Blood In Fire (Celtic Elementals Book 2) (15 page)

Heather was sure she couldn’t be the only one to notice how Ronan’s voice had thickened, and the look of shock on Aidan’s flaming face told her she was right.

“Shite. Ronan. I…I dinna, mate.
Tá brón orm, mo dheartháir.
Forgive me.”

Ronan shrugged, even though his face was pale. “Well, haven’t I already?”

But he did reach out and wrap Aidan in what had to be a bone-crushing hug. Heather swore she heard crackles before Aidan was released.

Ronan cleared his throat and looked at nothing in particular for a moment before speaking again. “Now that ye went ahead and did the stupid thing and we know it
works
…well. Maybe ye should have another go. I wanna know everything this bloody stuff can do…and what we should do with it, mind? I still think destroying it is best, but what if there's more, aye? What then? I want to know its limitations, if any.

"I donna know if Aillen just created it on his own, after all, or if he
got
it from someone? Who? And she’s right,” Ronan stopped his musings and nodded at Heather. “Ye’re here and Abhartach is showing no signs of coming yet. For whatever reason. So…”

“So, ye actually want me to take it again?”

“Are ye game, mate?”

Aidan’s smile was blinding as he punched Ronan hard in the shoulder. The huge man grunted ruefully.

“Tha’d be an ‘aye’, I am thinking.”

Of course, nothing was to happen the coming
dawn. Ronan could be a methodical arse when he wanted to be, came of being both a bloody surgeon and an architect in his time. He insisted Aidan needed all the time they could squeeze in to get rested up.

“We donna know when Abhartach will come
and
—” he continued on, holding up a hand warningly when Aidan showed signs of interrupting to say that was exactly the point of hurrying up, “—we both know ye need a kill. How long’s it been, Aidan?”

Heather had long since fallen asleep on the couch, Aidan resisted the urge to look at her before he met his friend’s eyes.

“A fair bit.”

“Stop qualifying and tell me.”

“It was…before Heather. Almost two, three weeks ago now.”

Ronan raised his eyebrows. “Tha’s playing with fire a bit, innit?
Damnú air!”

“
Tarraing
mó coileach.”

“
An bhfuil tú féin.”

Aidan laughed and shook his head. “I rather missed yer insults, ye know.”

“Aye, so let’s keep ye whole fer awhile longer so I can come up with new ones. I can take ye up to Limerick after sundown tonight. Ye think ye’ll be finding something suitable there alright?”

“It will do.” Aidan hadn’t always been exactly altruistic with his kills, but he did prefer to take only those who met his two basic qualifications. One, that they could be easily taken without a scene and two, that they had evil of one sort or the other inside them.

This was the one case where he was fervently glad for his psychic abilities, it made it easier to fight the guilt when he took a life. Not that he felt any actual guilt
while
killing.

Hell no.

The beast inside him took over. Once in the grip of blood lust, the only thing that was hard was stopping at
one
life.

It was only later, sometimes years later, when the silence got a little too thick and the souls he had taken a little too restless and started rattling around inside his head.

Those were the times he was thankful for the measure of peace his ability to read other’s minds gave him. He had seen what had been in their hearts, what they were capable of. And over the years, he was positive he had actually
saved
more lives than he had taken.

Not that you could balance the books that way, but it was still in him to
try.
No matter how ridiculously pathetic it was at this point.

Ronan was looking out the window, seemingly lost in thought. He straightened.

“Alright then, I am for bed. Ye kipping in the library again?”

Aidan shrugged. “’Bout the only place for me, innit? Unless ye and Lacey wanna give up the cabin…”

Ronan snorted. “I donna love ye tha' much, brother. Probably best to leave Heather here at this point, aye? Mam will no’ let the children wake her too early.”

Aidan smiled, taking the implied warning easily enough. No more shenanigans in Moiré’s house. At least not out in the open.

The bloody hypocrite.

“Aye, I’ll leave her be.”

For tonight anyway.

Ronan’s answering frown showed he’d caught the gist of that last thought, even if Aidan hadn’t spoken the words aloud. He shook his head, swatted Aidan on the shoulder once and left.

Aidan shot a sideways glance at Heather next to him on the couch.

Her hair was thrown back over one shoulder, some of the soft black waves tangled over her face. Her lips were parted and she was breathing evenly. She had such full lips…the same color of rose that her skin flushed whenever he made her come.

Unable to resist, he ran his fingertip over her mouth. She sighed and shocked him by whispering his name in her sleep. Aidan stared down at her as he withdrew his hand slowly.

He wanted to pretend otherwise, but this one was quare different. As he told her once before, half in jest. But he had realized that even in Istanbul. Heather
was
different.

It had become bloody apparent when he’d had that godawful dream of Ronan and woken up to leave. Shaken to the core, terrified for his friend, angry with Bav and not a wee bit conflicted about stepping foot on Irish soil for the first time in several centuries.

Any other woman, any other of a hundred different years and under circumstances far less dire, he would have left without a backwards glance.

He had done more than look back with Heather. He had sat on the bed next to her and watched her sleep for several long moments, like he was right now. Finally he had given in to weakness and kissed her goodbye. Softly enough not to wake her up, but trying to memorize the satiny imprint of her lips on his just the same. His reluctance to leave had at last pissed him off enough he’d stomped out in a fury, shoving her ruthlessly out of his mind.

He’d left people before, people he’d cared about far more than her. It should have been easy.

