Book One: The Girl (The Sanctum) (14 page)

Sensing a shift in Wyatt's energy, Dev stirred. Without opening her eyes, she reached up and touched his face, lightly raking her fingers across his stubble and running her hand through his hair. He caught her hand and softly kissed each of her fingers, the inside of her wrist and then worked his way up her arm, painstakingly slow. Dev lost herself to his touch, his lips along her neck, his hands on her body. She wrapped her arms around him and pulled him closer, feeling him smile against her lips and then catch his breath as her hands explored his body.

“Are you ever going to kiss me?” she whispered into his ear.

Wyatt pulled back and looked down at Dev with a mischievous smile on his face, running a finger along her lips, down her neck, tickling her stomach and caressing her inner thigh.

“Do you want me to kiss you?” he asked, his lips inches from hers, his hands playing along her leg.

“Yes,” she replied, then kissed him herself, hard and deep and full of urgency. She rolled on top of him and forced Wyatt’s hands to the bed, locking them down with her own so he could not touch her as he pleased. She then pressed her body along the length of his and listened to him whisper her name, full of desire. Releasing him, she fumbled with the drawstring at his waist, tugging at it in frustration. Wyatt laughed and finished what she could not, easily untying his shorts and standing up to let them fall to the floor.

“You,” Dev smiled as she studied Wyatt admiringly, “are truly the most beautiful guy in the world.”

Wyatt fell onto the bed next to Dev and allowed his eyes to wander slowly, up and down her body, memorizing every inch of it. He could not believe she was here, with him, open, vulnerable, beautiful.

“You should take a picture, it lasts longer,” she teased.

He grabbed Dev, tickling her viciously until she didn’t think she could take another second. Wyatt nuzzled her neck and ran his hands along her body, untying her knot of hair and letting it fall loose. Grabbing a fistful of her curls, he kissed her hard and deep, his tongue searching her, tasting her. Dev arched her body towards his, needing him, feeding off the heat from his skin where they touched, wanting to belong to him completely.

A light knock on the door brought everything to a screeching halt.

"Wyatt?"

Dev and Wyatt froze at the sound of the voice on the other side of the door, suddenly reminded they were not the only two people on the planet. Catching glimpses of one another and their expressions of shock made them forget all the tension of a few seconds earlier and fall victim to a serious fit of laughter.

"Look at your face," Dev teased.

Wyatt buried his head in her neck to muffle his laughs, his whole body shaking with mirth.

"Look at your own," he shot back when he could finally speak.

"Wyatt?"

"Hold on, dad," Wyatt called as he climbed over Dev to get out of bed and pull on some clothes.

Dev froze again, this time a look of concern shadowing her face upon learning Wyatt's dad was on the other side of the door.

"Wyatt," she whispered as she sat up in bed, cross-legged, and knotted her hair on top of her head.

Wyatt looked up and had to catch his breath. She was so perfectly stunning it was difficult for him to focus, thoughts of jumping back into bed with her clouding his mind. Dev pulled her shirt on and looked up at him, her eyes huge and questioning.

"It's all right," Wyatt reassured her, "it's just my dad."

Dev grabbed his hand as he turned for the door, pulling him back to her.

"You're kidding, right?" she asked, amazed at Wyatt's nonchalance.

Wyatt pushed a stray curl behind Dev's ear as he took her face in his hands.

"I promise you that he's the last person you need to worry about. If it makes you feel any better, he's been scouting portals throughout the city, hoping to find you."

Dev shot him a look, suggesting he wasn't making her feel any better.

"And he hates Breslin."

She knew plenty of people who hated Breslin. That didn’t mean they would help her. She also knew she loved the feel of Wyatt’s hands all over her body. That didn’t mean she was quite ready to believe every word that came out of his mouth.

But sensing she had very little wiggle room and that perhaps it was time to take a leap of faith, Dev told herself to calm down and trust Wyatt. She told herself that he loved her and would not lead her into a trap. She told herself to breathe deeply and ignore Wyatt’s ties to The Sanctum.

