Silver (19 page)

T
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I go directly to my car after school. Sherri's right about one thing—I need my bracelet. I might be able to make it to Friday on my own, but what about the Seventh Daughters who come after me? The bracelet was never mine. It was on loan from the daughters who came before.

Instead of turning on the road that will take me west to the beach, I keep driving toward McMillan Prep. It's a calculated risk, but I'm betting that Austin is the key to getting my bracelet back.

The campus is smaller than R.D. High's, but everything else about it feels bigger. Grander anyway. The football stadium is state-of-the-art, with actual restaurant vendors and a bar for the alumni and parents. The buildings are painted in fresh white, accentuating the red tile roofs. Stone pathways wind through shady trees and floral gardens.

The parking lot is full, but there are no students outside. I look at my watch. I don't know what room Austin might be in, so there's nothing to do but wait for class to let out. I find a spot on a low wall near the entranceway and wait. At the sound of a bell, students pour into the walkways.

I spot Austin right away. He walks with a backpack slung over his shoulder, flanked by other students. He keeps his head low and his hands in his pockets, as if he's purposefully trying to blend in. Now that I know he's not human it's easy to see that everything about him, from the too-long hair to his casual walk, is calculated. Of course, he can't hide his high cheekbones and handsome face, but even his crooked smile is a mask, a premeditated imperfection to make him seem more approachable. Nothing about Austin feels real to me now.

His eyes shine gold for just an instant when he sees me.

He picks up his pace, weaving through the crowd of students with undisguised grace. He stops in front of me, blocking me from their view. “And to what do I owe this pleasure?”

I stand to face him. “This isn't a social call.”

“A shame. I think we both would enjoy it more if it was.” His eyes darken, and I feel the fog forming around my brain. Some kind of mind manipulation. I let ice fill my veins until the fog fades away.

I meet his gaze, clear-eyed and focused. “What's the matter? Don't you trust your own charm anymore?”

He laughs, unfazed by the fact that I've stopped his power. “You're right. I didn't have to work very hard to convince you to come to my room that first night, did I?”

He goes right for the jugular. I'm shaking, embarrassed, and angry. But my pride can take more than a few hits; it's had lots of practice. “I think you might have something that belongs to me,” I say.

“Your heart?”

God. It's all I can do to keep from hitting him. “My bracelet.”

“Oh, right. You left it behind, didn't you?”

He knows exactly where it is. “Give it back.”

“For someone who claims not to be interested, you ask for a lot of favors. And now you show up at my school out of the blue. If I didn't know better, I'd say I have a bit of a stalker.” He looks behind him. “What if one of the Sons sees you?”

“It's a little late for you to pretend to be worried about me fighting the Sons.” He's the one who said Jonah should pay.

He shrugs and sits down on the wall, patting the spot next to him. “Sit.” When I don't move, he adds, “I promise to behave. Unless you don't want me to.” He shakes his head. “I'm kidding. We need to talk. You need to understand about me. And Blake.”

“Said the spider to the fly.” I sit down next to Austin, careful to keep a few extra inches of space between us. “So, spill.”

Austin looks into my eyes and smiles. For a second, I'm back at the quarters table that first night, laughing, flirting, reveling in the attention of a beautiful boy. I shake my head, and he laughs. Like he knows how easily I've slipped.

“I knew that if I stuck with the Sons long enough, eventually Danu's daughters would show up.” He takes a breath. “I've been waiting for you for a very long time.”

I try to process this. “You were waiting for me? For how long?”

“Not counting the thousand years that I was banished to the underworld? Three years.”

“What?” None of this is making sense.

“There was a time, Brianna, when the gods lived on earth and ruled humans. The humans turned on us, abandoning us in favor of the God of All Things. As if he would bother with them.”

“They went over your head?”

“Something like that.” He sighs. “A powerful group of warriors in a crusade for God succeeded in vanquishing our leader. We were tricked into splitting the earth. The Milesians selected the upper earth and gave us the underworld, knowing we'd be trapped there for eternity.”

Again, I've got to hand it to Sasha. She knows her stuff. “But you're here?”

“A loophole. The gods were trapped over fifteen hundred years ago, but I've always ruled the underworld, and with it the gateway to earth.”

“You can travel back and forth.”

He nods. “As long as I haven't been personally banished.”

“So what does this have to do with Blake?”

“The Sons are the Milesians. They want nothing more than to rid the earth of magic and gods, even as they covet their power.”

I know this part of the story. I just don't know if I believe it. At least not when it comes to Blake.

Austin's fingers trail the length of my hair. “They won't stop, Brianna. Not until you're dead.” His eyes meet mine. “We're on the same side here.”

