Shifter In Ascent (Louisiana Shifters) (8 page)
Read Shifter In Ascent (Louisiana Shifters) Online
Authors: Vivian Wood
thinking that Jace would get them out of danger. SEVEN
Tessa startled and forced her eyelids open when she felt the motorcycle begin to lose significant speed. She estimated that they’d been driving for almost an hour, but it could have been five. Tessa had no immediate way to find out as she was wrapped around the warm, hard body of some sexy werewolf. Or maybe she had dreamed that part?
She couldn’t be certain that she hadn’t nodded off at some point in the trip. After they’d turned off Magazine St., Tessa had been fairly certain that Jace was going to kill them both. Every half minute or so she was forced to envision her death, plastered to the side of a big truck or crushed against a house as Jace peeled through someone’s yard. But the hit had never come.
When they reached the highway, Tessa let out a relieved breath even though Jace was still weaving between lanes and driving faster than anything Tessa had ever experienced. He drove like a maniac for nearly half an hour before slowing to a slightly more reasonable speed.
Even if she could move, she didn’t know where her purse was and all her important possessions were inside it. Wait, no. The purse strap was snug around her neck, and Jace’s satchel too. It didn’t matter anyway. She was too exhausted to care much about abstract ideas like time.
Tessa stretched a little bit, and was immediately sorry. Her left shoulder had fallen asleep at some point, but with the slightest movement fiery pain radiated through her body. Tessa bit her lip to stifle a moan. Something painful was happening to her shoulder under the jacket, but she wasn’t about to investigate. At least she couldn’t smell her own blood anymore.
Jace hadn’t been able to talk to her because of the helmet, but he had taken to tapping his hand against her thigh. At first she’d been confused, because he’d tapped her repeatedly. Was it Morse code? Who the hell knew Morse code?
Then Tessa realized he just wanted to know that she was still conscious, so she’d touched his hand in return. He’d relaxed slightly and returned to driving, but kept up the tapping every ten minutes or so. Tessa thought it was kind of sweet, under the circumstances.
At least until she remembered that they were fleeing a group of angry werewolves. Also she had a gunshot wound. Both legitimate concerns, in Tessa’s mind.
Jace’s big hand squeezed just above her knee this time, and she noticed that they were turning down a smooth but unpaved road. Huge trees arched overhead, filtering out most of the sunlight. Ahead Tessa could see a row of neatly arranged clapboard buildings set off to the side of a barn or a very large garage.
Tessa examined the buildings, which were There were several small retail stores and a very old-fashioned service station. A diner sat on the far side of the shops, but it didn’t appear to be open. The whole thing reminded Tessa of a movie sound stage. The buildings were there, but the details weren’t right. The town didn’t seem inhabited. Maybe the whole town shut down on Sundays or something. Was this the Den Jace had talked about? It didn’t look very magical to Tessa.
Apparently they had arrived. Tessa felt Jace squeeze her knee again, and she slid her hand over his, squeezing back. The sensation soothed her, and Tessa shook herself. It was probably not a good idea to get attached to someone she was going to betray in less than a week.
She probably ought to be jumping off this motorcycle and running to seek medical attention, but her shoulder hurt and she didn’t really know who she’d be running
to
, anyway. Jace had brought them way outside the city, and there was only one other person in sight.
They rolled to a stop outside the garage, and a burly redhead glanced up at them from where he sat reading the paper. He squinted in the early-afternoon sun and then nodded, presumably to Jace. Somehow the town’s single occupant made things even more eerie. She wished she could be free of the helmet to ask Jace the questions burning in her mind, but he wasn’t paying much attention.
Looking at the mysterious man and the building he was seated by, Tessa figured that Jace probably wouldn’t answer her questions anyway.
Tessa had assumed that the building’s appearance that it was an older-model mechanic’s garage, but the redheaded man certainly wasn’t dressed as a mechanic. He was absolutely enormous, 6’7 if he was an inch. He was dressed in a white cotton t-shirt and a black kilt-like garment, which actually suited him perfectly. He looked as impassable as a brick wall, completely fit to be guarding something… even if that something was a random garage in the middle of nowhere.
The redhead looked her over for a moment before asking Jace a muffled question. Jace nodded, and the other man bent to roll up the garage’s wide steel front door. Tessa startled a little bit as Jace started up the motorcycle again and rode past the strange man and right into the garage.
Tessa wasn’t sure what she’d expected exactly. Maybe a car on a lift or at least a tool bench of some kind? But rather than seeing wrenches or whatever mechanics used, there was… Tessa could only conceive of it as a layer of light gray mist. The mist covered the entire back wall of the garage like a swirling blanket of fog. Tessa eyed it uncertainly as the hair on her neck rose. Something truly unnatural was happening in this room, more so even than watching Jace and McDonough shift earlier. The mist was shimmery, but looked almost two dimensional like a movie being projected onto the wall. Tessa did a double take to check for a projector set, but there was nothing feeding the mist. It was just there, flickering and bright and somehow alive.
