Bite the Bullet (Bitten Book 5) (13 page)

A
fter we recovered
from our wild coupling on the gym floor, Asher had to find me something to wear because he’d destroyed my pants.

Luckily, Conner kept extra workout clothes in the small adjoining bathroom and Asher found a pair of athletic shorts for me to put on. Even with the string tied as tightly as possible, I had to hold the shorts up with one hand.

I tried to gather up the tattered remnants of my yoga pants and underwear, hoping that I wasn’t leaving pieces behind for someone to find.

Asher and I were quiet as we hurried upstairs to the guest room I was using. We showered together and ended up on the floor of the stall, sweaty and spent all over again.

When we came out of the bathroom, Asher’s duffel bag was sitting on the padded bench at the end of the bed. I laughed at the expression on his face.

“Duncan did you a favor,” I commented.

As we both dressed, I wracked my brain for the words to tell Asher about my visions. I knew he wasn’t going to like what I had to say. I only hoped he would take the time to listen to everything I had to tell him.

“Asher, I need to talk to you about something and I need you to promise you’ll listen to me.”

He sat on the end of the bed. “You can talk to me about anything.”

I was pretty sure he would change his mind after I told him that the only way to kill Cornelius would be to bait the trap with something he couldn’t resist.

“While I was unconscious, I had visions.” When I hesitated, he nodded encouragingly, so I continued. “I know what we have to do to defeat Cornelius and the Faction.”

Asher straightened. “You had visions of this? What do we need to do?”

I rolled my lips between my teeth. “I’m going to tell you, but I don’t think you’ll like it.”

“If it means we’ll win this war and be able to get on with our lives, I’m sure I can deal with it.”

“We have to draw him out, and the only way we’ll be able to do that—”

He shook his head vehemently before I finished my sentence. “Don’t even think about it.”

Well, that was a lightning fast about face.

I sighed because I knew that would be his response. That was my initial reaction, but I couldn’t deny that my abilities were stronger than before. I was not only certain that this was what we had to do, I’d seen bits and pieces of the final battle.

“I need you to understand, Asher. This isn’t just a vague feeling or premonition. I
saw
what would happen. We will win. We have a future. I know for a fact that my friends and I make it out safely.”

“Shannon—”

I lifted a hand. “You said I could talk to you about anything and you would listen. Either stand by that or I’ll go to the Council with this.”

His face darkened with anger. “Don’t.”

My hands went to my hips. “Don’t what? Do what’s right for everyone? Save my friends?
Save myself?
”

“It’s my responsibility to keep you safe,” he stated.

“Why?” I asked. “Why, when I’m perfectly capable of keeping myself safe?”

“Because you’re my mate!” he roared, jumping to his feet and pacing the end of the bed.

“Whoa, stop right there,” I demanded, lifting a hand. “Up until I jumped you in the gym, you were fighting the connection between us pretty damn hard. Now you’re saying I’m you’re mate? That seems more than a little contradictory, don’t you think?”

He looked down, unable to meet my eyes, and took a deep breath. “Shannon, I—”

“What makes you think I’m your mate?”

When his gaze returned to mine, his eyes shimmered, lit from within. “Before I took you from the safe house, the night Conner and I came to discuss using you as bait, you felt it, didn’t you?”

Determined not to give an inch, I asked, “Felt what?”

He frowned at me. “The moment I laid eyes on you again, it was as if there was a part of me missing and I’d found it. Like a portion of my soul was empty and I hadn’t even known it. When I saw you again, I swear, there was a click in my mind so loud that everyone should have heard it.”

His words mirrored my thoughts from that night exactly. I found myself leaning toward him, unconsciously wanting to be closer to him, but I held myself back.

“Then why have you kept pushing me away?” I asked unevenly. “If I’m supposed to be your mate, why are you resisting it so hard?”

He smiled, but it wasn’t a happy expression. “Don’t you understand, Shannon? I want you to have a choice in all this.”

“Do you feel like you have a choice?”

He shook his head. “This isn’t about me. I grew up understanding that some vampires found mates. They’re our fairy tales. I’m getting what so many want but never find.”

“It is about you, Asher,” I argued. “And me. It’s about both of us. Are you ashamed of me? Is that why you’ve been trying to keep your distance?”

Suddenly he was right in front of me, his face inches from mine. “Absolutely not. You are everything I have ever wanted for myself and more.”

“Then why?”

His hand touched my face. “Because I’m afraid, now that I have you, I won’t be able to let you go. Even if that’s what you want.” He sighed. “I don’t want you to feel like your choices are being taken away, Shannon. You’ve been living a sheltered life for months now with very little you could do about it. I don’t want you to regret this when you no longer have to lead that life.”

“But I did choose, Asher. I chose to be with you. I could have told Conner no when he asked me if I wanted to help. I could have stayed in the safe house. I didn’t have to agree to let you bite me or to let you turn me. Those were choices I made.”

His hands crept around my waist, pulling me into his body. “You have to be sure, Shannon. I don’t want you to regret this or resent me as time goes by.”

With complete sincerity, I answered, “I’m sure.”

I was sure. With all the uncertainty I’d been feeling about everything else lately, it felt incredible to finally be confident in a decision I made.

This time, when he smiled it reached his eyes.

“No more running or pushing me away,” I admonished. “From here on out, we’re partners.”

“Agreed,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss me.

“Did we just make another promise?” I asked when his head lifted.

He nodded.

“Good. Don’t break it.”

*     *     *

Unfortunately, our truce
didn’t last long. As I shared my visions with Asher, telling him what needed to be done, he grew more and more agitated.

“No, Shannon. It’s too dangerous,” he insisted.

