Drop Dead Demons (37 page)

I felt his breath. Hot. Wanting. Coming in short, halting pants. Just like mine. And when I could stand it no longer, my arms tightened, closed the distance, and pressed my hungry lips to his. And that sumptuous mouth that had already delivered such magic to my body, now worked miracles on my lips.  

It was like fire bursting into my bloodstream. My skin burned. His mouth moved over mine, slow then fast, hard then soft. Molding against me. Tasting. Taking. Tongues tangling. He wouldn’t let up. Over and over again, spinning the tension in my core wire-tight, building to a need that ached for release.

Ayden made a strangled noise then lifted me into his arms and swept me across the room to the kitchen table, almost slamming me onto the wooden surface, lips never leaving mine, kissing me with a ravenous hunger. 

I felt it too.

My hands shoved the jacket off his shoulders. He let go of me long enough to let it fall to the floor. The edges of his pupils glowed. A ring of fire, burning from the outside in. His hands grabbed my face, tangled in my hair as he kissed me long and hard, ravaged my mouth. Almost brutal, but I couldn’t get enough.

I arched my body against him. He groaned. So did I. He held me tighter. 

My hands slid under his shirt, fingers kneading the curve of his back, feeling heat, muscles rippling underneath. He was like a candy store. I was on a sugar rush. And had yet to have my fill. 

I leaned back. His body followed, kept flush against me, his lips devouring mine. My back on the table, I felt the weight of him, his body hard, tense, unyielding. My own screamed for…I wasn’t sure what. But skin would help. Skin and close contact.
Closer
contact.

I rode my hands up his back, crushed him to me, wrapped a leg around his thigh. I careened in a whirlwind of longing. Clear thought had left the building and desire reigned supreme. Hallelujah.

His hands slid to my hips. I pressed closer, felt the heat between us intensify. It was a tangible thing. A running connection that—

Ayden jerked away. I reached for him, but with an angry oath, he pushed off me and backed away.

I sat up.

“No,” he put out a warning hand. “Stay back.” His eyes weren’t glowing, they were actually filled with flames. Wisps of smoke lifted off his shoulders.

“I’m sorry,” I rasped.

“Oh, God.” The words wrenched from him. “Please don’t. I’m the one with the…” his hand spiraled in the air leaving a thread of smoke, “problem.”

I wiped sweat off my brow, tried to catch my breath. “I wouldn’t call it a problem.”

“Really?” His hand raked through his seriously messy hair. “I almost lit you on fire.”

“Almost?” I said with a sly grin. “I
was
on fire.”

He covered his face in his hands, but at least he was laughing.

I suddenly remembered his wounds—because I could finally think straight. “Sorry. I didn’t even think. Does it hurt?”

He had a look of comical amazement. “Hurt? Oh, yeah. But not in the way you’re worried about.”

A blush drenched my cheeks. “Want some water?”

His hands slicked back across his skull. “A hose might be better.”

I fanned my face. “For you and me both.”

I scooted off the table, but Ayden stopped me, his look serious.

“Aurora, I didn’t mean to…” he swallowed, cleared his throat, “I shouldn’t have…gotten carried away. I want to get this right so…don’t, ah, let me make you uncomfortable…or anything.”

“Oh, it was uncomfortable, alright.” I offered a coy glance. “But not in the way you’re worried about.”

He arched a brow. “Miss Lahey, are you flirting with me?”

“Well, hot stuff, if you have to ask, I’m not doing it right.” 

His laughter rumbled low, slithering heat underneath my skin. I pulled him to me, backing him against the table, risking a literal firestorm as his lips laid upon mine with a burning promise of—

“That’s how babies are made!”

I reeled back and knocked over a chair. “Aunt M!”

“Sex kills!”

“M, seriously.” Mom walked into the kitchen and rolled her eyes.

My aunt patted her belly. “It killed my waistline.” Then she cackled.

Who was the banshee now?

“Ayden and Rory sitting in a tree,” Selena sing-songed, “making b-a-b-b-y-n-g.”