Tessa felt the door roll down behind them, and just like that Jace was driving right at the wall. Tessa gasped as they hit the wall, closing her eyes and throwing her good arm up protectively. It took several full seconds for her to realize that they weren’t ever going to collide.
There was an uncomfortable sensation, sort of like slipping on a wet floor and knowing you’re going to land hard and that it’s going to hurt. It was jarring, but the impact Tessa was bracing herself for never came.
Instead of a painful collision, Tessa opened her eyes to find that they were traveling down a quaint little country road almost precisely like the one that had led to the town they’d just left. It was a well-traveled road with light forestation to either side, huge mossy oaks draped here and there to frame the path. It was picturesque, with perfectly gray Spanish moss and gorgeous greenery. It was… spring? It was definitely late spring here.
Tessa blinked, trying to take it in. It had definitely been full summer when they’d driven up to the garage. She remembered the sun baking down on her back as they rode up from New Orleans. But here, this was definitely the most beautiful spring day she’d ever seen. There were literally birds chirping and bees buzzing, and the forest seemed to teem with life.
The road went on a little ways and then broadened as they reached a cluster of buildings. Tessa was all eyes, silently absorbing the majestic structures rising out of the clearing ahead. The largest building was a massive dark-wooded structure that resembled a hunting lodge, only much nicer. It was flanked by several eye-catching glass buildings and a handful of more modest but still crisply perfect beige brick buildings.
Tessa loosened her grip as they rode very close to what was clearly the Den’s main area, but Jace didn’t slow down. The buildings were gathered around a large grassy knoll reminiscent of a college campus circling a ‘quad’. Jace drove past the larger buildings and they rode for another minute or so, never seeming to turn left or right but still clearly going
somewhere
.
Finally they came to a stop in front of a tidy gray bungalow, and Jace cut the engine. The place was one of the most beautifully crafted small homes she’d ever seen, with perfectly shuttered windows and a pleasing flower bed out front. It took Tessa a minute to realize that Jace was waiting for her to get off the motorcycle first.
Well, that sucked. Moving was going to seriously hurt.
Tessa gritted her teeth and began to unseat herself. The pain from her shoulder was somehow awful and yet not intolerable, so her main difficulty was swinging her by now very stiff leg to get off the bike.
As soon as she was off Jace did the same, again looking natural as he did so. No saddle soreness for him, apparently. He turned to Tessa and pulled the helmet off her head, for which she was thankful. She took a deep breath, realizing she’d been breathing in Jace’s smell the whole way here. Even his helmet sweat smelled nice, which was preposterous. He smelled like fresh, dark soil.
“Are you okay?” Jace asked, when she didn’t immediately say anything. He was looking at her with serious concern, as if she might have serious brain damage that he didn’t know about.
Tessa blushed, and nodded. She probably shouldn’t be thinking about Jace’s smell like a giant weirdo. Jameson didn’t even refer to Shifters as people, which he said made things easier. Yet here Tessa was, thinking about Jace’s scent and allover dreaminess. Jameson would have scolded her.
They’re savages. They may seem human on the outside, but inside they’re killers. Every last one,
Ja
me
son’s voice echoed in Tessa’s head. The words turned her stomach a little bit.
She certainly didn’t think that Shifters were less than human, but that didn’t mean she should be lusting after them, either. Look what had happened when she’d eyed Jameson up. And that had been innocent flirtation at most!
It must be the gunshot wound. Loss of blood could make you feel all sorts of weird things, probably. Chalk it up to fever, then.
“Tessa?” Jace asked, reaching out to touch her uninjured arm gently. Her blush deepened, and she shook her head to clear it.
“I’m fine,” she said as Jace shooed her up the porch steps and into the house. When they were in the living room, Jace absolutely towered over her. The room was done in white paint and chestnut wood, which enhanced Jace’s gorgeous chocolaty eyes and hair. Tessa was struck all over again by his height and leanly muscled frame. It was like hanging out with a male supermodel, and Tessa really didn’t know how to handle it. She looked away, examining the house instead of its owner.
The living room of the house was simply furnished. A massive desk, a sleek leather couch, and several sets of shelves crammed full of books. All done in the same dark chestnut tones, accented only by the white walls and a floor-to-ceiling sliding door that let sunlight stream in the room. No color, no frivolity. The life of a bachelor, to be certain. No woman would live in such a Spartan manner.
It fit Jace perfectly, Tessa thought. Quiet, dignified, but not sterile. Very manly.
“I’ve got to look at your shoulder,” he said. He began gently pulling his leather jacket off her shoulders, which was intensely unpleasant. She bit her lip, and looked down at the floor.
Standing still, Tessa let him peel the jacket off her sticky left arm.
“Can you lift your arms up without too much pain?” Jace asked.
Tessa tried, but tears immediately welled up when she tried to move her left arm too much. Jace caught her frustration and shrugged, as if she shouldn’t be too worried.
