Darkness Seduced (Primal Heat Trilogy #2) (Order of the Blade) (22 page)

But there was no mistaking the fluttering and instability of Quinn’s energy.

The dude was worried.

“If you’ve met a second
sheva
, that means Grace and I aren’t safe,” Quinn said. “Destiny came back for you, which means she’ll come back for us. Fuck! I thought we’d defeated the curse. I thought it was over.”

Gideon slowly began to relax, finally understanding Quinn’s agitation. “You’re not going to kill Lily, are you?”

Quinn shot him a resigned look. “Who would I be to kill your
sheva
when I wouldn’t let you kill mine?” He stalked across the room, his hands clasped in his hair. “What do we do now, Gideon? What the hell do we do now?”

“We continue forward,” Gideon said. “We get Lily to translate the writing on the stone in hopes we can find Frank, or find out why Ezekiel’s prison walls are weakening, and we try to find Drew.” Frank had kidnapped Dante’s son, Drew, the night the Order had rescued Ana and killed Nate. They all believed Drew was a key component to freeing Ezekiel, and they had to retrieve the young Calydon before he could be used. “And when destiny comes to find you and Grace, you stop her again.”

Quinn spun toward him, his expression fierce and raw with fear. “Grace almost died last time we fought off our destiny. I can’t lose her, Gideon
. I can’t
.”

“I know.” Gideon softened his voice. “I was there. I remember.”

Quinn took a deep breath and settled his gaze on Gideon. “What are you going to do about Lily? Are you going to complete the bond with her?”

“And go through what you went through with Grace? No chance.” The words didn’t sit well for Gideon as he spoke them. Logically and morally, he knew that completing the bond with Lily was to be avoided at all costs. Centuries-old male instincts were growling with displeasure at the very thought of letting Lily go.

Gideon heard the shower turn on, and suddenly envisioned her clothes sliding off her body and hitting the floor, the water caressing her skin—

Quinn let out a soft chuckle of irony. “Not so easy to walk away from her, is it?”

Gideon groaned and paced across the room to the window Quinn had opened, sticking his head outside to catch the fresh air and listen to the damn birds, instead of getting a high off the faint hint of lilac coming from the bathroom. “No. It’s not.”

“I tried to resist. Grace tried. And we failed.” Quinn came to stand beside him, shoulder to shoulder. “You want my advice?”

“No.”

“Your only chance is to get her out of your life. If you guys stay together, you have no shot at keeping your distance.”

“She needs my protection.” Gideon ground his jaw, knowing Quinn spoke the truth. He wasn’t a dumbass, and he knew full well that the longer he spent with her, the harder it would be not to throw her down on the nearest horizontal surface and stoke the fires between them until she was his, completely and forever. “I can’t walk away from her.”

“You think it’s hard now? It just gets worse.”

Gideon slanted a look at Quinn. “You regret staying with Grace?”

“Hell, no. It ripped me to hell and back when she almost died, but it’s worth every fucking minute of it.” Quinn was quiet for a minute as he propped his shoulder against the wall. “There’s no going back for me, Gideon, but you don’t have go down that road. Grace is the best thing that has ever happened to me, and also the worst. And it’s not over.” He cursed softly and rubbed his hand over his own brand. “I can’t believe you have another
sheva.
”

“Me either.” It sucked, yeah. It was wrong, sure. But damned if Gideon couldn’t help feeling an intense, powerful satisfaction each time he thought of Lily carrying his mark. He wanted it. He wanted her. He wanted to complete the damn bond. When he’d met his first
sheva
, it had been about intense sexual need. With Lily, it was so much more, so much deeper, so much more intense. Shit. He was in trouble, wasn’t he?

Quinn shot Gideon a knowing look. “You dealing okay?”

Quinn was one of the rookies who’d stayed with him on the grave. Quinn and Elijah had stayed with him. They were the only two beings on the earth that knew what that experience had done to Gideon the first time. Elijah was dead, but Quinn would know how having another
sheva
would affect him.

Gideon gave Quinn a look and said nothing.

He didn’t need to.

