Spark Rising (38 page)

When Alex finished, he leaned in close, using his body as a threat again, to ensure Jackson had a full grasp of what he expected to get from the younger man.

“Do you understand? What you
will
do, now and until I give you direct orders otherwise, and what the stakes are for you if you don’t?”

Jackson finally looked at him then.

Alex had expected the resentment. He hadn’t expected to see a grudging respect from the kid after he’d outmaneuvered him.

“Yes, sir.”

“And you understand that you will keep her safe this time, and you will keep your fucking hands off of her?” At Jackson’s affirmative nod, Alex gave him a curt nod of his own. “I don’t give second chances often, Lee. Believe me when I say I’m not giving this one because I think you’ve earned it. I’m giving it to you for her. Now take a walk.”

He left the kid there, knowing the younger man would stay close enough to be ready to go when it was time. He’d do his job. He’d been conditioned his whole life to do it.

Alex glanced into each car as he passed, looking for Lena. He found her five cars back.

The water tank was out and open, and a wide puddle of dark water ran off to the side of the road. Lena, scrubbed clean of the bloody smears, leaned back against the rear tire looking up at the sky. At his approach, she turned to look at him, watching him walk. Even exhausted and probably pissed off, her gaze still moved over him like a caress.

He felt his body responding and took a deep breath.

What comes next is going to suck
.

She squinted when he drew up to her, covering her eyes with her hand. “You wanna tone that light down?”

Instead of turning it down, Alex pulled the lamp off and set it on the ground beside her. The light flared up, brightening the area but not shining in her face. She dropped her hand.

He pressed hard on his lower belly for support and started to lower himself down beside her.

“Stop.”

He hesitated.

She picked herself up off the ground, shaking her head at him. She scooped the light up and tossed her head at the car. “Get in the back, Reyes.”

He raised his brows and grinned at her. “When you want your fifteen minutes, you really want it. Not sure I can perform like this, but I’ll give it the Reyes effort.”

“Enticing as the offer is….” She snorted and rolled her eyes. “It’s time to heal you. No more excuses. Get in the car.”

He eased himself back on the rear seat. He lost his grin when she lifted his shirt and her breath hissed out.

“Oh, Alex.”

The slash stretched from hip to hip across his groin. He’d been able to function because it wasn’t deep, but it was ugly. She lifted her hands to hover over his belly.

Alex couldn’t resist a tease. “No scar, now. I’d hate to have a mark across one of your favorite places to lick.”

She glanced up and arched a brow at him. The warmth spread under his skin as the Dust did her bidding and knit his skin back together. Like before, the warmth became a hot itch that faded a few moments later.

Lena darted down, her tongue leaving behind a wet, warm path of sparks as she licked up toward his navel.

His breath caught, and his hands went automatically to her hair.

She reached up and tugged them away with a laugh. “Just checking. No scar.”

With the pain from his midsection gone, he had a good deal more ability to move. He flipped his hands around, caught her wrists, and pulled her in and up his body. She squirmed for a moment before he tightened his arms around her. She snuggled in to his chest. The Dust swirled lazily between them, warm and easy. It was home.

She rubbed her cheek against his chest, inhaling. “All right, Alex. I can tell your brain is working something over. Let me have it.”

He didn’t want to send her away, certainly not with Jackson. He’d rather keep her with him, fighting by his side. It just wasn’t the right decision—not for her, not for the movement.

He wouldn’t draw it out. She wouldn’t let him get away with beating around the bush anyway. “Jackson’s not going with the caravan. He’s not going to be Azcon’s new security chief. I don’t know how aware you were, but I basically made Merritt confess to being part of a plot to take out the Councilor. It changed the strategy for this operation.”

“I know,” she answered. “With his confession, and all the witnesses, you don’t have to ‘die.’ No one will be looking at you. You can keep your position, consolidate your hold on Zone Three, and deal with the assholes behind Lucas.” She exhaled again, and the long, warm breath flowed across his skin, chased by Dust beneath it. “You don’t need Jackson to stay. Don’t need me to stay, either. I’m going back with him.”

His breath eased out. The difficult scene he’d envisioned, her fighting to stay and him fighting against his desire to let her stay, winked away. She knew. Of course she did.

Now it became difficult for an entirely different reason. He didn’t have to send her back. She was leaving. Was it the recognition of the greater strategy that had her returning to the Fort? Or was it something else? Jackson. Or the decisions Alex had made back at the caravan.

What about us?
He hated how plaintive the question in his head sounded.

He waited. Not only did he not trust himself to say anything yet, but he could feel her gathering her breath. She wasn’t finished.

“I want you to know that I’m not going because of the collar. I know why you made that choice. I understand all of your choices. And I want to stay with you. But you don’t need me here, not like those girls need me.”

He couldn’t stay silent. “I want you to stay, too—”

She nodded as she talked over him, needing to get the words out. “And I know that in the same way you can stay now, I could too. Mina Gardin could go on.”

