The Relentless Warrior (16 page)

She let out a surprised laugh and said, “Yeah, if I were your dad that would probably
be hard for me, too. But do you think that is enough of a reason to join forces with
Terletov? I mean, come on. You turned out half-way alright, so your dad couldn’t have
been all bad. Terletov is straight up evil. You really think your dad could be part
of that?”

I shook my head; I had no idea. “We’re just following a lead. If my dad walked in
the door right now, I wouldn’t feel the need to hide what we’re doing or anything,
it’s just… something feels off. The activity is happening too close to where my parents
spend their time. And Analisa’s down here. Plus, the sacred mountain. Something isn’t
adding up, I’m just trying to put the pieces together.”

“Did you always know you didn’t believe what he did?” she asked in a quiet voice.

I looked up at her and fell into that hypnotizing gaze again. I found myself walking
towards her, unable to ignore the pull of her seductive aura. “No,” I answered truthfully.
Slowly I came to a stop in front of her, straddling her outstretched feet between
my own. “Avalon talked me out of my beliefs. He showed me a different way to think
and it made more sense than how I had been taught to think.”

Liv nibbled on her bottom lip and gave me her profile while she thought over my answer.
“That’s all it took for you? Someone showing you a different way to think about something?”

Feeling that this was more about her than my personal feelings on the proper treatment
of Shifters, I said, “It’s easy to get stuck thinking one particular way. And a lot
of times it’s even good to be rooted in your beliefs. But every once in a while someone
comes along and blows everything you ever thought to be true right out of the water.
Sometimes it’s more important to be flexible than right.” I stepped into her and placed
both hands on the desk near her hips. I dropped my chin to my chest and rested my
forehead against her temple. She tensed underneath me and let out a shuddering breath,
but didn’t ask me to move. “I’m sorry I’ve been a jerk lately.”

“Exactly,” she whispered, letting her breath fan against my lips. “You’ve been a jerk.”

I suppressed a smile and leaned in. She was so close. So very close. My Magic had
started reacting to hers sometime back in Romania. Now, every time I got close to
her, I felt the tug of her Magic and the eagerness in mine. I didn’t know if she noticed
it or even understood what was happening between us, but I couldn’t deny the strong,
magnetic pull her body had on mine.

I’d been denying myself this contact since I’d met her.

But I was so tired of stopping myself short. I was tired of not closing the distance
between us.

I was tired of only fantasizing about what her lips tasted like.

I wanted to know how they felt, how sweet her tongue would be against mine, how pliant
her body would be beneath mine.

Or would she be this feisty in every way?

“I said I was sorry,” I murmured, letting my lips touch hers with a teasing graze.
Fissions of electricity popped and sizzled down my body, igniting my blood in a way
that went beyond my Magic, even beyond a simple familiar connection with her; this
was elemental… this was life-altering.

Potentially, this was suicidal.

“And if I don’t believe you?” she asked breathlessly. She hadn’t pushed me away. In
fact, her neck had arched gracefully so that her bottom lip rubbed a sensual brushstroke
against mine. I wanted to groan in frustrated pleasure.

“Then I’ll have to prove it to you.” And I planned on doing exactly that.

Finally, my mouth dropped down to hers with the lightest, most intense kiss of my
entire life. I felt the tender press of her skin against mine, felt it all the way
to my bones. Every cell in my body jumped to life, singing, humming and
vibrating
with an awareness that had never been there before. My Magic all but attacked Olivia’s
in its fervency to unite. I felt my body lurch forward from the force of the connection.
The sweetest whimper escaped her luscious mouth and every thought in my mind demanded
I sweep the desk clean and lay her down on it to claim those lips as completely as
possible.

“Look, Xander, Jericho finally closed the deal,” Sebastian drawled from the doorway.

Olivia jerked back out of my reach. Dazed and more than a little pissed off she blinked
up at me.

“He’s been working on this for a while?” Xander asked around a mouth full of… popcorn?

Really?

I tried to drop my forehead to Liv’s, but she was already scooting out from underneath
me. Her cheeks flushed prettily and her body trembled from the intensity of our connection.
She pushed past the guys crowding the doorway and ripped her Magic from mine in a
violently, irritated way.

