Golden's Rule (25 page)

Beauty swallowed, feeling a shifting in the air. A sense of great unease.

“Torque, come to me, now.”

“Don’t move, Beauty. Don’t fucking move. I’m there.”

The witch murmured something but Beauty couldn’t catch it. Her head pounded and something like a shiver, but more like a shudder rippled up her spine. Pain was on the horizon. Horrible, sickening pain. Through numb lips she managed to say, “Don’t. My mate is coming—”

The door crashed open. Torque was by her side and had her behind him in a blink.

“I set my wards, warlock, no need to worry.”

Torque tensed. The breath knocked out of her on a gasp when she felt something. A deep touch. Quickly, she shut the pain down. If Torque sensed pain from her, he’d lose it. He suddenly stepped away from her and drew an enormous sword.

“Stay,” he ordered in a voice she’d never heard him use before.

“Absolutely not.”

All hell broke loose. The witch beside her went flying through three bookshelves and a few dozen piles of her things to land in a silent heap twenty feet away. The shop erupted in what felt like a whirlwind, but instead of a funnel cloud, a figure dressed completely in black, even cloaked and face concealed under black, stood in the middle of the storm. None of the flying debris hit him. And none hit them.

Torque glanced down at her once and squeezed her arm. “Drop the book and shift out of here. Go home. Directly home.”

“No. Not without you. No. I won’t.”

“Beauty, do it!” he shouted at her above the sound of the storm, his grey eyes silvered out with rage.

“No, Torque. I will not. You come too or I’m staying,” she told him calmly. She was keeping the flying shop of horrors from hitting them. They both knew it. If she left—she blinked. She had no idea what Torque could or couldn’t do. And now was not the time to find out. She tightened her hand on him and shook her head at his angry expression. 

“Torque.”

He was seething. Under her palm, he was tense, hard, and nearly rippling with the need to do damage.

The figure raised his hands and five more of what looked like him appeared in the shop, all of them with swords out and ready. The feeling of unease grew to a sickening assault on her senses. She needed them gone. Now.

“Now, Torque!”

Torque was shaking and not from fear. He was livid. And some of his anger focused directly on her.

Well, then. She took things into her own hands.

She dug her nails into his biceps and she shifted them out, but not to their home. She took them to the other side of Paris where she’d read about a private restaurant, then immediately to a bookshop in London she’d wanted to go to. As soon as the room became visible, she shifted again, this time to Alaska hoping to ease Torque’s temper, but the humid, mosquito-filled summer air only made him try to break her hold. Desperate now, she shifted to a football field in Scotland.

As soon as they felt firm ground, she let him go. The moonlit field was deserted. She still moved away from him, giving him space. He was raging mad. At her, at the Death Stalkers threatening them, and most assuredly, at the mage.

“What the hell?” he roared, coming after her. His face was so full of fury she felt certain he was going to blow. His silver eyes flashed down at her, his handsome face was a mask of flushed masculine rage.

Not about to let him yell at her, she held her ground. “You need to calm down. Tell me—”

“Don’t you fucking tell me to calm down!” he shouted, so angry he took a menacing step towards her. He went to grab her jacket and she stepped back and knocked his hand aside.

“Torque, stop it!”

“Don’t you ever do something that stupid again. Don’t you ever—”

“Stop yelling at me!”

“I wouldn’t be yelling at you if I was killing Death Stalkers—”

He broke off in mid-rant and stormed away from her, stalking to the other side of the huge arena. She turned and walked in the opposite direction and took a seat in the stadium. Things were a mess. He was angry, she got that, but part of her felt as if he thought she was weak. Again.

Tears filled her eyes. Maybe he was right because she’d known two things at that shop of horrors. Torque would die before letting her get hurt. And she’d not survive his death. He was strong. So strong, she had to fight just to feel her own power when he was near her. He was including her now, but she still felt as if any misstep would prove she wasn’t strong enough. But she knew, absolutely knew, he couldn’t have won against those men. Somehow, she’d sensed the Death Stalkers before they’d touched down in the shop. The witch had too, so had Torque, but did they also sense a connection? A means to find—her eyes widened. A means to find her?

