Page 6

Kit

D amon was as big and solid as they came. Even though I was only supporting his head and shoulders on my leg, he was heavy enough that the limb was trying to go to sleep on me.

I flexed my toes, pointed them then began flexing the rest of the muscles, starting with my calf and working upward as I smoothed back the strands of his curly hair.

He didn’t stir, gaze locked on the metal surface over our heads. The roar of the engines drowned out fainter sounds, including his heartbeat, but I could hear his breathing well enough—deep, steady respirations that told me he was getting enough air.

That didn’t offer much comfort.

His eyes were wide open. Staring blindly at nothing, the irises were an intense gold—not the green-gold that warned of a foul mood or the deeper green-gold when he shifted.

No, this gold was a shade I saw only rarely, and it was usually in moments of high emotion or high stress—when he was using all of his control to keep the power of his beast locked down.

It was an intense, blood-chilling gaze, one more penetrating than any shifter I’d ever met…save for Chang.

Chang… a shifter whose inborn shapeshifting abilities were a genetic legacy from angelic relatives .

Was it the same with Damon?

It had to be.

Caught by that awareness, minutes ticked away until I lost track. It was only the pins and needles sensation in my leg that had me stirring.

I started the muscle exercises again, flexing my toes, my ankle and calf as I stroked Damon’s hair. My fingers shook, a slight betrayal of the terror gripping my heart. in an icy fist

Who he is hasn’t changed, I told myself. It’s just that now you know—both of you know—the truth about his past .

“True enough,” I murmured to myself. Trying to ease the knot of tension of dread and tension building inside me, I cupped his cheek. It was sandpaper rough under my hand, but I didn’t care. “I really can tease you about being an old man, you know that, Damon? Not just a decade or two older, but decades …”

The enormity of it hit me and I closed my eyes.

His body tensed and my lids flew open, my hand moving to his chest.

“Hey, I can still handle your mean old ass, so don’t go getting weird,” I told him lightly.

But his gaze was still locked, still staring off into the distance without seeing me or anything else.

I bent low over him and pressed my lips to his. “Wake up, baby. Please.”

A week earlier

Chang had always seemed ageless.

But in the short time we’d been in this room with him, he seemed to have aged centuries.

Oh, his face was still smooth and unlined, hair midnight black and thick. But the weight of millennia hung like a cloak around him, dripping from each word. As he looked at Damon, there was mourning in his eyes.

Just say it, I wanted to shout. Whatever it is…just say it.

“You're like my son. You are my son. I would willingly give my life for yours."

“What’s this about?” Damon asked, voice so rough, it was almost unintelligible.

Chang turned his back and walked to the window, staring out into the courtyard. “You know your parents were targeted when you were a child and you were spared. It was always my belief that you were the actual target and that, for some reason, she chose to spare you. Perhaps she wasn't given all the information and when she realized you were hardly more than a babe, she decided she couldn't do it.”

“Why was I a target?” Damon demanded.

A cold chill raced down my spine. Without thinking, I wrapped my arms around my middle and eased closer to the empty fireplace. I wanted warmth suddenly—craved it. But a deep-seated awareness kept me from moving toward Damon.

She… Chang had said.

She chose to spare you .

My mind spun back to a day a few short months early, the memory suddenly painfully clear.

Jude’s taunting words.

Without realizing it, I shook my head and backed away, not stopping until the couch bumped up against my calves. I sank down onto it and buried my face in my hands.

‘She wouldn’t kill a child. A child…because children are innocent. But children grow up and lay waste to plans that have been years in the making.’

“Stop,” Damon said roughly.

I flinched away when he placed a hand on my neck, but he didn’t let that deter him. He pulled me into his arms even as I tried to twist away.

And Chang kept talking.

“We can only speculate about what happened,” Chang continued. “And there were no other attempts to come after you.”

A choked sound tore out of me. Weren’t there ?

“I said stop ,” Damon snarled.

Silence fell and Damon pulled me onto his lap, rocking me. But when he pressed his lips to my temple, I exploded on his lap and shot across the room. “Don’t.”

He was on his feet, staring at me.

