Warrior Enchanted: The Sons of the Zodiac (32 page)

“Not really.”

“Yes, really.” Drake searched her wide eyes and innocent cupid’s-bow mouth, but other than a very stubborn hand cocked against her hip, she didn’t offer up any further protest. “I knew you had skills. Power. But
this…” He turned the sword over in his hand once more. “This is just not possible.”

“You can throw your body into the space-time continuum at will. I can move things. Do you really want to talk to me about possible?”

“This doesn’t change my mind.”

“It has to.”

“I can’t put you in that sort of danger.”

Her small hands folded over his where he held the sword. “Don’t you get it? Don’t you get how much more powerful I am when we’re together? What we can do when we’re joined, just like those fish on your back?”

As if her words conjured their response, the tattoo on his back leaped in seeming agreement. Unwilling to acquiesce, he sought some other argument to change her mind.

To make her see reason.

“It doesn’t change the fact you’re mortal.”

She pried his fingers off the hilt, taking the sword. With her free hand, she linked their fingers. “Watch this.”

A small painting sat above his dresser on the far side of the room. The image depicted the twelve signs of the zodiac in a circle, with lines crisscrossing between the twelve, evenly demarcated signs. The lines all came to a point in the middle of the circle, at the exact center point of the painting.

As her fingers tightened on his, Emerson lifted her other hand and let go of the sword. Rather than fall to the floor, the weapon sprang from her hand and flew toward the painting.

Drake watched in awe as the tip hit dead center.

E
merson marveled at the raw power that coursed through her veins as she looked at the sword embedded in the wall across the room.

She’d done that.

She knew she had power. She’d honed it over the many lonely years of her life, to both celebrate her gift and to stave off boredom. But she’d never shown it off to another.

And she’d certainly never before been willing to show off her magic—or display the full dimension of her power—for the man she loved.

It was exhilarating.

“You look awfully proud of yourself.”

“I am. And I’m also trying to figure out what took me so long.”

Drake turned toward her, the delight in his gaze only reinforcing her satisfaction at finally showing her true self.

“I’ve been hiding this from you and now you
know. And you seem to still want to drag my clothes off.”

“I think you’re amazing. Always.” The evident pride that sparkled in the flecks of gold in his green eyes morphed into something even more seductive. “And I always want to drag your clothes off, too.”

“Well, you can’t right now. We’ve got a job to do. I presume Quinn’s already got a council of war going downstairs and we should be a part of it.”

Drake crossed the room to yank the sword from the plaster, his smile falling. “None of this changes how I feel.”

“About my clothes?” She tossed the joke back at him, knowing full well what he meant.

“It doesn’t change how I feel about you going with us. It also doesn’t change the fact that while you wield a very powerful magic, you’d still have to use that power on your brother.”

Drake’s words stopped her, as her memories of the fight in the garage ran through her in a cold shiver. She’d turned her fire on Magnus twice now. Had taken her magic and not only used it against another, but used it against a loved one.

What did that make her? A betrayer of her gift or a betrayer of her family?

Or both?

“It doesn’t change how I feel, either. I’m in this and I want you to accept it.” When he turned to argue, she added, “I
need
you to accept this.”

Drake settled the sword back against the armoire, his movements gentle for such a large man. Her gaze
drank in the broad stretch of his back and the raw physicality of his form.

He was a Warrior.

And when he turned back to face her, the responsibility of that calling was etched across every inch of him.

“Do you know why I never married that woman? The one I was betrothed to?”

That familiar spurt of jealousy at the knowledge he’d been engaged to someone was quickly tamped out by curiosity. “No.”

“I didn’t love her.”

Emerson had thought about his story—hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it since they’d sat in the library—and she’d come to her own conclusions. “From what you said she was a child when you met. You’d have come to love her. Would have come to love the family you made with her.”

A small smile ghosted his lips as Drake nodded. “You sound suspiciously like my father. But he was wrong, and so are you.”

“Drake, come on. You lived in a time when people didn’t marry for love.”

He never moved from his spot across the room, but his words held a strange, enthralling power she was helpless to ignore. “Another one of my father’s arguments. He claimed I had a duty to uphold. A duty to my family and to my country.”

“And you felt differently?”

“I did, even though I couldn’t put a name to it.”

“What was that?” The question rose to her lips on a breathless whisper. “Why did you feel differently?”

“I wanted love.”

“Everyone wants love, Drake. It’s part of our human existence.”

“Do you think so?”

Emerson heard the question beneath the question. “Don’t you?”

“I think many people want what’s convenient. Or they want the idea of love, but they’re not really interested in the sacrifices that come with it.”

“Maybe people aren’t brave?”

“Or maybe they don’t realize what it takes. What’s required of them to love another.”

“And you think you know?”

“I always thought I did, but now I don’t know. I want to support you, Emerson. I want to believe in you and give you the freedom to be who you are. Because you’re the woman I love. You’re the woman I knew was out there.”

With slow steps, he crossed the room. She felt that large, powerful body wrap itself around her as he took her in his arms. Felt him shudder as her arms went around his neck.

“But the gods help me if I’m brave enough to let you be who you are.”

Finley curled on the small couch in the windowless room, unable to stop the shivers that racked her body. What had she done? And why hadn’t she listened to Grey?

His heavy-handed tactics had chaffed more than she wanted to admit, but he had protected her. Had worked to keep her safe. But the stubborn, willful heart that
beat in her chest had finally made a decision that would be her end.

Her hubris was her doom.