My Magic recoiled into me, like a punished puppy. I felt it curl back into my body,
neglected, painfully alone and pathetically disappointed.

“I swear to God, Sebastian,” I groaned. I flipped around so I could lean back against
my father’s Peroba Rosa, Danish-designed desk. “I am going to murder you.”

He just grinned at me and stole some of Xander’s popcorn.

“Where did you get that?” I gave a pointed glare at the microwaved bag in his hands.

He shrugged. “It was in the cupboard. The kitchen was clean, by the way.”

The popcorn was imported from America.

Strange.

My father hated instant anything, and popcorn wouldn’t be an exception. He also didn’t
order anything from America. He didn’t have anything against the country exactly,
but he didn’t typically need to import anything. He lived with whatever he could find
in Brazil.

“The popcorn’s a clue.” I stood up and walked over to the bag. I sampled a piece and
didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary, but still, its presence was… bizarre.
“That doesn’t belong to my parents.”

Sebastian eyed the bag curiously and Xander dropped his handful of buttery kernels
back into the bag. They moved out of the way so I could head back to the kitchen.

I had the strongest urge to go after Liv and talk her through what just happened to
us, but I could sense her Magic upstairs and I decided she probably wanted some space
.

I couldn’t normally feel out other Magic; it wasn’t one of my gifts. But somehow Liv
and I had gotten close enough so that I could sense hers.

And right now, it was screaming for me to leave her alone.

Damn it.

“What are you going to do now?” Sebastian trailed behind me sounding hesitant but
definitely amused.

“I’m going to see what other foreign foods have taken over my parent’s kitchen.” My
feet stomped across the Brazilian cherry floors so shiny I could see the shadow of
my profile in them.

“No, about Olivia?” Sebastian clarified. “Was that a kiss we interrupted?”

“You damn well know it was a kiss, Asshole. Don’t bother playing stupid.” There was
a new frustration building inside me and it was the opposite of the sexual tension
I’d felt only moments ago. Why had she run out like that? Why was she hiding now?

Obviously, she felt something for me. So what was with this cat and mouse game?

“Touchy,” Xander grumbled. “I see what you mean now, Bastian.”

Oh, good grief. Only God knows what these two clowns had been discussing.

Thankfully, Sebastian ignored Xander so he could continue to grill me. “Really, Jericho,
what’s your game plan with her? What’s your next move?”

“I don’t have one,” I admitted. I had no idea why I was being honest with these two
clowns. It wasn’t like they were relationship experts. Xander had never settled down
with one girl for any length of time. And Sebastian had dated Seraphina. I didn’t
need to say anything else about that. I mean…
he dated Seraphina
. “I’m not really trying to start something with her… I just, I can’t seem to stay
away either, though. I don’t know how I feel about her yet.”

“Bad move,” Sebastian grunted. “She’s not the kind of girl that gets pushed into the
background. If you don’t do something about her, someone else is going to.”

“Oh? Like you?” I laughed derisively.

“What’s wrong with me?” Sebastian demanded in a tone that was a little high-pitched
in my opinion.

“She can’t like you. The Gypsy told her if she falls in love with you then her brother
dies.” I didn’t sugarcoat that; he needed to know I was serious.

“Bloody hell,” Sebastian groaned.

“Were you really thinking about making a move?” This needed my full attention. I turned
around in the hallway and glared at him.

He had the decency to look slightly embarrassed. “She’s intriguing. You can’t blame
me for being interested.”

Fury pinged through my blood, hot and justified. My vision clouded, narrowing until
Sebastian’s face was only a pinpoint and the only thing I could see. “Don’t touch
her,” I growled in a deadly voice. “Don’t talk to her. Don’t think about her.”

Xander let out a bark of laughter. “Don’t know how you feel about her, huh?”
“Shut up,” I snarled.

I turned back around and went to work in the kitchen, throwing open cupboards and
then slamming them closed again.

“You got it bad, my friend.” Sebastian sounded sympathetic but Xander only snickered.

“I am aware,” I said.