“How can you want to touch me?” I demanded. “Don’t you hear what he’s saying?”

“It didn’t matter when Jude said it. Why should it matter now?” Damon’s eyes burned into me.

“Jude?” Chang said softly.

We both looked at him.

Damon hadn’t told him. For some reason, that was the only thought in my head.

Damon hadn’t told him.

Why?

Damon’s chin lifted. “Jude dropped that bomb on us when he came after us at Deep Lake. He and Malcolm were either with her or close behind.” His eyes moved to me.

“Her…” Chang turned slowly and pinned a look on me, understanding dawning.

He hadn’t realized it had been my mother sent to kill Damon—only she hadn’t been able to take the life of a child.

Nausea churned in my belly and I pivoted away, looking out the window.

“It was the job Rana had talked about,” Damon said, sounding weary. “I figured that much out once I realized Jude probably hadn’t lied. He always hated me, even from the first time we met, before Kit ever came into the picture. This makes as much sense as anything else as to why.”

“What exactly did he say?” Tension pulsed in his voice.

Damon responded, his words barely more than a growl, “What, after taunting Kit about killing her mother? He tossed out the fact that her mom refused to kill me because I was a kid, so they killed her. That’s pretty much it, Chang. And they were busy trying to kill us, so we didn’t really feel like having a sit-down with them. Now they’re busy being dead and good fucking riddance.”

Wrapping my arms around myself, I tried not to cry.

My mother.

Dead because of Jude and Malcom. Dead because she wouldn’t kill Damon .

Jude… he hadn’t died hard enough.

Although I didn’t hear him, I sensed the movement and turned to see Chang gliding up behind me.

I tensed.

“I am so sorry,” he said softly.

Tears blinded me and I looked away. If I gave into them now, I’d never stop. “Can you just get on with whatever it is you have to say, Chang? If it’s this…truth bomb about my kind hunting Damon, we know. So—”

“I’m sorry,” he said again. A snowy white handkerchief was tucked into my hand. “But it’s far more complicated.”

I snatched at the handkerchief and spun away.

Fuck .

Chang cleared his throat.

Damon’s arms came around me from behind and despite the guilt choking me, I didn’t have the strength to pull away.

“I watched and waited for years,” Chang said some moments later. “If you were the target, it would be best to take you out while you were young, before you grew into your power. But nothing happened. You grew into a man, strong, confident, powerful…”

Damon’s heart beat harder against my back and the air around us grew heavier.

“Then, the raid happened. Kei was killed.”

Damon flinched at that name and he let me go so abruptly, I stumbled.

Spinning around, I caught sight of him just in time to see his hands flying up to grab his head, face contorting in agony.

Chang was there before I could reach out.

The slim man lifted a hand to touch Damon’s brow.

I flung up my arm at the flash of light and power prickled over my skin, thick and potent enough to steal my breath. It was gone in a blink and Damon stumbled back award, shaking his head as if to clear it.

“Kei,” Damon said. The word was flat, as if he was caught in a trance. “I forgot her. How could I…”

Gold exploded through his eyes and he lunged for Chang, slammed him against the stone wall by the window.

“ You …” Fangs sprouted from his gums and when he snarled, the sound that came from his throat resembled nothing human. “Did you fuck with my memories?”

Now

A harsh sound tore from him, like something or somebody had reached deep inside him and wrenched at things buried within, ripping them out.

Damon went rigid, spine arching until it lost contact with the hard surface of the floor, his shoulders and head pinning my leg down as his torso bowed upward.

He bared his teeth in a ferocious growl, one hand swiping out.

Instinctively, I caught his wrist. “Damon, wake up ,” I ordered. “It’s Kit. Wake up !”

His eyes snapped toward me and he heaved out every breath on a ragged exhalation.

“ Nene .”

Nene… I flinched back, gaping at him.

In the next moment, he shuddered and jerked, then he was on his feet, breathing as if he’d circled the earth twice.

I shoved upright with a staggering lack of grace, my stiff limbs protesting every movement.

His gaze cut to me as if he’d scented an enemy—assessing, cold, probing.