He could feel her cheek move against his chest as she smiled at her code name. He could also feel the hesitation at the end of the sentence. “Except?”

“Except Mina Gardin, sous chef, serves absolutely zero tactical purpose at the Meet. I don’t offer what we’re doing enough value in that role to offset the danger of me being there.”

Alex felt a smile tug at his lips. His heart swelled. The smile grew into a grin. Just as he hadn’t been preparing to send her away as a means to end what they had, she wasn’t going away to abandon him. She was going back to fulfill a more important role. She believed in what they were doing. She was with them. She was with him.

Apparently unnerved by his silence, she finally lifted her head from his chest to rear up and peer down at him. “Wow. That relieved, huh? I guess maybe I underestimated the effect of all that darkness I soaked up.”

“Nope. That proud. I want you to come. I want you by my side, where I can keep an eye on you myself. And there’s nothing about you—certainly not any darkness—that could make me relieved to see you go.” He held up a finger when she started to talk again, silencing her. He couldn’t send her away not knowing exactly what had drawn him to her. “I want all of you, not just the pretty sparkly bits that shine in the light.”

“You think light inside is bad,” she interrupted, probably parroting something Jackson had told her. “You think kindness is weakness.”

“No, I don’t. I know your kindness is what makes you care enough to fight. It’s what made you take on the responsibility of those girls without a second thought. But you need to understand that it’s your darkness that allows you to protect them. It’s your darkness that gives me the confidence to send you off with Light Boy to teach those girls. I know that you can protect them. Not Jackson. You, Lena. Because of your darkness. You’re the perfect balance of light and dark.”

He settled his head back against the seat of the car. She was. And he had been prepared to send her away. Instead, he had to let her go as she went on her own. What a fucking idiot.

When he continued, it was as much to remind himself as to tell her, “I figured out way before now that my woman needs purpose, not safety. And you’re right. Your purpose is waiting for you back at the fort.”

She bit her lip. “Your woman, huh?”

Alex lifted his head and raised a hand to her cheek, rubbing his thumb across her lips. “Yeah. Mine.”

“I thought you weren’t interested in having your focus compromised.”

“No, that’s not what I said.” He huffed a laugh when she raised her brows and started shaking her head. “I said I couldn’t—that I had nothing to offer. I was wrong. I was scared.”

“Alex Reyes, scared?”

He could hear the laughter catching in her throat, sweet and heady. He couldn’t help the answering smile. “Woman, I don’t scare easy, but damn if you don’t terrify me.”

“That’s what I hear. I don’t get it. What’s so scary about me?”

His smile faded. Alex stared into her eyes. It came down to this. This moment. And even though she’d walked right up to it with him, ready and willing, he felt a hot flare of anxiety stab into his chest and then settle in, throbbing. They both recognized that her role in their war was best fulfilled at the Fort. She’d told him it wasn’t to get away from him. Except for the distance, they’d go on.

Except for the distance? You won’t be there.

If he sent her with Jackson, everything would change. Yes, they’d both be working to push through this revolution. But Lena would be wrapped up in her new world, building a life for her girls. She’d build a new life for herself. Would there be room in it for Alex each time he returned? Or would she turn to Jackson?

He was taking a huge risk. Perhaps he should follow the course his heart screamed for him to take: make her stay, keep her close, find another way for her to contribute to what they were doing. The moment stretched. Alex swallowed.

What was so scary, she wanted to know.

“The possibility of losing you,” he said.

She shook her head. “You’re not losing me.” She narrowed her eyes teasingly and drawled, “You’re sending me away with another man, sure, but you’re not losing me.”

He’d be damned if he would let her head off into the sunset with another man, even at his own insistence, without making good and sure she understood they were meant for each other.

“Prove it, then.” He stroked his thumb back up her cheek. “Kiss me a promise, so neither of us forgets that this is home.” He gestured with his chin to the small space between them. “Right here with us. Make it a good one.”

Her mouth turned up. A small smile grew into a familiar naughty grin, her top teeth catching her bottom lip in a way that made his breath catch. She slid her legs around him and boosted herself further up him, then leaned down over his face. She hovered there, inches away.

“A promise, huh?”

The Spark between them already gathered into a glow he could feel just under his skin. He gave his head a tiny nod, and she smiled again. Her face softened as she leaned in and opened her mouth to his.

She made it a good one.

Chapter 33

Alex moved through the caravan as those under his care moved around preparing for another post-attack night on the road. Much of the damage to the caravan was psychological, from the loss of caravaners and the Councilor and his senior staff. They’d waited as long as they could before leaving two days before. Most of those who’d run away had drifted back in over the day and a half they remained outside of old Denver. Alex and those few of Councilor Three’s administrative staff who had survived managed to sop up the mess and organize the survivors. They buried the dead together near the tree line, a way to appease the living who didn’t want to leave their loved ones behind in a Hell Zone.

