Wrath: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 2 (29 page)

“Didn’t I hurt you?” he asked, reaching down and placing his hand on top of the reddened mark of a large handprint on my hip. It would, undoubtedly, be blue come morning.

I reached for his wrist and pressed it into the young bruise. “Maybe a little.” He tried to gently pull away but I pressed myself into his hand. “The point is, you didn’t hurt me any more,
or any less
, than I wanted you to.” I blushed a little at this intimate revelation.

“You’re joking.”

“Not so much. I’m, um, finding I like it a little energetic at times.” I swear I heard a snort from behind the curtain. “The point is, you asked me if you should stop. I said no, knowing full well you intended on being rough. With foreplay like that, it wasn’t going to be classical music and tender glances, now was it?” I teased. “More like Nine Inch Nails and serious—”

“Fucking,” he finished for me, and a huge grin split his face.

“Yeah, that.” I turned away to hide my blush, and he caught my chin in his hand, turning me back to face him. I glared, uncomfortable with this level of intense scrutiny. Couldn’t he just back the hell off and let me be a little embarrassed? I’d tried to assuage his guilt. Couldn’t he respect mine? “What?” I snapped, whipping my head out of his grasp.

“Don’t be ashamed of what you like,
anamchara
. Not now, not ever. Not when it comes to me. I want your honesty, all of it. But for now, come hide your face,” he said, taking my hand and pulling me in close so I could press my forehead to his chest.

I rested there for a few minutes, allowing him to soothe me by running his hands up and down my bare back, completely forgetting that Darius was waiting to exit the room until I saw a pale hand wave at me from near the window.

“Shit!” I exclaimed, jumping back from Hellion’s arms.

“What?” He looked around to see what had scared me.

“Uh, I need to clean up. Now. Would you go start the shower for me?” I asked, using his body as a shield while I crawled under the covers on the bed.

“Sure.” He looked at me curiously but didn’t say anything else. He bent to kiss me and padded out of the room, the twin globes of his ass rolling as he swaggered into the bathroom, confidence restored.

I winced, feeling the first pangs of discomfort as the endorphins officially left. “Get. Out.” Fury rang true in my voice, even though it was low to prevent Hellion’s overhearing me.

Darius stepped out from behind the curtain and strode to the bed, each step measured and graceful.

“What are you doing here?” I hissed. “I meant it: get out.” I pulled the covers up higher and glared at him. Unfortunately it’s hard to look mean when you’re rumpled and smelling of sex…that was witnessed. Oh crap. I covered my face in my hands just as the sound of the shower started, and cool hands grasped my wrists.

“I stepped in moments before you two appeared. The lovely lady who agreed to spend the evening with me entered a doorway down this hall, and I was to meet her there.” He pulled a hand down his face. “I clearly ended up in the wrong room.” Darius lifted his chin a bit and looked at me very seriously. “I meant it earlier, Maddy. If it doesn’t work out—”

“You damned voyeur! Do you really think it’s not ‘working out’?”

“I must admit I’m impressed, but—”

“Out, Darius. Just leave, and don’t you ever mention this again. Ever.”

He inclined his head toward me and flashed to the door, pulling it open and shut in one seamless movement.

Hellion stepped out of the bathroom, his head cocked to one side, his eyes roaming the room. “Who were you talking to, Maddy?”

“No one. Shower ready?” I asked with forced cheerfulness as I crawled out from under the covers.

Hellion watched me carefully before looking around the room one last time. He grabbed my arm as I tried to sneak by him and I flinched. “I’ll not hurt you, but I’ll ask you for the truth. Did I cause you harm?”

Thanks to all the appropriate powers. I thought he was going to push about my behavior. Instead he was worried about whether or not I was okay. I smiled and reached up to tuck a stray strand of hair behind his ear. “I’m fine. I’ll undoubtedly be sore tomorrow, but it will have been well earned.”

He looked down bashfully, long eyelashes rimming guarded eyes. “So you aren’t too sore now?”