Since they’d blood bonded five hundred years ago, Quinn could get into his mind, and he into Quinn’s. And Elijah’s. None of them ever bothered to lie to each other, or to hide their emotions. There was no point, not from the three of them. Others were a different story. Gideon kept the rest of the Order out of his damn head, except for the terse commands during battle. Hence Gideon’s legendary reputation as an ice cold killer. Quinn knew better.

“Do you think if I separated from her, that would really work?” Gideon asked. “Or would destiny find a way to bring us back together? Is there really any way to win? To stop our fate?”

“There has to be.” Quinn’s voice was strong, firm. “I have something I’m not willing to lose, so yeah, I have to believe there’s a way to beat destiny. Or at least beat her back each time and win the small battles, so you never lose the war.”

Gideon worked his jaw. “You and Grace are the only ones in history to have made it this far. Two thousand years, and only one couple has survived a complete bonding.” His gaze flicked to the bathroom. “Lily and I could crash and burn like everyone else.”

“Yeah, you could.”

Gideon thought of Lily’s strength and knew if anyone had a chance to win, it would be her. Except for the Satinka... Shit. He’d forgotten about that.

“She’s
Satinka?
”

He grimaced at the thought Quinn had picked up from his mind. “Not just Satinka. I heard her bells.” He sensed Quinn would probably know what that meant, and when Quinn cursed, he knew he’d been right.

“Jesus, man. You’ll kill her.”

“No shit. Already would have if Kane hadn’t been there.”

“You have to separate.” Quinn turned to face him. “You
have
to, and it has nothing to do with the
sheva
bond. I’ll put someone else on her, and you stay away from her.”

“I can’t—”

“You
will
.” Quinn’s jaw flexed. “We need her for Order business, and you don’t have the right to drain her. I’ll violate my pack Oath and not kill her for the mere fact she’s your
sheva
, but I’m damn well using her to stop Ezekiel from getting out.”

Gideon stared at Quinn as his words settled in, as the pieces started to fall in place. “That’s what he wants her for,” he realized. “He wants her for her magic.”

“Who?”

“Frank Tully. Nate’s partner. Lily gave me his name. We know who we’re looking for now.”

“Frank Tully,” Quinn repeated. “He’s the one who was manipulating us? He’s taken over?”

“Seems that way.” Gideon paced the room, thinking. “He’s after Lily, even though she doesn’t have the stone. He must want to use her magic.” He looked at Quinn. “Somehow, he’s going to use her to free Ezekiel. She’s part of the plan, along with the Calydon weapons he harvested from all the dead Calydons Nate murdered over the last couple months.”

Quinn let out a low whistle. “He’ll be coming after her, then. It’s just a matter of time until he realizes where she is. We need to be ready.” He strode toward the door, his concern about Grace subordinated to the warrior who had a job to do. “Meet me downstairs with Lily as soon as she’s done in the bathroom. We need her to read the inscriptions on that knife. I’m going to go alert the team to be on the lookout for Frank or his Calydons coming after her. Then we’ll put Kane on her and you take off.” Quinn’s eyes glittered. “And don’t worry if you can’t bring yourself to leave her. I’ll make sure it happens.”

“You mean, you’ll knock me out so you can take her?”

Quinn nodded. “Trust me, Gideon. It’s the right choice.”

Gideon scowled as Quinn strode from the room. Quinn had raised his mental shields at the last minute, but it had been a fraction of a second too late. Gideon had caught his teammate’s thoughts: if Lily really was a necessary key to Frank freeing Ezekiel, then the only way to truly stop Frank might be to kill Lily so he couldn’t use her.

Gideon had seen the determination in Quinn’s mind, and knew Quinn was already steeling himself to do what would need to be done, if it got to that point. Such a neat solution, to kill one of the critical components to Frank’s plan. Sacrifice one innocent to save millions.

It was an easy, automatic choice. It was a decision Gideon had made hundreds of times in order to make the world safe, to protect the thousands who would have died otherwise. It was the essence of who Gideon was, of his oath to the Order and the girl who’d died so he could live five hundred years ago.

It was who he was.

Lily, quite simply, might be too dangerous to be allowed to live.

Then Gideon heard the soft sound of singing coming from the bathroom, and he closed his eyes, allowing the beauty of it to fill him. It spread through him like a violet light, the scent of spring, and the warm rays of a summer sun, reaching into the parts of him that had been dark, cold and silent for so long.

