No Time to Cry (Nine While Nine Legacy Book 1) (8 page)

 
~ Chapter Seven
~

I
woke up slowly, not ready yet to let go of my dreams. As strange as they were,
I was having a great time. A dream of adventure and love and death.

Of course death.

I had flown up above the tree tops in
the night sky, just skimming the tops of the trees and buildings, the houses.

At one point I was sitting in a huge
tree, perched high up in its branches, watching people below me. Searching
them.

Parts were blurry, parts were distinct.
I remember becoming something, not quite me.

I was confronting a person. I think he
may have been a criminal. I felt scared, stupid for being there.

It was a dark and unfamiliar area, a
park or maybe the countryside, and he’d been approaching me.

Threatening.

The word had come to me like a wave
washing into me. And I
knew
he was dangerous. With all certainty I knew.
But I stood my ground. I stood there as he came closer—and then I glowed.

My skin warmed and tingled. I saw a
radiance, an aura, an energy, a warm luminosity emerge from me, spread out and
surround him. And his face changed. The dark scowl slackened. His eyes changed.
The danger faded away. A gun dropped to the ground. He fell to his knees.

The glowing…
whatever
that came
from me surged into his chest. I could feel it, a connection, it wrapped
throughout him. Around his soul. All danger was gone. I had changed him. And I
felt changed.

I walked away without a word.

~
Chapter Eight ~

I
sat up, pushing the soft chenille blanket away, quietly padding to the
bathroom.

Shocking! How was this remotely
possible? To wake up and look like this—this good?

So, I guess maybe there was a slight
perk to this thing. I looked fresh, beautiful, luminous. This would take some
getting used to. I mean, that face in the reflection looked like me, but it
really didn’t in some ways.

I turned my head from left to right,
inspecting myself. It was like seeing a perfectly Photo Shopped image. Even
that little scar on my jaw that I’d been sporting since I was nine, from a
beach accident, had vanished.

I splashed some cool water on my face
and swished with some mouthwash that I’d found beneath the vanity, before
heading back to the living room.

I ran my fingers through my hair,
untangling—all of two tangles—and smoothing the long silky curls and waves as I
walked.

My eyes landed on Liam, still splayed
out in the exact same position in the chair, still fast asleep.

Was he still angry at me? Was he still
sunken deep in remorse?

I pondered what to do. Should I wake
him, or wait on the couch until he woke on his own? I was much to
angsty
to be still for very long. What was to happen today?
Where was Gideon? Would I have to see him again today? That consideration made
me shake. Dread? Or eagerness?

I paced back and forth in front of Liam,
eventually kneeling in front of him. I wanted today to start, but I kind of
didn’t. I wanted to talk to him, but I kind of didn’t.

So, I just stared at him instead.

Watching him. Studying him. He was
beautiful. Still unshaved. His face was relaxed. Unworried. Unstressed.
Unangry
at me. Looking at him like this, in sleep, and
feeling so vulnerable and alone myself, I found my animosity for him fading
away.

And I couldn’t resist.

 I leaned forward, his jean clad
thigh grazing my waist as I shifted in closer to his outstretched body, that
wonderful face. Softer than Gideon’s, yet just as strong. The sun slanted
through the window behind the chair, beams of warmth streaked across us,
soothing, inviting. The rays were hitting the top of his head, warming the
colors of his hair, bringing out the red and gold in his light brown shaggy
mane.

I very softly ran my fingertips along
his jaw, his bottom lip. My eyes lingering there, remembering the good part of
yesterday, before I ran, before things became even more deeply confusing.

His eyelids flickered open and it only
took two heartbeats for him to slide his hands into my hair and pull me to him.
“You’re awake,” he spoke softly against my mouth, relief in his voice. His
mouth hovered over mine, resisting.

 I attempted to move into his, but
his hands held my head immobile. His breath was warm on my lips. He pulled
slightly away, looked in my eyes, there was relief there too. No anger.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d wake up,” he
breathed. It was so nice not to see any self reproach on his face, or temper in
his eyes.