“Well, if it’s any consolation, I’m fairly certain she’s as lost as you are.” Sebastian
walked to the refrigerator and opened the door. Not that he would know what should
be there or not, but I appreciated the help.

“I’m not sure you’re right,” I sighed. But I felt the slightest rallying of nerve
because Sebastian believed she was.

I had no idea what to do with all these feelings. They were new to me. This was uncharted
territory.

Sure, I’d felt strongly for Eden, but in the years since we ended things, I’d often
wondered if I felt as deeply for her as I believed I did. I mean… love? If I really
loved her as much as I thought I did, why was it so easy for me to walk away?

Obviously, it hadn’t seemed easy at the time. But after all we went through, it was
as hard as any logical decision was. I knew there wasn’t a future with her that she
would always belong to Kiran. So I cut my losses and got the hell out of Dodge. I’d
moped about her for years after, but there wasn’t this true sense of heartbreak that
could destroy me.

Mainly, my pride had been hurt.

Would the same be true with Olivia?

I didn’t know.

And I didn’t really know if I wanted to find out.

Chapter Fourteen

Olivia

“Whatchya doing?”

I looked up to see the girl with all the attitude staring at me intently from the
doorframe. I let out a deep sigh and looked down at the blank piece of paper I’d torn
into tiny bits of outwardly expressed irritation.

“Making confetti,” I answered dryly.

“Oh, yeah?” She raised her eyebrows at me like she hadn’t expected me to be funny.
“What are you celebrating?”

I paused dramatically and then met her assessing gaze. “There’s just so much… how
to narrow it down? There’s the fact that I’m trapped in this alternate reality in
which my entire molecular structure has been changed without my permission. Or, there’s
the very real possibility I’ll never be able to go home again. Oh, or my sister is
in a coma. Or wait, there’s the fact that I’m ready to murder the man who did this
to me and I can’t ever remember wanting to have real feelings about killing a person
ever before.”

Roxie’s lips twitched in what, I had to believe, was a rare smile. “You’re going to
need a lot more confetti if we’re celebrating all of that,” she said.

I allowed myself a shallow chuckle and then stood up, brushing the “confetti” from
my lap. After that…
thing
with Jericho downstairs, I’d escaped to a room on the second floor that had guest
bedroom-ish vibes. The deep rich woods still accented the floor and furniture. The
large sleigh bed was made up with all white linens and a billowy sheer mosquito net
that swayed from the breeze coming through the open window. The desk along the wall
remained empty though, and the open closet door revealed more blank space. A slow
ceiling fan thumped around above head.

“The electricity was left on,” I pointed up at the ceiling fan, noticing the switch
next to the door Roxie leaned against.

“That’s not all,” she told me. “They’ve found something downstairs.” She turned back
to the hallway and motioned with her hand to follow.

I let my fingertips run along the soft, pure white of the comforter on my way out.
Little bits of electricity popped beneath my fingertips, leaving my hand buzzing and
my arm tingling. I frowned down at my traitorous appendage. It wasn’t the Magic falling
out of me like there was too much for my body to contain. It was… it was that this
had started to feel natural, instinctive… innate.

“Coming?” Roxie asked impatiently.

“Yep.” I ran a hand through my frizzy hair, thanks to the suffocating humidity and
heat, and hurried after her.

We walked down the hallway in silence. I admired the different pieces of unique Brazilian
art that popped with bright colors against the stark whiteness of the paint behind
them. Each painting had a unique point of view, clearly created by a different artist.
Still, they flowed together in an effortless design scheme that impressed me. Jericho’s
parents had good taste.

“So you’re freaking out, huh?” Roxie paused at the top of the stairs and just laid
it all out there. No preamble, no softening interlude... just the meat of her curiosity.

I looked back at a portrait of a woman’s head, her obsidian hair whipped back to fade
into little black birds. Her full lips, her dark lashes, her small chin depicted an
exotic Brazilian woman while the color palate mixed and matched all over the painting.
Her eyes were closed, her face tilted toward the burning sun in the top edges. The
overall effect was breathtaking.

“A little bit,” I sighed in answer to Roxie’s question.

