Charred Tears (#2, Heart of Fire) (12 page)

His voice broke her spell. “I’m not so sure about that,” Skylar said, folding her arms across her chest.

“Tough crowd.” Gunner cleared his throat. “He did kick the griffin’s ass. Saved your life.”

Dammit.
She was hoping the griffin had just flown off, thinking she was dead after she hit her head. It was already hard to hate Chace when her body was straining for him to touch her, even harder if he helped her.

“I’m just gonna go … over here.” Clearly uncomfortable with the tension stretched taut between them, Gunner backtracked slowly towards the rear of the SUV.

A soft yowl from one of the tigers greeted him.

“I thought you were human again,” she said to Chace.

“I am. More or less. Not sure what happened exactly,” he replied, his deep, soft voice sending shivers down her spine. “Decided not to be a selfish dick for once.”

Skylar almost smiled but stopped. She said nothing, reminding herself that he’d betrayed her once already. She wasn’t going to risk trusting him again.

“These are yours,” he said, holding out her long-sleeved shirt, filled with figurines. “The little Pegasus said you can fix the shifters that were turned to stone.”

“Apparently I’m the opposite of a slayer,” she said, unable to bear the thick silence between them.

“Just add water,” he half-joked.

She glared at him.

“Or not,” he muttered. “The dragons you freed found me and brought us back here.”

“They did?” she asked, meeting his gaze again.

“Yeah.” He seemed like he wanted to say more but didn’t.

What wasn’t he telling her? Immediately suspicious, she frowned at him. Her eyes went to the statues. Why did the dragons bring him back to her?

“You want these or should I just put them down and walk away?” he asked.

“Yes.”

He said nothing, and she could tell he was trying hard not to show his feelings. After a moment, he did as she wanted and set down the figurines before moving away.

She approached and bent to retrieve the tiny shifter statues. She straightened and caught a wisp of his intoxicating scent. It made her blood sing, and she shuddered.

“For what it’s worth –“ Chace started.

“No. Don’t apologize,” she interjected. “You did what you did. Sorry isn’t going to make up for it.”

“I figured as much,” he said. “What I was going to say is that I’m happy you’re okay.”

His honesty took her by surprise. Skylar stared at him for a moment before managing to find a response. She felt embarrassed she’d assumed he meant to try to offer up some meager apology and excuse about what he’d done.

Then again, she shouldn’t be surprised. Chace was too arrogant to apologize.

Do I want him to try or not?

“Thank you,” she said.

“It’s cool what you’re doing with the shifters,” he said, glancing at the figurines in her hands. “Freeing them after what Caleb and Dillon did to them.”

Her brow furrowed. “Dillon?”

“The griffin. I’m assuming …” Chace studied her. “Dillon is a shifter. A griffin. The one that tried to drop your SUV from the sky.”

Some part of her knew it after their exchange at his father’s house. Still, Skylar wasn’t sure how to digest the news. She’d dated him for a few months – without suspecting him of being a shifter. She cared about him, even if their friendship was rocky, and she never wanted to see his father hurt.

“Mason-” Chace started.

“No!” she snapped more sharply than she intended. “Dillon I can almost believe. Not Mason. He’s been the only friend I’ve had the past few years. He was marked by a shifter the same way you marked me, and he has memories like I do of his family. He just wants answers, like I do!”

“Okay, Skylar,” Chace said softly. He tucked his hands into his pockets. “But know I’m not going to trust him, just because you do. Right now, I don’t think you should trust any of the slayers.”

“I guess you’d know a thing or two about being untrustworthy,” she said before she was able to stop herself.

“Yeah.”

Skylar expected him to get angry. Instead, he stayed calm, focused on her, almost pensive. She felt herself falling into his dark blue eyes the way she had too many times before and looked away. Being near him, craving him with inhuman need while knowing she’d never touch him again, was making her crazy.

Something happened to him. It wasn’t enough for her to want to trust him again, but it warned her that the man she thought she knew was different.

