Page 37 of Incubus (The Incubus Saga #1)

“There’s a garage in Rushville,” Nathan told Sasha as they peeled out onto the road.

He hadn’t noticed until then that he and Jim had both gone for the backseat, leaving Sasha as chauffer, unknowingly with Walter in the passenger seat beside him.

“We have to change the tires or we’ll be dead in the water. ”

Sasha nodded, but was strangely quiet and tense as he clutched white-knuckled on the steering wheel.

Not a single sound left him the entire time they drove into town, not while Jim chattered on about Alex’s safety, and Nathan gave a play by play of every car he thought he saw sneaking up behind them in the dark.

When they pulled up to the garage, a heavy silence had fallen over all of them.

They made quick work of the locks and broke inside without much trouble, thankful that the small town was asleep at this late hour and no one seemed to have noticed them.

Nathan had hoped for a drivable car they could steal, but there was nothing inside the shop other than parts and, thankfully, tires .

Sasha’s incubus strength made it possible to raise the car onto blocks without the aid of any noisy machines, but he still wasn't speaking. Once the car was raised and they could get to work, Sasha disappeared from beside Nathan.

“You really think Alex will be okay?” Jim asked, rolling the first new tire toward Nathan. “He knows she was helping us now.”

“She’ll be fine inside the Gatehouse,” Nathan said. “Alex is the rightful Keeper. He wouldn’t dare hurt her. Plus he broke Gatehouse rules and tried to use a gun inside the walls. She never has to let him in again. We’ll call her once we’re somewhere safe and check in, okay?”

Jim nodded vaguely, lost in thought. Nathan nudged him with his foot as an indication that speed was of the essence here, and Jim got the message, grabbing another tire to help.

“I didn’t mean to freeze you too,” Jim said after a moment. “I did, though, didn’t I? I didn’t even know if it would work, but I thought…if I got the Muses to run back to the Veil, maybe…”

“It’s okay, Jim,” Nathan said. “You did good. It was more annoying than anything.” He smiled for good measure, but Jim still looked far away, like half of him was back at the Gatehouse.

“Hey. Don’t you believe that stuff you spouted back there?

‘Cause I do. You’re not like other changelings, Jim.

You’re different. You’re going to be different. ”

The twitch of a smile pulled at Jim’s lips. “If you say so, Nathan,” he said.

Nathan took that for as much of a win as he was going to get and started to work on the first tire. Jim took another.

There was still no sign of Sasha.

“Hey, Red, where did you go? We need some help here!” Nathan called, not daring to yell too loudly or risk them being discovered, but there wasn’t even so much as a grumble in reply.

Being half under the car, Nathan couldn’t see anything but what was right in front of him. Jim, closer to the front end, nodded his head somewhere behind the car with an unsure expression, like he didn’t dare disturb whatever Sasha was doing.

Nathan pulled himself out from under the car with a huff, quickly spotting Sasha standing amongst the hubcaps at the back of the shop.

They didn’t have time for quiet reflection right now.

Walter understood that and had kept quiet despite remaining visible at Nathan’s side.

That they had been ambushed by Gabriel was obvious enough from conversation.

Before Nathan could ask Sasha what was going on, the incubus suddenly lashed out, his hands morphed into claws that caused a great crash of metal to skitter over the floor.

“ Sasha ,” Nathan spat like a curse, walking up behind the redhead and grabbing him by the shoulder.

“Are you out of your freaking mind? We need to get the car fixed and out of here. What we don’t need is for every Good Samaritan on the Neighborhood Watch to call the cops on us.

Sasha ,” Nathan said again, pulling harder on Sasha’s shoulder to get him to turn around.

The sudden movement of Sasha spinning around on his own startled Nathan, gripped hard by Sasha’s hands that were still mostly black. Sasha’s eyes were red and slit, and his teeth had turned to fangs like he was halfway to frenzied.

“I don’t care, you know. I don’t even care anymore!

” Sasha said, louder than they could afford right now.

“Did you see the way he looked at me? I've known that man since I was sixteen and he looked at me like a monster just for being with you. Can you imagine what he would have done if he knew what I really was?” Even though Sasha was holding Nathan too tightly, his voice broke and his eyes were swimming.

Nathan was too stunned to struggle free or think about how much his arms would be bruised tomorrow.

