“Do you think you should get checked out?” Kiera asked. “Maybe you did have some strange fever. Or maybe there are chemicals still in your system?”
Ash shook her head. “I’m fine. Really. Just still wiped out. You guys mind if I call it quits early?”
“Of course not,” Kiera said. “You go ahead. We’ll cover your dinner.”
Ash pulled some cash out of her purse anyway, then leaned over to kiss Kiera’s cheek. She did the same for Summer, then walked to the door, pleased at how she was keeping it together—at least while they could still see her.
When she stepped outside into the cold night, she had to pause against the wall of the restaurant, fighting a wave of tears.
A couple came out of the restaurant. Ash gave them a small smile as she turned away from them.
What a terrible thing to do to a person, a tourist visiting a foreign town, make her believe in a hero. Fill her heart so full that it was overflowing. She’d almost been ready to pack up her whole life just so she could move back to where she knew Merc had once been. She grabbed the small medallion at her neck, seeking that warm, rich feeling that always came over her when she held it and felt him near.
Her chest eased enough to let a full breath in. She let that one out and took another. She pressed the glass against her skin. If Merc hadn’t once lived and breathed, how could an artifact of his life affect her as this one did?
That was easy. She’d lost her shit.
It was glass woven around dirt, nothing more.
She squeezed her eyes shut, accepting the ease the necklace gave her for what it was—comfort. When she opened them again, she looked toward her car.
Someone was there, leaning against the back hatch. She blinked, but the man remained. A cold flurry of fear spilled into her chest. She knew that man. He was the redheaded guy who’d threatened Summer when she was first seeing Sam.
Ash flashed a look back toward the restaurant, wondering if she should go back inside and get the girls. Or call the police. But when she looked at her car again, the guy was gone.
A family spilled out from the restaurant, laughing. Children and adults. A noisy, happy family. They went down the side of the parking lot where her car was. Ash fell into step behind them. Surely that weirdo wouldn’t assault her with so many witnesses nearby.
It was early April now, so the day’s light was fading, but it wasn’t yet dark. The streetlights had come on, but they weren’t needed to illuminate the parking lot. The family went past her car. She looked carefully all around her vehicle before hitting the unlock button. And then she checked the inside of her car before getting in and locking the doors behind her.
No one was hiding anywhere. How had that guy gotten away so fast and without her seeing where he went? She used an app to turn her lights on at home, then started her car. Her music came on. Everything was so normal. Mechanical. Programmed. Regular. It was that relentless sameness that motivated her to escape in her biannual trips, but she craved that simplicity now.
Why had she suddenly become so paranoid? And when had she become such an easy mark? She left the parking lot and drove home, resolving to get back to reality. She had to put her Merc episode behind her so she could get on with her life.
Life had been so easy before he moved into her brain.
Merc parked near Grumpy’s Beer Haul, the team’s preferred hangout in town. He shouldn’t have come. Being here was too damned close to her. Ashlyn DeWinter, his perfect mate, chosen for him by the Matchmaker. Fuck the demon to hell and back. What Merc was experiencing felt real, as if it came from his heart, mind, and soul, but it didn’t.
He’d survived his mutant transition—he was strong enough to resist this.
Acier was returning to the table with two glasses of beer just as Merc joined the group. He set them down then hooked thumbs with Merc, pulling him close to pound him on the back. “Whoa. Glad to see you’re up and about.”
Bastion slammed his hand down on the table, then jumped up to stand on his seat, his glass held high. “Ho-ho! A round pour tout le monde! My friend is back from the dead!”
An approving roar swept through the room. Merc looked at Guerre and Liege, neither of whom was smiling. He kept himself closed to all of them, maintaining a level of privacy that was rare within their immediate group. He hoped they’d attribute it to his recent brush with death and not for any other reason.
Acier pushed a beer in front of him. Merc took a sip of the icy brew. Tonight was the night Summer had her weekly dinner with her two best friends—Kiera, Liege’s daughter, and Ashlyn.
Grumpy’s was a typical college dive. Not the place you’d expect a group of oversized mutant warriors to hang out. He didn’t know if Acier or Bastion had found it first, but it had been their go-to watering hole for a while. A quick look around explained why—plenty of unattached females and a large supply of alcohol. Even now Acier and the bartender were having a private eyeball convo. Geez, just a glance from the mutant made the girl lick her lips. Acier, the team’s weapons master, had the run of the place now that Bastion had settled down with his missus. It was the Matchmaker who’d gotten Bastion and Selena together—a more unlikely pairing Merc couldn’t imagine, but he had to admit that they seemed happy.
But Merc wasn’t Bastion. Or Liege, for that matter.
Merc had had his one and only, his dream life, everything, until the Omnis took it away from him. He knew what that felt like. He lost them a little more every day that passed as his emotional scars mended the edges of his soul, pulling him back together, numbing him.
And now the Matchmaker wanted him to take up with another woman, bring her into the fold like a sheep offering.
He wasn’t going to do it.
Bastion grinned at him. “I thought you would change your mind about coming in. I am happy you’re here.”
“Righto,” Merc grumbled, then sipped his beer.
Liege had struck up a conversation with Selena, taking his attention from Merc. But Guerre still watched Merc—not surprising, as it was his first night away from the fort since his coma. He ignored the healer. The man was no more interested in the females or liquor than Merc was. The guy’s healing skills were wicked strong. Since the mutations made a changed person more of what they’d been before the change, Merc wondered what that meant for Guerre. Had he been a doctor? Had he studied medicine?
Whatever—they were lucky that Liege had convinced Guerre to join them. Had the Omnis gotten hold of him, it would have been a severe loss for the Legion.
Merc stared into his rapidly warming beer. He wasn’t a fun addition to the group that night. Really, he was just running down the clock, waiting for Liege to pick up Summer from her weekly dinner with her friends so he would know when Ash had finished her evening and was alone.
12
Merc parked outside Ash’s house, watching for it to go dark, then waiting even longer for Ash to sleep.
He shouldn’t do this. Not because of its questionable morality—he’d long ago run out fucks for human etiquette. He shouldn’t because he was skating dangerously close to a tragedy—for him…and her.
He would do this just once, just one time be physically in the same room with her. He would breathe the air she breathed, touch her skin, maybe slip into her dreams, then leave…if only to prove he could.