Sins of the Flesh (Half-Breed Series Book 2) (8 page)

And then I saw what Kai had. Bits of burning palm fronds were dropping onto the top of the surf shack, and golden flames licked along its thatched roof.

“Irix, help!” I ran after Kai, putting every bit of my elven speed into the sprint and not caring if any of the humans saw me. I couldn’t do anything about the fire, but at least I could stop Kai before she ran into the shack.

A surge of energy whispered past me, setting my hair on end. The two trees closest to the shack cracked with a mighty sound, falling backwards. I winced. The shack was safe from any more burning leaves, but now the gardens behind the tree line ignited. I reached Kai and grabbed her arm, spinning her toward me. “Don’t. That thatched roof is going to come down on you. Whatever is in there isn’t worth your life.”

She twisted, pulling her arm from my grasp. “They’re
my
boards in there, not the company’s. I need to get them out.”

I might be fast, but I’m not that strong. I grabbed at her again, but she pulled free, and, with a quick twist of the lock, was through the door. I hesitated, thinking about the fire behind the shack as well as the growing one over Kai’s head. And then I ran through the door after her.

The sound of sirens and Irix’s panicked shout reached inside the shack, muffled by the crackling of the roof on fire. Bits of burning ash and plant matter floated down like pixie dust, and smoke hazed the darkness of the moonlit interior. Wood scraped noisily against the floor.

“Kai, hand me a board.”

She thrust one in my hand, and my eyesight cleared enough to see her, grabbing as many of them as she could in her arms. Then there was a deafening crack, and a beam crashed down with a shower of sparks. One of us screamed; I wasn’t sure who. There was another crack, and I reached out with my awareness, grabbing any bit of dormant or dead plant life I could find and willing it to life.

“Down!” I grabbed Kai and threw her and the boards to the ground. Everything happened at once. The ceiling fell, revealing the sky and stars. A forest of bamboo shot up, splintering the floor and arcing above us. Thick, green, waxy, and so close together they made a wall. The bamboo reverberated from the impact of the burning roof, easily shrugging off the beams and thatch with a quick bounce. Kai stared at me openmouthed, her face shadowed in the shelter of the mini forest I’d created.

“How? You?”

An explosion rocked our bamboo dome, and the orange glow on the outside of the bamboo vanished in a puff of smoke. Canes cracked and separated. I looked up. Irix loomed over us, furious.

“I ought to whip both of your asses so hard you can’t sit for a week.” He glared at us. Kai stared at him, her eyes wide. Then Irix turned to me. “Especially you. What were you thinking, running in here?”

There was that whole spanking thing again. I started to laugh, realizing I was right on the edge of hysterics, then stopped as I felt the heat of Irix’s anger. “I couldn’t just stand by while Kai went into a burning building. What did you expect me to do?”

“I expected you to use your fucking brain. You can’t heal or fix injuries like I can. And I can’t help you if you go up in flames. I don’t give a damn about this woman or her surfboards, but I do care about you. Stop risking your life for stupid shit.”

Kai gasped. I bristled. I know he was pissed, but there was no need to treat me like a child, and no need to turn into a total asshole. So I punched him in the shoulder. And it hurt — me. I don’t know if it did anything more than surprise him.

“Fuck you!” Sirens nearly drowned out my words, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw firefighters racing to put out the blaze in the tree line. “I’m not going to do nothing while someone runs into a burning building. This is who I am, and if you don’t like it, then shove off.”

Irix’s eyes blazed. He reached out to grab my arm and stopped, curling his fingers into a tight fist before dropping his arm. “You... I can’t take this, Amber. I can’t watch you throw your life away for these stupid humans.”

I snarled. “Up until last year, I thought I
was
one of these stupid humans. Don’t you dare speak about them in that fashion. Do you understand me?”

Kai and Aaron stood like statues beside us, their heads jerking back and forth as they tried to follow our confusing conversation. The air crackled with tension. Irix towered over me, staring me down. I faltered, for a moment doubting myself in the face of his power and two-thousand years of experience. Then I straightened my spine and glared back. I stood by my decision. And he’d need to learn to live with that.

“We’ll discuss this later. In private.”