A spark of fear exploded inside and a cold rush of wind passed through me, smelling of cold nights by the sea and windswept plains— Lemeraties . Somehow, I sensed her staring out through my eyes. When Damon turned away, her blade was there, in my hand. I shoved it through the loops of my belt at my back. Not now—

Damon took a deep breath and looked at me again and I saw him —saw the infuriating, stubborn bastard I knew looking back at me.

His nostrils flared as he scented the air.

But he said nothing.

He said absolutely nothing over the coming hours as the plane hurtled through the night toward our first layover.

A contact of Chang’s waited at the small airport where we landed outside Reykjavik, Iceland.

A tall, slim female wolf who looked us up and down before dealing with our passports, she introduced herself as Lilja.

Although she spoke in English, her accent called to a part of me I’d buried and I locked my jaw as those memories tried to surface.

“Technically, you’re now here legally,” Lilja said, baring her perfect white teeth. “But you’re also on…how you say…probation?”

Damon stared at her stonily.

Lilja looked unfazed. “If you step a foot out of line, you will answer to me. My debt to Chang only goes so far.”

Gentry stepped between the two Alphas, showing he was either brave or stupid, or maybe just very unaware. “We’re just passing through, Ms. Jóhannsdóttir. Out of the three of us, I’m more likely to be interested in causing trouble—and only by way of having a few too many drinks. Since I’m piloting these two around, I can’t even have me a bit of fun. I owe Chang a favor, too.”

Lilja flicked him a look, considered, then nodded and passed two of the passports back, although she held onto mine. Her gaze burned into me for several long moments.

With a jerk of her head, she indicated she wanted me to follow her.

Damon shifted restlessly but said nothing as I trailed the wolf female.

But that wasn’t surprising.

He hadn’t said a damn thing to me since waking up from whatever the hell spell had left him calling out some other woman’s name.

Bitter, wounded jealousy twisted inside and I smashed it down, slamming a lid over it.

I didn’t have time for this.

Lilja led me to a small, cramped office and shut the door, turning to pin me with a gaze coolly blue and wary.

“I know your kind.”

The words, along with the icy assessing look she kept focused on me, had a silent warning going off in my head.

“That so?” Casually, I leaned back against the wall, careful to stay clear of the door. She was tall and probably topped me by a foot, which put her at over six feet. She was leanly muscled and would be heavier than me, with a longer reach and a shifter’s speed.

And she knew my kind…just what did that mean?

She settled behind a small, meticulously organized desk and sat comfortably in the shabby chair, her pose as carefully casual as my own.

“Yes.” The blue of her eyes turned brighter, gleaming until I realized I was looking into the eyes of her wolf—and I knew when she shifted, her eyes would remain that cool, pale blue. Power pulsed from her and under that was the steady thrum of anger.

It was an old, seasoned anger.

“That guy out there is my lover and he walks around holding back more power than you possess,” I told her calmly. “And if you know about…my kind, then maybe you know a lot of them are batshit crazy. I knew more about fear and pain by the time I was eight than most people know in their lifetimes. So, if you’re hoping to creep me out or scare me into some sort of…reaction? It’s not going to work.”

Her lids flickered.

Cocking my head, I leaned forward a fraction. “How about you just tell me what it is that’s on your mind? It will save us both time.”

A minute passed before she slowly nodded her head.

“Your flight manifest shows you're headed to the Faroe Islands.” One golden brow arched. “But that’s not your final destination, is it?”

“Does it matter?”

Hooking one ankle over her knee, she made a vague gesture with her hand. “It’s just part of the picture. I’ve always had a keen interest in people traveling there…especially those who aren’t human, so when I got the call about this flight…well, I hoped. I saw you disembarking and I wondered. But then I caught your scent…and I knew.”

It was her turn to lean forward and her eyes narrowed in menace.

“A little over a decade ago, a girl roughly fitting your description showed up in a seaside village on the western shore of the Island of Vidoy. She was found by a couple of local fishermen—she didn’t seem to understand what they said, so they brought an older woman out. The older woman wasn’t…from there, nor was her grandson. But they were trusted, had done a lot of good for those in the village. The old woman saw the girl and sent for her grandson who knew many languages.”

