Love Beyond Sight (15 page)

No way had he expected this to bother him like it did. Facial features were facial features. He'd had hundreds of them over the years. But these? This was the stuff of nightmares he'd hoped never to see again. He looked like the person who had tried to kill him when he'd been but a child.

He was also two inches taller as Sebastian than he was as Samuel. It felt weird to be higher up in the world. In the past, it had only ever been his face that had undergone change. Now, his whole body seemed different. He was no longer comfortable in his own skin. Even his rush to the mirror had made him nearly stumble over his now bigger feet.

There was only one thing to do—he needed to find Eden and tell her this would never work. No way could he pull off existing in this body. Not successfully, anyway.

* * * *

The humidity hit him first as he stumbled out the door of the motel room onto the street. Eden sat back on a bench talking to Isabelle. The other woman said something and Eden laughed, covering her mouth as if she didn't want to show her mouth. It was an odd little quirk he'd seen her do before and he wondered for a second why she did that.

"Eden." He called out her name. "This is never going to work."

Eden jumped to her feet at his call, her eyes getting huge the longer she looked at him. "Samuel? That is you, right?"

He ground to a halt. If even Eden was unsure then the transformation must have gone well. "It's me." His voice still sounded the same. Northwestern Washington State born and bred, he knew his normal tone made him sound like a news reporter. His lack of an accent was almost an accent unto itself.

Eden visibly swallowed as she rushed forward. She grabbed his hands and the softness of her skin did something to loosen the tightness in his jaw. Eden calmed him.

"That was fast. You've only been in there ten minutes."

He shook his head. "Ten minutes?"

It had felt like hours and he'd lost consciousness. How could so little time have passed?

"That's right." Eden's eyebrows furrowed in clear confusion.

"I can't do this. We have to come up with another idea."

"What?" She backed up so she could look him up and down. "Obviously you can do it. You've already done it. To perfection."

"All right, that's true." He stared into her blue-green eyes, wishing he had all day to do so.
But I don't like it. It's making me feel horrendous to look like this. I've never had a panic attack in my life and I'd rather not start now
.

She reached up to stroke his cheek.
It's just a costume. Just something you're wearing temporarily until we get through this
.

It's so much more than that
. She would never understand, none of them could. They'd never have to exist actually as someone else. No one could grasp the significance of looking like the most evil creature on the planet. Unlike the faces he'd stolen in the past, this get-up made him wonder if he could actually absorb some of the bad vibes simply by looking like the person.

"Won't work." Gabriel's voice caught his attention and he turned to look at him. The other man leaned against a black SUV parked to the right of the nearly deserted parking lot. Samuel wondered why there weren't more people staying at the hotel.

"Why won't it?" Eden swung around to look at him.

"Why aren't there more people here?" Samuel didn't mean to interrupt the flow of conversation but the lack of population ate at his gut. Winter everywhere else meant prime travel season in New Orleans.

Gabriel scratched his head. "That's a good question. Kal, why aren't there more people here?"

From behind him, Kal spoke. "Not sure. But now that you've mentioned it, I don't like it."

Terror traveled up his back and he grabbed Eden's hand. "Run."

"What?" Her eyes got huge as he pulled her along. "Run." He shouted so everyone could hear him. No way did he want everyone hurt but Eden would always be his number one priority.

He had no idea if anyone followed him and his own body didn't work as well as he would like. Running in Sebastian's body proved to be harder than in his own. There was more of him to manage. Still, more winded than he might have liked, he'd managed to get a distance away when the first car exploded in the parking lot.

Shoving Eden in front of him, he knocked her over and covered her with his own body seconds before the heat from the explosions pressed into them. Samuel had been burned before. He knew he could survive it. Eden would never be hurt. Not on his watch.

His back heated up but his hair didn't catch on fire and he didn't feel any flames on his legs either. So far, so good. He raised his head to look around. Kal and Gabriel lay in similar positions covering their respective soul mates.

Gabriel groaned before lifting his head to stare at him. "Good instincts, man."