Taking his hands in her own, Dev kissed them, then stood up next to him and smiled, more to reassure herself than anything else.

"I suppose if I'm going to meet your dad," she grinned nervously as she pulled on her pants, "it would be nice to put on some clothes."

Wyatt watched her pull up her pants and button them, admiring the way they hugged her slight hips.

"Stop it, Wyatt," Dev caught him staring at her.

"Sorry," he smiled as he came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close and nuzzling her neck. “I can’t help it.”

Dev closed her eyes and ran her fingers through his hair, losing herself again to his touch.

"Wyatt Clayworth, I swear," she chuckled, "you are nothing but trouble. I'm going to establish a moratorium on you touching me."

"You wouldn't," he laughed as he walked down the long hallway, headed towards his front door.

From the corner of her eye, Dev spied her knives sitting on Wyatt's desk and strapped them around her hips. Just in case.

She had no idea what she was getting herself into; the blades at her hip allowed her to breathe a little easier. She was willing to go out on a limb for Wyatt but she knew nothing about his parents except for the fact that they were Founding Family, members of the Circle of Ten and ran an Academy.

In other words, some of the most powerful Sanctum in existence.

She shuddered at the thought, cringing inwardly, wondering what her parents would think if they could see her now, hiding in a Sanctum Academy, hopelessly bound to a Sanctum warrior.

And then Dev did it.

She didn’t want to. She desperately fought the urge. But finally, her fear won the battle and she leapt.

Out the window. Gone in a flash.

"Dad, I'd like you to meet...”

Wyatt's voice trailed off as he spied his empty room, every trace of Dev gone, as if she was never there at all. His open window the only hint as to her disappearance. There was a symmetry to it all, a certain elegance to her coming and going. Wyatt could not hold her departure against her and simply hoped she would return, sensing she probably would not.

Dev lingered outside his window, yearning to go to him, comfort him somehow. Listening to the silence as Wyatt absorbed the fact that she was gone, again, pained her but it could not be avoided. She spied on him for a moment longer and then escaped into the night, a hoodie she stole from him covering her head as she camouflaged herself and disappeared.

After spending the
day hiking Twin Mountain with Jools, Ryker was roaming the halls with his head stuck in a book, headed back to his room for the night, when he stopped, dead in his tracks, thoroughly annoyed. The longblade strapped to his back had slapped him all day; each step he took resulted in a slap on the back. Why the harness only worked properly when he carried both blades was beyond him, but he needed it fixed. Now.

“Coco!” Ryker called as he ducked his head and walked down the dark stairs towards the lab, “Coooooo-coooooo!”

“Didn’t I tell you not to come down here anymore?” the troll stepped out from a doorway behind Ryker, startling him purposely.

Ryker seemed momentarily abashed but quickly recovered.

"Come on," Ryker flirted, "don't be like that."

"Does Jools like it when you talk to me like that?" Coco asked flatly.

"Okay," Ryker immediately changed his tone, "let's start over."

"No, let's not," Coco stated as she walked past him towards her lab.

Ryker watched her walk away, wondering what to do. He could hear Wyatt's voice in his head, warning him not to mess with the girl in charge of weapons development and design. Ryker didn't listen though, unable to resist Coco's bright purple skin and big, green eyes. She was taller than him but slight, wispy almost. Her green hair curled down her back and came to a rest on her most perfect behind.

"I'll tell you the problem," Wyatt had said to him all those years ago when his parents instilled Coco at The Academy, much to the chagrin of some of the other founding families, "her butt is the problem. Her butt is going to get you in major trouble," Wyatt had laughed.

In all honesty, that hadn't been it at all. Wyatt was the butt man, always had been. It was Coco's extreme intelligence that caught Ryker's attention. She was no joke: there was not a finer weapons-designer anywhere. Sanctum from around the world sought her expertise and craftsmanship, willing to travel thousands of miles for one of her blades.

