Tempting Evil (2 page)

Rhoan had the good grace to look uncomfortable. “Only when he’s in town, and that’s not often these days.”

“But didn’t you tell Liander you two were no longer an item?”

“Well, we aren’t. We’re more occasional lovers.”

“A nitpicky difference Liander will
not
appreciate.”

He shrugged. “Look, maybe my inability to commit is just a part of what I am.”

I knew he was referring to his sexuality more than his being a guardian or a half-breed. And that angered me.

“Liander’s just like you, and he wants to settle down. Don’t start making excuses just because you’re scared.”

He raised his eyebrows, yet there was a keenness in his silvery eyes that suggested I was right on the mark. “Scared?”

“Yeah. Settling down means making a commitment. And you don’t want to commit to anyone because of what you
do,
not because of what you are. Admit that to yourself—and him—if nothing else.”

“He deserves more than just a part-time partner.”

“Maybe he does,” I agreed, eliciting a startled response from Rhoan. “But neither you nor I have the right to decide that for him. It’s his choice, his life.”

He chuckled softly, then leaned forward and kissed my forehead. “You’re pretty clever for a girl. And I hope you take note of that advice in your own life.”

“Me? Take advice? It’ll snow at Christmas before
that
ever happens.” And given December was the first of the summer months here in Melbourne, something pretty disastrous would have to happen to the climate for that to occur. Though given the weird turns my life had been taking recently, snowing at Christmastime wasn’t altogether beyond the realms of possibility.

Nor was me actually taking some of my own advice.

I gave him the baton, then shoved him gently toward the exit. “Go see him, and make sure you talk to him.”

“You don’t want me to walk you up to the change rooms?”

“Nah, I’ll be all right.” The arena was fully monitored by security whenever anyone was down here training, but I had no doubt Jack would also be around somewhere. He had a vested interest in keeping me safe and whole. Not only because he wanted me on this mission, but because he wanted me as a full-fledged guardian. “I’ll see you here tomorrow morning.”

He nodded, tossed the towel around his bare shoulders, and headed off whistling. Obviously, I wasn’t the only one anticipating a good time tonight.

Grinning slightly, I headed down the other end of the arena where my towel and water bottle waited. I grabbed the towel and wrapped one end around my ponytail, squeezing the sweat from my hair before wiping the back of my neck and face. I might not have been fighting to full capacity tonight, but we’d still been training for a couple of hours and not only did my skin glimmer with heat, but my navy T-shirt was almost black with sweat. It was just as well I could shower here—with the way my luck had been running of late, Kellen would be waiting for me by the time I got home. And as much as most wolves preferred natural scent over synthetic, right now I was just a little
too
overwhelmingly natural.

I reached out to collect the water bottle, then froze as awareness surged, prickling like fire across my skin. Rhoan had left, but I was no longer alone in the arena.

My earlier intuition had been right—crap
had
been about to step back into my life.

And it came in the form of Gautier.

Towel still in hand, I casually turned around. He stood at the window end of the arena, a long, mean stick of man and muscle who smelled as bad as he looked.

“Still haven’t managed to catch that shower, I see.” It probably wasn’t the wisest comment I’d ever made, but when it came to Gautier, I couldn’t seem to keep my mouth shut.

It was a trait that was going to get me in trouble—if not tonight, then sometime in the future.

He crossed his arms and smiled. There was nothing nice in that smile. Nothing sane in his flat brown eyes. “Still jumping mouth first into situations even the insane would think twice about, I see.”

“It’s a failing of mine.” I idly began twirling the towel and wondered how long it would take security to react. And if Jack would
let
them react.

“So I’ve noticed.”

He’d be hard-pressed not to when most of my mouth-first offenses of late involved him in some way. “What are you doing here, Gautier? Haven’t you got bad guys to kill?”

“I have.”

“Then why aren’t you outside hunting, like the good little psycho you are?”

His sharklike smile sent a chill running up my spine, and in that moment I realized he
was
on the hunt.

For me.

Fuck.

Which didn’t really fully encompass the shitload of trouble I’d landed in, but right then, it was the only word I could think of. And it was running over and over and over in my mind.