Rip.
Tessa half jumped out of her skin when Jace shredded her cardigan, and pushed against him with her good arm when he moved to rip her shirt down the front.
“Hey!” she gritted.
“I need to look at your shoulder, but your clothes are in the way.”
Why did that sound kind of hot?
“I have a tank top on. You only need to get my sweater off,” she grumbled. Better than saying what she really wanted, to find out what his lips would feel like if she brushed hers against them ever so gently…
He just grunted and peeled off both sides of her sweater, taking great care with her injured shoulder. He examined the wound tenderly, but every touch still stung.
“Am I going to make it, doctor?” Tessa joked, trying to take her mind off the pain. Between keeping her mind off her arm and keeping her mind off ogling Jace, Tessa was hard off. Luckily Jace didn’t seem to notice as he was absorbed in examining the wound.
“Basically it’s a bad cut surrounded by a burn. It’s already started to pull together. The only thing we need to do is clean it and wrap you up,” he pronounced.
“That’s pretty anticlimactic. It hurts like crazy. And the way you were tapping my leg on the way here, I thought you were expecting me to fall off the bike.”
“I didn’t know what to expect. The tapping was supposed to be reassuring,” Jace said, amused.
“Well make a note: ‘leg tapping more scary than comforting’. For the next time you swoop in and rescue a random girl.”
“That was the last nice thing I’ll ever do, so I’m not too worried about it.”
A joke? Couldn’t be. She must be hearing it wrong.
“And even that was out of character, apparently. It makes me wonder about your motives, sir.”
“My motives are my own business, and I’ll thank you not to question the purity of my reasoning.”
This time there was no denying it. Jace had just made a joke, even if he was still deadpan about it. It was the first time she’d heard him make light of anything. He really must feel more comfortable back in his own home, and Tessa couldn’t help but appreciate this relaxed version a bit.
Jace settled her on the black leather couch, and headed down the hallway. Tessa looked out Jace settled her on the black leather couch, and headed down the hallway. Tessa looked out
the sliding doors into the backyard, if you could call it that. The grass ended after about ten feet, and a solid wall of woods rose up there. The entire house was enclosed in trees. If Jace was some kind of axe-murderer, no one would ever hear her scream, or find her body in the woods.
Tessa was less worried about this than the situation seemed to merit. She supposed that if he’d wanted to kill her, he could have done it last night.
“Okay. I don’t use this kind of stuff much, so you’ll have to tell me which is which,” Jace said.
He sat down next to her, cracking open a large first aid kit. He was much too near, and Tessa’s stomach fluttered. He did really smell good. Like almonds and mint and rich soil.
Tessa wrinkled her nose. She’d never had a good sense of smell. Odd that she could smell Jace today, all the sudden. Maybe this was some weird Shifter thing.
“Tessa.”
Her eyes snapped up to meet his. Oh God. She’d been staring at him, deep in thought. He was going to get the wrong idea.
“I’m thinking about which one to choose,” she lied. She sifted through several different kinds of medicinal ointments, finally choosing the basic triple antibiotic blend and the rubbing alcohol. These she offered to Jace, who was already tearing open swabs and bandages like it was Christmas day.
“Hold still,” he instructed.
Tessa clamped her mouth shut and stared across the room at the blank white wall. Jace cleaned, swabbed, and wrapped her shoulder with a surprisingly gentle touch.
Tessa only cursed six times during his treatment, which she considered a victory. She gave a deep sigh of relief when her arm was properly wrapped and sanitized.
“Thanks,” Tessa sighed when he’d finished and put up the first aid kit. “I have to say I’m surprised that you even have a first aid kit. You mentioned that Shifters heal quickly, and somehow it’s hard to imagine getting hurt here. This place is so…” Tessa trailed off, waving a hand at the sliding glass door.
“Well, yes. I’ve had that kit for years, just in case we found a human hiker wounded in town or something. I’ve always wanted a reason to use it,” Jace said, appearing entirely sincere.
“There’s something about this place that’s putting me off,” Tessa commented with a frown. “I can’t put my finger on it exactly, though.”
“Well, I don’t want to freak you out, but this whole place is Faery-made,” Jace said cautiously.
“Like… it’s not real?” Tessa asked.
“It’s real enough, but the rules here are a little different than the human world. The Den was designed for us, designed to give us whatever we need.”
“I don’t think I understand.”
“Well, the Den is semi-sentient, or at least intelligent. Let’s say someone new moves into the pack. The Den would produce a new house like this one, but tailored to their taste. It can provide you a couch, a weapon, a telephone… anything you need, it will create. It lives to care for us, in a way,” he explained.
“It can give you anything you need? Like what? It’ll produce a Starbucks if I think I need one? And what about people? If I think I need to see my friends, will it bring them here?” Tessa asked carefully.
“Okay, almost anything. It doesn’t produce any kind of food. It doesn’t have control over “Okay, almost anything. It doesn’t produce any kind of food. It doesn’t have control over
