Something Wanton (Mystics & Mayhem) (26 page)

“I didn’t hear them burn her,” she whispered, staring down at her hands.  “Zan saved me.  When I fought him, he knocked me out with a tranquilizer dart.  By the time I came to, we were far away and it was all over.  That’s how he got that scar on his jaw.  My brother’s people are well trained and armed for anything.  One of them had a pure silver dagger.  He was very good with it.”

“Oh, Ainsley, I’m so sorry,” I breathed, knowing it wasn’t nearly enough to cover something so heinous.  “What happened after that?”

“I survived.”  She lifted her head and I saw something dark and angry flit across her features.  “I didn’t
live
, Ember, I survived.  I survived on anger and hate and refused the love I was offered.  I had failed to save my sister, and I couldn’t bear the thought of letting anyone else I could lose get close to me.”

“What about your mom?” I asked.  “Why didn’t she stop him?”

“Mom died of cancer six months before Kinsley burned,” Ainsley said, brushing away a tear.  “My brother, Benny, might have been able to save us, but he was gone, off hunting his own monsters.”

“So, you didn’t have anybody?” I asked sadly.  “You had to go through that alone?”

“I didn’t
have
to, but, yeah, I went through it alone,” she said, the anger leaking out of her voice.  “I pushed away the only person who could have filled that terrible, gaping hole in my heart Kinsley left behind.  I lost my mate that night.  Don’t be as stupid as I was and lose yours.”

So that was what she had been trying to tell me when she was bleeding to death.  I turned away from her, staring out the window as the grayish light of dawn crept toward us.  It was finally snowing, and I watched the flakes fall as I tried to erase the horrible things I had just seen from my mind.

“Nate loves you, Ember,” Ainsley said, undeterred by my silence or the fact that I wouldn’t look at her.  “He’s suffered every minute you’ve been apart.  I know what he did to you was terrible, but he wasn’t himself.  He hasn’t been himself since the day you left.”

“Our situation is different,” I told her, still watching the snow fall.

“You’re right about that much,” she grumbled.  When I turned to look at her, one eyebrow arched, she smiled bitterly.  “When I rejected him, Zan turned his emotions off.  It was too hard for him, loving me when I wouldn’t love him back.  Nathan’s not like that, Ember.  He’s stronger than that.  But he won’t wait forever.  Eventually, the two of you will end up just like me and Zan.  I love him, but he doesn’t love me anymore.  I waited too long, and now I’ve lost him for good.”

“What?” I asked, laughing in surprise.

“He doesn’t love me,” she mumbled, talking to her hands again.

“Now
that
is bullshit!”  Her head snapped up and I laughed even harder at the confused, angry expression on her face.  “Do you know what Zan was doing when I teleported us here, Ainsley?”

“Fighting would be my guess.”  She shrugged and rolled her eyes.  “Maybe you haven’t noticed, but Zan really has that bad boy thing down.  He
loves
to fight.”

Yeah, I’d noticed all right.  I suddenly saw that kiss in a whole new light.  He hadn’t really wanted to kiss
me
.  He’d just been trying to make Ainsley jealous.  I was glad his plan hadn’t backfired as badly as mine had.  If it had, I probably would have found that arrow stuck in my forehead instead of in my shoulder.

“No, he was covering you with his own body to keep you from getting shot again,” I told her.  Her mouth fell open in shock and I nodded.  “If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.”

“You’re lying,” she breathed, suddenly vulnerable.  “That’s really cruel, Ember.”

“I’m not, Ainsley.”

I looked her right in the eye so she could see I was telling her the truth.  I had an idea that she was like Nathan.  Maybe she wasn’t a telepath, but she was something like that.  Her power had something to do with the mind, anyway.  How else could she have invited me to share her nightmare with her?

A knock at the door interrupted us only a second before it opened and Zan came through. His expression was strained until he saw Ainsley sitting up in the bed, smiling at him.  He tried to hide it behind his usual smirk, but I saw the relief that filled his eyes.  For a long second, they just stared at each other, and when he finally looked away there was a whole lot more than relief in his eyes—and a whole lot more light in his pretty green aura.  Deciding I had just become the unwanted guest at the party, I got to my feet.