But it hadn’t been. Not even then. And now…

Now it would be harder. He still had it to do, though, and probably very soon.

Aidan cocked his head. She had tried to say she was his friend. Her words had sunk a hard, little fist in his gut, and he'd gotten pissed. He didn’t like the way it made him feel.

He didn't like being scared.

There was a reason he didn’t have friends, he couldn’t have people he cared about in his life. It wasn't
safe.

Ronan, and the Fitzpatricks were different. Ronan first, because once upon a time he'd been a monster, too. Even though he wasn’t now, Ronan was still far more capable of protecting his family than an ordinary human. There was also the fact the Fitzpatricks enjoyed the protection of being beloved by Lugh, their far distant ancestor through his bastard son,
Cúchulainn
.
There weren’t many who would risk Lugh’s displeasure outright.

Heather enjoyed no such favor. When she left this house, she would be a target simply because Abhartach had seen her with him. It was very important Abhartach not get
ideas
about her.

Aidan knew what happened when vampire king got ideas about people he cared about.

So…he simply
wouldn’
t let himself care for her. He’d fuck her, sure enough. Let her think they were whatever the hell she wanted to think. And as soon as possible he'd leave, without a second thought. Fine.

No problem
.

Aidan started to get to his feet, but Heather stirred at the movement and opened her eyes.

She smiled at him as she curled onto her side. A sweet, unaffected smile that was so different from the one on her cover shots, but that went straight to his heart.

“Go back to sleep,” he ordered roughly, throwing the afghan that had slipped down to her legs back over her.

He remembered the first time he had seen that smile. In Istanbul, the second night he’d woken up in her bed. He's been surprised as shite to find himself still there, and still
wanting
to be there. She had been sitting on the edge of the bed, half turned away from him, finger combing the tangles out of her wavy dark hair. Tangles he had put there. She had this look on her face, an expression between solemn and sad, but somehow neither.

It had unnerved him a little. In the purple desert twilight she had looked eerily, almost heartbreakingly beautiful, and so very lost. He had reached out a hand and touched her thigh, wanting to bring her back from wherever she had gone. Heather had turned her head and smiled at him. Just like this, just for a moment.

Before the mask had come back down.

He could have sworn the soul he no longer possessed had let out a long-held breath at that smile. Later, he’d blamed that particular fancy on too much Yeats in his past and not enough goddamn whiskey in his present.

Right now, it was hard as hell to deny the ache it had brought to his chest. For one moment he was torn between the need to pull her into his arms and the need to get the hell out. In the end, he did exactly what he had done in Istanbul, he leaned over and kissed her, soft and slow. He only pulled back when she would have reached for him.

"Go back to sleep, ye damme woman."

Heather smiled again, obviously not fully awake. She closed her eyes obediently and snuggled back under the bright, fluffy afghan. Aidan stood there for a minute, his hands clenched.

Aye, no fucking problem at all.

Bav stood outside the window of the Fitzpatrick home. Watching Aidan kiss the human woman through a gap in the curtains. Her eyes narrowed. She had only wanted a glimpse of Aidan before she left Ireland on her errand. This was more than she had bargained for.

She hadn’t seriously thought the chit competition. If she had, she might have had second thoughts about messing with the woman’s car, slowing her down so that she would encounter Aidan again on that roadway.

It had been necessary, she reminded herself. She had wanted to be sure he would have someone other than himself to watch out for when
Abhartach found him. Someone who would push him to come back here, where he would be safe until she was ready to spring her trap. She knew the connection between Heather and Lacey, had known it all along, far before she pushed Aidan down that narrow street in Istanbul to the bar where Heather waited.

Now, she wondered if she had made a serious misstep. Aidan hadn't gave two cents about any woman in ages. She'd had no reason to fear any change in his attitude with this one.

But the look on his face as he stood up and left the room sent a hot stab of jealousy through her midsection. Turning away, Bav stalked under the rose trellis in the backyard and stared out at the distant gleam of Lough Gur. Had he ever looked at her like that?
Had anyone?

She closed her eyes, then opened them with a snap, touching her cheek in wonder. Staring down at the tear that glistened there in the rising moon. Her lips thinned.

The glint of the Aine’s lake caught her attention again, reminding her of those who would apparently defy her. She drew her robe up, shutting out the pain and the loneliness. She would not fail again. It was too late to stop now, not when she was so close.

She could deal with the human later.

For now, she had much more important matters to deal with. Bav had made her overtures and been granted an audience, albeit an obviously reluctant one. In any other instance, that attitude would have infuriated her. This was an exception. She was prepared to do anything to get her way.
Manannán mac Lir was definitely in her way, even if he didn’t know it yet.

Or mayhap he
did.

Bav bit her lip as the worrisome thought snuck inside her.

It was always wise to assume the god of the sea knew more than he let on. He was as changeable and tricky as the tides. She would have preferred to deal with any of the De Nanaan, even Lugh himself, rather than face
Mac.

Nothing worthwhile was ever easy. Or without a price. Bav wiped the last of the wetness from her cheeks and threw a bitter glance at the house behind her. Aidan was
hers,
even if he had always been too stubborn to realize it. Lifting her fingers, she sent a coil of green light through the window, smiling to herself as she felt the human woman stir uneasily in her sleep.

At least she had her little pleasures.

Bav was too distracted as she turned away to notice a curtain fly back in another room of the house, or the brown eyes that narrowed as they tracked her retreating form.