Allie's War Season Three (71 page)

I smiled, slinging an arm around him. "It's not my
real
birthday, you know."

"I know, I know...but..." he shrugged. "It's sort of
our
version. Seeing as how it was mom's version, I guess it's ours now."

I flinched. I hadn't actually thought about our mother in awhile, either. The realization once again brought back some of the choicer comments Jon made in that dressing room. It also made me wonder just how good I was getting at stuffing my emotions.

"I said I was sorry," he reminded me, softer.

"It's not that," I said. I looked up at him, realizing suddenly what I'd wanted to say before, but hadn't. "I
do
want to go there," I said. "Soon, I mean."

"To San Francisco?"

"Yeah," I said, nodding. "I really do. I want to find Cass."

Jon nodded, his face unreadable. After another moment, he shrugged.

"Well, I'm sure we'll hear from Gar soon enough," he said, his voice neutral. "He can tell us if it makes sense for us to head that way. In the meantime, it probably doesn't hurt to try and get confirmation that the disease won't kill you. From someone
other
than our enemies, I mean. I hear the science staff is working on a test for all of us...seer and human. They're hoping not all humans are susceptible to it, either..."

I nodded back, but still felt like there was something I wanted to say.

I wanted him to know something about what I was worried about in regard to Cass, I guess. I needed to express it to someone, and Jon of all people might be the only one who really understood, since he'd known her as long as I had. I fumbled with words, trying to think about how best to explain what I was worried about...if it even made sense to me, or if it was more in that 'unexplainable feeling' category.

I was still struggling a bit with my own mental sluggishness, when Jon nudged my shoulder, moving out from under my arm. It didn't occur to me why he might do that until I saw his eyes trained on one set of elevator doors.

Before I'd focused on who was inside, Jon let out a low whistle.

"Well I guess that answers that question," he commented.

"Which question was that?" I said, still looking blankly at the elevator doors.

"You didn't overdress," Jon replied, nudging me playfully with his arm again.

By then, Revik had emerged. Seeing him, I felt an odd rush of nerves. I'd never really seen him dressed up before, other than for that shindig in Delhi, and once in the Barrier. Since that time in the Barrier had been for his wedding to his first wife, Elise, I didn't really have a burning desire to dwell on how good he'd looked then. As far as the night in Delhi, I'd had a lot of other things on my mind at that press conference, including the fact that he might be there to kidnap or kill me.

He looked different now anyway, and not only because he wasn't as buffed out or as arrogant as he had been at that hotel in India. His light, the way he carried himself, the expression on his face...everything was different. And he looked nervous, too. In fact, he bounced a little on his heels as he walked, like he did when he thought he might get into a fight. I saw Wreg see me first, and grin, right before he nudged Revik in the arm, saying something to him without taking his eyes off me. I didn't hear it, of course, or catch any part of it in the Barrier even, but the look on Wreg's face brought warmth to mine.

It was pretty hard not to stare at Revik, though.

The tux he wore looked like it had been made for him, but it was of an unusual style I'd only seen on the feeds. The jacket and shirt had what they called a Mandarin-style collar, and he wore a light gray embroidered vest that somehow made the suit look dated despite the modern lines. He'd managed to get a haircut sometime that day, too, leaving it shorter than I'd seen it in over a year. For some reason he looked taller to me again, too, but that might have been the lines of the black tux...or maybe the dress shoes.

In any case, he looked good. Really, really good...maybe better than I'd ever seen him look. The style of the tux suited the long lines of his body, and fit somehow with the more feral, angular lines of his face. The dark jacket and light vest also seemed to highlight his clear eyes, making them stand out more than usual.

Just looking at him made me feel nervous.

I couldn't quite remember feeling so awkward around him before actually, as he walked up to where I stood. He had kind of a funny look on his face as he stared at me, too...enough that I went into a mild panic, wondering if maybe I should have gone with the green dress after all.

I'd gone with one of the floor-length styles in the end. They looked more elegant to me, and less show-girly, and I already knew he'd liked me in a long dress once before. This one was strapless though, a dark gold detailed with black...and according to Jon, more classic looking than what I'd worn in Delhi. The material tightened to a near corset over my upper body, with looser fabric forming a softer decolletage. The fabric did something similar below my waist, bunching up around my hips before draping straight down my legs to form a slight train in back. The saleswoman found me open-toed, gold, high-heeled shoes to go with it, and even put up my hair with gold and green pins. I also wore dark, satin gloves she'd insisted went with the dress, since they matched the embroidered detail on the front. They went up past my elbows, and considering I'd never really worn gloves like that before, were surprisingly comfortable.

I tugged on the ends of them anyway, avoiding looking at Revik and Wreg, even as Jon nudged me, rolling his eyes.

I definitely should have gone with the green.

"There's green in it..." Jon said quietly.

"Not really green," I muttered. "It's gold."

"Goldish-green..."

"It's gold, Jon," I muttered again. "Bordering on yellow..."

By then Revik and Wreg were standing there, and Jon and I fell silent. Wreg was grinning at me, shoving at Revik's arm again like we were all in grammar school.

Revik gave him a half-smile, but it didn't really dissipate the awkward look on his face when he glanced back at me, pulling at the sleeve of his shirt to straighten it. He even wore cufflinks, I noticed, with what looked like some kind of gold symbol on them. After giving me the quickest once-over imaginable, his clear eyes returned to mine, holding more light than usual.

"You ready?" he asked me.