“I think I’ll go see what Grams is up to,” I told Ainsley, winking and tilting my head in Zan’s direction in case she didn’t get the hint.  “You’ll be okay for a little while on your own, right?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine.”  She caught my hand when I turned to leave.  Her eyes were warm and full of gratitude, and her smile was so gentle that it tugged at my heart, when she said, “Thanks, Ember.  I don’t know why you saved my life, but thank you.”

“Anytime,” I told her, returning her smile.  “Maybe someday you’ll return the favor.”

Squeezing her hand one last time, I left the room, patting Zan’s shoulder as I passed him.  Maybe Zan and Ainsley would be able to work things out where Nathan and I hadn’t been able to. 
Somebody should be happy.  If it couldn’t be me, it
should
be Ainsley.  After what she’d gone through, she deserved it.

I’d known when I said it that I didn’t have any intention of finding Grams.  I had managed to avoid her a lot longer than I’d thought I would be able to,
and I knew it wouldn’t last, but I still wasn’t ready for that particular conversation.  Instead, I let myself into my room and fell onto the bed.  I pulled the quilt up and over my head and tried not to think about
anything
.   

It was dark when I heard my bedroom door creak open and the sound of soft footsteps moving toward the bed.  I had to suppress a moan as a familiar, delicious scent drifted to me through the thick quilt, waking up my demonic side and sending it into
feeding mode.  I tried to calculate how long it had been since my last dose of Nexus, but time had started to run together for me.  Groaning, I threw the quilt off and sat up, preparing to tell my guest that I was hungry and he needed to be more careful when he snuck into a girl’s room.  Especially when that room belonged to a demonoid who didn’t sleep.

Tyler was sitting in the chair next to the bed, watching me with a gentle smile.  I smiled back, wishing he would say something.  Tyler’s voice had a soothing effect on me and, after the night I’d had, I needed that kind of magic. Oh, and it didn’t hurt that he’d brought coffee and my shot up with him. 

For one second, I thought I just might be in love with Tyler Jordan.

“You know, I
think I spend most of my time lately making sure you’re all right,” he said softly, smiling at me when I tore my eyes from the syringe that kept me semi-human.  “I even brought coffee this time—liberally laced with Shea’s secret stash of Irish whiskey.  I know how much you’ve missed your morning caffeine fix and you seem to be able to digest alcohol, so I figured it was worth a shot, anyway.”

“You are a true prince, my friend,” I quipped, grinning and holding out my hand for one of the still-steaming cups beside him.

I reached over him to snag my dose of Nexus and suddenly found myself being lifted from the bed.  It happened so fast I didn’t have time to protest.  When I came to rest, I had my coffee in my hand and I was in Tyler’s lap.  He didn’t say anything, just sat there looking at me for the longest time as his intoxicating warmth seeped into my bones and chased away the cold of my own blood. 

He reached up slowly, rubbing his thumb along my cheekbone to check the break that had been there.  It was still sore, and I was sure the bruise was a beautiful shade of purple by that point, but it wasn’t as painful as it had been the night before.

“It’s fine, Ty,” I told him, holding his hand against my cheek. 

“If he hadn’t looked like he was ready to do it himself, I think I would have killed him for that last night,” Tyler said, his voice just above a whisper.  “I wanted to.”

“It was an accident,” I sighed as I leaned against his chest, pulling the quilt over both of us to trap his wonderful heat around me.  “I guess that’ll teach me to get in the middle when the Titans are beating the shit out of each other, huh?”

He chuckled and wrapped his arms around me, laying his cheek against the top of my head.  Totally comfortable, I took a sip of my coffee and just let myself relax.  It had always been that way with Tyler.  I’d never felt awkward with him, never felt like I had to put on a show so he wouldn’t see how vulnerable I really was.  It was one of the reasons I loved him. 