Was that possible?

If it was, why hadn’t they come to her before? Why would they want her?

Her head hurt. The pain making this all the more miserable. She wanted Torque, his warmth holding her tight so she could think this through. If the Death Stalkers could somehow trace her, then wouldn’t they have come to the lodge?

The barrier she’d hit. The protection spells.

The Immortal Council would use the same. What had Torque said? They would frown on an unknown witch shifting in…but maybe that meant no one could shift in, or maybe the compound had its own protections.

Again, she had too many questions. She thought after they’d bonded that the questions would stop, the unknowns about her life fall to the side and eventually not mean as much to her.

If Death Stalkers could find her, could trace her, they needed to talk, and worse, they needed to leave this place.

And worse, she’d once again have to wait until her memory returned before she could join in the fight. Who’d want her on their mission if she brought Death Stalkers?

She stared over at Torque where he stood with his back to her. He was still pissed at her. She’d taken him from a fight. Understandably, he was upset. She could give him a few more minutes. Just a few, then they would have to go. She drew her legs up to her chest and rested her head against her knees. Maybe he was right, maybe she shouldn’t have shifted them, but at the time, his rage had been out of control and her instincts had warned her he’d die trying to defend her in such a tight spot.

But how did she tell him that? Or tell him she thought the Death Stalkers could somehow trace her. What if she had worked for them? Or worse, been like the mage, partially under their curse? That would explain why she hated them, why she knew so much about Death Stalkers.

Please, Danu, give me something here, because that can’t be the answer. I can’t be like them.

Torque blew out an explosive breath and calmed himself down. His anger beat at him like a damn drum, making it hard to think straight. He thought he might have yelled at Beauty even. His rage still filled him but with each second he felt it dying down and he realised more and more what a shithead he’d been to Beauty.

He glanced around at the deserted football field and turned, finally spotting her sitting with her knees up to her chest, looking too damn small against the wall. His chest hurt.

He swallowed past a dry throat and tried to reach her through their bond. She blocked him but he caught a hint of sadness and fear.

He had yelled at her, hadn’t he? Did she fear him? Had he frightened her with his temper?

She’d used her head when all he could do was think to protect her and kill the Death Stalkers. He couldn’t remember ever being so angry before. Reaching up with a hand, he watched her as he rubbed his chest, feeling the anger still lingering there. It shouldn’t. Not at her, not at Beauty.

Feeling worse by the second, he walked over to her, seeing her face clearer and clearer as he drew closer. She’d been crying.

The evidence of it still lingered on her cheeks. He felt like someone hit him in the gut.

“Beauty, I never meant to yell at you, I—” He broke off and knelt down next to her, wanting to touch her but unable to bridge the distance. “I didn’t mean a thing by it, sweetheart. You have to believe me. Shit, I was…” What was he? Madder than he’d ever been in his life.

“Angry. You were so angry, Torque.”

He nodded, feeling miserable. She looked so sad, so damn small, and confused.

“At me. You were angry at me.”

He grimaced and reached out, cupping one hand over her warm knee. “I can’t explain it, I mean, shit, I was pissed at being taken from a fight, but I shouldn’t have taken that out on you. Yeah, I have a temper, sure, but I never lose it on people, and I sure the hell shouldn’t on you. I can’t explain it, though. I just…shit, it was like someone dipped me in rage.”

“Oh, Torque, I’m sorry—”

“You’re sorry?” He grimaced and pulled her close, brushing a kiss against her forehead. “I’m the one that lost it. There’s no excuse. None.”

“Torque, there’s more, more I have to tell you.” She struggled to break free from his embrace so he reluctantly let her. She stood, and immediately started pacing. She shook her head and finally stopped in front of him. Something, fear, something threaded to him from their bond but it was gone so fast he couldn’t be certain. She was blocking him.