“If you're some kind of god, why don't you just kill the Sons yourself?”

He shakes his head. “It's not permitted. The last time I got directly involved, I was personally banished. I couldn't cross over for a thousand years. I could do little more than wait, watching the world carry on without me. Now that I've returned, it's almost too late. The Sons are winning. If you don't stop them, they
will
win. We're running out of options. I need your help.”

Somehow, I'm not convinced that the gods ruling the humans would be a good thing. Not if they're anything like Sherri Milliken. “What about the humans?” I say. It feels weird to call them that.

“You only ask that because you were raised by them. You don't know what you are yet—not fully. You're not one of them. You can control them. True, the gods are angry, but you needn't worry—the humans will be put in their place, but most will survive to serve the gods. To serve you. If you live.”

I scoot further away on the wall.
Most
will survive. That can't be good. “Blake won't kill me.”

“Don't kid yourself about him. You have a piece of his soul inside you—it clouds your judgment. He may not want to kill you today, but eventually, he'll have to. He claimed the right to do it. His path is set.”

“What do you mean?”

Austin laughs again. “It's what tipped me off about you. That flash of magic at my party. It was all very dramatic, Blake claiming the right to kill you in my kitchen.”

Isn't that what Jonah said too? I'd thought that frozen moment just meant my craziness was back. And it was. But if it meant something else …

Mine
.

My lower lip trembles. I don't want to believe it. But hasn't Blake admitted as much to me? That he didn't want to do what he was going to have to do?

Austin reaches over and takes my hand. “He's going to kill you. Unless you end it first.”

How? By killing Blake? By killing them all?
No
.
The word pounds in my heart, resonates in my head.
No
.
Blake is not a killer.
I
am not a killer. I didn't kill Blake when I had the chance. I didn't kill Jonah. I didn't even kill Derek and Cassidy when I set the chem lab on fire.

“I want to help you.” Austin waits for a reaction, like he expects me to throw myself in his arms and beg him to help me kill my boyfriend.

I pull my hand away. “I'll figure this out on my own.”

“Then you're a fool.” His eyes turn dark. The fogginess is back, but I'm ready for it this time, letting my veins flow with ice. I want to tell Blake that I can do it fast now, but of course, he's not here.

“I should go.” I stand up from the wall. Most of the students have left. Only a few mill around the parking lot, hanging by their shiny BMWs.

I'm a few steps away before Austin stands up. “Forgetting something?” He dangles my bracelet from his fingers.

I almost forgot. I practically run to him. He raises his hand over his head, keeping the bracelet just out of reach. “What do I get if I give this to you?”

“Some self-respect?”

He shakes his head. “You owe me.”

I'm instantly back in the stall with Dart. What had Austin said after he healed him? “For Dart?”

“That, too. For now, I'll settle for a small recompense for recovering your bracelet.”

“What?” I step back. It can't be good to owe Austin anything.

His lips curve up. “One kiss.”

“No.”

He twists the bracelet around his fingers. “What are you afraid of Brianna? Afraid you won't be able to stop at just one?” He doesn't advance further, a fact for which I'm grateful. “Face it. You weren't meant for him. You were meant to kill him.”

It's not like that. Not now. It can't be. “I wasn't meant for you either, was I, Romeo? This is a tragedy, remember?”

He laughs. “That doesn't mean we can't have a little fun in the meantime.” He leans against the wall and folds his arms against his chest.

I move a step closer. “You don't think it's sad that the only way you can get a girl to kiss you is to resort to extortion?”

His smile grows. He knows I've just caved.

I stand frozen as he closes the last few inches between us. His hand comes to my cheek. My skin is still cold from the trick I used to fend off his power. The heat of his hand sends prickles of pain across my skin. I flinch away from his touch.

His voice is a low growl. “Don't play with me.”

“Last time I checked, I wasn't the one blackmailing you into kissing me.” I turn my head away from his hand.

He holds my chin, forcing me to meet his gaze. “Am I so horrible?”

He looks radiant, his brown eyes flecked with gold. And he saved Dart. But he's not real. I can't forget it. He leans toward me, and this time, I stay put.

His lips touch mine slowly. So slowly. He pulls away, and I exhale. Okay, that wasn't so bad. I open my eyes. Austin's face is too close.

“It doesn't count if you don't kiss me back.” He lowers his face to mine. I hold my breath.

“What the
hell
?” Haley's voice is a high screech.

Austin jumps away, bumping into the wall behind him.

Haley's perfect silhouette is outlined in the sunlight. Christy drops her car keys onto the concrete beside her.

Haley advances on me. “Oh. My. God.”

