Evil (29 page)

“I love you, Kellan.”

It was a quiet testament from me, heard perfectly in that quiet room.

“I love you, too, Shay.”

He held me for the rest of the night, waiting for the others to wake. I knew two things. One was that I loved Kellan with all of my being, and two,
nothing
was going to happen to us.

Nothing.

We were hiding. We drove that night for hours, eventually finding a home set deep in the woods somewhere. It was clean with fresh laundry folded in piles on the kitchen table. Everything inside the house was modern and chic. Outside the glass patio doors, right by the kitchen, let out to a patio overlooking a large lake. Trees wrapped around both sides of the patio, giving the house a treehouse feel to it.

“Do I want to ask if there was an owner here when we arrived or not?”

Vespar and Giuseppa were sitting on stools at the bar-end of the island. They shared a look, both grinning to the other.

“Never mind.” I changed my mind. “I don’t want to know.”

“He’s not dead,” Vespar offered. “If that helps.”

“Only because Damien wouldn’t allow that.” Gus sneered at the messenger as he walked into the kitchen behind me. “Speak of the devil.”

Damien grabbed an apple and paused, shooting her a look. “Don’t start, half child. I can eviscerate you with a thought.”

“No, you can’t.” She raised her chin, challenging him.

“You don’t think I can?” He stepped next to me, stepping toward her. I felt the anger radiating out of him. His entire body tensed up and he was ready for a fight.

“Gus,” I said, shaking my head. “Maybe not this fight, not today.”

She snorted, rolling her eyes. “I meant it when I said he really can’t, because he can’t. Kellan did a spell. No messenger-on-demon action going on in this house.” Her nose wrinkled, and her top lip lifted in a sneer. “I don’t think he wanted to get up this morning and find half his backup obliterated by the other half.”

“Yeah.” Damien grunted. “You guys.”

“Let’s take this up outside where it’s not charm-free, buddy.” Gus swung her long and tanned legs off the stool, standing in a sensual fashion. She was dressed, but barely. A white top clung to her, fitting around her breasts and resting a few inches above her waist. She was showing off her stomach muscles and how fit her body was. Sticking her hands in the pockets of her white shorts, which stopped at the top of her thighs, she struck an alluring and cocky pose at the same time. She could’ve been in a yachting magazine. She looked him up and down, noting how his hand had a tight grip on the apple. “Imaging that thing is my neck?”

And on cue, the apple exploded, but a cold smile told me it wasn’t by accident. Damien retorted, “How’d you know?”

Gus cooled, just a bit. A tiny amount of caution entered her gaze and she glanced to Vespar, seeing that he had a bored look on his face. “What? The thought of me fighting a messenger is putting you to sleep?”

“Fuck off, sister. You’re not going to do shit and you know it.”

“Yeah?” Anger sparked in her eyes once again. The little bit of fight that had left her, returned and it was doubled. “You don’t think so?”

“No, because he’ll wipe the floor with you. If by some miracle he doesn’t, Kellan will wipe the floor with you right afterwards. This guy has juice. Kellan’s smart. He knows we need him around.” Vespar had slowly risen to his feet as he talked. He wasn’t dressed in the nice clothes Gus was, but he looked every bit as dangerous. He had pulled on a torn black shirt over jeans. Standing next to his sister, the two were striking together. Both blond. Both gorgeous and both deadly, but Damien didn’t seem disturbed. He came around the island, regarding both of them. All three were locked on each other. Damien skirted between the two, but he didn’t look scared. He said, “So, you think I’ll wipe the floor with your sister, huh?”

“Yeah. Alone.” A warning was there. Vespar rolled his shoulders back and held his chin up, slightly higher than Gus’. It was obvious who the alpha was of the two. “But there’s two of us and one of you. You don’t stand a chance,
messenger
.” The last word was spoken with such disdain, my own messenger stirred inside. She didn’t like that, not one bit, and my eyes cooled.

“Watch it,
brother
.” I used the same disdain he had. “You’re forgetting he’s not the only messenger around.”

I’d just declared war, or at least threatened it when Kellan swept into the room. I felt him coming, like a dark cloud that slowly filled the room. His presence was felt long before he appeared from the stairs where I had come from a few minutes earlier. Without breaking stride, he went past Gus and Vespar, placing a hand on both of their shoulders and physically sitting them both back down. Then, he was around the island and he tugged me with him, pulling me away from Damien before he let me go and he went to the patio doors. He pulled the shades and ordered, “Messenger, close the rest of the windows.”

It was an insult and command all rolled into one.

Damien seemed ready to protest, but his shoulders lowered, and he went off to do as Kellan said. One by one, all the windows were closed, and all the shades were pulled. I didn’t know the reason, but I waited until Damien was done. Kellan was leaning against the counter next to me. His arm brushed against mine, and I knew the contact was on purpose.

Damien saw it, too, gritting his teeth, before he stopped at the other side of the kitchen.

“Aumae?” I asked.