“Mason went missing,” she continued. “I went to Caleb’s to see if he was there and found these guys.” She lifted the figurines in emphasis. “I need to wake them up.”

“I’d say you need some rest.”

“I don’t care what you say, Chace,” she retorted.

“Fair enough.” He was unexpectedly calm. His jaw was clenched, his gaze steady, but he was making an attempt to give her space. If she’d said the same to the Chace who betrayed her, he’d be struggling not to turn into a dragon.

This Chace was watching her closely, listening, with no sign he was angry or frustrated or agitated.

She shivered, exhausted and chilled by the night air. She needed to think, away from his presence. The Arizona desert didn’t feel large enough for her and Chace at that moment.

“I’m headed inside,” she said and turned away.

“We came to talk to you,” he said.

“Later.”

Chace said nothing. Skylar held her breath, wishing he would at least try to say something. She walked away, her heart toppling when nothing but the sound of her footsteps reached her ears.

I don’t want to lose him? Or do I?

Her head hurt too much to think clearly.

She made it back to the hotel stairwell before sagging against a wall. Dizzy, weak and tired, she slid down to sit for a moment. The tiny figurines were heavy in her shaky arms, her shoulder hurting bad enough that she wanted to cry.

And then there was Chace. She thought it’d be easy to write him off, to send him packing if he ever crossed paths with her.

The simple exchange, however, made her whole world flip inside out. Some small part of her rejoiced to see him, and she hated herself for it.

“You, uh, need a hand?”

Skylar wiped her eyes hastily and looked up. Her head a mess, she hadn’t heard Chace enter the stairwell or noticed him standing over her. His scent soothed her, which only agitated her more. In the light of the hotel interior, she was able to see the strain on his features more clearly. White underlined his eyes, a sign of pain, layered with dark circles that marked his exhaustion. Despite this, he was as she always remembered him: build like the proud, noble, irresistible Viking god whose attraction she’d been unable to fight since they met.

“No. I’m fine,” she said and pushed herself up with effort.

“Gunner said you need to stay awake until he can determine if you’ve got a concussion,” Chace told her.

“Thanks.” She maneuvered around him to the stairs without looking at him again.

“Will you let me walk you to your room at least to make sure you’re okay?”

“I think you’ve done enough, Chace,” she said and then held her breath again, waiting to see if he would disappoint her once more.

He said nothing.

I knew it. Maybe sleeping with me was a lie, too.
Even more upset, she put the last of her energy into climbing the stairs and shoved the door to the second floor open. Striding down the hallway, she fumbled with her keycard only to find the lock to her room was broken.

Skylar sighed, knowing it was dangerous to stay in a room with no lock, but too worn out to make the journey down to the lobby and ask for a new room. She nudged the door open with her hip before crossing to open the patio door.

She wanted nothing more than to curl up and go to sleep but doubted the pain in her shoulder would let her, even if she ignored Gunner’s message and tried to sleep. Instead, she sank into the chair near the patio, chilled by the evening air creeping in through the open door. She set the figurines on the ground beside her and picked up the first one, a panther.

Leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees, she felt like passing out for a long moment. She floated in the in-between place until the panther in her fist began wriggling.

Skylar forced her eyes open and rose, stepping to the patio to deposit the figurine on the balcony.

Too worn out to make the trip back to her chair, she sat against the doorframe, watching the creature grow. A faint smile crossed her features. As messed up as her night was, at least she was doing some sort of good by saving the figurines and returning their lives to them.

When the panther had grown, it paced into her room, looking around. She followed him with her gaze, startled to see Chace standing in her room near the door, as if he was deciding whether to stay or go.

“Not trying to tell you how to do things, but setting free a bunch of predators and mythical beasts in a hotel might scare people,” he said with a small smile. “It’s twenty feet to the ground. You’ll survive a jump.” This was addressed at the panther trying to nose the door to the hallway open.

Chace closed it and waved the animal back towards the balcony.

“Shift when you can, and avoid crowds. You’re gonna stick out here,” he added.