Although Magnus had held the snake at bay, using it only to taunt and frighten her, she saw in his eyes what he was capable of.

She’d first thought it was malice, but after a long hour spent shivering in mind-numbing terror, she acknowledged what it really was that lived in his dark eyes.

Fear.

She’d lived her entire adult life around criminals and she’d learned early on that fear was a far more dangerous emotion than malice or greed or even out-and-out evil. It was what turned a good man bad and decimated his soul.

Magnus Carano lived in a constant state of dread from the woman who’d made him and of what he’d become.

And she’d come blithely calling at the devil’s door.

On a deep breath, Finley wrapped her arms around herself and willed the shivers to subside. She tried fervently to resurrect the spirit she knew she’d buried somewhere inside at the sight of that horrible snake.

On a heavy breath, she willed her nerves to calm as she fought to think rationally about her situation.

In…out…

What did she know?

Although it felt like she’d been in this room forever, she knew the reality was that she’d only been here a few hours. She’d simply run out for a late lunch—the corner deli a block from her office—when she was
grabbed by the mystery woman. She’d even brought the security detail Quinn had assigned to her along.

But it hadn’t mattered.

Halfway down the block, her hand had grabbed her arm. Before she could even struggle, her body had been thrown into that disorienting sensation Grey called a port. Then she’d been shoved into this room and the door had slammed behind her.

In…out…

What else did she know?

She’d already surmised they were holding her in some sort of basement and also suspected they were still in the city because she could swear she heard the heavy throb of traffic at regular intervals.

In…out…

Where could they have taken her?

The door banged open and Finley leaped to a sitting position, the heavy exhalation of breath catching in her throat. A small cry echoed across the cavernous room as a small, petite body fell through the door before it was slammed closed once again.

Melanie?

Finley raced to the woman only to have her scrabble away as she came close. “Don’t touch me!”

“Melanie.” When the woman just shook her head, Finley raised her voice. “Melanie! It’s me.”

The blond head stopped its wild shaking as her gaze focused. “Finley?”

“Yes.”

“Why? How?” Melanie lifted her head farther as hope bloomed on the pale pink of her cheeks. “What are you doing here?”

White-hot anger sharpened into a narrow point as Finley moved toward the still-huddled woman. “You mean you really don’t know?”

“Know what?”

Feelings she hadn’t even realized she’d repressed came barreling out. The shivers that had consumed her only moments before shifted on a rush of adrenaline. She clenched her hands into tight fists to try and stop them from reaching for Melanie. “You’ve been setting me up for weeks.”

That slight wash of pink in her cheeks vanished. “But I haven’t.”

“Cut the bullshit, Melanie. I know about the files on your computer and your relationship with Gavelli.” The woman’s eyes went wide with surprise, but Finley pressed on. “I know all about it.”

“But you can’t know. He told me you’d never know.”

“Who? Your mobster boyfriend?”

“Franco told me it was all for the greater good and that he just wanted a chance to explain. That you were out to get him for something he didn’t do and that he had evidence that proved he wasn’t guilty.”

“Guilty for what?”

“He said you were trying to frame him for those murders up in the Bronx last January.”

What
?

The urge to simply throw up her hands was strong, but Finley waited. Something in the woman’s voice—in her broken gaze—held her back. “Why would I do that? Why would you think I’d done that?”

“He had evidence. E-mails.”

Finley ran the history of the case through her mind,
unable to make a connection with the Gavellis. “Those murders had nothing to do with a mob hit. I never even pursued that angle because the police had already gathered quite a bit of evidence that suggested it was a gang retaliation.”

“But Franco had evidence.”

“And you believed him?”

The shoulders that had looked broken when she’d arrived bent even further under the weight of her misjudgment. “Oh my God. Finley. Oh God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I…” A heavy sob shook her. “I love him.”

Finley wanted to rant and rage.

Wanted to tell the woman what an idiotic sap she’d been, but playing judge and jury didn’t rest all that well on shoulders that only moments before had shook with the knowledge of her own stupid decisions.

“Love, Mel? Really?”

Large tears welled in Melanie’s eyes and spilled over. “I’m the worst cliché. But I swear he was telling the truth.”

“What would possibly make you believe him?”

The woman’s slender shoulders crumpled and the blue of her eyes shined with a sudden clarity. “I don’t know, Finley. I really don’t know.”

Finley moved forward and dragged the woman into her arms. “Come on. There’s a bed over here you can sit down on.”

They crossed the room and, as she held Melanie’s shaking body close, she couldn’t help but wonder what would come next.

Drake kept his gaze focused on the big-screen TV that Quinn had hooked up to the security center for their briefing. They’d descended into the Batcave, as Ilsa had dubbed it, in the basement of the brownstone rather than all crowd their way into Quinn’s office.

While the leather couches were more comfortable than hard rolling chairs, all the comforts in the world couldn’t calm the roiling nerves that filled the room.

“Where did Eris get a warehouse, Quinn?” Grey argued with the bull as Quinn pointed out the only entry point on the building he believed housed Finley. “She’s got to be somewhere else.”

“It’s Gavelli’s warehouse and it’s the first place I looked.” Quinn tapped the flat screen. “Luckily, I still had the feed set up from the other night and on a hunch I looked at it. Finley’s there.”

Grey wasn’t calmed by Quinn’s reasoning. “You’ve got no video of the surrounding blocks.”

Drake inserted himself into the conversation. Although Quinn had been in Grey’s spot not all that long ago, it was obvious his patience was fried. “And if Eris ported her in—which is likely—there won’t be any.”