“Here.” She sailed in, coming from down a first floor hallway. A long white dress billowed behind her, and her eyes were dancing. She smiled at me, her face almost glowing. “You look so well rested, Shay. That’s wonderful. A good night’s sleep must’ve done the trick, hmmm.” She cast a sideways look to Kellan at the last part, with the sides of her mouth turning inward like she was trying to hold back a grin.

“Matt.” I chose to ignore whatever innuendo my aunt said. “We brought him with us. Where is he?”

“Tied up in the shed outside.”

Giuseppa added to Vespar’s statement, “Along with the owner of this place.”

“Who put them there?”

“I did.” Kellan answered him, his eyes hard on me, almost daring me to say something against him.

I frowned at that. “Okay.”

“Did you charm that place, too?” Vespar asked Kellan.

He nodded. “They won’t be able to find us, for now. We have a few days to come up with a plan before Shay’s father finds us again.”

“And speaking of my dad,” I told them about my encounter with him.

“Huh?” That was all Gus said.

Vespar seemed confused.

Damien was quiet, his face unreadable and closed off.

Kellan didn’t say anything either, out loud. He said to me in my head,
“He said you didn’t have enough power?”

The backs of our fingers were resting against each other. I moved mine, just barely, to brush against his.
“He was disappointed. I don’t know why he fought for me. Before that, it felt like he was going to send me back to you. He wanted us to bond.”
I kept the part where Damien suggested the same sentiment to me. Things were tense enough. Kellan could use that as an excuse to kill Damien and for some reason, I didn’t want him to do that. I snuck a look across the kitchen to the male messenger. His eyebrows were bunched together, lost in thought. A nervous feeling trickled through me, but I wasn’t sure where it came from. I had no reason to distrust Damien. If anyone, it should’ve been Vespar. He actually planned to kill me, but for some reason, that same feeling wasn’t there for my pseudo half-demon sibling. I knew where they stood, he and Gus. Both were too scared of Kellan to go against him. One would think they’d be loyal because we saved them both, but I snorted at that thought. I wasn’t going to hold my breath for that kind of loyalty from them.

“What’s so funny?” Gus asked.

“What?”

She told me, “You just laughed at something.” She looked at Kellan with suspicion. “Are you two doing the thought thing?”

“What thought thing?” Damien asked.

“They can hear each other’s thoughts.” She glared. “It’s annoying.”

“You can’t?” Damien surprised her.

“What?”

“You can’t hear your brother’s thoughts? You two are connected through blood. You should be able to hear each other’s thoughts.”

Gus and Vespar shared a look, both shifted in their seats. Then, Gus burst out, pointing at us, “She and Kellan aren’t connected by blood. What the hell?”

I felt everyone’s attention turn to us, and I straightened against the counter. I didn’t want the attention, at least that attention. Everyone knew we were close, but the less they pried, the more comfortable I would be.

Kellan said, “Even more reason to learn your place.” He stood up and glowered down at Gus, using his body to intimidate her. “We’re both powerful, more than you.”

And it was working. Gus sat back down, her shoulders lowering, and she seemed almost submissive. “I wasn’t challenging you. I was just wondering how you guys can do that. That’s all.”

Vespar’s jaw clenched, shooting his sister a sideways look.

Damien remained quiet, observing the entire exchange. His gaze was clouded over and he cleared his throat, drawing everyone’s attention. “Do you have a plan?”

Kellan glanced over his shoulder to me. I saw one lurking in him, but he said, “No, and we have three days, maybe four tops, to figure one out. I’m assuming you’ll bring something to the drawing board.”

Damien narrowed his eyes, but he said nothing more.

Aumae smiled. “Well, I think if we all put our heads together, we can all come up with something. Three half-messengers. Three half-demons and two captive humans in the shed. That’s a recipe for success, if I ever heard one.”

She clapped her hands together, amusement sparking from her. But from the rest of us—not so much.

“Everyone wants us to bond.”

I tensed, but turned around. I’d gone on a walk. It’d been two days of hiding. Everyone was tense inside the house. I knew Kellan didn’t want anyone to leave, but I was going nuts. For the last two nights, Kellan went with me to our room. It wasn’t my room. It wasn’t his room. It was ours, and every night, I lay in his arms. We kissed, but we never went further. The ache for him was taking over. Even the messenger in me was ready to combust.

I couldn’t see him now. The walking path I took in the woods shut out the moonlight, but I felt Kellan before I heard him. I knew he was going to follow and a part of me had been waiting for him.

“What took you so long?” I asked.

He drew closer, stepping further toward me so I could make out his silhouette. I saw the whites of his eyes. They were lidded. “Bonding?”

“No. You’ve been following me since I left.”

“Oh.” His shoulders relaxed, straightening out a bit. “I wanted to wait until we were farther from the house.”

“Yeah?”

“There’s a traitor in the group.”

Alarm jolted me. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. “Who?”

“If you were to take a guess?”

I frowned. “Damien?”

“Maybe.”

“You don’t think it’s him?”