Those of his agents who had posed as Council attackers had long since pulled back. Alex had thoroughly enjoyed the raid on Lucas’s waiting mercenaries in the early morning hours after he’d seen Lena and Jackson off. He was happy to take out his frustration and fear on those who’d attacked his people. That he had also been responsible for an attack on them was irrelevant—his attack had been for the greater good, and his agents had only targeted known Council collaborators. It served a purpose other than the terrorizing of Zone Three’s people. They didn’t know it yet, but he was freeing them.

The bulk of Alex’s Fort Nevada force had been sent back to the fort to await his and Thomas’s return from the Council Meet. Jackson and Lena were with them.

Alex savored the warmth that spread through his chest at the memory of their goodbye. Once they’d managed to pull themselves out of the car, they’d handled the final details of their group’s pull-out together. He’d been right. They made an excellent team. She’d even smoothed Jackson’s ruffled feathers as she took control of those who’d be returning with her, while Alex handed out final orders to the men who’d be staying with him.

As the men had scattered to their assigned exit points, she’d taken Alex’s hand in hers and pulled him to the side. After running her hands up his sides, she’d risen to her toes to cup his face in her small hands.

“Tell me again,” she’d demanded softly. “We will make this work.”

He’d grinned down at her. “I’m Alex. You’re Lena. It’s what we do.”

She’d returned his expression with a broad smile of her own. “Especially when we’re highly motivated.”

Alex had leaned down to press his lips to hers, to pull up on the Dust within her and feed on the energy that swirled between them. Feeling her doing the same had deepened the exchange. It had been about sharing who they were, and not just what they could do to each other.

When he’d caught his breath again, he whispered against her lips, “I’m about as motivated as a man can be.”

She’d pressed her lips softly to his for barely a moment, then she’d gone, turning away and signaling the men who’d be heading back with her with a three-note whistle she must have heard him use before. Minutes later, they’d pulled out.

Alex had headed over to the ridge where his men were waiting to lead the raid on Lucas’s men. He hadn’t looked back. He didn’t need to. Everything he needed he carried within him until he returned to his home or she came back to him.

He hadn’t felt this focused and energized in a long time. It wasn’t just the relationship, he told himself, because that was tucked away in its compartment. He only allowed that to affect him when he they were together.

Okay, Alex. Sure.

It wasn’t that. It wasn’t. It must be that he had the chance to return to what he did best. There were other villains afoot. Courtesy of Councilor Three, Alex had names. And courtesy of Lucas’s ineffectual leadership, they had proof, too. The Meet would be even more of a spectacle than he had planned. He meant to flush his prey out of hiding. And once they were exposed, he and Lena could hunt them together.

Ya see? Lena again.

His growl at himself turned into an unrepentant grin. Whatever the source of the new enjoyment, he had a caravan to rebuild, people to inspire, and a new Councilor-elect to prep. He hoped the young man had the foresight to be out among the caravaners, now, cultivating their feelings for him. If they played it right, he would have a swollen wave of popularity to ride into Azcon after the Council Meet.

Alex stopped to watch a scene playing out at the end of a car two up from him. A small, satisfied smile played about his lips. Danny, the most senior survivor of the Councilor’s staff other than Alex himself, had taken command and handed out evening assignments as the caravan tucked in for another post-raid night on the road. Tend to the wounded. Set a perimeter. Ensure everyone was fed. See to the equipment.

As the charismatic young man spoke to a mechanic and sent him off to check an engine, Danny caught Alex standing at the end of the car line. He strode over.

“Word about Lena?” He spoke her name in an undertone. Of course he’d take the first opportunity they’d had to speak alone to ask about her.

Alex shook his head. “She’ll be making Fort Nevada in a day or two. It’ll be fine.”

“Tell me again that she doesn’t hate me.” He’d always feared her discovering the full truth.

After Danny had screwed up and caused her arrest, Alex had to imagine the feeling had multiplied. It had turned out all right, though.

It had turned out better than Alex could have imagined.

Alex hated that he’d had to keep this from her. He hated that Thomas had forced his hand, but he’d extracted a promise from Thomas in exchange that would guarantee her and her girls time and space. Still, there would be hell to pay when he was finally able to share the full arc of what they’d done with her. He just wasn’t sure if he dreaded the fireworks, or looked forward to them. Lena did fiery like nobody else.

Alex shook his head again. “I’ll make it right. Lena and I will work it out.”

It’s what we do.

He swallowed the smile that was threatening to break out and made his voice no-nonsense for the young man in front of him now. “Are you ready? We have a lot to get done tonight. We’ll reach the Meet the day after tomorrow, and once we get there and they swear you in as Councilor Three, it’s going to be meeting after crisis after intrigue.”

Danny nodded, excitement written across his face.

Alex might not have found a successor in Jackson, but he’d found a kindred spirit in Lena’s brother. He’d been training him for this for a long time.

“I’m ready.”