The fear in Julian’s voice was so real and so powerful that Brielle crouched down beside him and put her arms around him. She was prouder of her brother in that moment than she’d ever been in her life. “But you stopped them.”
Julian nodded. He opened his mouth to say something, but the thud of heavy boots on the stairs interrupted him. Brielle knew it was Caleb before he even reached the landing.
“How is she?” Caleb asked, bending down to snag one of the ham and cheese sandwiches as he walked over to stand beside Brielle. They both got to their feet. Caleb didn’t even look the least bit apologetic as he shoved half the sandwich in his mouth.
“I think she’s doing okay,” Brielle said. In the bedroom, the doctor seemed to have finished his examination of Kiara and was busy writing notes in a folder while Jake and McKay continued to talk to her. “We’ll probably be able to talk to her soon.”
She glanced over at her brother to see what he thought of her assessment, only to realize that he wasn’t listening to her at all. He wasn’t even paying attention to Kiara now. Instead, he was glaring at Caleb as he finished the rest of the sandwich he’d helped himself to. Crap. If looks could kill…
For reasons that defied explanation, Caleb didn’t seem to like her brother, and Julian didn’t like him, either. The two of them had been circling each other like a couple of tomcats since coming out of those subway tunnels. They looked like they were going to start fighting at any second.
Now that she thought about it, Brielle supposed Caleb disliked Julian because of all the negative things she’d told him about her brother and how difficult he’d made her life. As far as where Julian’s animosity was coming from, she had no idea. Unless Julian had somehow figured out that she and Caleb were sleeping together and decided Caleb wasn’t good enough for her. That was insane, though. Her brother had never once cared about what she did with her life. Hell, he probably assumed she didn’t have one.
She would have told both of them to grow up and stop acting like children, but she’d be wasting her breath. They were men, which meant they pretty much were children.
“I’m surprised you’re not in there getting checked out by the doc,” Caleb said, looking at Julian. “I know firsthand that those ghouls can be hard to handle. It isn’t your fault if they roughed you up some.”
Brielle rolled her eyes at the thinly veiled insult. There hadn’t been much conversation between Caleb and Julian since they’d gotten to the safe house, but what little there had been was exactly like this, all snarky hidden jabs and petty taunts.
Julian didn’t rise to the bait. Instead, he gave Caleb the most fake smile she’d ever seen him bestow on anyone. Which was saying a lot, since her brother was full of crap nearly every minute of his life.
“Thanks for your concern,” Julian said. “But I got through the fight with those ghouls with nothing more than a few scratches. They aren’t all that hard to deal with.”
“Really?” Caleb lifted a brow, clearly curious despite himself. “I was wondering how you managed to kill one of them. Like I said, I’ve fought them before and found them damn near impossible to even damage.”
“Impossible to damage?” Julian snorted. “Maybe you didn’t hit them hard enough. It’s not your fault, of course. You don’t look that strong.”
Beside her, Caleb stiffened. Brielle immediately put herself between him and Julian even as Caleb’s eyes began to shimmer with a blue glow and a low growl erupted from deep in his chest. Oh, crap. The guy she was falling in love with was going to kill her brother.
Fortunately, Jake and McKay chose that moment to step out of the bedroom, forcing Julian and Caleb to step back from each other whether they wanted to or not.
“Good, you’re here already,” McKay said as he glanced at Caleb, completely ignoring the fact that his eyes were still glowing blue. “Get everyone together in the living room. Jake and I talked to Kiara Harrington enough to know that her father’s plan is worse than we even imagined. I want everyone to hear the details ASAP.”
Caleb threw one more glare at Julian before heading down the steps with another growl, giving Brielle a chance to let out a sigh of relief. They might be facing whatever nightmare Xavier Harrington had planned, but at least her brother and soul mate weren’t at each other’s throats—yet.
* * *
“In a nutshell, my father has completely lost his ever-loving mind,” Kiara said from where she sat beside Julian on the couch. The wound on her forehead directly above her left eyebrow hadn’t needed stitches, but the doctor had put a small bandage on it. While she still seemed a little worn-out, Caleb noticed she wasn’t as pale as she’d been earlier. Then again, that might have something to do with the fact that she was near Julian. The moment he’d draped his arm around her shoulder, the tension had visibly drained from her body. “He wants to destroy the world to save it.”
That announcement was met with the requisite stunned silence, but Caleb still found himself focusing more on Julian than the words Kiara had just spoken. He couldn’t help it. Something about the guy irritated the hell out of him.
Based on everything Brielle had told Caleb about her brother, it was hard to think of him as anything other than a self-centered, selfish douche canoe. Kiara Harrington either didn’t know that or didn’t care. Either way, it seemed clear she was enamored with the man. Caleb knew it was none of his business. Kiara was an adult and could do whatever the hell she wanted—with whomever she wanted to do it with—but Julian was trouble. Caleb could recognize that better than anyone. The man had used his sister like a Get Out of Jail Free card for most of his life without any thought to the danger it put her in. And now, he was already trying to work his way back into Brielle’s good graces, probably wanting to make sure she’d be ready to come save his ass when things went bad again. There was no way in hell Caleb was going to stand by and let her brother use her again. Not now that he’d finally realized how important she was to him.
“Maybe you should back up a little bit and start at the beginning,” McKay said. He was leaning back against the mantel in front of the unlit fireplace, arms folded and a grim look on his face. “Tell them why your father and the Harrington Group stole the nukes.”
Kiara took a deep breath, nodding as Julian hugged her closer. “Before I do that, I should probably mention that my father isn’t like any of you. Actually, I’m not, either. No one in my family is. We’re videns. You would call us seers.”
“You mean like fortune-tellers?” Forrest asked, and Caleb could tell from his teammate’s expression that the man thought Kiara was messing with them.
“Actually, you’re closer than you think,” Kiara admitted. “There have been times in the past when my people have posed as fortune-tellers, clairvoyants, oracles, and psychics in order to earn money. But we haven’t done that in recent times, mostly because it simply isn’t necessary now.”