The long, large, black animal with golden eyes growled deep in its chest but retreated towards Skylar. It nudged her with its head as it passed in a form of either greeting or silent order to move. She didn’t know but pushed it away in response, too tired to move. It stepped over her, its soft, silky fur brushing her as it did.

The great cat lifted his front legs to peer over the balcony then hopped up, balanced with the lethal poise only a cat had. It shifted its body, sharp gaze on the pool area below, before leaping.

“One down. A hundred more to go,” she murmured, stretching towards the others. She snagged the sleeve of her t-shirt and pulled the figurines to her.

“Seriously. You need rest.” Chace knelt beside her and tugged the t-shirt loose, pushing the figurines away. The warmth of his body and his honey-fire scent washed over her, stirring her blood and making her too aware of how close he was.

He moved away and sat opposite her, settling against the other side of the doorframe. His long, lean legs stretched out on either side of her, and she worked hard on ignoring how nice it would be to sink into his strong arms and rest her head against the width of his chest. Seated directly across from her, it was difficult for her to deny her anger, hurt – or the charge of sexual tension that always stretched between them, straining to pull them together, where they belonged.

They gazed at each other. He seemed to be waiting for her reaction, and Skylar grappled with her feelings to determine what exactly that should be.

She felt like crying, if not because of the pain in her body then because of the twisting of her heart.

Chace was too selfish to understand the depths of her emotion for him.

Chapter Eleven

Chace had never faced as much emotion in someone as he did now. He studied Skylar, sensing just how much she was trying not to show. Her breathing was growing shallow, not out of desire, but because she seemed ready to cry. Her eyes were large and filled with turmoil, her beautiful features pale from blood loss. She was beat and struggling to stay upright, when she clearly did need to rest.

What bothered him more? That she was bloodied, bruised and upset? Or that he wasn’t able to do anything to help her? She wasn’t going to trust him to hold her, when it was all his body wanted him to do. Without his magic, it was all he
could
do.

He cleared his throat and glanced at the figurines.

“Can I try?” he asked.

“Why would you be able to do it?” she asked, the edge of anger still in her voice.

“Because you’re the other half of my heart. You could control my cabin, so maybe I have the power to wake up the shifters, too,” he said simply. He didn’t look at her when he said it but reached for a figurine. “Let’s try one that won’t scare people.” He sifted through them, willing her to say something while he took his time finding a statue.

He pulled another Pegasus free.

“What do I do?” he asked.

There was a pause before she responded. “Hold it in your hand and count to ten.” The tremor in her voice warned him that something he’d said had hit too close to home. He avoided looking at her, wanting to give her some space, even though they sat a few feet a part.

Chace did as she directed. He counted to ten and was about to smile and make some verbal observation about how she was the good one in the relationship when the figurine in his hand began to move.

Startled, he dropped it, staring.

Skylar gave a husky, tired laugh.

He glanced up. Her eyes were glowing.

“That’s really … weird,” he said and eyed his hand. It was warm and tingly where the Pegasus had been.

“You have to put it out on the porch,” Skylar said. She reached forward and grabbed the expanding creature with two hands and placed it on the balcony. She pushed it away. The small Pegasus was turning from black to gray.

Chace watched it grow, even more fascinated to know that he’d been the one to awaken it.

“Hala – one of the dragons you fixed – said the lasso puts them into this deep sleep. I guess it turns them into these little stone figures. Then we wake them up,” he said.

“I don’t understand why, though,” Skylar said. “Why would anyone want to do this in the first place?”

“That I don’t know. Dillon and I had a little … talk.” Chace rolled his eyes. “I think it has to do with the fact that you’re the Protector of the shifters. You’re meant to help them when they need it and can use their magic to do so. Someone wants their magic, and the best way to get to it was to take you out of the picture. I don’t understand the reasoning of whoever is behind this.”

“
All
the shifters?” she repeated, thoughtful despite the note of alarm in her voice. “I guess I knew … or should’ve known that. It was another dream …” She drifted off. “But Caleb wanted to kill you, not take your magic.”