“I don’t know what happened,” I told
him. “I was yelling at Gideon…and then I was dizzy…falling.” I shrugged. His
face was too close not to be kissed, and I was overly conscious of every inch
of where our bodies touched; his thigh against my waist, my arm against his
side, the other alongside his shoulder. His hands holding my face.

“Ah, sod it,” he growled before he
pulled me in and kissed me, obliterating from my mind any thought of asking him
what I’d heard, about being different, not human, not—

 One arm went around my waist and
tugged me gently to collapse against his chest and stomach. My arms circled him
and I was lost in him again.

Nothing else mattered.

Too soon, always too soon, I felt him pulling
away from me, his mind clearing. Once again the idea that we were not supposed
to be doing this interrupted my escape and my bliss.

“Why do you have to be so hard to
resist?” He asked into my hair.

Oh here we go again. My heart dipped. I
sighed. He was pushing me away, standing up, pulling me to stand with him. “So
don’t.”
No
no
no
!
My
mind objected, my body right along with it.

“I have to.” He stepped away from me.
“This was my fault, I know better. I was so relieved to see you awake and
so…I’ll admit it, pleased to see you where you just were…” He gestured towards
the chair, but I knew he meant between his legs, leaning over him. “I didn’t
think. I couldn’t think, didn’t want to.” He rubbed both of his hands through
his hair, paced. “But I have to. I can’t keep doing this.”

I just stood there, dazed. This morning
had started out mere moments ago and I’d woken, surprisingly, in a good mood.
Almost hopeful. Happy to be lost in his kisses again. Happy to see the
reservation gone from him.

And now here it was again.

“Iliana…”

The sound of that name, my name now,
made me flinch.

“This isn’t a good idea. This…” he
gestured between the two of us, “is not supposed to happen.”

“Why?” I breathed, exasperated, heart
sinking.

“I don’t want to simply shag you, or be
your diversion from what you’re in the midst of.”

I tried to interrupt him, to tell him it
was more than that, more than what he was saying.

“No, let me finish, please. I understand
how much you’re hurting, how confusing, how bloody messed up it all is. But you
said it yourself; I make you remember better times. I make you feel like who
you used to be. Maybe that is not such a great thing. Maybe that’s not enough.
You need to become whoever it is you are meant to become.”

He barely looked at me.

I was numb, struck dumb and mute by his
words. Being with him felt good, not just when we were kissing. We hadn’t had
that much time, but being stuck in a car for almost twenty hours, taking a road
trip with someone, you forge a sort of bond, especially after a traumatic
experience I’m sure.

Or so I’d thought. I guess it truly was
just his job. I hadn’t had a chance to tell him how much it meant to me, the
way he had treated me on the drive to Seattle, his attempts to cheer me up,
make me laugh. How nice he’d been. The thoughtfulness he’d shown me. Now I
didn’t want to. He had it all wrong. He didn’t make me feel like I had in the
life I’d lost. He took me to a new place, and made me feel things I had only
ever wished for. The wildness I’d never had the nerve to seek out. He was
sunshine and ocean breezes—wild and unbound, unrestrained, all things possible.
When he held me it felt like there were no limitations in the world, like I
could soar, do whatever I wanted. Whatever crazy thing I could dream up. How
was that wrong? Was my life to now be only about work? This new
job
? Was
there to be no room for anything else? Was this job to define me?

“Gideon will be back this morning. He’s
working on everything, trying to find answers…about last night, about...” he
paused awkwardly, “he’s finding an apartment for you, until then I’ll stay with
Nicklaus. You can stay here.”

I knew I should say something, ask him
not to go. Tell him how I felt. Yell at him for the seeming accusation of using
him. But no words formed.

He watched wordlessly as I zipped my
boots on. Last night’s clothes would have to do. I retrieved my bag from the
ottoman and strode to the door. All I seemed to do now was run away from
situations, but it was all too sickening to stand around and listen to, or wait
for.

Action. I desperately needed to take
action.

“Iliana? You can’t just leave.” He
stopped in front of me. Not quite meeting my eyes still.