“Mom!”

“Selena,” Mom admonished. “That’s not the right spelling.”

“Thanks, that’s helpful.” I picked up the chair. “What are you doing back?”

“Forgot Bubbles,” Mom said.

“And I have to pee.” M left the room with a parting, “Told ya.”

Mom gave us a long look. “You two might want to fix your hair.” She picked Ayden’s jacket up off the floor and held it out to him. “Before you get in Ayden’s car and follow us to school.”

Technically, it was
my
car. The Maserati was my wildly extravagant gift from Ayden’s parents for saving Jocelyn from being blown to bits. It was also the wildly extravagant gift my parents wouldn’t, technically, let me accept. At least I got to drive it occasionally.

Like now.

Good golly, Miss Mechanical Molly, this baby could purr. Like a jungle cat on steroids. Sleek lines, seductive curves, sinewy, engine muscle. It wasn’t a machine, it was a monument of mechanical perfection, responding to my every touch.

Much like I responded to Ayden.

We were almost to school and neither of us had said a word. Then Ayden finally glanced my way once too often, and we both burst out laughing. Ayden was first to catch his breath. 

“So that wasn’t embarrassing at all.”

“Not at all.” I lifted a hand off the wheel to wipe away tears. “You sure that didn’t hurt?”

“Trust me, I have no complaints. In fact, I’d be happy for you to pull over right now and we can continue our…conversation.”

I blushed. “Yeah, except my mom hasn’t stopped watching us in her rearview mirror. Not to mention Luna and Lucian.”

In the back of the van just ahead, my brother and sister kept pointing at us and laughing hysterically. I waved. Live this down? Not a chance.

“Yeah,” Ayden grinned, “except for that.”

We followed Mom through the school’s massive wrought iron gates, and while she dropped off Luna and Lucian, I headed for the parking lot.

“I’ll search through Flint information at home for info on the stone,” Ayden said. “Then the rest of the guys will help after school while you meet Matthias and Jenny to work on your powers. Unless you want me there?”

“No. Better enjoy that yippie-kai-yay party on my own. But thanks.” I parked next to Jayden’s car and leaned back in the seat. “So what are we going to do if or when we find the stone?”

“Use it to take down the gods and save you,” Ayden said, stroking a gentle hand down my cheek. 

I smiled. Over Ayden’s shoulder I saw the students happily starting their day in the misty morning air draped over the Gothic mansion, oblivious to the impending catastrophic wrath of demon gods.

I sighed with more than a little envy. “Ever wonder what it’s like to be normal?”

Ayden slipped a hand over my neck and pulled me close, lips brushing mine as he spoke, “I’d hate it, because then I never would have met you.”

Just before they closed, embers flickered in his eyes, then his mouth completely covered mine, sending my insides into a flip-flopping turmoil of excitement. I started to return the kiss. 

“You’re to be recuperating at home!” Jayden stuck his head through Ayden’s window.

Ayden pulled away with a growl. “Just dropping her off.” He rolled up his window.

“Hey!” Jayden jumped back to avoid being strangled.

I laughed and when the window closed I asked, “Did you tell him you know about me?”

“Never got a chance. When he’s not berating me for not resting, he’s going on and on about those stupid Flint manuals. He’s driving me nuts.” Ayden rested his forehead on mine. “So I want to mess with him first.” Ayden’s lips captured mine. Hot and hard.

“That is
not
recess from inactivity!” Jayden banged on the glass. “Dr. Lahey clearly stated— Agh!” Logan yanked Jayden back.

With any chance of a romantic mood irrevocably destroyed, Ayden and I got out. Rather than listen to Jayden’s tirade, Ayden slid into the driver’s seat of his brother’s car, and skidded out of the parking lot while I booked it into school. Not that things got much better there. 

Because math, my first and worst class of the day, was about to get worse.

Tristan and I, both exhausted, were minding our own business—a.k.a., dozing off in the back of the room— when Katie — super-tall, super-jock from my PE class — who sat in front of me in this period, rapped my head with a rolled up newspaper. I was about to use it as a pillow, when Tristan snatched it from under my head.