“Now? No, not really. Why do—”

He swept me up, hooking one arm behind my knees and one behind my shoulders and carried me into the enormous bathroom. “Then there’s a load of time before tomorrow gets here. Come, Maddy,” he whispered, stepping into the steaming shower. And I did. Repeatedly.

The morning light crept across the bedroom floor, lighting first a sock, then a pair of pants, and, eventually, the rest of our clothes as they had been strewn with enthusiastic abandon across the hardwoods and antique rugs. Fresh light played hide and seek with the shadows and coaxed dust motes into a lazy, uncoordinated dance. And for all its cheerfulness, I watched the creeping of the light with an unexpected sense of foreboding ambiguity, as if the coming day was nothing more than an exercise in frustration and dubious plotting by a person, or persons, unknown.

Too true
, I thought.

The bed shifted as Hellion rolled over, but I didn’t move. His breathing settled back into an indolent rhythm, and I eased myself out of bed. I needed to walk a bit, to have a few minutes to myself. I picked up my dress and slipped it on without undergarments, only holding it together until I was out in the hall and could tie the sash appropriately. I wandered down the long hallway, stopping now and again to mindlessly admire some relic or another, or to peruse a painting, eventually finding my way back to the main hall and the doorway to the family room we’d used last evening. Stepping inside, I located my boots and fetched them, noticing in passing that the glass had been cleaned up.

I exited the room through the nearest French doors and stepped into the breezy morning. The partly cloudy sky felt like a game of roulette—it could go either way. We could end up with a lucky spin and sunshine or the more predictable outcome of rain. I wandered down toward the waterside, thinking back over the clues and my decision to both organize and formalize my thoughts about Bahlin’s potential involvement in the crime. It was so frustrating to realize that the dragon himself had planted a kernel of doubt. How could he abandon me when I needed his help and he’d promised to always be there for me? How could he abandon me
period
? I’d been so convinced I was falling in love with him, and I’d rushed headlong into that mess, agreeing to marry him when I still had my reservations. I’d never make that mistake again. Never.

I picked up a flat stone the size of my palm and chucked it out across the water, watching it skip across the agitated surface several times before sinking away. I ran the clues back through my head, summarizing what I knew to be true. First, the killer was right-handed. I began to walk along the shoreline, paying little to no attention to where I was going but, rather, doing my best not to twist an ankle on the rocky terrain.

Second, the killer was using a weapon of some type that had a wickedly sharp, smooth edge. It could be a knife, or it could be a claw. The cuts had been clean, though, so we knew with relative certainty that whatever wielded the weapon had both the experience and the strength to get the job done.

Third, the killer was attacking at night. I rolled my head around my shoulders, feeling the muscles knotting up already. This third point was a real sticky issue for me. I couldn’t count the number of times Bahlin had emphasized to me that he couldn’t use his cloaking skills except after the sun went down. So if he was hiding from, or stalking, a potential victim, nighttime was the time for him to be most effective.

Fourth were the gold coins, and they posed a real problem for me. Bahlin surely wasn’t the only individual in the world to have those same coins.
Think, Maddy
, I chastised myself.
Who else would be a prime candidate?
It could be his mom, or even his little brother, Aiden. What had Bahlin told me? Something about a dragon’s parents making an initial contribution to the young dragon’s treasure cache when he or she came of age, and then the young dragon had to amass his or her own fortune. Bahlin’s gold coins had been given to him by his father. So realistically, I was going to have to focus on Bahlin’s family as the source of the coins because he would have given Bahlin’s brother and dead sister deposits in the same currency.
Shit
.

Pausing in my list making and my leisurely morning stroll, I grabbed a handful of stones and began throwing them, one at a time, as hard and as far as I could. I made it through a half a dozen throws before I had to reach for more stones. Settling in to continue tossing the small rocks, I kept on with my mental compilation.

Fifth, the killer was targeting women who looked like me as he, or she, tracked my movements around London. Bahlin had known where I was at all times. It would have been a matter of simple deduction to determine I was with Hellion after we disappeared from the fall together.