"Yeah." Kal laughed. "We owe you one." He rolled off Isabelle who cursed, loudly. Samuel couldn't help his grin. He never would have thought the little woman would swear quite so profoundly.

"I'm okay, Samuel. Could you move?" Eden's voice jarred him and he moved off her body. Lying on the hot ground, he stared up at the sun above him. Looked like he'd live another day. There was something nice about going through this with others, as opposed to on his own.

"Marina and Leonardo? Charma and Jason?" Eden sounded panicked as she rose. She grabbed her cell phone out of her pocket but it started ringing before she could dial. "Hello? Oh thank god. No, we're fine. We were worried about you." She covered the speaker as she informed the group. "Their side of the building shook but didn't fall. Everyone is fine."

Samuel loved how Eden concerned herself with everyone else's welfare.

"Really." Kal patted him on the back as Gabriel and Loraine approached him. "We owe you. Big time."

He shrugged. This was new, too. He'd gone through something, come out the other side, and he wasn't alone. There might be something to this 'team' thing he hadn't considered.

"No one owes me." He stretched as he stood. "I was lucky. I've been blown up by him before. I might be attuned to it or something."

Eden hung up the phone. "Why didn't I see this coming?"

"Because it wasn't set by the demon and that's where your messages come from." Samuel stared at her as he spoke the words. He wanted her to really hear what he said and not get lost in the moment.

"How do you know that?" Eden put her hands on her hips.

"It's what he yelled at me when I was trapped in the closet burning to death. Without me, the prophet would never be able to see what he did."

Loraine stroked Gabriel's arm. "So who set this?"

"His group. The one Eden wants to infiltrate."

Gabriel laughed. "You look so much like him. It really is freaking me out. But the way you talk, the way you move. It's not working. It's not Sebastian."

The group fell silent. Even Eden who had been so sure of herself earlier seemed deflated.

Samuel clapped his hands together. "Then I guess you're going to have to show me how to be him."

Gabriel nodded. "I could do that." He pointed to the rubble. "But first I'm going to suggest we all move to someplace safer. The group might come to see the damage they've done. I don't want them to find us here."

"Actually." Kal grinned. "I might like them to find us. I feel like kicking a little ass."

Isabelle groaned. "I'm with Gabriel on this. Kick ass later, move locations now."

Eden nodded. "What about the others? Jason, Charma, Leonardo, and Marina?"

Samuel took her hand. "They're going to have to move, too."

"This is so much more complicated than I thought it would be." Eden bit her lip. "I thought we'd get in, we'd get out, we'd save the day."

"We still will." Samuel didn't know when he'd started to believe that. Maybe when they'd all made it through the explosion. "Simple is not our destiny."

Eden nodded. "I'll go help the others move Leonardo and Marina."

"Be careful." Samuel watched her scurry away, enjoying the way her ass looked as she ran. He wanted to reach out and squeeze it. Kal walked up next to him, deflating the sexual urges that had started—temporarily.

"What are you thinking? That this group has some sort of Outsider tracking going on? That's how they knew we were here?"

"I don't know but I gather we're going to find out when we get in there." They needed to save Leonardo and Marina. Two people he had never met but whose lives seemed very important to him all of a sudden.

"I get it, you know. He tortured me, as well."

Samuel stared at Kal. To look at him, Samuel would never have guessed the man had ever been through anything harder than chopping wood. Even after running from an explosion, he seemed cool and collected.

"Really? When?"

"Almost a year ago." Kal patted him on the shoulders. "Gabriel can teach you how to be him. Back then, he used to work for Sebastian. Grew up in the same house. Yeah, I'd say Gabe will have you in Sebastian shape in no time."

Samuel didn't know what to feel more horrified about—that Gabriel had once worked for Sebastian or that it was going to turn out to be a really good thing that he once had.

Chapter Twelve

So, they had thought they could break into his house when he wasn't there? Those stupid fucks. Sebastian smiled as he boarded the plane that would, eventually, get him back to New Orleans. Alexa thought he had relented and was taking her home. By contrast, he was simply moving them to where his prey had hidden. If that happened to be his so-called abode, then even better.