“I’ll find my own place. I’m still
capable of taking care of myself. I don’t need a baby sitter. I’m not going to
run off and disappear no matter how much I’d love to never see either of you
again.”

 I caught his eye and that set all
the words that were jumbled crazily in my head free.

 “I get that we’re just some sort
of twisted co-workers, that you’re my watchdog. That I was just trying to
forget and bury some pain, to get some sort of semblance of my life back,
something, any bit of it. That I can’t have what I had as a mortal. That all of
that is done, gone. That you did a job—well done—you kept me from jumping from
the car in Oregon, maybe, not that I would have at that point, but whatever.
You did one
helluva
bang-up job at delivering the
‘parcel’ to the bigger watchdog. Awesome work Liam.”

 I applauded him, gave him a
derisive smile, and moved around him, and out the door. “Tell him he can text
me if he wants anything.”

Keeping my back to him, so he could not
see the tears and doing my best to keep them from my voice, I kept moving
towards the stairs.

“Iliana!”

 I heard him roar as I raced down
the stairs, the power in his voice pulled at me, made me want to go to him. I
needed to be away, as far away as I could get from him…or I might find myself
running to him, crashing into him, begging him to change his mind. I couldn’t
do that.    

 
He’d made it all too clear what his stance was
on the matter.

~
Chapter Nine ~

So
now what? That seemed to be my mantra lately. I sat on a park bench, thankfully
it was a nice semi-sunny day, but even so, my thin sweater and leather coat
were not being very cooperative with keeping out the serious October chill
factor.

It hadn’t taken me very long to walk the
few miles to Green Lake Park, and for a short while I had amused myself by
people watching. People walking their dogs. People jogging. People reading on
park benches. People just being people. People having coffee and sitting on
blankets near the water. Couples, holding hands and snuggling against the cold.

Enough of that. No more watching. It was
only making me sink down deeper into the darkness.

Now I was staring down at my tablet,
trying to figure out where to find an apartment. I didn’t want to stay at
Liam’s, that would be torture even with him not there…it would still smell like
him…feel like him. I didn’t want to sit on that couch. I didn’t want to see
that chair, or the way the sun came in behind it.

I’d found some places, they were out
there, some rather nice ones I’d love to take, but how in my circumstance? No
job, at least not one I could validate. How without even knowing who I was,
beyond the small bits of new I.D. I carried in my bag? I didn’t have any
references. Did I have a credit report? What if they ran a background check,
did Iliana have one? I hated,
really
hated to admit that maybe I did
indeed need Gideon, and whatever connections he had or tricks he pulled, to get
this kind of stuff done.

So, I gave up on the hunt for lodging
for the time being, figuring I could stay in a hotel for a night or two. I
didn’t have all of my money, but I had a pretty decent amount in my purse.

That was the plan, but instead I spent
an hour or so checking out my Facebook page, and a couple of links that people
had posted featuring pictures and memories of me. Not the most productive
manner in which to get anything done. It’s not as though it made me feel any
better, to have read how missed I was, or to see those pictures of me posed
with friends and having fun in that life; parties, concerts, vacations, holidays,
so very many events and memories. So, in somberness, I closed down my tablet
and duck watched instead, trying to gather my muddled thoughts and feelings.

I had said to Liam that I could no
longer have what I’d had as a mortal. A mortal? Was I not one anymore? Why had
I used that word? Was there really such a thing as a non-mortal?

My head was teeming with questions, that
was nothing new, but it seemed like they just kept building, and I’d admit that
I recalled very little of what Gideon had told me at the coffee house. That
whole
Ru
-something was confusing. The only part I
remembered was about the Cerberus, and that was only because it was the last
thing I had discussed with Gideon the night before, just before getting so
strangely woozy and losing consciousness. Oh, and about Liam being a
Coimhdeacht, but I had already known that part.

I had to figure out my next step.

I should be more open to this, more
open-minded, and maybe accepting of it all, the idea of it. I did after all
write supernatural chick-lit novels. I’d been part of the vampire-gothic
subculture, believed in ghosts, and angels, magic and the possibilities of
other life forms aside from humans. So why when something so bizarre actually
happened to me, and not to a character of my own fabrication in one of my
books, was I so resistant to buy into it?