She stood there, silent and sentinel to the staircase escape I so desperately wanted
to take. With the smallest hints of sympathy she said, “It wasn’t right, what happened
to you. But we’re going to murder him. You shouldn’t doubt that. You’ll get your revenge.”

A small smile curled the corners of my lips. “Thanks.” I tried my best to sound genuine.
“I appreciate that.”

I had just started to wonder if I was less concerned with the outcome of this mission
than I was with how the middle part was working, the most damage on my head- the Jericho
part of this mission.

“It’s not all about the mission, though, is it?” She turned around and started down
the steps.

I felt a little annoyed at her perception, but not enough to lie to her. “No. I’m
not just freaked about the assignment.”

“Jericho’s a good guy,” she shrugged. “Damaged, cynical about love, and maybe a bit…
skeptical that anyone would choose him. But he’s still a good guy.”

I cleared my throat in an effort not to choke on my tongue. “That’s very… insightful.”

She threw me a rueful look over her shoulder. “Only because Jericho’s love life has
been an open book since the beginning. He’s been through a lot in the heartbreak category.
It’s natural for him to be careful. I mean… I don’t know how he’s been with you or
anything, but he’s the most speculated bachelor in the entire Kingdom. We want to
see him settled more than anyone else.”

“Is there a list?” I gaped. It was so weird to think of these people as a real, functioning
society. I imagined them with a Most Eligible Bachelor’s Calendar that arrived in
the mailboxes of Immortals around the world once a year with Jericho on the front
cover, shirtless, glistening in baby oil and holding a puppy. Ridiculous.

“Not a legitimate list, but we talk. We’re a small Kingdom. You can’t really blame
us. Plus, in case you haven’t noticed, he’s hot.” She reached the bottom step and
paused. Looking around to make sure nobody was in hearing range, she said, “People
want to see him happy.” She turned and started walking again, but not before she threw
over her shoulder, “He deserves to be happy.”

What did she mean by
that
? And was she assuming I could be the one that made him happy?

What?

What?

Not possible. Whatever was happening with Jericho and me was a temporary attraction.
I was on my way out. And he didn’t seem like the settling down kind of guy, no matter
what Roxie thought about him.

Plus, there was the simple fact, that even if he was… I wasn’t. I didn’t have time
for this in my normal life, let alone this fairy tale realm in which I hunted bad
guys and shot lightning out of my fingertips.

I stood there for a few moments too long, trying to slow my spinning brain.

“We’re waiting for you,” Sebastian called from down the hallway effectively snapping
me out of my internal maze.

I looked up at him and smiled confidently. “Sorry.”

Sebastian’s face froze and then became a mask of horror. “Whoa! Stop right there!
You cannot fall in love with me. You might not care, but I’m concerned with your brother’s
life! I’m putting a stop to this right now.”

Recognizing his teasing tone, I rolled my eyes. “Oh yeah? You’re really worried about
my brother?”

“Obviously,” he snorted. “He’s the reason I’m ending this thing between us right now,
before either of us gets in too deep.”

“What’s his name?”

“Who’s name?” I was just a few feet from him and took the flirty moment to admire
Sebastian as a man, good looking, laid back and funny. Other than the whole doom and
gloom prophecy from the Gypsy Witch, why couldn’t I fall for an easy guy like him.

“My brother’s,” I reminded him. “What is his name?”

His eyes narrowed for a moment and then he came up with, “Odysseus? No… Olag? Oliver
Twist?”

“Getting warmer.” I stepped passed him into the kitchen where everyone had gathered.

He followed me in, announcing in that crisp accent of his, “Do not fear, peasants,
I have convinced Olivia to stop falling in love with me. It took some… persuading
on my part, but eventually she saw things my way.”

The room collectively groaned.

“Pretty sure, all she had to do was talk to Seraphina for thirty seconds before she
realized you were a bad idea,” Xavier quipped.

I was a little surprised when Sebastian didn’t have a retort to that.

“We found something,” Talbott called our attention to the front of the room. “This
house has been stocked with food and clothes that don’t belong to Jericho’s family.
Whether his parents gave permission or not, someone else has been staying here.”

“Can you call your dad and figure out if he’s loaned this place to one of his buddies?”
someone asked.