“How do you do it, beautiful?” he asked after a few minutes.  “No matter what we throw at you, you just take it and keep going.”

I started laughing.  I spent most of my time either terrified, ready to kill someone, or wishing I could cry.  If he thought that was taking everything in stride, he had very low standards.

“What’s so funny?” Tyler asked, leaning to the side so he could see my face.

“Oh, Ty, if you only knew.”  Still laughing, I glanced up at him only to find him looking at me like he didn’t understand.  Rolling my eyes, I told him the truth.  “
You were right, you know?  I
am
scared.  I’m terrified all the time, Ty.  If I’m not terrified, I’m pissed.  If I’m lucky enough not to be scared or mad, something happens that makes me want to cry a river and then I get mad all over again because I can’t.  Do you really consider that taking things in and getting on with my life?”

“Do you want to know what that sounds like to me?” he whispered in my ear.  “It sounds to me like you’re only human, beautiful.”

“But I’m not,” I muttered, glancing over at the syringe glowing in the light from the bedside lamp that confirmed that in a very brutal way.  “I’m not human anymore, Tyler. I’m—”

“You are, though.”  Taking my hand, he placed it over my heart and laid his on top of it.  “Right here, where it counts the most, you are still just as human as you were when I first laid eyes on you
kicking the shit out of Nate’s car.  Nothing really changed, Em.  You were always beautiful.  You were always stronger than anyone I have ever met.  Now, you just get your energy shots from a syringe instead of a coffee cup.”

I stared up at him in amazement.  I had been so focused on the things that
had
changed that I hadn’t even realized how many things hadn’t.  I still liked the same things.  I still listened to the same music. I still read the same books and dreamed the same dreams. I still loved the same people.  I was still determined to do things my own way, damn the consequences.  A lot
had
changed, but the changes weren’t as monumental as I had been making them out to be.

Other than the pretty auras and my newly acquired taste for other people’s life forces, that is.

Little tendrils of happiness and relief started to snake through me, pushing away the darkness and fear that I had lived with since the morning I’d come back from Oblivion.  It wasn’t all at once, but a slow process.   I curled up against Tyler’s chest and hugged him tight, just letting those good feelings work their magic.  As if he could sense the break in the sad little shell I’d surrounded myself with for months, he smiled against my hair and held me closer, sharing his amazing warmth and peace with me the way he always had. 

It was really too bad I already had a mate.  I honestly believe that, if I hadn’t been so madly in love with Nathan, I could have fallen in love with Tyler for real.

I thought I heard the door creak open and Tyler went stiff as a board as I turned to see who it was, interrupting my moment of true resurrection.  I expected to see Grams standing there, waiting for the explanation I had promised her the night before.  But there was no one there.  Still, I had this feeling, like if I got up and opened the door there would be someone on the other side. 

And that by doing so, I would be setting myself up for a whole new set of complications to my already complicated life. 

So, yeah.  I stayed right where I was.

“Em, will you take a ride with me?” Tyler murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of my head, his eyes, too, focused on the door.

“Sure.  Where are we going?”

“Just get dressed and meet me downstairs,” he said, standing and lowering me gently to my feet.  “I want to show you something.  I was going to wait, but I think you’re ready now.”

“Is it a good something or a bad something?” I called after him as he walked quickly to the door.  The way my luck had been running the last couple of months, I wanted to be prepared.

“I honestly don’t know anymore,” he said, turning to wink at me.  “I think I’ll let you decide.”

He closed the door behind him before I could ask him what that was supposed to mean. Rolling my eyes at how cryptic the men in my life tended to be, I went to the dresser and started to open a drawer to find something to wear.  It was only then that I remembered there were no clothes there.  The pajamas I was wearing belonged to Grams, and I was pretty sure my clothes from the night before were nothing but a memory now. 

I was still standing there
wondering if I could go wherever it was Tyler wanted to take me in my pajamas when a soft tap at the door interrupted my thoughts.  I rolled my eyes and smiled as I bounced over to the door, sure it was Tyler coming back to find out where I was.