I guess it all came down to death. My
lead characters had never died—well, not in any manner such as I had at any
rate. They still got to keep their friends and homes.

Defeated. I felt utterly defeated—and
somewhat abandoned by Liam. He was my first contact with this new world, this
new life, and he was so…I don’t know…hesitant? Unavailable now that he had
gotten me here to Gideon. So irresolute too, pulling me to him one minute and
pushing away the next.

I hated feeling like the victim, playing
that part, feeling so pathetic. It was not in my personality make-up to be this
way and it was making me nuts. I was used to being independent, on my own,
being the problem solver. This was such messed up, unfamiliar ground to be
mired in.

But I guess as much as it annoyed the
hell out of me, I really was the victim this time around. So if ever there was
an appropriate time to play the role, now was it. I shouldn’t feel wrong or bad
for suffering these emotions, I merely did not want to. I wanted a life. It was
all so deeply frustrating. I was a girl of action. I made things transpire. I
didn’t wait for someone else to fix things. But that is exactly what was
happening. I was unable to manage it myself this time.

Clouds were moving in at a fast pace,
bringing along more darkness and chill. It was getting too cold to be out and I
had no desire to be sitting on a park bench, getting soaked should those clouds
decide to cut loose with the rain. I needed to find a hotel, a soft bed, a warm
shower.

Gideon sat down next to me. I think I
felt him before I saw him. An electric tremor ran through me. How did they keep
doing that? Liam had found me last night, after only being gone an hour, and now
Gideon had found me after barely two.

He looked annoyed. Of course he did.

“I told Liam you could text me,” I
stated simply.

“You can’t keep running off,” He
growled.

“I didn’t run. I walked. And it’s not
like I went far.”

“Give me your phone.” He held out his
hand.

“I didn’t call anyone.” His hand
remained palm up, waiting. I shook my head and did not look at him, but instead
kept my eyes on the lake instead.

“I’m not playing these games.” The
serious tone forced me to respond; the sound of pushing him too far again.

“So messed up,” I complained as I placed
my phone in his hand.

My fingertips brushed his palm as I laid
the phone there. He flinched slightly. What was that about? He checked my call
log—so rude—before reaching into the side pocket of his dark wool overcoat and
pulling out an even better device.

“Your new phone. You’ll need it for work
and so I can keep in touch with you, give you your assignments…if it comes to
that.”

“What do you mean
if
? I asked as
I dropped the new phone into my purse without a glance. I’d check it out later.

“You keep bolting.”

“Well, I know, but I’m here…it’s not as
if I got on a train and took off for another state or something. I just needed
space to think, to figure this out, to sort out all the feelings. The things
I’m thinking and feeling, they don’t mesh at all.” I continued staring at the
ducks in the water. “And if I don’t work for you, end up with…” my head swam.
“I mean…” I paused, not sure what I was saying, just feeling an even deeper
loss by his words. “What am I supposed to do?” I looked him in the eyes, my
gods…those eyes. I remembered last night, the words I’d almost let escape from
my tongue just before passing out and I felt myself begin to blush.

He looked at the sky, scanning the
increasing cloud cover. “Getting out of this weather would be a good start.” He
stood, held out his hand to help me up. Or to make sure I came along with him?
Whichever, I accepted. What girl wouldn’t have? He was much too handsome to
refuse.

“I don’t want to go back to Liam’s, I
won’t. I’ll get a hotel, I have money,” I informed him obstinately.

“Of course you do, you little thief.” He
half smiled, tried to hide it. I don’t think he realized that I saw, his
stern-face was back on. Hmmm…maybe he didn’t dislike me quite as much as I’d
thought.

“It was my money to take.”

“It was not yours any longer…Iliana.”

“I made that money, I earned it.
Besides, it’s not as though I took any from my bank account.”

“And I’m mildly shocked by that.”

