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935 Words
“You’re different. Tonight, you seem…different,” she whispered. “What’s happened?”
His hand stilled on her face. His brows drew together and he looked at her—looked into her—with a gaze so penetrating she felt naked. He murmured, “Definitely smarter than my usual type.”
“That’s not an answer.”
He gave her a lopsided smile, very faint, and even more faintly said, “Life is so short, mystery girl. And people like you so few and far between. Perhaps in another lifetime…”
From behind them came the sound of a throat being cleared. Corbin said, “Pardon, sir, but there’s a phone call from the Earl of Sommerley. I told him you wouldn’t want to be disturbed, but he said it was urgent.”
“The…the Earl of Sommerley?”
Christian exhaled a breath and closed his eyes. “My brother.” He opened his eyes, looked at her lips, and slowly traced his thumb across her mouth. He exhaled again and pulled away.
“I’m sorry. I’m afraid I have to take the call. This won’t take but a moment.”
He turned to leave, then stopped and pinned her with a burning look. “Don’t run away,” he commanded, and she wanted to laugh.
As if she could run with these rubber legs he’d left her with.
But she only nodded wordlessly, and watched as he walked swiftly from the room.
“Ten more are confirmed missing from the colony in Manaus,” said Leander brusquely.
Christian’s own, “What is it?” when he picked up had been equally brusque. He and his older brother had never been much for small talk. “I don’t understand—how the hell are they getting out? I thought the entire colony was on lockdown?”
“They are. But someone is helping them get out, assisting them with passage, arranging the entire damn thing. Probably someone on the inside. We don’t know who yet, but one thing we know for sure: we’ve got to stop the bleeding.”
“If they make it to Barcelona—”
“Not if, Christian. When. The six who deserted the colony in Bhakthapur are already there.”
“How do we know?”
“One of them made a phone call to his mother. Said he’d arrived safely. Said they should come, too. It was better there. So much more freedom.”
“s**t,” hissed Christian.
To which Leander wryly responded, “Precisely.”
“Can we track the call?”
“It was a prepaid, disposable cell. Untraceable.”
Which meant the deserters were taking precautions. Which meant they’d been coached.
Which meant their insane, murderous, diabolical leader wasn’t so stupid after all.
“Are you any closer to finding him?”
“Barcelona is a very big city, Leander,” Christian said tightly. “We knew it would take some time.”
“Unfortunately time is the one thing we don’t have, brother. I can send The Hunt—”
“We’ve been over this a million times,” interrupted Christian. “The Hunt is too busy containing the situation in the colonies. Without them, the bleeding would be exponentially worse. We can’t afford to divert their attention now. Besides, if we have too big a presence here we’ll be noticed before we can find him and they’ll just move again. And this time we won’t have a clue where he went.” His voice lowered. “And I’m the only one without family. It has to be me.”
There was a long silence, then a heavy exhalation from Leander. “I know. I still can’t wrap my head around this whole thing. I know you’re doing all you can. I’m just worried about you. This entire situation…I never imagined it would come to this. You’re right. I know you’re right. But it doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
Christian took that in. For his older brother to utter the words you’re right was nothing short of a miracle. It meant something was very wrong.
His voice carefully neutral, Leander added, “Jenna’s worried about you, too.”
Oh, minefield. Christian’s defenses went up, the automatic response to any mention of his brother’s wife.
“How is she?”
“Cranky. This pregnancy…I had no idea it would be this bad. Not only is her Gift of Sight gone, but she can’t Shift because of the baby, and most days she’s so sick she can barely get out of bed. The midwife says it’s all perfectly normal, but I hate seeing her sick without being able to do anything for her. It makes me feel so…helpless.”
Helpless. Yes, that’s precisely how Jenna made Christian feel, too.
His brother’s wife was painfully beautiful, and there had been a time, before she married Leander, when Christian had imagined himself half in love with her. Well, maybe three quarters. She was an American, with that American forthrightness and independence, and had upset the balance of their carefully controlled world in a million different ways.
Jenna was the most powerful of his kind in centuries, which was all the more astonishing because she was half human.
Human…like September Jones.
He closed his eyes at the thought of the fragile, feisty human girl awaiting him in his library, the disaster waiting to happen that he was finding himself more and more unable to resist, and remembered the intoxicating smell of her. The soft, sweet scent of vanilla and orange blossom that rose from her skin.
- Writer