Along with the thought that I’d been set up. That this was what Jack had intended all the time when he’d arranged this training session.

Rhoan wouldn’t have known. He would never have agreed to this. Never.

“So, you’re here to put me through my paces, huh?”

His amusement rippled around me, as slimy as pond scum. “You catch on quick.”

Not quick enough, apparently. I should have known Jack was up to something. He’d been too jovial all day—a sure sign the shit was about to hit the fan where I was concerned.

But why would he put me up against Gautier so soon? Hell, I’d only been training a couple of months. Most would-be guardians had at least a year before they had the pleasure of Gautier pulping them.

Maybe something had happened. Something that had forced a revamp of the timetable.

Despite the situation, excitement trembled through me. I wanted this ended. Wanted to get back to a normal life—though given six months had now passed since I’d first been injected with the experimental fertility drug, normalcy might be a thing of the past. If that drug
was
changing the very essence of what I was—as it had other half-breeds—then those changes would soon start appearing.

Gautier began to stroll leisurely in my direction. I continued to twirl the towel, and watched him through slightly narrowed eyes. I was never going to beat him, and we both knew it, but I sure as hell was going to go down fighting.

He stopped halfway down the arena. “You ready?”

I raised an eyebrow, feigning a confidence I didn’t feel. Which was pretty pointless, because he was a vampire, and would know how accelerated my heart rate was. Would know it was fear, rather than excitement.

But fear and I were old companions. It hadn’t stopped me before, and it wouldn’t stop me now.

“Do you give all your targets a warning?”

“Yes.”

The complete and utter stillness about him reminded me of a snake about to strike. And it made me afraid, as no real snake ever had.

“And why would you do that?”

“Because tasting my prey’s fear as I hunt them down is almost as heady as tasting blood.” He paused to breathe deep. Rapture touched his flat eyes, and the chills running down my spine became a landslide. “I can taste your fear, Riley, and it is exquisite.”

“You’re sick. You know that, don’t you?”

“But I’m very, very good at what I do.”

The promise of death was in his eyes. And I knew that he and I would fight it out, for real and to the bitter end, sometime soon. Not here, not at the Directorate, but somewhere on his turf, on his terms.

Goose bumps ran across my skin, but I resisted the urge to rub my arms. Clairvoyance might be a latent skill coming to life, but it sure as hell was one I could do without.

Especially when it told me shit like that.

Gautier’s fingers flexed, just the once, then he was gone from sight. His steps were featherlight on the matting, little more than whispers of air. I wished I could say the same about his scent. It was thick with the reek of death, so vile that it snatched my breath and made it hard to concentrate.

And if I didn’t concentrate, this could go very, very badly.

Not that it wasn’t going to, anyway.

I blinked, switching to the infrared of my vampire sight, and watched the heat of him draw closer. And closer. At the last possible moment, I flicked the towel forward, snapping the end across his stone-cold features, then I ran like hell out of his way.

He didn’t give chase, simply stopped and raised a hand to his face. Though I’d been aiming for his eyes, the towel had actually snapped across his cheek, and hard enough to draw blood. It probably wasn’t the wisest thing I’d ever done, but damned if the sight of his blood didn’t cheer me up a little. I might get beaten senseless, but at least I’d managed to do the one thing no guardian had ever been able to do—draw blood from the great Gautier.

But then, few guardians would be insane enough to face Gautier armed with just a towel.

He ran a finger across the wound. Even from where I stood, I could see the blood sitting on his fingertip. His gaze met mine, and again I saw death.

For all of two seconds, I thought about running. Just getting the hell out of this arena and away from this psychopath. But if I did that, I’d be off the mission. And right now, I wanted that revenge more than I feared Gautier.

Gautier sucked the blood from his fingertip, then said, in a voice that was flat and yet oh so lethal, “For that, you will pay.”

“Oh, I’m so scared.” Which was nothing more than the truth. Anyone possessing the merest grain of sanity would
not
want to exchange places with me right now. Except maybe my brother.