“One day…maybe it won’t matter to you either,” Sasha said quietly, his grip on Nathan finally going slack as he stared at the hands he had let half turn into claws.

“You’ll look up…and it won’t matter that we’re friends.

You won’t care anymore. You’ll remember what it was like to think like him and only see this . ”

Nathan formed fists so quickly, he almost cut himself with the flat of his nails. Right then punching Sasha as hard as he could sounded like the best idea in the world.

Nathan's hand throbbed the second he connected with Sasha’s jaw, but it was worth it. Sasha morphed back to being fully human and all he could do was gape at Nathan with wide, too blue eyes.

“If you ever say shit like that to me again, next time I'm using iron. You hear me?” Nathan said. “Now get your ass over to the car and help us. We are out of time. Or do I need to hit you harder for that to sink in?”

“Nathan…I…”

“Save it. Just help us or we’re leaving you behind.”

Nathan didn’t miss the matching gape Jim was sporting when he moved back to the car, but he didn’t acknowledge it either.

Halfway through his second tire, Nathan risked a glance at the others.

They had both finished tires of their own and were sitting together without talking, sharing the silence comfortably as they waited for him.

“Nathan.” The sound of Walter’s voice was soothing. “I do not believe Gabriel is headed this direction, but you should still be swift. The next doorway is a few hours from here and you will need to leave this car behind.”

“I know,” Nathan said quietly. “I’m almost done here, Walt, it’s just been…a really long night.”

"Nathan?" Walter prompted softly. “What happened in there?”

Nathan assumed Walter meant what had happened with Gabriel, and why Sasha and Jim were so shaken up, but it wasn’t something Nathan could really explain. His thoughts went more to before Gabriel interrupted them and how he had been about to return a very mutual kiss.

“Nothing,” Nathan said. “Just the usual.”

Walter knew Nathan well enough not to buy that, but he left things be for now.

A few minutes later, Nathan was finished with the last tire. There had been no sign or sounds to indicate they were going to get caught or that Gabriel had caught up to them, and Sasha looked fairly back to normal.

Nathan gave a smirk as he stood and patted the hood of the car. “Let’s get a move on,” he said. “I want to put as many miles between us and Gabriel as we can. We good to go?” He cast his gaze so much more obviously on Sasha that his real question was clear.

We good?

Sasha nodded.

“Then let’s get the hell out of Dodge.”

Nathan drove until none of them could keep their eyes open.

After hours had passed with the clock quickly overtaking three AM, they made it to the next doorway, abandoned the car, and slipped through to the closest location to their next dark fae lead where they crashed at the first motel they found.

They got one room to share, too paranoid to be separated. The plan was to set out early the next morning in case Gabriel was using supernatural means to track them. Jim collapsed on one of the beds almost immediately.

“Is he breathing?” Sasha joked on his way out of the bathroom.

Nathan raised an eyebrow his brother’s direction and shrugged. “Probably. Must have worn himself out with all that Simon Says bullshit.”

An easy laugh fell from Sasha’s lips and he went to sit beside Nathan on the bed that Jim wasn’t currently passed out on.

“Look, Nathan, I…I’m really sorry about before,” he said, having left a good foot between them when he sat down, and sagging forward to rest his arms on his legs.

“It just all happened so fast, and he...made me so mad, you know? The way he looked at me…”

“ Hey . Don’t you get it by now?” Nathan said. “Forget Gabriel. He didn't even say two words to you and you're flipping out? Jim and I aren’t going to wake up one day and suddenly decide that liking you isn’t worth our time. Even I learned my lesson on that.”

Sasha slouched further, staring at the carpet. “I guess...it’s hard for me to believe that people I get close to won’t all eventually leave.”

Nathan wasn’t sure how to respond to that, so he simply nodded.

They sat silently for a while. Nathan was so tired, he didn’t think he could sleep. With his eyes drifted off somewhere on the other side of the room, he jerked back to himself at the sudden feeling of warm fingers taking his hand.

“Is it sore?” Sasha asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

That foot between them lessened as Sasha scooted closer, turning Nathan’s hand over and pressing his thumb lightly into Nathan’s palm.

Blue eyes fluttered up to look at Nathan and Sasha smiled.

“You know, from when you punched me so hard, I heard your knuckles crack. It did hurt, in case you were wondering.”

“Probably not as much as I wanted it to,” Nathan grumbled, but his words came out fast and breathy, losing most of their bite.