Cassandra's Dilemma (4 page)

“I will be assisting Ms. Belle.” Helcyon’s presence flooded from his position in the doorway. “She will not be alone. You may make a list of any symptoms that should concern me.”

Doctor Randals’s hesitation faded as she was lost in his gaze. The compulsion was riveting, tugging at Cassie even as she forced herself to look away. Dr. Randals’s mouth softened, her shoulders rounded out, and the air left her with an almost forlorn sigh.

“Well then…I think that’s settled. I’ll take care of the discharge papers and send a nurse to help you dress.” The doctor’s voice grew softer, muffling the sharper, more professional edge from the initial conversation.

“That won’t be necessary.” Helcyon escorted her to the door. The doctor melted under Helcyon’s attention.

“I have Ms. Belle’s address on file—I will send the notations and paperwork to her doctor—everything will be taken care of…” The doctor was still talking as the door closed behind her.

Cassie turned a speculative eye onto Helcyon. “Does everyone fall for that routine?”

“Generally, human women are easily persuaded.” He fixed her with the same look he’d given the doctor, but Cassie knew better than to lock eyes with him. Her initial meetings with the Fae included weeks of protocol and etiquette training with a delicate wisp of a woman named Silver.

“Never, ever, meet one of our kind in direct, eye-to-eye contact, unless you are sure that your will is stronger than ours. It is not uncommon for us to bend the will of mortals if it suits us, and most will do it without a second thought for what it means to you.” Silver’s tone was apologetic. “It is how we have survived when you outnumber us so badly. We simply turn your attention to our whims.”

“You might not want to advertise that,” Cassie suggested, but she’d listened to the advice. Even when meeting the Danae, the urge to meet her eyes warred with the urge to maintain her own composure. It was a slippery slope of negotiation.

Cassie focused on that advice, keeping her gaze on a point past his right shoulder.

Helcyon chuckled, a warm, buttery sound that shivered through her to her belly. “You are well informed, Cassandra Belle.”

“That’s why they pay me the big bucks. Billy is dead, right?” She didn’t need to ask. But she wanted the answer to change. Stabs of pain pierced the pleasure that Helcyon’s use of her name had evoked, but she pushed past it.

“I am sorry for the loss.” The simplicity of the response spoke to the sincerity. Another quality of the Fae, directness was their show of respect. The more pomp and circumstance in their responses, the more likely they were playing their audience.

Grief closed a hard fist on her heart at the sympathy that stroked the underside of his words. Cassie lifted a hand to stifle further response. His sympathy merely stoked the sadness inside of her, and she couldn’t spare the emotion—not right now.

She pushed the blankets back in order to swing her bare legs down toward the floor. Vertigo swirled through her. Helcyon’s warm palm pressed against her forehead, driving the vertigo back with a wave of pleasurable heat that plunged to her core. He dipped his head down, concern, desire, and some indefinable emotion flitting across his face.

“Slowly, Cassandra. Slowly.”

“I don’t have time for slowly. The Danae gave me seven days.”

“Us.” He punctuated the words with a gentle rub of his hand across what remained of her hair. The action should have made her feel self-conscious, but instead it brought comfort. “She gave us seven days. If you move too swiftly, you will do yourself harm. I am charged with protecting you, and I
will
protect you—even from yourself if I must.”

“You don’t scare me.” Cassie’s mouth quirked into a half smile. The vertigo passed. His hand lingered against the side of her head, stroking downward to cup her cheek.

“It is not my intention to scare you.” Helcyon chuckled, his comforting hand caressing her cheek, knuckles tracing her jaw before drifting the length of her arm to cup just under her elbow, assisting her as she stood. “Do you need to use the facilities before dressing?”

“I need the IV out…” Cassie began but broke off when he held up the end of the IV, the same IV that had been inserted in her arm just moments before. Her gaze dropped to where he applied firm pressure to her arm. She let that register before giving him a sulfurous look. “You’re pretty pushy.”

“You don’t mind.”

Helcyon’s expression softened, his thick, full lips spreading into an easy smile. The ripple effect took his natural beauty to new heights, and desire tugged at her belly. Nervousness flared to life as she looked into his dark-green eyes.

“You wish.” The mumbled words tripped over defiance.

“No. I think you’re delightful the way you are.”

Her heart thundered into the silence. Her skin tingled as though recalling the gentle stroke of his hand on her cheek, her head, and now her arm.

Cassie stared into his eyes, challenging, searching, and laughing in the same breath. She knew better than to look into his eyes. She knew she should look away. She knew. But she didn’t do it. Her pulse pounded, the hooves of a wild horse stampeding out of control. “Do you actually have clothes for me, and do they have a shower here?” The tight, newly healed skin itched. Cassie knew she still looked a mess, but she also knew the Brownie from the night before had been quite thorough in her healing.

Emotions chased themselves across his features like clouds on a blustery day. “They do. But you might want to wait until you are home. The police have arrived.” Helcyon cocked his head toward the door, and Cassie sighed. She’d hoped to escape from the hospital and the possibility of interrogation today. The deadline loomed urgently at her, tugging her from inactivity in the hospital bed.