When the Clayworths decided to bring Coco onboard as their head weapons engineer, they had faced Sanctum-wide outrage. For one, Coco was a Magical and two, she was a troll. Sanctum bylaws explicitly stated no Magicals could enter an Academy, much less seek refuge or employ. Sam and Josiah not only invited Coco within the sacred walls of the New York Academy, they also provided her with a luxurious apartment in the South Wing, right next door to her state-of-the-art laboratory and design center.

Possibly even worse than her being a Magical was the fact that Coco was a troll. Carter Breslin despised trolls. He considered them the lowliest of life forms, worse than demons and hellions. He refused Sanctum assistance in troll matters, finding their needs, wants and desires to be inconsequential and killed them often, with wanton abandon. Since becoming head of The Sanctum, Breslin had yet to seek justice for a troll murder; rumor had it he allowed his son to hunt trolls for sport.

Over the years, Coco's importance to The Sanctum had grown and many who initially balked at her hiring had become her most ardent supporters, much to the chagrin of Breslin. Coco and her blades were just one more reminder to Carter Breslin that he did not have control of the Clayworths.

It was common knowledge the Breslin and Clayworth families never liked one another, but the discord had grown dramatically in recent years. Micah and Rose Clayworth were chosen by the gods millennia ago as a check to Augustus and Victoria Breslin’s egos. After Micah and Rose convinced five other founding families to support them in putting down a Breslin-sponsored witch hunt through the deserts of Persia, the four founding members of The Sanctum never trusted one another again; over the years that mistrust evolved into full-blown dislike. Current Sanctum state of affairs only played into the sharp divide: Breslin’s chief goal, which in turn became the chief goal of The Sanctum, was to capture and kill Dev; Sam and Josiah voiced their disagreement with that course of action at the European meetings. Breslin threatened the Clayworths, Sam and Josiah laughed in his face and everyone went home, accomplishing nothing.

And so it continued.

“Don’t take one step further into this lab, Ryker Morrison,” Coco warned without looking up from her metalwork.

Ryker stopped in his tracks.

“Come on, Coco,” Ryker begged, “you’re not serious, are you?”

Coco pushed her goggles on top of her head, shut down the flame she was working with and stared at Ryker. God, the boy was stunning, she thought to herself. Stunning and annoying.

“What do you want?” she relented.

Ryker smiled and started walking towards her.

“Uh-uh,” Coco held up a warning hand, “I did not say ‘come in.’ I said what do you want. You can answer from right where you’re standing.”

“I’m not going to bite,” Ryker laughed.

Coco rolled her eyes, not one bit amused, recalling some very Morrison-like teeth marks on her hips.

“Shut up, Ryker.”

Ignoring all her warnings and the arsenal available at her fingertips, Ryker entered the lab and sat at the table, directly across from Coco.

“You are really something else,” Coco stated as she turned back to her work, lighting the flame so it shot out in Ryker’s face, missing him by mere inches.

Outwardly, Ryker didn’t move a muscle; inwardly, the little flame trick had him slightly ill at ease. Coco smirked to herself, knowing he was a little scared of her.

“Look,” Ryker began, “I just need you to look at the harness for my longblades, then I’ll be out of your hair. I swear.”

Coco didn’t look up from her work as she spoke, “You’re hardly a scout and we both know you have zero honor.”

Ryker ignored her comment and began unstrapping his harness, figuring Coco’s pride would not allow her to ignore the inferior equipment. He tossed the leather and straps on the table, close enough so she could inspect it without pausing her work.

She glanced over briefly.

“Of course that piece of garbage doesn’t work. It’s made by Breslin’s idiots in that factory. Why would you even carry that?” she asked him rhetorically, “it’s beneath even you, Morrison. Let me guess. When you only have one blade, it slaps your back every time you take a step.”

Ryker smiled. There was no denying it: Coco was freaking brilliant.

“Don’t smile at me.”