A second later he said, “Oh, no. No, no, no,” and when I looked up he was holding the paper in front of my face. “What did you do?”

I blinked to focus and read the headline.

“LONELY HEART LONE WOLF ACHING FOR
TRUE
LOVE’S KISS.”

Underneath was a photo of Matthias — probably taken off Mika’s stalker wall — and a story she had written about how he was…well, the headline says it all.

Oh boy.

I told Tristan, “It wasn’t me.” Exactly.

“Yes, it was,” Katie said over her shoulder.

“Thank you, Katherine,” I gritted a smile. “So helpful.”

She turned in her seat. “You told us Matthias was in the market for a girlfriend. Now Mika is hellbent on making sure he’s happy even if it isn’t with her.” 

“For heaven’s sake,” I said. “I didn’t think she’d do a whole story about it.”

Then Tristan started yapping about how this overt publicity was exceedingly bad, and Katie started yapping that I better not be messing with Mika. At that point my math teacher, Mrs. Likes To Make Things Complicated, got ticked off and brought Tristan and I up to the white board — because superstar-jocks were apparently immune to public humiliation — to suffer unwarranted embarrassment by giving us some ridiculously hard problem to work on.

Mrs. LTMTC rapped a finger against the white board directly in front of me. “Will you be starting this problem any time soon?”

Beside me, working on his own equation, Tristan jumped at her voice and dropped his dry erase marker. He looked around dazed and confused as if just woken from sleepwalking. Which was entirely possible given how exhausted we both were.

“You betcha!” I gave Mrs. LTMTC a hearty thumbs-up. “I love algebra.”

“This is pre-calculus.”

The class snickered. 

“Right,” I said.

“If you don’t start studying you’ll be
back
in algebra,” she told me.

“How fast could I make that happen?” I muttered under my breath.

More laughter from the crowd. Guess I didn’t mutter.

“Quit making it worse,” Tristan hissed.

Mrs. LTMTC glared and brushed by us to address the class. About what? Not sure. Not sure why I’d drawn a smiley face as an answer either.

All of my precious brain cells were geared toward solving the complex equation of staying alive. No way, I could do a calculation with more letters than numbers in my current state. I was borderline delirious.

Scratch that. I was beyond delirious.

I uncapped the marker trying to remember her morning lecture, but since I’d been napping through most of it, I wasn’t having much luck. 

“If the Greek demon gods don’t kill me, my parents will after they see my report card,” I whispered.

“Let’s survive the Code Olympus first. And quit putting Matthias in the spotlight. We’re supposed to stay low profile.” Tristan stifled a yawn. “How am I supposed to write the answer without a marker?”

I pointed at the one he’d dropped on the floor. As he picked it up, I asked, “You have the answer?”

“No. Is that a smiley face?”

Crap. I’d drawn another one.

I scrubbed it off then focused on the board. It was slightly blurry. I wrote a few things down.

“I just want to blast Eros and Aphrodite and go to bed,” I whispered.

“Less talking, more solving!” Mrs. LTMTC said. “Miss Lahey, are those Roman numerals?”

“Is that the correct answer?” I said.

“No.”

“Then those are
not
Roman numerals.” I wiped the Roman numerals off the board.

She turned to answer a student’s question. Whew.

Tristan looked relieved, then returned to his problem. “If you could just track Aphrodite and get us her location—”

“We could take her down. I know.”

“Uh, no.” He paused to yawn. “I was hoping she was far away and we could anonymously tip-off the Mandatum to send some
Sicarius
team to take her down before she ever got close to us.”

“Oh. That makes more sense.” After a yawn of my own, I nearly broke the marker as I scribbled on the board and huffed, “Don’t you think I’ve tried? But I can barely track demons that are as close as here in Gossamer Falls.”

“I know. That gorilla demon was almost on top of you before you noticed. Long-range detection is much more helpful.” Tristan focused forward as he actually started to gain traction with the equation. Smarty pants. “I wonder why you’re different,” he said absently. “Maybe it’s just a training issue. Wish I knew more about how the Divinicus visions work.”