“Can you get to the point?” I snapped. Unease had my gut going tight.

“You were there for a week, then you disappeared—some of the villagers thought you jumped off one of the cliffs. They thought you were crazy,” Lilja said. “But the old woman, her grandson…they weren’t human. And those fishermen? They’d seen things, heard the stories about the island some kilometers away—a haunted one. On some nights, they say you could hear the howls of a demon coming from that island.”

I set my jaw.

“She called me. Her name was Birna. She was my best friend’s grandmother—a witch who had to leave Iceland as her visions became too…erratic, too unpredictable. Her grandson? He was my best friend’s twin. Born with only a hint of magic but gifted with languages. They helped you.”

Oh, no… my mouth went dry as the weight of the words she had yet to speak fell on me.

“Birna called to ask if I could keep an eye out for you.” She sneered now, tossing out the passports she’d helped modify. “She wanted me to help you if I could, said that something evil was after you and that you could use a friend. A few days later, we got the call that somebody had gone through and slaughtered half the people in the village.”

She reached into the inner pocket of her heavy coat and pulled something out, hurling it at me.

The pictures flew out of the envelope, most fluttering to the desk or the floor.

I caught one in mid-air.

It was a close-up crime scene photo of a corpse, a young man, his face frozen in a rictus of a scream, mouth open, eyes wide.

Despite the ruin that had been made of his face, I recognized him.

A harsh breath escaped me.

The door flew open with enough force it slammed into the wall, hinges screaming in protest.

Damon plucked the picture from my hand and looked at it.

I shifted my attention to the ones scattered at my feet.

Slowly, I knelt and picked up another, this one of the old woman.

She, too, had been captured by the camera’s unforgiving eye, but unlike her grandson, her mouth was stubbornly silent, jaw locked and her eyes had the look of unyielding refusal.

“They died because of you ,” Lilja said.

“She was a kid ,” Damon snarled, cutting her off.

“Don’t,” I told him.

He ignored me.

“You want to be pissed?” he growled, stalking forward to loom over Lilja as she remained behind the desk. “Then be pissed at the ones who tormented and terrorized a fucking kid from the time she was orphaned and left alone with those bitches. Be pissed at the ones who used her as their whipping girl until she had enough and ran away when she was still a kid .”

“She could have warned—”

Damon grabbed her from across the table and hauled her upright, one big hand around her throat.

I surged upright, galvanized into action. I threw myself at him, but I was no match for his strength—never had been. Hissing, I pulled a knife—it wasn’t until I felt the cold hilt in my hand that I realized it was the dagger—Lemera’s—but it was sharp and it would cut and that was all that mattered.

I lunged again.

He hissed as the blade met flesh and the scent of blood filled the air.

Lilja sucked in a breath through her abused throat when he released her. She stumbled back.

I pushed between her and Damon before he could go for her again.

“Don’t,” I told him.

Eyes of furious gold stared at me.

“Dial it down,” I said flatly. “You know that doesn’t work on me.”

He snarled and went to reach for me, then stopped, staring at his hand.

“I cut the FPL,” I told him. “You want to grab and hold onto things, you kinda need that.”

He glared, brows drawing low over his eyes as the gold melted away, first to the more normal green-gold of his cat, then to the storm-cloud gray.

“It’s the flexor pollicis longus—it lets us use our thumbs. You can’t use your thumb, you can’t choke people.”

Slowly, he lifted his hand and a grimace twisted his features as he tried to make a fist. Blood continued to ooze from the deep laceration I’d inflicted on him.

“This choking people when you get pissed is a habit you need to break,” I continued.

A rough laugh escaped him and he looked around, then gestured to a white metal box attached to the wall, marked with the ubiquitous red cross. “Clean it up, smart-ass.”

I didn’t move. “Are you ready to play nice?”

He shot out and grabbed me, this time with his other hand. His mouth crushed down on mine. “I won’t kill her, if that’s what you mean. As long as she’s done running her mouth on shit she knows nothing about.”