I want to back up, but there's nowhere to go unless I want to end up in Austin's lap. Probably not a good idea under the circumstances.

“I knew it. I knew you couldn't leave him alone.” Haley's face is twisted into a venomous scrunch that she obviously hasn't practiced in the mirror.

“It's not what you think.”

“Don't look at me.” Austin holds up his hands in mock surrender. My bracelet still hangs from his fingers.

I spin toward him. “Give it back.”

He closes his fingers, flashing me a crooked grin. It's all a game to him.

“Now,” I say.

Fire fills me so fast that I have to grab the wall to keep from falling over from the pain. The heat chases away the last remnants of ice in my blood. I face Austin, sending fire to the bracelet still trapped in his fingers. He opens his hand with a start, dropping the glowing blue bracelet on the grass.

Wind whips around us, wildly at first. I focus on the silver chain until the wind catches it and sends it flying toward me. I snatch it out of the air, closing my fingers around it. My internal temperature drops as the bracelet cools in my hand.

Austin blinks. It's my turn to smile.

“What was that?” Haley looks from Austin to me and back again.

I step around her on my way to the parking lot. “Just getting something that belongs to me.”

I don't look back.

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I just drive, without conscious thought of a final destination. The pain is worse now. The dull ache is still there, but it's accented by sharp pangs, like shards of glass swirling inside me.

On some level Blake knew what would happen between us that night on the beach. He knew what it would mean. How it must end.

It's not so much like a GPS as something more intuitive that sends me to the parking lot near Magic Beans. I only know I need to see Blake, and I move accordingly. When I get out of the car, I head toward the sidewalk that leads to the park. I follow the path as it winds to the fake lake at the center. The park is quiet as the last rays of sunlight reflect off the water.

I don't see Blake, and for a second I worry that I've got it wrong. Then I feel him, a soothing balm that coats and covers the jagged cuts inside. Warmth spreads from my chest, lower and lower, until my whole body is wrapped in it. His footsteps barely register in the soft dirt path, but I'm attuned to every single one. When he steps into the open, it's all I can do to keep from launching myself at him.

He watches me, his eyes wary, unsure. We just stand staring at each other, and I realize he's waiting for me to attack him. I can't stifle a giggle, because I do want to attack him. Badly. Just not in the way he thinks.

“Fancy meeting you here.” I step closer, savoring the electricity that charges the air between us. I feel the change in him, the trepidation replaced by curiosity, then the growing heat that mirrors my own. He starts to reach for me, but puts his hands in his pockets instead.

He lifts his chin. A current of energy flows around us. He shifts from one foot to the other, but doesn't move closer.

“Are we okay?” I blurt.

He rubs the back of his neck and looks past me to the lake. “Define okay.”

“I'm sorry for what I said last night.” I take a tentative step closer. He doesn't back away. “It's just all happening so fast. And it's hard to remember that I'm not that girl you would never look at. Because, well, I am.”

His eyes travel to my wrist. “You got your bracelet back.”

“Austin had it.”

The flash of silver in his eyes is all the warning I need. I can feel his anger too, and the double impact makes me back up again. “You saw him again?”

“What to do you mean, again? I went to get my bracelet.” And there's the part where I let Austin kiss me. It's not like I kissed him back.

“He's dangerous, Brianna, don't you get it? You can't trust him.”

“Like I can trust you?”

“It won't be me that ends this.”

“Why not? Because you'll let Jonah do your dirty work for you? Or is it the older Sons who will be the ones to take me out? You know there's only one way for this to end, and something tells me that you're not going to make some noble sacrifice so I can live.”

He finally moves toward me, breaking the tension. He puts a hand on each shoulder and his eyes find mine, searching. “Is that what you want? For me to fall on my sword for you? Prove my love like some crazy martyr?” His eyes sparkle with silver. And then he's gone. Vanished.

“Blake?” I spin around, but he's nowhere. “Blake!” I shout at the air. I run up the path, frantic to find him before he does something supremely stupid. I stop halfway to the parking lot, aware that I'm not running toward anything. He's not here. He's not anywhere that I can follow.

I wait to feel something, any inkling of where he's gone. My built-in GPS is on the fritz, which means he hasn't come back. Only the pain in my gut tells me he's still alive and breathing. I turn back down the path. My steps are slow, in no hurry now. When I get to the lake, I sit on the grass and wait.

It's not until the sun disappears completely and the big dipper is fully visible in the sky that I feel him again, just before he materializes in the grass next to me. He sits down beside me and stares out at the lake.

“I can't do it,” he says quietly, like he's almost sad.