He wiped the smile off his face immediately.

Coco turned off her flame, pushed her goggles on top of her head and studied Ryker’s equipment. She left the table and walked to the far end of her lab, towards the supplies room and then disappeared. Ryker leaned back in his stool and waited, hopeful she was going to help him, wondering what it would cost. The last blade she had made him was amazing, his current weapon of choice, and had been a gift. He highly doubted the current transaction would be so easy.

Returning to the table with her arms full of materials, Coco set about to work, knowing exactly what Ryker needed. She had him stand up so she could measure his back and waist, fighting the urge to laugh at his flirtatious jokes, happy she was standing behind him and he could not see the curve of her smile. Grabbing the tools she would need from her workshop, Coco began creating Ryker’s new harness.

“You’re doing it right now?” Ryker asked.

“Have you ever waited for something you want?” she asked as she worked.

He didn’t answer, knowing she was talking about his pursuit of her. And knowing she was wrong. He had waited for something he wanted. For years. But throwing Jools in Coco’s face was cruel so he took her veiled insult in stride, accepting her disdain, knowing he deserved it.

Coco looked up at him from the corner of her eye, taking pleasure both in his discomfort and his beauty. For as much as Ryker annoyed her, she never grew tired of looking at him. And she had to admit to herself, he had never been anything but kind and respectful towards her. Coco knew what she was getting into when she invited him into her bed; she was a big girl. But it was fun giving him a hard time, watching him squirm just a bit.

“So,” she began as she continued her work, “how’s Wyatt?”

“The same,” Ryker replied.

“Meaning?”

“Meaning just what I said. It is Wyatt you’re asking about.”

“Ah, yes,” Coco grinned, “the never-changing rock in your marriage.”

“Precisely,” Ryker agreed.

Coco sat up straight for a moment and stared hard at Ryker, expectantly almost.

“What?” he asked.

She returned her attention to her work, threading a huge needle with a leather string. “I heard, you know. Folks talk. That wolf got him good.”

Ryker’s attention was piqued, but he did not let on. When she realized he would not take her bait, Coco continued.

“Lots of Magicals saw you carrying him to the vamp’s place. And he looked bad. Reeking of mjestec and whatnot. And then he just disappeared for a while...”

Coco’s voice trailed off as she allowed her words to sink in to Ryker’s consciousness.

“I’m just saying,” she continued, “folks know something was up. There’s been much chatter about it. Some even think you’ve seen that hybrid Breslin is so hot for.”

“Ha! Really, Coco?” Ryker slapped the table, laughing off her suggestion, “I know you’re not buying this hybrid nonsense.”

“Stop it, Ryker,” Coco admonished. “I saw her. Lots of folks have seen her around the city the last couple of weeks, poor thing. Running around, always looking over her shoulder.”

Ryker remained quiet as Coco worked.

“No one’s going to let on they’ve seen her. We protect our own, you know. But I’m telling you because she’s going to need help and you saved Darby,” Coco put down her materials and shot Ryker a very purposeful look, “and you hate Breslin as much as Sam and Jo.”

“I have no idea...”

Coco cut him off, “She’s about five feet ten inches tall, gorgeous, brown skin, long, lean legs, dark hair that she tends to knot on top of her head, tatted on both shoulders to her elbows, a face created by angels, Jools’ holster and Wyatt’s blades.”

This time, Ryker didn’t say a word.

“I have this crazy ability to recognize my own work,” Coco explained as she continued stitching the leather pieces for the harness.

Ryker pushed away from the table and stood to leave.

“Your silence speaks volumes.”

“I’ll come back later.”

“Morrison!” Coco called to Ryker’s departing figure.

“Yeah?” he stopped walking but didn’t turn around, determined to avoid the conversation.

“As always,” Coco stated, “my lips are sealed.”

Ryker turned slightly towards her, tipped his head and walked away.

“I’ll be done soon. Come back tonight,” she called out as the door to the lab closed with a bang.