I winced at the barely contained violence in his voice. Damn, this wasn’t going to be the pleasant evening I’d hoped for. Still, I had to do what I felt was right. Kai could have been severely injured when that roof went down — heck, she could have died. Turning around to admire my handiwork, I blinked. Holy shit, there weren’t just a few bamboo shoots; there was a whole forest of them amid the smoldering roof and twisted walls.

I’d accelerated growth in young plants before. I’d sprouted seeds. I’d even brought some pretty dire brown husks back to health, but I’d never grown a mature forest from long-dead, processed and poly-coated bamboo flooring.

Regaining control over my mental faculties, I helped Kai pull surfboards out from under the debris, passing them to Aaron. “We saved the boards,” I said, not sure whether I was talking to the still-furious demon or Kai.

“And almost got yourselves killed,” Irix ground out.

I turned to Kai for support and saw her still staring at me as she handed the boards over. “Amber, why is there a mature bamboo forest in my shack? And what was all that about how you
used
to be a human?”

Here comes the other conversation, the one where she runs screaming and never wants to see me again. I’d just gotten her to accept Amber-the-swinger. I had no idea how she’d feel about Amber-the-half-elf-half-demon swinger.

“Well, your floor is bamboo, and it was sort of a Hail Mary on my part to turn it into a protective shelter.”

She held tight to the last board, as if it were a shield. “And how did my floor become a live bamboo grove?”

I took a deep breath. “Remember when I told you I was a botany major in college? Well, I’ve got a bit of a green thumb, too.”

“I’ll say,” she muttered, passing me the last board. And that was it. No more questions, no look of fear, no running and screaming. We searched the debris as best we could, avoiding the still-smoldering areas, collecting paddles and gear that had escaped the roof collapse. The fire crew was busy taking care of trees and shrubbery that had caught fire when Irix had toppled the trees.

I looked around for the partygoer who had been single-handedly trying to stop the blaze, but he was gone. Not that I blamed him. He’d done all he could, and it would have been a shame for him to be arrested for the fire while his irresponsible buddies got away. We were just finishing with the last of the salvageable equipment when someone shouted, and a figure in fire gear ran our way.

“Makani!” Kai stood and wrapped her arms around the man who clearly was her brother. “We’re okay, and we got most of the boards out.”

He squeezed her tight and pulled back, staring at the tall stalks waving gently in the ocean breeze. “Where the heck did these come from?”

Kai shot me a quick look before turning back to her brother. “I don’t know. Mom would say our ancestors were looking over me.”

He tilted his head, regarding the bamboo. “Okay. Pretty freaky when fully grown plants appear out of nowhere, but, then again, everything about this fire was freaky.”

“Fireworks?”

I’d completely forgotten Aaron was here and turned to him in surprise.

“No,” Makani’s voice was thoughtful. “No sign of fireworks or any kind of incendiary device that I can tell. The original bonfire was well away from the trees, with only a few bits of wood. It was a small fire, and there’s not enough wind to explain how it grew so fast or managed to spread like that. It’s almost as though it had a life of its own.”

I shivered, wrapping my arms around myself. Hopefully that was just an expression, because I really didn’t want to contemplate a fire with a life of its own.

Chapter 6

B
y the time Irix and I headed back to our room, the smoldering fire was no more than a haze of smoke obscuring a strip of stars. The luau guests had meandered off to other activities, and my thoughts turned to Irix. He was still pissed at me, and although I was getting ready to dig in my heels for a fight, I’d had time to think about the situation more objectively. It couldn’t have been easy watching me run into danger. And I’d completely forgotten about his safety, and the repercussions of my decision on him.

Irix had felled two trees as well as created an explosion that put out the fire on the shack. When I’d yelled for him to help, I’d not remembered that in doing so, he’d be risking his life. Were his actions enough to bring about an angel’s notice? Would we be separated again after only a day together?

I twined my fingers in his. “I’m not sorry for what I did, but I am sorry for scaring you. Next time I promise I’ll try to come up with a solution that doesn’t risk my life.”

He grunted.

“If I can help, I have to. It’s who I am, Irix. And humans mean something to me. Their lives are important.”