“We’re not exactly on speaking terms,” Jericho shrugged.

A pang in my chest sent unwanted feelings of empathy for Jericho oozing through my
body. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, he missed his dad. Their falling out had
meant something hurtful to him. He didn’t have to say that for me to see the pain
in his eyes and stiffness of his body when he told me about his parents earlier.

“What’s our next move?” Sebastian asked, getting back to the task.

“We’re going to go see my parent’s other weekend house. Check out the activity there
and then…”

Before Jericho could finish his thought Talbott had surged to life and leapt across
a long, bamboo-topped kitchen island. He had been listening stoically to Jericho’s
plans when suddenly an electric charge zipped through the room and seemingly straight
into Talbott. His whole body jerked into motion. His face became a steel mask of determination
and his Magic ballooned through the room with aggressive force.

“What the hell?” I heard someone demand.

My Magic started thrumming, too, like a warning beacon that had been triggered. Something
electric was outside this house, sizzling with Magic. I didn’t question my instinct,
but just let it lead me.

Talbott had gone after something and from his behavior, I had to assume it was something
bad. Nobody else seemed to get it, though, so as I turned to run after him, I called
out, “There’s something out there!”

I raced after Talbott with everyone else hot on my heels. We burst through the front
door and spread into a defensive formation. I fit somewhere in the middle, more of
a spectator to their practiced movements than an active part of the play.

Magic clashing in the air, beyond where we parked, pulled at every single one of my
senses and set me off in that direction. Thick, gray Magic flashed in front of us,
clashing with a putrid green that I swore I could smell. It was just barely masked
by the scent of singed earth and burning wood.

We broke through the line of cars and nearly ran straight into Talbott and an older
gentleman with silver-streaked black hair and a large, patrician nose. Magic flew
back and forth between the two men angry and dangerous.

“Don’t kill him, Talbott!” Sebastian shouted out.

I had half a second to wonder why Talbott would be tempted to kill him, since he was
not familiar to me, before the rest of the group surrounded him and brought him to
his knees with their combined Magic.

Jericho was at his throat in another second, his hand clamping around the corded muscles
with a vice-like grip. I sucked in a breath and watched the struggle play about before
me.

“Alexi?” Jericho seemed to guess the name.

“The one and only,” Alexi grinned up at him, some blood trailing from the corner of
his smile-tight lips. “Were you expecting someone else? Perhaps… my brother?”

Jericho’s grasp tightened and the older man coughed out his struggle to breath. “I
wasn’t expecting anyone at my
home
.”

“And here I was under the impression that the son of the politician had been disowned,”
Alexi goaded. The group as a whole took a step forward, closing the circle and making
their threat well known.

Jericho laughed cruelly, “I’m the politician now.”

“For a self-destructing King and an unfaithful people.” Alexi moved in a flash to
grab something from the back of his pants but Jericho was too fast for him. Jericho
threw him to the ground, maneuvering Alexi in such a way that his head took the brunt
of the impact, cracking loudly on the smooth driveway.

I flinched in reflex and felt my blood go cold. I watched in wide-eyed horror as Jericho
retrieved a gun from Alexi’s pants and checked the chamber. More dread sluiced through
my blood while Jericho pointed it deep into Alexi’s neck. The skin around the barrel
puckered and wrinkled, while the cold metal dug into the man’s skin.

“That won’t kill me,” Alexi gasped, sounding fearful for the first time.

“I don’t want to kill you,” Jericho growled.

Never had I seen such an image of pure testosterone-driven rage. I’d never witnessed
a man so purposed in his task or possessed by conviction and decision. Jericho practically
glittered with fury and I could have sworn my heart stopped beating with the tension
of the moment.

“I won’t tell you anything,” Alexi growled out.

“We’ll see about that,” Jericho promised. Without taking his eyes off the man on the
ground he called out orders to the rest of us, “Get him on the floor of my car. We’re
taking him back to Gabriel’s.”

They carried out his orders immediately. Jericho handed the gun over to Sebastian
who kept it trained on the stranger. I just stood there, like an idiot. It wasn’t
that I’d been necessarily afraid to act… I just didn’t know how.