We stopped at a very familiar looking
car. It was the one Liam had driven to take me from Long Beach. So, it must be
Gideon’s. That made much more sense, it suited him better. Liam came across
more of a Rover or Jeep kind of guy. This dark midnight blue Lexus was
unmistakably Gideon’s style. Sleek, polished, elegant, luxurious. But fast with
the possibility to be dangerous.

He opened the passenger door for me, but
I stood rooted. “Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise.”

I shook my head, fervidly. “No. You
know…surprises recently just haven’t worked out too well for me.”

“You’ll like this one, I assure you.”

“Oh yeah?” I narrowed my eyes at him
suspiciously. I tapped my fingertips against the top of his car, studying his
face for a moment, then turning my thoughtful gaze upwards to the surly sky,
weighing my options, but very aware actually that I had none. I didn’t want him
to necessarily know that’s how I felt. “Well, okay, but I’d better,” I kidded.

Was I just flirting? I was flirting!

Probably not such a good idea.

It
took less than five minutes to arrive at our destination back in Capitol Hill.
It seemed like forever…and yet not long enough.

The rain had started shortly after
getting into the car. Being in such a confined space with Gideon made my heart
pound. Again, this was so very unexpected. This was not like me. Not at all. To
kiss one guy in the morning and by the afternoon be having heart palpitations
over another one. So déjà vu. Sitting in a parked car in the rain. With a man
that sent tremors up my spine—in a very good way. But somehow I knew that
Gideon would never make Liam’s
mistake
.

“Here we are,” announced Gideon, pulling
me from my thoughts. I looked at him. I really needed to stop looking at his
mouth, before he noticed.

“Where is here?” I asked, looking out
the window at a beautiful brick and stone Tudor style building with a gorgeous
and expansive courtyard that wrapped from one side to the other surrounded by a
brick and wrought iron fence.

“Your new home,” he stated it simply,
like it was no big deal. I looked over at him—his eyes, not his mouth.

“Unless I don’t end up working for you,
isn’t that more accurate? What then?”

“We’ll deal with that when we know more.
Until that time we assume that you do.”

“You know what happens when people
assume…?” I bit my lip, trying not to smile, lifted an eyebrow.

“Funny. Another ‘ass’ remark.”

Why did he make my heart
feel…feel…light?

He got out of the car, came around to my
side, and let me out. Such a gentleman. He offered his hand again to help me
out. I was momentarily tempted to refuse, as I had with Liam, so he would maybe
reach in, put his arms around me and pull me out…as Liam had done. I remembered
vaguely how Gideon’s arms had felt holding me the night before, when he’d
caught me.

For being such a hard-ass, I was
noticing a gentleness to him. It was well hidden indeed, but I could sense it
in him, in his ever-so-slight touch when he held my hand for just a heartbeat
longer than needed.

 His hand was warm and strong,
smooth, without calluses. And something else.

The contact, the brief contact skin to
skin, made my flesh hum. Before I had a chance to really scrutinize it any
further than noticing it at all, and becoming more baffled, he pulled his hand
away.

 I looked at his face. He looked
thrown slightly. And then his mask dropped back into place. That serious,
all-business look.

“This way.” He gestured to the walkway
that began at a lovely wrought iron gate and curved its way through the lushly
adorned garden courtyard.

“Really? How do I have an apartment
here?” I asked, stunned.

“Second floor.” He pointed to the right
wing that stretched the entire length of the courtyard to the right with a view
of the garden and the little park across the street.

“You’re serious?” What was the catch?
There had to be a catch.

It was a gorgeous building, and it
looked like I would be in a prime corner apartment.

“Of course,” he answered, in a tone
indicative of how he could never be anything other.

He unlocked the large, heavy wooden main
door and guided me in ahead of him, with his hand laid lightly on the small of
my back. Yep, shivers up my spine with such minimal effort.

The arched door opened onto a foyer. I
was expecting mail boxes to be housed here, but Gideon told me that they were
built into the round brick, gated guardhouse that we had passed on our way in
the front gate.

The floor was gleaming parquet. A runner
ran up the center of the stairs leading to the second floor, held in place by
an antique looking brass stair rod system. Our footsteps were quiet on the
thick pile of the dark red carpet.