The Sight (24 page)

“Help me!” the man screamed.

I moved but was still ten feet away when the wraith dug those nails into the man's stomach, filling the air with the scent of blood.

“Jesus,” said the other man with a gun, the one who'd scrambled away from my first shot. He aimed his gun at the wraith, started firing. He'd grazed the wraith, twice, missed on every other shot. But the wraith hadn't even noticed. He was busy on the ground, searching for the magic he could feel in the air.

My
magic. And my problem to handle.

“Hey!”
I screamed. The wraith's gaze snapped to me, the eyes staring blankly, hungrily. He lumbered to his feet and darted awkwardly toward me, limbs angular and pinched.

“That's right,” I said, walking backward toward the truck, keeping the light in his eyes, hoping it might slow him down.

He lunged, fingers catching my forearm and scraping painfully down. I kicked, made contact with his shin. He hit the ground but scrambled up again, grabbed at me again. His eyes were dark and empty, his hair as white as snow, his arms skeletally thin.

When my heart ached with pity, I had to remind myself he wasn't a child. He wasn't an innocent. He wasn't a Sensitive. Not anymore.

Ignoring the mental warnings, I tucked the gun into the back of my waistband and grabbed his left wrist, pushed his arm down to pull him off balance. His arm was thin enough that I could nearly make a fist around it. He screamed furiously, clawing at my hand to free himself from my grasp, then lurched forward, leading with pointed, bared teeth.

“Shit!” I said, letting go and jumping back to avoid his snapping jaw. He came at me, mouth nearly foaming in his hunger for magic I probably needed to cast off. I wasn't sure even Malachi could have given me such a solid incentive.

I moved backward to stay out of his grasp, hit the truck's front grill, realized my opportunity. I feigned right and, when he jumped forward, dodged left. He hit the grill, screamed from the contact with hot metal.

I plunged the tranq into his shoulder.

He screamed, spasmed one last time, and went limp. I caught him as he fell, lowered him carefully to the ground, cradling his head so it wouldn't crack against the asphalt. He was a wraith, but he
was what I could become, and he'd become that monster much too soon.

The wraith out of commission, I stood up again, looked at the scene.

Liam had twenty pounds of hard muscle on the man, and probably a lot more legit fighting experience, but they were still going at each other. Liam, a satisfied grin on his face, was leading the man into making stupid little jabs, which would only wear him out.

Liam was toying with him. Not that I couldn't sympathize.

Behind him, there was one dead Reveillon member on the ground, two whose gazes were transfixed on the man the wraith had disemboweled.

I pulled out the gun, walked toward them. “I'd suggest you hit the asphalt, faces down.”

“Fuck you, bitch,” one of them said, but his teeth chattered with fear.

Liam stepped beside me, breath heaving. “You moron. Now you've insulted her.” Liam walked forward, kicked him square in the balls. The man went down to his knees with a groan, eyes rolling back.

“Thanks, I guess, for protecting my honor?”

“Anytime.”

Keeping the gun on the second guy, who wisely lifted his hands into the air, I pulled zip ties from my pocket as Liam turned the guy onto his stomach, pulled his hands behind him.

He took one, fastened the man's wrists together, then stood and wiped sweat from his brow. “You'd make a pretty solid bounty hunter.”

I flipped the gun around, offered it to Liam grip-first, and looked down at the warp and weft of scratches along my arms. “Thanks. But I have a job.”

—

The cavalry arrived, two fresh-faced Containment agents who looked barely older than the wraith on the ground. Containment was down to the newbies. Everyone else was in Devil's Isle, searching the streets for Reveillon, or already fighting them.

“They're all Reveillon members,” Liam said. “They were attacking the wraith.”

Their gazes tracked from humans to wraith. “And the Para. Did you kill it?” one of the agents asked.

“It's ‘him,'” I corrected. “Not ‘it.' And he's a wraith, not a Para. They're different.” At least to me. “And no, we didn't kill him. We tranqed him.”

“Licensed tranqs,” Liam said. “We'll take him to the clinic. Can you handle these three?”

“Sure,” the other agent said.