“I know it’s risky, but it
will
work. We can defeat the Faction and move on with our lives.”

“No, I won’t let you do it.”

“
Let
me? I’m not some helpless damsel in distress, Asher. I’m not human any longer, and I’m probably better trained than half the vampires that guard this place. I’m also no longer a sensitive. I’m fully clairvoyant.”

“So that makes you invincible?” he asked scathingly.

“No, it’s who I am, Asher. I may be your mate, but that doesn’t mean that I stopped being Shannon Frye. We haven’t had time to learn everything about each other yet, but from what you’ve seen of me so far, do I strike you as the type of woman who will sit back when I know I can make a difference?”

I could tell my words were sinking in because the thunderous expression left Asher’s face. The tension in his shoulders dissipated a bit.

He lifted a hand and curved it around my neck. “I understand what you’re saying, but I want you to put yourself in my shoes. Most vampires take companions or spouses who will benefit them financially or socially. Money and power are what they want. It’s part of our culture. It’s very rare for a vampire to find a mate, one who completes them. Love isn’t used much in our vocabulary. What we have, and what Conner, Finn, and Lex have with their mates, it’s rare. There’s more than magic at work here, it’s fate. You’re the only female I will love in my lifetime, and my life will likely span another five or six centuries. Maybe more. You’re priceless to me. Hearing you talk about placing yourself in danger not only angers me, it frightens me. I’ve waited five hundred years for you, Shannon. I don’t want to live the next five hundred without you.”

He said so many amazing and beautiful things that I couldn’t focus on which one to respond to first, so I rose on my tiptoes and pressed my lips to his.

“What if I can promise that I won’t be hurt or killed?”

He heaved a sigh. “Let’s go talk to Conner. He can decide if we should pursue it and gather the Council.”

Surprised that he gave in so easily, I dropped back down on my flat feet and started to back away. Asher’s hand shot out and wrapped around my arm.

“I’m only agreeing to this because I know you’ll harangue me until I change my mind or you’ll convince Conner and the Council to do this anyway.”

My eyebrows rose. “Agreeing to?”

“Fine, I’m not fighting you about it for those reasons. Better?”

I grinned at him. For a vampire his age, he wasn’t as chauvinistic as I would have expected.

“But that doesn’t mean I won’t be shadowing your every move.”

Okay, maybe he was only
slightly
less chauvinistic. Still, it was the first time a man hadn’t treated me like one of the boys in a long time. Every man I’d known in the last few years knew how capable and skilled I was. They expected me to pull my weight and do my job. If they did seem overly protective of me because I was a woman, I’d disabused them of that notion quickly because it was important to me that my colleagues saw me as their equal. They had to trust that I would watch their back, no matter what.

While I still wanted Asher to see me as equal, ours was a different relationship dynamic. Even though I didn’t want him to coddle me, I couldn’t help appreciating his desire to take care of me. I’d been on my own for so long, never having someone to lean on. Now, it appeared I had Asher.

“If you watch my back, then I guess I’ll have to watch yours.”

He took my hand. “Let’s go find Conner and we’ll discuss your plan further.”

When we found Conner downstairs, his reaction was so much like Asher’s I wondered if he’d been listening to every word we’d said upstairs.

“Absolutely not.” Conner glowered at me, his eyes burning like two blue flames. “I won’t allow you to endanger Donna in such a way.”

Donna leaned forward in her chair. “Allow?
Allow?
”

I could see that Conner recognized his mistake in word choice immediately, but, bless his heart, he tried.

“Donna, I can’t agree to this. It’s too risky.”

She got to her feet, arms crossed over her chest. “Agree to it? Risky? But you let Shannon go off with Asher as bait. How was that not risky? My God, Conner, she was almost killed!” She paused. “And since when do you get to agree or disagree to something that is my choice?”

“I can’t plan something like this based on one of Shannon’s feelings,” he argued, still facing her.

I opened my mouth to correct him, but Donna shot me a look. Okay, apparently this argument wasn’t to include me.

“Didn’t you listen to anything she said?” she asked him. “She’s more than a sensitive now. She’s clairvoyant. She has visions. She knows exactly what will happen.”

I had to interject there. “Not exactly, Donna. I just know that we win and how we go about it. I’ve seen the beginning of the fight and the aftermath, but not what happens in between.”

She scowled at me because she knew that Conner would jump on my words with both feet.

Which he did.

“See? Shannon can’t guarantee that you won’t get hurt in the fighting.”

Ignoring him, Donna focused on me. “Answer me this, am I injured in any way at the end? Bedridden? Half-dead? Comatose?”

I shook my head.

She tossed Conner a triumphant look. “Clearly, I make it through without a scratch.”

Considering the rate vampires healed, that was an erroneous statement, but I wasn’t about to contradict her. Especially not when her arguments were an attempt to win Connor over.

Conner looked down and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Headache?” she asked lightly.

He growled at her, but didn’t answer. She sighed and walked over to him, placing a hand on his cheek. Conner lifted his eyes to her and the worry in them tugged at my heartstrings. It was obvious he was anxious about her being involved, just as much as Asher was about me.

Surprising me yet again, Asher spoke up. “Conner, I have faith in Shannon’s visions, and I know she would never do anything to put her friends in mortal danger unless she was sure that no lasting harm would come to them.”

Conner nodded, but he still didn’t look happy. He glanced at Donna once again, who was standing next to him, looking at him expectantly.

“We can discuss this more. I’ll have to call the rest of the Council.” He paused. “And Calder Atwood.” A smile spread across his face. “This will be an interesting meeting.”

Considering half the Council and Calder were mated to my friends, I had a feeling that the meeting was going to be a lot like my earlier conversation with Asher, only worse.