“That makes two of us.”

I started copying Tristan’s work. Not proud of it, but I promised the universe I would study in earnest later. However, Tristan was right, figuring out how to utilize my powers long range would—

Wait a second.

My hand paused the copying. My head swiveled toward Tristan.

I stared. “What did you say?”

“That I don’t really know how your Divinicus visions—” Tristan froze. Dropped the marker again.

“Oh, crap,” I said.

He
knew.
Fear iced over my skin. I was sick of living with the terror of being found out. Waiting for the hangman’s noose of doom to strangle the freedom from my life.

I grabbed his shirt. “Who told you?! Who else have you told?”

Tristan’s hands flew to shield his face. “Don’t smite me!”

My grip loosened. “Smite you?”

“Pearl said you threatened to smite her!”

“I don’t even know what that means!”

“Neither do I! But I don’t know what a Divinicus can do!”

Mrs. LTMTC rounded on us. “My goodness!” She gave a quick clap and smiled. “You solved it! Wonderful. Oh, there’s the bell. Don’t forget homework tomorrow. ”

Student’s gathered their things and I moved aside as everyone, including Mrs. LTMTC filed out. Interesting because there had been no bell since class had another thirty minutes before it was over,
and
we had definitely not solved the problems.

After they left I said, “What just happened?” Then I saw Tristan’s eyes glowing with swirls of amethyst. I slugged his shoulder. “That was you? Why didn’t you do that before she dragged us up here?!”

Tristan looked aghast. “It’s against Mandatum protocol. And
unethical!”

I rolled my eyes. “Oh, for crying out loud. What good are your powers if you don’t use them?”

“They’re dangerous. Rules are in place for a reason.”

“Like turning in the Divinicus to the High Council?”

“I’m not turning you in.” Tristan massaged his face. “Who else knows? I thought I destroyed all the footage.”

“Footage?!” I shrieked and it echoed off the walls of the now deserted classroom. “You recorded me doing Divinicus…stuff?”

“Shh!” Tristan looked over his shoulder. “Not exactly. I just watched enough of our surveillance video of you around town dealing with demons, and along with everything else, I figured it out. For the record, you let demons get way too close. Once we get the traitor, you’re much safer under the Mandatum’s protection. Have your own Sicarius guard, round-the-clock security, eat lobster, be safe.”

“Be ripped from my family,” I snapped.

“Mandatum would protect them too.” Tristan said. “Probably. They’re basically royalty along with you.”

“Royal
prisoners
.” I rubbed my temples against the ache that threatened.

“But—”

“I will smite you!”

“You don’t even know what that means!”

“But I do,” said Mrs. LTMTC as she walked back into the room. “And it is never pretty.”

Tristan was speechless, but I caught on.

“Eros,” I said staring at the teacher’s glowing pink eyes. “Quit doing that to people. It can’t be good for them.”

He, Eros, as the she teacher, gave a tired smile. “In this case, I thought it necessary to help. I had her send the class to the library to study rather than cause a commotion when they attempted to access their next class too early.”

“Oh,” Tristan said, still a little wide-eyed and very wary. “Didn’t think of that.”

“Of course.” Eros nodded. “I must compliment you on the impressive extent of your powers. You captured the minds of the entire room in a moment of stress and almost without thinking. It is not surprising that as an untrained child, you had such a devastating effect upon your parents.”

There was a beat of silence, then Tristan’s eyes glowed bright purple and he shouted, “Don’t you talk about my parents, you son of a—!”

The teacher immediately hunched over, cradling her head, moaning.

I grabbed Tristan’s arm which, like his entire body, was shaking. “Tristan, stop. You’re hurting
her
, not Eros.”

Tristan blinked. Focused. He turned to me. His eyes still had enough of a faint glow that my head felt a sharp, painful twinge, and I winced. He looked terrified, grabbed my shoulders as the light in his eyes died immediately. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. Please.”