He wondered how many of them he had managed to kill with his electrical bursts. As he found his seat and sat down, he couldn't help but wonder if his luck was finally changing. It was always a matter of time with these things. Alexa sat down next to him, smiling. Her eyes darted quickly around the plane.

Sebastian knew why she did that even if she didn't know it herself. She still thought she felt an Outsider watching her. That was ridiculous, of course. He would certainly know if one of them was around before she would. The woman didn't even know that's what they were—Outsiders. She continued to call them Cult Members and, if he had his way, she would continue to do so until the day he ended her life. He blinked at that last thought. Perhaps enough of them were dead now and he could get on with helping Alexa draw her last breath.

She buckled her seatbelt and took a deep breath. Maybe she'd felt one of the Outsiders leaving this world and going on to his or her next one. They were sure to face a massive amount of disappointed losers. There had been so much hope that the Outsiders could beat him. He smiled at that. Nothing felt as good as shoving the presumptions of those who had always been on the opposite side of the fence from his family down their own throats.

His first Outsider kill had been Samuel Quinn. Now who was dead?

"The presence is still with us, Seb." Alexa sounded tired. He really didn't give two shits.

He rolled his eyes. "You need sleep."

"No, I'm telling you…"

He interrupted, unable to stop himself from raising his voice. "You don't tell me anything, got it?"

"What?"

"I don't need to listen to bullshit. I have no time for it. Now, I've told you that there is nothing here. Nothing. Go to sleep. You'll feel better in New Orleans."

Alexa's eyes got huge. "Why are you talking to me like that?"

"Just go to sleep."

She slumped down in her seat, her eyes away from him. Alexa was correct. He had never, ever spoken to her like that before and with good reason. Before today he'd needed her to believe in him, to have no doubt that he was a prince who had rescued her from a fate worse than death.

Sebastian had to be the good guy to Alexa. Otherwise how on earth could he have made Gabriel out to be the evil one? Now, however, it wasn't going to matter what she thought. Let her stew and wonder. She should have doubt and pain before she died. Fucking Outsiders. He couldn't wait until every last one of them was gone from the Earth.

He'd made the right decision hooking up with the Twelve. They had resources his human self just didn't have.

"You've been acting so strange. I'm just trying to tell you that there is someone here, a cult member or something."

He bit down on his tongue until it bled. Finally, he spoke. "On an airplane? There is a hidden cult member on the airplane?"

She nodded.

"Alexa, I think we might need to get you some sort of mental evaluation."

She flinched like he'd struck her, which was why he had said it. The years she'd spent in and out of foster homes had been filled with horrendous mental health workers. Alexa would never think a psych evaluation was anything but torture.

"But?"

"Are you crazy, Alexa? Are you?" He stared into her dark eyes. A true Outsider in possession of her true powers, supported by her Unit would tell him where he could go. The fact that she flinched showed him how far she had fallen. And he loved her pain.

"Sometimes I feel like I don't know you."

"Or maybe you know me too well." He closed his eyes. Maybe she didn't like what she knew and what that meant about the decisions she had made over the years.

"You really won't believe me?" He didn't have to open his eyes to know she would have a desperate look on her face. "After all we've been through?"

"Nope."

When he got back, he needed to make sure he thanked the Twelve. They were the best minions a demon could ever want.

* * * *

All he could hear in his apartment was the ticking of the clock on his mantel and even that seemed too loud. There had to be some kind of rhyme or rhythm for why he got sent to the places he went. Christophe leaned back in his chair. If he could figure out what that was then maybe, just maybe, he could figure out how to control his movements or even use them to locate Leonardo. That had to be the ultimate goal.

So far, as much as he could tell, since he'd moved to the United States, he'd appeared in Ruby's bedroom, which had been a huge surprise, but that had only lasted a matter of seconds. He'd appeared in someone's house where Leonardo and others were being held captive. That experience hadn't lasted long enough for him to speak to an unknown woman and to call some people for help. Then, just recently, there had been the incident with the ghost.