“I think the Death Stalkers can find me. I felt them—just like you, and like the witch, but I felt them before you. Before her. It was like…” She looked down and shook her head like she was trying to piece it together. Meeting his eyes steadily, she drew in a breath and said quickly, “Like they knew me. And even now?” She gestured to the deserted football field. “Even now I can feel that they’re on their way. Somehow. And that somehow? That’s freaking me out. What if… What if I’m one of them?”

If she’d sprouted two heads, he wouldn’t have been as shocked. He stood up, got right in her face, and kissed her. “There’s no chance of that, sweet. No fucking chance. You’re all that’s good in this godforsaken earth. And you’re mine. Mine.”

“Oh, Torque, how can you be so sure?”

He pulled up and tightened his arms around her. She’d threaded hers around his waist, holding him tightly. Through their bond, he felt her fear, not at him, at herself and what she didn’t know, and at him trying to hold her back from the fight.

“Baby, I’m positive. I’m not sure how they sense you, if they do, but maybe it’s your gifts they sense and not you. We don’t know, but I won’t hold you back, shit, I promised, didn’t I? And besides, there’s more to do than go on missions. You saw that—”

“Torque, I love you so much, but you’re missing the point. If they can sense me, no matter how”—she buried her head in his chest, making him insane with the need to kiss her senseless again—“then I will endanger any mission I’m on.”

“Baby, we’ll figure it out. I’ll figure it out. Now kiss me and get us the hell out of here.”

Instead of kissing him, she laughed and looked up at him but just as quickly her amusement died and she grew serious. “We should go. Now, but what of the witch? Should we go back to check on her?”

His first instinct was an adamant no, but he knew without a doubt Beauty was waiting for him to say just that. “Yes, we should go back. It was hours ago, she may not be there,” he warned, bending to brush a kiss to her cheek.

Suddenly she stiffened in his arms. “Torque. It’s them.” He could feel the shivers race up her back.

“Death Stalkers?”

She nodded and tightened her arms around him.

How could she sense them and he couldn’t? “Shift us, but do it several times, then take us to the witch.”

She softened against him. She’d thought he would demand they go home. She was still blocking him, only allowing a little through, but he sensed her relief that he hadn’t been an ass again.

“Don’t block me, sweetheart. Do you trust me?”

He felt her anxiety grow as her block went down. She still feared she was tainted or worse going to get him hurt.

“Shift us so I can deal with your silly fears, woman.”

“Woman?”

“Move it.”

“All right. Hold on.”

He did, tightly, probably too tightly. The football field vanished, darkness of the shifting swallowed them, then snow of all things, the crisp cold air billowing in clouds around them before they were back in darkness for only a breath then in a closed-in space, book store?

“Quick, now a few more stops, here, follow my images.”

“All right.” She sounded steady, but their bond showed she was still worried.

He flooded her with a firm image of a beach. She shifted them effortlessly. She had power, magic that simmered between them, none of which was tainted. He shared that thought and felt her tension ease a bit.

“You’re not a Death Stalker, baby.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“I am right, now shift us once more.”

He sent her a place he knew in Japan, then another in LA, then finally near the witches’ shop. “Here, we will go on foot from here. That should put them off. It took them a while before, right? We can only hope this takes longer.”

“We need to find out how they can follow us,” she whispered.

She was right. How did the Death Stalkers find them? How could they follow a shift? It seemed impossible. It should be. But he’d seen it with his own eyes.

Still not happy, he guided her down the deserted street, careful to remain in the shadows of the dark awnings. When he reached the shop, he tugged her gently to a stop and forced her to face him. “We need to be cautious. The witch could be harmed, or even dead. Are you certain?”

“That I want to go in? Yes.”

He nodded. He opened himself to scan the surrounding area, going as far out as several blocks before pulling his vision back to the shop. He could feel the witch’s power, centred in her shop, the odd little magic she sold, but nothing more. “Stay close to me. I won’t take you in there unless you stay close. It’s clear that this was their goal. You were their goal.”

She paled. “What makes you say that? This could have been retaliation against us for the cell in London.”

“True, but they wanted you. It might explain my rage, Beauty.” As he said it he realised it might very well be why he’d lost it. Maybe he was more wolf than he’d ever known.