“In addition to the one who didn't make it, four more ran away.” Liam pointed. “They headed that way on foot. They're cowards, so you might still be able to grab them.”

“Sure,” one of them said, and pulled a comm unit from his belt.

“In that case,” Liam said, “we'll be going.” He didn't wait for them to argue but walked to the wraith and picked him up. He looked even more frail being held by Liam, his arms drawn up like a bird's wings.

“There's a blanket behind the seat,” Liam said, gesturing to the truck. I grabbed it, spread it onto the bed. The wraith probably wouldn't care, but that Liam had thought to do it tugged at my heart.

He placed the boy carefully on the blanket, then used tie-downs to create a kind of cage that would keep him from rolling through the truck. It wasn't a pretty solution, but he wouldn't be able to attack us en route, or escape to attack anyone else. However pitiable he was, that had to be the priority.

“I didn't know it could happen to a child,” I said as Liam backed the truck onto the main street again, headed toward Devil's Isle. I sat halfway turned in the seat, watching him dutifully.

“He's the youngest I've seen. By far.”

“He could have learned balance, to control it. He shouldn't have gotten that far.” I looked at Liam. “Is it ironic that we're taking him into Devil's Isle? Or just cruel?”

Liam kept his eyes on the street. “There's no other place to take him, Claire. No one else equipped to handle him.”

The breaking of this small boy was only one of the million tragedies, big and small, that the world had seen since the Veil opened. But this hurt as much as any of them.

—

The Devil's Isle guards were silent when Liam carried the boy through the gate. The houses we passed were equally quiet.

“Lizzie!” Liam called out when I opened the clinic door for him.

She walked into the room a moment later. Her pink scrubs were wrinkled, her face sweaty, locks of hair in damp curls around it. She peeled off dirty gloves, tossed them into a waste can. “It's been a long night already. And it looks like it's about to get completely demoralizing.”

She walked to us, checked the boy's pupils with a penlight, then sighed. “How old is he? Eleven?”

“About that,” I said as Liam handed the boy over to the orderly who followed Lizzie into the room.

“That's a kick in the teeth.” She looked back at us. “Any sign of his parents?”

“No,” Liam said, and described where we'd found him, and how. “It's possible they were nearby, but it doesn't look like he's been in a stable home for a while.”

“No,” Lizzie agreed. “He looks feral. We'll match against missing persons, just in case,” she said. “If his parents are alive. It's possible he's an orphan, has been living on the streets for a while.” She looked up at me. “Want me to tell you if we find them?”

I nodded. “I'd appreciate that.”

Lizzie nodded. “Thanks for taking care of him. I hear you did pretty well on the home visits.”

I smiled. “For a novice, maybe.”

Lizzie smiled. “That's pretty much what Vendi said, which is high praise. Now get out of here so I can do my job.”

—

The store was locked and quiet when we returned, everyone asleep. Gavin was curled into a chair in the front room. Burke and Tadji had hung a sheet across the hallway to the back room, and I assumed they were sleeping. I didn't want to check.

I went upstairs and changed into a tank and shorts, brushed the day's knots from my hair. I heard Liam step into the doorway. “You need sheets or pillows or anything?”

“No,” he said, and when I glanced, I saw that he looked at me like a man with a long-denied thirst.

My heart pounded in silent answer.

“You look like a fairy queen,” he said. “Radiant and otherworldly.”

I smiled. “I'm exhausted and pissed off.”

“You did good tonight. You handled yourself. You handled the wraith.” He smiled. “You handled Lizzie.”

“I tried.”

Liam shouldn't have walked toward me. He shouldn't have cupped my face, stared down at me with adoration even I could recognize, and he probably didn't want to feel.

“It would be so easy for you to run,” he said. “To walk away from all this and spare yourself the emotions, the fear, the danger. But you don't. And you don't stand by. You jump in with both feet.” He smiled, his eyes glimmering like jewels. “You are so brave.”

“Reckless,” I said with a smile.

“Reckless,” he agreed.

“Doubt is part of life,” I said. “And so is hope. Life is about taking chances. You just have to hope that the chance is worth the risk.”