Sixth, the blue string tied around the hair—

A hand dropped onto my shoulder and I screamed, spinning around and striking out at my assailant as my boot heels dug into the rocky soil and dumped me on my ass. I was unable to stop my right hook before it glanced off Hellion’s chin and snapped his head back.

“Bloody hell!” he shouted, grabbing the side of his jaw and slowly shaking his head. “What was that for?”

I sat on the ground, the water from the lake’s shore seeping through my dress, and I looked up at him. It suddenly struck me as funny, and I began to laugh, trying to get my feet under me so I could stand. I finally ended up taking my boots off before being able to get vertical again, albeit with Hellion’s proffered hand as help.

“Sorry,” I hiccupped, wiping at the tears that had leaked down my cheeks. “Oh, you should have seen your face.”

“Likewise,” he said, a smile lurking in his voice under the frustration and mock anger. “What in the saints’ names were you thinking of that had you so—ah, murder. Don’t I feel foolish?” We walked hand in hand back toward the house. I was surprised I’d come so far. “I’ve always felt this was a good place for thinking. Did you come to any profound conclusions out here on the water’s edge, then?”

“No.” I pulled him to a stop and he turned to face me, effectively blocking out the sun. His hair was slightly wild this morning, loose and blowing in the breeze, and the light created a nimbus of gold around his head, making him look like a fallen angel. Why fallen? Because no angel could do what he could do in a bedroom and maintain their holy standing. No way. I blushed and looked down, remembering last night and early into the hours of this morning.

He chucked me gently under the chin and said, “And why does it embarrass you, what we shared last night?”

My head snapped up and I asked, “How in the world did you know what I was thinking?”

“Nothing makes you blush except sex, Maddy, and it’s usually either right before or right after the main event that leaves you most vulnerable. So really, it’s just a matter of deduction.”

“And you didn’t think you were a detective,” I muttered, turning to walk back toward the house. “I was thinking about last night and…” I paused, unsure how to say what I really wanted to say.

“Are yeh hurt, then?” His voice barely carried over the sound of the wind and I was forced to stop and turn back to him. He hadn’t moved with me as I continued on toward the manse.

“Not really. What I wanted to say was thank you.” I held my head up and met his gaze despite the heat I could feel crawling up my neck and staining my cheeks. “I asked you for memories and you gave me just what I wanted.”

He tilted his head to the side, and a strange look passed over his face. He turned to face the water, sticking his hands in his pants pockets and looking out across the water. “You make it sound like it’s the last we’ll be together.” He didn’t look at me.

“No, that’s not what I meant.” I took a couple of tentative steps toward him and stopped, unsure of his reserved mood. “Is something wrong?”

“Not wrong, per se. I was just curious why you saw fit to get out of bed without saying anything.” He turned to look at me, capturing his hair in his hands and holding it back from his face so he could see me without impediment. “I woke to find yeh gone, your clothes and shoes missing. No note, nothing. I suppose…” Now it was his turn to look awkward and uncomfortable. “I suppose I was concerned.”

“I’m sorry. It never occurred to me to leave a note or to wake you. Frankly I needed a few minutes to sort out the clues I’ve got, and I wanted to get out of the house to get some fresh air to do it. I’ve been cooped up inside since we left Ireland, and I wanted a little country air and some solitude.” I took the last few steps back to him and dropped my boots near his feet. I stepped into him and wormed my way under his arms, and they instinctively wrapped around me. “Thanks.” His shirt was still missing the buttons I’d ripped off last night, so I had access to his smooth chest. I nuzzled his skin and laid my head against his chest so I could hear his heart beating in my ear. “I’ll try to be more considerate.”

He tightened his hold around my shoulders. “And I’ll try to be more trusting.” He bent and kissed the top of my head, and I tilted my face back so he had access to my mouth. He kissed me tenderly and I relaxed into him, following his direction as the kiss morphed into a more serious moment. He broke from it first, and his eyes pulsed softly. “We’ve both had a hard go of it in the relationship department.”