Wreg laughed. "Gods almighty, Nenz. Sword or not...you
are
a pup. That's all you have to say to your wife when she looks like
that?"

Revik gave me a sideways look. I saw that smile touch his lips again, but he didn't seem to react much to what Wreg had said. Even so, I saw his eyes flicker down the length of me once more, lingering longer that time, long enough to stare at my feet. Maybe he'd overheard Jon's shoe comment and wanted to check them out for himself.

"You ready?" he asked me again, giving me another of those smiles.

Nodding, I took his proffered arm, rolling my eyes at Wreg when he clicked at the two of us in mock disapproval. I let Revik lead me down the stairs towards the main doors of the hotel, aware now that more than simply Jon and Wreg were watching us go. The female seer from the dress shop and her two assistants stood by the glass doors, along with another female seer I was slowly getting to know who worked the registration desk. I could feel Jax, Mila and Holo around too, along with Neela and that seer who just joined the military arm, Oli.

I glanced back to see Wreg saying something in Jon's ear, right before Jon laughed, the sound bursting out of him in near-surprise. Shaking his head at the muscular seer with an amused smile, Jon turned that smile towards me, giving me a 'go on, leave' gesture with one hand, as if shooing us out the door. I couldn't help smiling at him first, though...that laugh almost sounded like a real laugh to me. It was certainly the closest I'd heard from him since Dorje and Vash died, and maybe even for a few months before then.

But I didn't have long to think about that, either.

I'd expected there to be a car waiting for us, since we couldn't exactly walk around the city incognito and our clothes would only make us more conspicuous, not less...but I hadn't really expected it to be a limo. I couldn't help laughing when the driver opened the door for me.

"Really?" I said, glancing at Revik. "You didn't have to do this, you know."

He just smiled, not answering until he'd already followed me into the back seat of the white car.

"I seem to remember getting lucky with you in limos in the past," he said. When I laughed, his voice dropped to a near murmur in my ear. "Seriously. Is it too much?"

I shook my head, smiling at him, but still oddly nervous. When I turned my head, his face was still only a few inches from mine. He was looking at the dress again, his eyes a bit more predatory that time.

When he glanced up, I laughed more openly that time, and he smiled.

"Too much?" I said.

He shook his head, looking me over once more, his expression unreadable that time.

I bit my lip, realizing again he really might not tell me if he liked the dress or not. The Syrimne version of him had been the only one to really lavish me with compliments, and he'd probably been the most superficial of all the versions of Revik I'd known...or the crudest anyway. He certainly had a more idealized image of me...and of us...that made it harder to take his words seriously. In any case, the compliments hadn't really hit their mark with me a lot of the time.

This version reminded me more of the old Revik...the one who only complimented me once, as far as I could remember, and that time, he'd been trying to get me into bed. Getting compliments out of
that
Revik had been like getting blood out of a stone. Most of the time, I didn't mind, but at times like this, it could make me a little paranoid.

I could tell he didn't hate it. He was probably just relieved I didn't look like a Lao Hu prostitute.

I did my best to look out the window, to try and guess where we were going, when he leaned closer to me, kissing my throat. He did it slowly, putting light into his tongue so that my brain stuttered, despite the caution I still felt from his light. He took my hand in the same moment, caressing my fingers through the glove as he looked down at my satin-clad arm. I saw the driver glance at us in the mirror and smile. It occurred to me in the same instant that I knew him...or recognized him, anyway. He was another of Wreg's new recruits.

"Can we really go to a restaurant like this?" I said. "With our real faces, I mean? Isn't that kind of risky? We're still wanted criminals, after all..."

"I think it will be okay," he said. He smiled at me vaguely, glancing up from where he'd been tracing my gloved wrist with his fingers. His touch remained soft, as if he were tasting my light as much as my skin through the thin material, but it was distracting as hell.

"Where are we going?" I said, knowing he probably wouldn't answer.

Smiling faintly, he just shook his head.

"You're really not going to tell me?" I said, smiling at the look in his eyes. "But we're already in the car..."

"I'm not sure if I've made up my mind yet," he said. He caressed my gloved fingers lightly again before leaning closer to murmur against my ear. "Gods, Alyson. I'm not sure if I'm going to make it through dinner..."

I laughed, looking up at him again. "Meaning what?"

He motioned, seer-fashion, towards my clothes, his hand resting briefly where the dress cut in at my waist. His eyes turned predatory again, right before I felt a coil of pain leave his light, seeming to wrap around and into my skin, and down my legs. That one was a lot less subtle. My light opened in response, enough that his expression tightened. His fingers gripped my waist a little harder, just before light left his hand, pulsing against me again, reminding me of what he'd done to me that morning in his old room, trying to get me to lose control.

By the time he eased up with his light and the shiver of pain had finished passing through, I found myself struggling a bit to hold his gaze.

"I thought you wanted to wait," I said, my voice lower.

He didn't look up from the dress. "Rethinking that right now, wife," he said, his voice distracted. "Wreg and the others have bets...he was giving me shit about it as soon as he saw you. Kept saying, 'good luck, brother'...and 'see you on the other side'..." Revik grunted, his eyes still on the dress. "Bastards."

I laughed. "Well, it's your fault. You should never have told them."

"I didn't," he said, looking up briefly. "I didn't tell them anything, Allie. Wreg could tell I hadn't had much sex yet...he and Jax started the bet. I think it's on the likelihood of one of us giving the other an orgasm before we make it back to the hotel."