Jerking her gaze away, Cassie ignored the lurch of vertigo and the warm hand that flattened against her abdomen, burning through the thin cotton of the hospital gown. “I want to be dressed before they get in here.”

Helcyon must have been swayed by the determination in her voice, because he acquiesced. In a few short seconds, he stripped her from the hospital gown. One hard-muscled arm held her around her waist as he reached for a duffel bag she’d failed to notice. He dropped it on the bed and then turned her so that he could brace Cassie’s weight against the length of his body. His manner was clinical, but her heat licked along her flesh everywhere his body touched hers.

Cassie knew she should object to being dressed, but despite the warmth of his hands and the thick muscle she could feel against her back, he betrayed a disturbing lack of interest in her nudity.

Really, Cass? Really? You have a crime to solve, a Danae to please, and you’re nervous enough about being naked with him, and you’re going to be upset that he isn’t noticing that you’re naked?

Rolling her eyes at the lust in her thoughts, Cassie focused on the possibilities of an interrogation. Homeland Security was the most likely candidate, but it could be Chicago P.D. Whoever it was—they were going to have questions. Questions she wouldn’t have answers to and questions she couldn’t answer due to professional confidentiality. Beyond the interrogation was the nagging worry about the investigation.

Where was she supposed to start?

His hands glided over her hips, smoothing the simple white blouse over the dove-gray trousers. The man, no, not man, the Elf, was gifted. He finger combed her hair as three firm knocks struck the hospital door.

“Ready?” Helcyon breathed the words against her ear.

“Do I still look hurt?”

“Yes. The glamour will hold. Just remember you are bruised, battered, and burned.”

“Bruised. Battered. Burned. Got it. No matter what happens, let me do the talking.”

Helcyon paused, considering her words, and stroked his knuckles along her cheek. “As you wish.”

Chapter Three

“Ms. Belle, I’m Special Agent Jacob Book, Homeland Security. The doctor indicated that you might be up for a few questions now.” The special agent stood in the doorway to her hospital room.

Correction, he
filled
the doorway to the hospital room.

Cassie had set her scene well, choosing the chairs next to the window. Helcyon obeyed her instructions without voicing the questions that flickered in his eyes. Image was what the Fae hired her for in the first place.

The gray slacks were quiet, understated, and complemented by the simple white top. The tank top was better for the appearance of the burns. Cassie wanted to project an air of injury but not weakness. Convey vulnerability but not vulnerable. She knew precisely how to produce the desired impact.

Cassie took a deep breath, lifted her chin, and met the special agent’s gaze. Her seat at the window didn’t allow her to escape the impact of the agent’s presence. She couldn’t if she’d wanted to. Book’s squared jaw held just the faintest cleft in it and highlighted the intensely masculine face. His raw maleness seemed almost primal when compared to Helcyon’s more refined and delicate features.

Cassie exhaled, counting mentally to reorient her focus. The world around her shimmered, like heat bleeding up from summer pavement. Inside, her world tilted hard to the left. The uneven vertigo shivered, as though one too many shots of tequila swam in her system.

What the hell?

“Ms. Belle?” His deep voice sounded like warm whiskey poured over ice.

“I’m sorry. I thought I was ready for this.” The words trembled, quivering, like Jell-O on the end of a spoon. Helcyon moved forward, his hand dropping on her shoulder. She reached up for his fingers, an instinctive, unconscious need for comfort.
Get a grip, Cass
.
It’s probably just a side effect of the Brownie’s healing.

“I can come back tomorrow. You’ve been through quite an ordeal.” The agent’s tone reflected equal parts concern and solicitation. He spared a brief look at Helcyon, but his attention oriented on Cassie. “The sooner we do this, however, the more helpful you can be.”

“You are so certain I can be helpful?” Cassie wished she shared the agent’s sentiment. The drive to leave the hospital, to start digging and investigating, crunched under the fist of grief that choked her. “I don’t even really know what I remember or what I can tell you.” Both were true. She’d focused on
not thinking
about the explosion.
Not
seeing Billy’s face.
Not
feeling the heat.
Not
experiencing the pain.

And there was much more she couldn’t tell him. Regret slipped in under the grief, stealing through her defenses, and souring her stomach. She didn’t want to lie to the agent.

But she couldn’t tell him the whole of the truth, either.

“Let me be the judge of that.” Book smiled. It was a kind smile. The kind directed at recalcitrant children and stubborn old women. The kind Cassie employed when she wanted to cajole someone around to her way of thinking. Book gestured to the chair near hers. “May I?”

“Of course.”

The agent’s behavior intrigued her. He ignored Helcyon, and it went beyond just polite disinterest in the man in the room. Book barely even acknowledged that Helcyon was there. If not for the flicker of his gaze earlier, she would have thought that Helcyon was trying to glamour himself out of the equation. It would save on unnecessary explanations.

Cassie resisted the temptation to glance at Helcyon. He remained at her back, casual and relaxed. The hand on her shoulder was warm, comforting, and a physical reminder that he was there, even if she didn’t turn her head and look up at him.

Is he glamoured, though? Can Book see him or not? He looked at him. But he didn’t introduce himself. Do I ask? Do I ignore it?