Gideon Roarke, Order member, would do his job.

Gideon Roarke, bonded male, had different priorities. Damn.

* * *

Lily lifted her face, letting the hot water wash over her as she scrubbed her hair with the shampoo Grace had left for her. It smelled like lilacs.

Lilacs.

After two years of deprivation...lilacs just smelled...decadent? Frilly? Silly?

Silly.

That was it.

She used to care what her shampoo smelled like. She used to pay money for highlights and a flattering haircut. There was a time when she made certain to put only all-natural products on her skin.

Now, things like that just seemed...silly. It felt foreign, like some confusing world she didn’t understand anymore.

Lily turned and let the hot water wash the soap out of her hair. She wanted to care about her hair. She wanted to fill her brain with little thoughts, like whether the conditioner was adequate, and whether the shirt she was wearing was flattering. She wanted to be the woman who hounded her publicist to find out whether enough tickets had been sold to her upcoming lecture.

She didn’t want to be thinking about the heat pulsing in her forearm, about turning into a murderer like her grandmother. She didn’t want to be consumed with the reality of being bonded to Gideon. She didn’t want to recall having Frank’s ice cold eyes focused on her, and wonder what he was planning for her.

Lily dumped conditioner in her hair and mechanically worked it through the strands, her belly aching. She’d thought a leisurely shower would be wonderful. Healing. Purifying. She’d been in Gideon’s sweatpants in the woods for so long. She’d been in her skirt and blouse at Nate’s for two years. Now that she’d been able to shed them, to cleanse all the vileness from her body...it should have been invigorating, right? Healing?

But she felt no relief. In fact, she almost felt more vulnerable and more naked, as if the filthy skirt and blouse had been her armor against becoming soft or weak. Now that she smelled like lilacs and had been undone by the kisses of a man who made her entire soul shift when he walked into the room, she didn’t know who she was anymore. She felt like she was straddling two worlds: the woman in battle fighting to be strong and to survive, and the female who wanted to be delicate, pretty and consumed by a strong, powerful man whose entire being was focused on her safety and her world.

Gideon was out in the bedroom, negotiating for her life with another Order member. He was her barrier against evil and death, but he was also her ticket to hell.

But she couldn’t stop wanting him.

Lily was too smart, too educated to fall into the trap of being a
sheva
. She’d spent her life intellectualizing all that Gideon and his race were. She’d tried to control their power by learning about it and understanding. She didn’t react emotionally to things. She didn’t have some burning female wooziness when it came to men, especially male Calydons.

And yet the things she felt for Gideon had nothing to do with her mind. It was her body. Her soul. A craving for him so deep it hurt.

She knew her feelings for him couldn’t be healthy. It was too intense, too desperate. Too needy. He made her feel like a woman, but it was sexual and sensual, reverberating in her core. Not light and frivolous, like wearing a cute outfit for him and exchanging flirty glances…not that she’d ever been flirty or frivolous in her life. She had no idea how to do that, or be that kind of woman.

Her desire for Gideon made her body pulse with longing. It was a relentless calling that made her not care if she was covered in mud and blood, because the attraction and the need were so deep inside her—

A thud from outside the shower curtain made her jump. “Lily.”

She caught her breath at the nearness of Gideon’s voice, realizing that he was in the bathroom. “I’m still in the shower.”

He yanked open the shower curtain and she jumped back with a yelp. His eyes were burning, so dark.

Her heart started pounding and she grabbed the shower curtain to cover herself. “Gideon! This is so not a good idea.”

He said nothing as he stepped into the shower, the water pounding on his clothes, like tears darkening the cotton of his shirt. Dirt swirled off the treads of his boots, turning the water a light beige. Water teased his blond locks, dampening them to his head, changing the shade of his hair to a dark brown.

Gideon grabbed the shower curtain and ripped it out of her hand, exposing her. Yet still, he didn’t look at her body. His gaze was riveted to her face, so intense she felt as if steam were rising off her.

He was every bit the warrior, the dominating Calydon who took what he wanted and wasted no thought on the needs of others. The marks on her forearms began to pulse, searing her skin as if they were on fire, and she couldn’t make herself turn away from him. She didn’t want to make herself leave, even as her mind was screaming at her to run.