you’re telling the truth,” he whispered.
“He’s in class.”
“Class?”
“Here on campus. He’s a part-time student.”
George stopped pressing the blade against her skin, but didn’t remove it entirely. “Why is he taking classes?”
“The Flame Lord insisted.”
“The pompous ass.” George lowered the knife.
If he had any other comments, Elysia didn’t stick around to hear them. She sprang away from him, angling for the end of the mausoleum where the door was. If she could get inside…
She rounded the corner and slammed into someone. The impact surprising a cry from her.
“Ely?” James’s arms came around her. “What’s—” He looked past her, and his lips lifted away from his teeth.
“Hello, little brother,” George said from behind her. “How was class?”
“She’s bleeding.�
� James snarled the words.
George lifted his knife, displaying the smear of blood on the blade.
“You’re dead,” James spoke the words so softly that Elysia barely heard them, but George did. He dropped into a fighter’s stance, the knife held before him.
“James?” Elysia pressed a hand to his chest. “Don’t do anything foolish.”
“How about a Hunt?” James asked, his eyes never leaving George. “A Hunt to end all Hunts.” He grinned, exposing teeth much more canine than human.
“You want to live, little brother. Remember?”
“I want to Hunt.” James lifted a hand, displaying wicked-looking ebony claws curling at his fingertips. She had never seen his claws so pronounced, or so black. They grew as she watched, and black fur began to sprout along his knuckles and the back of his hand. Dear God, was he pulling his other form into this world?
George abruptly turned and ran.
James jumped after him, slashing the air where he had been.
“James!” Elysia shouted. “Stop!”
He dropped into a crouch, snarling.
She hated to give him commands, but he had clearly lost it. “Come here,” she whispered.
He rose to his feet and turned to face her. His glowing eyes met hers, his stare like nothing she had ever seen. It took everything she had to stand her ground as he walked to her.
She took a breath. “I’m—”
He slammed a fist into the mausoleum door, shattering the bolts that held it closed. The door bowed inward, and the locking pin mounted in the bottom of the door dug into the stone floor, leaving a deep groove.
She took a step back. “James?”
He braced his hands to either side of the door and bowed his head.
Tires squealed on the other side of the trees George had vanished into. Hopefully, that was him speeding away. She didn’t need another worry. She had her hands full with James.
“Talk to me.” She took a step closer.
“You denied me the Hunt.” The words were soft, but at least he didn’t growl them.
“Yes. If killing him didn’t kill you, I would have gladly let you go. I’m sorry I had to command you.” She took another step closer, eyeing the demolished door.