He stopped, pulling me around to face him. “If I have to choose between you and a human, that human is dying. That’s who I am.
You
mean something to me.
Your
life is important. I won’t allow you to do that sort of thing again, even if it means you end up hating me.”

I squeezed his hand gently. “I’m a grown woman, Irix. I’ll try not to worry you or do something foolish, but I have to make my own decisions about what’s worth risking my life over and what’s not.”

A muscle in his jaw twitched. “Work with me, Amber. I’m willing to budge a bit on this, but only if we approach issues like this as a couple. Promise me you’ll include me in these sorts of decisions, and I’ll try and understand your need to save every blasted human, plant, and earthworm on the damned planet.”

I held back a smile. “Some situations don’t provide enough time for collaboration.”

His grip nearly crushed my hand. “Make time. I mean it.”

All I could do was try. “Are you going to be okay? I mean, do you need to head off to Seattle?”

Seattle was the nearest gate. Suddenly I realized Irix was trapped on an island with no easy way to escape an angel. Did he Own any sea creatures that he could turn into to flee to the mainland? What would happen if a winged being showed up at the resort tonight?

“Relax.” He kissed the top of my head and massaged my mangled fingers. “It wasn’t a huge display on my part, although I’m sure supernatural creatures everywhere are taking note of
your
work this evening. Quick thinking on the bamboo, by the way. Nice job.”

I warmed with his praise, so unexpected after his anger. “You sure you can safely remain here? I want you by my side, but I don’t know if there are any angels closing in on us as we speak.”

“Probably not.” He shrugged. “Not a lot of demons hang out in Hawaii. The whole island thing skeeves most demons out. Angels position themselves where they’re most likely to catch demons — around the major gates, big cities, and areas of war and turmoil. The nearest angel is probably on the mainland, and it would take a heck of a lot more from the pair of us to bring him winging across the Pacific.”

The tension dropped from my shoulders, and we walked in silence all the way to our room. Irix kept the lights off and flung open the curtains, revealing moonlit waves crashing along the beach. The ocean’s rhythm was a mantra of calm. Arms encircled my waist, and Irix’s cheek rested against the side of my head.

“Did I do okay tonight with your friend? Except for losing my temper and threatening to paddle her ass, that is.”

I turned in his arms, wrapping mine around his neck.
You were awesome. You put both Kai and Aaron at ease. You made this the best impromptu double date ever. And when I needed you, there were no questions asked; you were there for me
. Those were the words on my mind, but something different came out of my mouth.

“I love you.”

There. I’d said it again, and not after an endorphin-induced moment of orgasm.

“I love you, too.” His mouth met mine in a tender, gentle kiss. “And if we don’t retire soon, you’re going to be harder to wake than the dead tomorrow morning. And you’ll be pissed as hell if you miss the burning of Atlanta. I mean, burning of the sugarcane. Although the burning of Atlanta was pretty spectacular.”

I swatted him, for once feeling rather dewy-eyed at his memory from over one-hundred-and-fifty years ago. Others I loved might age and die before my eyes, but Irix had a demon’s lifespan. I hoped to share many memories with him — although, hopefully not another burning of Atlanta.

“Come on, swivel-hips hula-boy. Let’s go to bed.”

His arms tightened around me. “Elf-girl, from you that’s a proposition I can never refuse.”

Chapter 7

I
t was far too early in the morning for this, even given the time difference. I was in jeans, my hands buried deep in the sleeves of my hoodie as I cradled a steaming go-cup of coffee. Irix was obscenely chipper, commenting on the beauty of the orange streaking up from the horizon as well as the fresh ocean scent carried on the morning breeze. I just mumbled incoherent, monosyllabic replies, hoping Kai arrived soon.

My cup was half empty when the dusty, blue Jeep pulled up to the hotel entrance. Irix insisted I take the front, winking at me as he climbed into the back seat with the grace of a panther. I swatted his ass in general principle then hopped in, grateful to see a thermos propped against the center console.

“Coffee?” Kai offered, giving Irix a wary glance.

Ugh, all the “your boyfriend is amazing” washed away with one outburst of temper. Hopefully Irix could turn on the charm and redeem himself in her eyes; otherwise it was going to be a long, tense morning.