I frowned at the thought. Rhoan would know what was happening—at the very least, he’d feel my fear. So why wasn’t he here, watching if not intervening?

Gautier gave me the sort of smile a cat might give an amusing mouse just before he ate it, then disappeared from sight again. I tracked him with infrared, waiting until he closed in, then threw the towel at his face even as I dropped, spun and lashed out with one foot, trying to bring him down. He avoided the towel and the kick, then his fist was arcing toward me. I dodged, felt the breeze of it scrape past my cheek, then dove forward, tackling him at knee height and bringing him down. As we both hit the matting, I landed a punch, kidney-high, before rolling to my feet and getting away. Close-in fighting with Gautier was something I was never going to win. I had to hit and run, hit and run, for as long as I could.

The bastard didn’t even have the courtesy to grunt at the force of my blow. He climbed to his feet, his movements leisurely, calm. But there was murder in his eyes.

I wiped the sweat from my eyes, then flexed my fingers, trying to remain relaxed. He wouldn’t kill me, not here. I had to believe that, if nothing else.

“Very good,” Gautier said, his slimy, too-confident tones sending more chills up my spine. “There are very few who have managed what you just did.”

I wondered if those few were still alive to speak about the experience. Knowing Gautier, probably not.

“I shall have to try a little harder, it seems,” he added.

Oh, fuck.

The thought had barely entered my head when he was coming at me, a whirlwind of power and speed and sheer, bloody force. I weaved and dodged and blocked as best I could, throwing punches and kicks. But I was never going to beat him, and we were both too aware of that point. He might not be faster, but he was stronger and far more experienced.

Eventually, several blows got through my defense, leaving me winded, battered, more than a little bruised but somehow still upright. I kept blocking, kept fighting, then another blow came through, crashing against my chin, snapping my head back and sending me flying. Stars danced in front of my eyes, and the black peace of unconsciousness flirted with me. I shook my head, denying the call, and twisted in the air so that I landed catlike and on all fours. Saw, in a brief flash of awareness, my brother, his knuckles white with the force of his grip on the railing. Saw the four security guards holding him back. Saw Jack watching it all.

Then the air was screaming with the scent and force of Gautier’s follow-up leap. If he pinned me, that would be the end of it. I rolled away and slashed sideways with my heel. The blow connected low down, against his ankle, and flesh and bone gave way under the power of it. He grunted, fury flashing across his dead features, then he spun and grabbed my leg even as I tried to scramble away.

A scream ran up my throat as he pulled me toward him, but I managed to push it down enough that it came out only as a slight gasp of fear. I twisted around, ignored the slivers of pain that ran up my leg, and kicked out with my free foot.

He laughed.
Laughed.

Never a wise move when it came to dealing with werewolves—even if the odds
are
on your side. You might as well wave a red rag at a raging bull.

The anger that swept through me momentarily bolstered my reserves of strength. I called to the wolf within, and the power of the change swept around me, through me, tingling through vein and muscle and bone, blurring my vision, blurring the pain, the fury. Limbs shortened, shifted, rearranged, until what was lying on the mat was wolf, not human. It wasn’t a move Gautier had expected, and just for an instant, he didn’t actually react. I ripped my leg free of his grip, then leapt to my feet, launching at him rather than away. Teeth slashed, tearing through the flesh of his arm as easily as scissors through paper.

His blood spurted into my mouth, a foulness worse than even his scent. I coughed, spat out his taste, his flesh. Then his fist was in my side, burrowing deep. Something snapped within, and everything went red as the force of the blow battered me away from him. I shifted shape as I flew through the air, and hit the mat hard enough to knock the air from my lungs. Or maybe there wasn’t any to begin with, because my lungs burned and I couldn’t seem to get enough air no matter how much I gasped. All I could feel was pain and fear.

All I could hear was the wind of Gautier’s approach.

“Stop.” Jack’s command barked across the arena.

Gautier didn’t seem to hear. Or maybe he didn’t want to hear, because suddenly he was beside me, his fist filling my vision as it hurtled toward my face. I curled into a ball, protecting myself the best I could, knowing it was never going to be enough.