“I am not at liberty to discuss that.” Anger laces his tone.
“First you screw up your mission, then you insist you need to go AWOL. It’s not like you, Dante—”
Dante. The name fits him. Fire and ice…he is both. A dangerous name for a dangerous Fae male.
Dante’s tone hardens. “I couldn’t let her die.”
“Since when did a mere civilian come in the way of your duties?”
“I cannot tell you the reason, Commander. I know there will be consequences to fouling up my mission, but I’ll just have to deal with the outcome of that…after—”
“You have no idea how serious this is. The Elders are demanding that you come back and face trial. Do you know what that means?” Boris snaps.
“You’ll kill me as soon as I set foot back in Singapore. Even as we speak, I bet you have already sent soldiers to hunt me.”
There’s the scrape of Dante’s chair against the floor.
“I trained those soldiers. Even though the bastards changed loyalties, I expect they’ll manage to track me down. Doesn’t mean I can’t make it difficult for them.” Dante laughs. It's a harsh, cruel sound.
A cold feeling fills my chest.
This Fae, he’s lethal. A trained soldier. I’d forgotten just how much danger my life is in with him. And all because why? Because he’d almost fucked me?
His footsteps thud, and I assume he paces, back-forth-back.
“If you come back and bring her with you, perhaps there’s a chance—”
“No.” His reply is harsh, final.
“What is it about her anyway? A pretty face? A succulent pussy? I thought better of you—”
“Don’t you fucking talk about her that way.” Dante’s voice lashes through the space.
I pull back from the door. He’s angry because the other guy insulted me? My mouth goes dry. Why is he defending me? Why does he care what his superior thinks of me?
“So it is as I suspected.” Boris sounds calm. Too calm.
Fear skitters down my spine.
“You have no idea.” There’s no mistaking the sarcasm in Dante’s tone.
“I can hazard a guess, soldier, and I can tell you that you are headed in the wrong direction. Once you take this road, you are on your own.”
“No, you listen to me, Commander.” Dante’s tone hardens. “I’ve spent all my life in service of the Elders. I’ve let them dictate every part of my life. I’ve dropped everything and always rushed to them when they needed my help. This occasion, it doesn’t work that way. I need time to complete what I’ve started. Things are too delicate as it is… One wrong move and—” He swears.
“Last chance, Colonel. If you don’t turn yourself and the human in, it will not end well.”
“I am not coming. I can’t leave my mate and— Fuck.” There’s the sound of a crash, then something hits the floor and shatters.
I freeze.
Mate? Whose mate? His mate? Who is his mate? I don’t want to accept what he’s talking about.
Sweat slicks my palms.
I rub my hand against a twinge of pain in my chest. There it is again. That strange pain I’d woken up with. It’s not like heartburn, it feels more intense, more deep-rooted, as if something in my veins has been changed. As if I’ve been ripped apart from the inside and put back together all over again. I raise my arm and look at it, at the fresh pink skin. Like the skin regenerated overnight. But that’s not possible, is it?
“When were you going to tell me, Colonel?”
There’s silence, then the sound of footsteps as he paces again. “Didn’t mean for it to come out that way, Commander. But you see now why I am not able to leave?”
There’s the low sound of his swearing.
“I understand, Colonel. Better than you’d imagine.”
“Sir?” There’s surprise in his voice.
“Question is, do you understand the magnitude of what you have taken on? Not only is she human, and you know the track record of Fae’s mating with humans is—”
“I understand the dangers, Boris, but it was the only way to save her.”
“And then you are a military man.” The Commander seems to continue as if he hadn’t heard Dante. “You put your life at risk all the time. Once you consolidate the mating bond, if something were to happen to you, it also endangers her life.”
“It won’t come to that.” He huffs out a breath.
“What do you mean?”
“I…”
Dante lowers his tone, and the uttered words are too difficult for me to pick up. I lean in closer and press my ear to the door again.
“So you see…” The rest of his words are too low to be deciphered.
“I don’t agree with your plan, Colonel, but if that’s the only way out…” Boris seems relaxed. Almost bored by the conversation.
“It is, sir.” The floorboards creak, as if Dante has widened his stance.
“And you are sure there is no way in or out of the safe house?”
“She could try to scale the wall, but I doubt she’s strong enough for that.”
I set my jaw. That’s a challenge if I ever heard one. I am definitely going to have to try to get over that wall.
“Then there is the door.” Dante hesitates.
“Door?”
So there is another way out. Relief floods me.
“It leads out from the study to a hidden passage and all the way to the closest town. But the study is locked when I am not here, sir, so I am sure she won’t get to it.”
Okay, so I need to find the key to the study and then find the door and escape. A second route. It’s more of a challenge, but worth the try.
“Well, if you are confident, soldier—”
“I am, sir.”
How did he get access to a communication device? Since the tsunamis had changed the geography of the earth and leached the ground of trace elements, all kinds of comms devices have gone out of circulation.
The thoughts rush around in my head, and I try to make sense of everything I’ve heard.
His footsteps approach the door, and I make to rise, but already the door is swinging open.
Busted. My throat goes dry.
Light pours from the open doorway.
I don’t look up. His feet clad in military-issue boots come into view.
My hand shakes, and coffee spills from the cup. The drops slosh toward my freshly skinned arm. I brace for the burn—which never comes.
The drops of coffee weave away from my arm, up, drifting up as if drawn by an unseen force which I know is coming from him. I follow the arc of the drops as he raises his arm and simply sweeps them over to the side to deposit them in the bin in a corner of the room.
The cup tilts in my hand, and I am not surprised when it rights itself again. “I guess I don’t have to worry when you are around. You’ll always be there to clean up after me, to prop me up when I need it, make sure I never hurt myself again.”
“You make it sound like a bad thing.” He squats in front of me.
That scent of fresh rain and dark chocolate deepens. The ball of heat in my chest twinges.
His thighs are massive, and with him crouching like that, the muscles bunch.