“Thank God.” I lace my words with a touch of sarcasm, doing my best to mask the desperation I'd felt waiting for him. It's not like he can't feel it now that he's here, but that doesn't mean I have to acknowledge it. “I would never ask you to do something like that. Never.”

“You'd sooner kill me yourself?”

“I'm not a killer.” I hope it's true.

He barks out a laugh. “You shouldn't bother lying to me. I can tell what you're feeling.”

Fine. If he wants the truth, I'll give it to him. “I don't know what I am. What I'm becoming. But I do know I want to live. And I'll fight if I have to.”

“I don't doubt that for a second. And though I've never given it much thought before tonight, it turns out I want to live too.”

“So where does that leave us?”

“We're both alive at the moment.” He takes my hand in his, sending shivers along my skin.

“There's that.”

He waits for me to look at him. “I'm sorry,” he says.

“You're sorry … ”

“That I didn't see you sooner. I wish I could take back all those times I didn't. I feel like I've wasted the last year. All those times when you were right there in front of me. If I'd just bothered to look.”

My heart skips and races at an unhealthy pace. “You weren't exactly lonely.”

He laughs at that. “You have no idea.”

“All those girls?”

“All those prospects. For the breeding program. It's my role in the Circle. I'm a prospector.”

“Prospector?”

“There aren't many breeders, but they're out there, and it's my job to find them.”

“How?”

“We look for certain traits. Those girls you saw me with were potential breeders. I only had to get close enough to get a few strands of hair for DNA testing. Then I moved on.”

“So it wasn't that you liked all those girls?”

“I didn't say that. Some more than others. But it wasn't like I could stick around to see where it went. Less than one percent of them have anything we can use, and I have to keep moving. It's too risky to bring pure humans into our Circle. I'm not even supposed to have a girlfriend until I settle on one of the breeders.”

“What does that make me?”

“You do have a hell of a gene pool.”

“So you're just using me for my DNA?”

He laughs. “I wish it were that simple. Brianna, I haven't worked for the Circle since I saw you at the party. You're all I think about. Even before the bond.”

“You knew the bond could happen.” Finally, I say what I've come here to say. “You knew what it would mean.”

“I didn't believe it. Even if I did, it probably wouldn't have mattered. I just knew I wanted you. More than anything I've ever wanted in my life. And when we kissed … I don't think I could have stopped it.”

I'm desperate to believe him. Every part of me wants to believe that he wants me. That there's nothing else. I press forward anyway. “When you saw me, at Austin's party, you planned to kill me. You claimed the right.”

His face pales. “Who told you that?”

“It's true?” My heart plummets to the fiery pits of hell. I shouldn't have said anything. I don't want his admission after all.

“It wasn't something I could control,” he says quickly. “When you walked into the room, I didn't even see you at first. Then there was this weird flash of light and everything went black. When the room came back into focus—”

“Everything was frozen.”

He stares at me. “You saw that?”

“Nobody moved, and then you turned your head and looked at me.”

He shakes his head. “You looked at me, and that's when I knew. I knew that you were the
bandia
, the one we were looking for.”

“And you claimed the right to kill me?”

“I claimed you, but I didn't kill you. I already told you, I won't. Not unless you come after me first.”

“But you set us on this path, knowing how it had to end. What are we supposed to do? What if I end up killing you?”

“You won't.”

“You can't know that.”

Sparks of silver illuminate the green in his eyes. “I know you, Brianna. Not just what you are.
Who
you are. If you come after me, you'll have a damn good reason for it.”

“I hope you're right.” My birthday is now just four days away and I have no idea what to expect. “I torched Jonah's truck today.”

“Thank you. I hated that truck.” He laughs. “You don't have to convince me that you're dangerous. I get it. And it's not like I'm going to go down without a fight. I just won't be the one to start it.”

I lean into him, letting my shoulder touch his. His arm comes around me, pulling me closer. I close my eyes. “I hate this.”

“Really?” His hand rubs light circles along my back. “Because I kind of love this part.”

I smile into his shirt.

His lips press light kisses along my neck. Lower. He watches me as he unbuttons the top button of my shirt. “I can't imagine my life without you in it.” His smile is almost sad, like he knows that our time is short, that we have to make the most of the moments we still have.

His finger trails down the opening in my shirt, between my breasts, underneath them, then back up to my neck. Everywhere but where I want them. I twist my fingers in the hair at the back of his head as his lips follow the path of his finger. My skin is on fire, only briefly cooled where his tongue licks.

I lie back in the grass and he rolls on top of me. He kisses his way to my ear, his labored breaths fueling me. Then his lips cover mine the same way his body does. And when I kiss him, it is with everything that I am, good and bad, human and goddess, friend and enemy. It's somehow perfect.