I dug fingers into his shirt, rested my forehead on his chest. I should have done the hard thing—the smart thing—and walked away, left us both in peace. But it was too late for that now.

“I don't care about tomorrow, or the next day, or the next. I just care about right now, about me, about you.” It was only half a lie, and it was half a lie I could live with. And when he looked at me, I knew he knew it.

I put a hand on his face, knew where we were heading. “Tonight, you'll make me feel whole. You'll keep me safe.”

His groan was deep, elemental, utterly masculine.

“I want to be home,” I said. “And I'm home when I'm with you.”

With those words, I sealed our deal.

—

He swept me up and into his arms, carried me to the bed. I let myself be carried. I let myself rest against the warm solidness of his body, surrounded and safe, and for the first time in years, content. Maybe this would be the end of us, maybe it wouldn't. But for tonight, neither of us would be alone.

He placed me on the bed as if I were a delicate antique, began to pull off his T-shirt, but I shook my head.

“Let me do it.” I wanted to unwrap him, reveal him, one bit of cotton and denim at a time.

Smiling with obvious satisfaction, he put his hands down. “Go ahead.”

I pulled up the hem of his shirt, revealing flat abs, strong chest, broad shoulders. He lifted his arms, let me pull the shirt over his head.

While he watched with avaricious eyes, I let my fingers trip and skim over hard and chiseled muscle, honed from sweat and effort. Every inch was strong and taut, every muscle firm, and he shivered under the slip of my fingers.

I let my eyes skim to his impossibly gorgeous face. Piercingly blue eyes, generous mouth, the dark slashes of eyebrows. “You are the most beautiful man I have ever seen in my life.”

Those eyebrows popped up. “That's quite a compliment, Claire Connolly. Thank you.”

“You're welcome, Liam Quinn.”

I didn't have even a moment to wonder what would come next. He climbed above me, roped arms balanced on either side of my head, and stared down at me reverently. “You are the most beautiful and haunting creature I have ever seen in my life. And in New Orleans, that's saying something.”

I grinned at him. “Your accent gets stronger when you're flattering me.”

He leaned down, lips to my ear.
“Tu es belle.”

I understood the gist of that well enough.

“And it's my turn,” he said, and skimmed his strong hands along my ribs, sliding up the thin cotton tank as we moved.

A hand across the flat of my stomach, then my breasts. I closed my eyes and arched into his hands.

“Nearly delicate,” he said, his hands on my breasts, soothing and stroking and inciting at the same time, and then his mouth. I arched against him, moved my body against his. My heart wanted to revel in each touch, but my body wanted him to hurry.

He pulled the tank over my head and lowered his body to mine, then kissed me. Softly, at first, then demanding, teeth and tongue challenging me to take, to give, to meet him breath for breath. I slid my hands into his hair, thick and dark, and tugged him closer until his body aligned with mine, his arousal impressive between us.

“Jesus, Claire,” he said, burying his face in my neck. “I feel like a teenager.”

I smiled. “Good. Because I've been feeling that way for a while now.”

He pressed soft kisses to my neck, my collarbone, then down to my breasts again, where his long fingers, equally gentle and strong, teased and incited.

I opened my eyes to stare into his, found him staring back at me as his lips and fingers moved across my chest.
“Ma chère,”
he said, and moved down my body, slipping away shorts and panties until I lay on the bed, bare to him.

“Ma chère,”
he said again, and kissed each inch of my legs in turn, until he'd worked his way to the center of my body, until his mouth found me and drove me relentlessly to that first, shimmering crest.

“Liam,” I said, tangling my fingers in his hair. I sat up to capture his mouth, busied fingers at his belt, then the buttons of his jeans.

Buttons. So many buttons.

“Never wear these again,” I teased against his mouth, and almost cringed at the suggestion there'd be more days, more nights like these, when I'd promised him tonight was enough. But his eyes stayed closed, his lips open and nearly panting when I found him, stroked.

His chest heaved as I found my rhythm and his dark eyebrows knitted together with passionate intensity. Until his eyes flashed open, stared back at me, and he kissed me fiercely, teased my tongue with his. “I don't think I can wait any longer.”