Exhale (33 page)

She exhaled hard and straightened, her chest heaving. He stood and leaned over her mouth, close enough to feel heat against his skin, but not touching.

She grabbed his cock, stroked it. Her lids lowered. “I want you, Gavin. Now,” she said in a low, raspy voice. Her grip on him tightened, and she drew the head of his dick toward her wetness. He sucked in a heavy breath and held it. God, was he finally going to—

The front door slammed in the other room, and Adriene’s laughter filled the air. Words bantered back and forth, keys clanged onto a table.

Alarm shot across Zoe’s face. She pushed him away, dropped her feet to the floor.

Fuck. Maybe if he hid…

Closet. He started toward it. She got off the dresser, gathered his clothes, and thrust the jumble into his hands.

He accepted the unruly ball. Hope sunk along with his erection.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered and swept his forehead. She pressed her lips to his in a quick kiss. “You have to go home.”

Funny. He’d just
found
home. He hadn’t expected an eviction notice so soon. He sighed.

She cut her eyes to the door, then her ridged brow smoothed. “Come to my dreams tonight, and we’ll finish this…
conversation
then.”

His heart bounced so high, it smacked against his throat. He kissed her through his grin. “I’ll see you soon.”

Chapter Thirty-three

“How’re you going, Pancake?” Gavin whispered behind her.

Zoe spun around, long hair whipping her cheek. Her beautiful lover scooped her into his arms like a groom on his wedding night and hung his parted lips just above hers. Smoke floated high in the heavy, orange-tinged air of the Dreaming.

Damn Fyres.

“I missed you, Flapjack,” she whispered back, shifting her bare legs with a little kick. A light drizzle of sand fell from her toes. He glanced sideways in their direction. He always noticed her feet. Like he had some kind of love affair with them he tried to hide from her. She smiled.

The heat from a hungry kiss raced through her fast-pumping heart and spread to her body’s outer reaches. Gavin set her down. She slid her fingers between two of the buttons on his shirt and rubbed the soft fabric with her thumb and forefinger. Jeez, his tan and tats against the white shirt and rolled up pants got the juices flowing. So unlike his usual attire, but so hot. She swallowed the saliva flooding her mouth.

Zoe cleared her throat. “Sorry about the interruption tonight.”

“Would you really have done it if the girls hadn’t come home early?”

Her mouth didn’t give her brain a chance to think about the answer. “Absolutely.”

He leaned closer. The shine on his lip ring shadowed when he licked it. “You trust me enough to have unprotected sex with me? Despite the fact I’ve been with hundreds of women and haven’t got the results of my HIV test back yet?”

His cedar scent had followed him into the Dreaming. She loved that smell. “There’s a little uncertainty, sure. But, yeah. I trust you. Is there a reason I shouldn’t?”

“I don’t trust myself, Zed. Fuck knows why you would. But I haven’t been with anyone else since we met in the Dreaming. And I intend to keep it that way, whether you do or not.”

She yanked the shirt, and a button popped off, grazing her shoulder. He stumbled forward and caught himself before plowing into her.

“I have zero interest in anyone else.” Understatement of the decade. She pressed her lips to the warm brown triangle of skin and scattering of dark hair peeking from the shirt in the wake of the button’s untimely demise. Her hand found his cock, which stiffened the moment she touched it, and she rolled her cheek against his chest to look up at him. His Adam’s apple bobbed.

He grabbed her wrist and guided it away. “I need to tell you something before we go any further.”

A bomb dropped in her stomach. She straightened. Oh, shit. She stepped back. The countdown initiated. He was trying to let her down easy and—

“I l—” He stopped, frowned, and twisted his neck to the left. The tattoos on his right forearm blared like red-hot rivers of lava.

The gut bomb fizzled, rolled over, and played dead. “Wait, what?” Couldn’t have been what it
sounded
like he was going to say.

He scowled at the clouds. “Fuck.”

Distant, anxious voices pierced the air. Running feet. A scream. Smoke wound in fast-moving curls into the sky. “I have to go. Sorry, Zed. I’ll try to find you later.”

Before she could protest, he took two steps away. His eyes spoke a soft apology, then he darted off to help someone else. Ridiculously, she held out a hand to him as he jogged out of sight.

Shit.

She dropped her butt to the sand, sifted through it, and unearthed a couple of shells. The tide rolled out and in. Just like Gavin. Mr. Popular—in Realis and in the Dreaming—here one minute, off to save the world the next. She sighed and tossed a shell into an oncoming wave. What happened to the dreams where it was just the two of them?

He regrets leaving you.

Zoe flinched and turned around, shading her eyes from the sun’s glare. Iri.

“You know, I get that you can read my thoughts, but it’s really annoying. If you
spoke
to me instead of
thinking
at me, it’d be easier to forget that you’re inside my brain.” She faced the ocean again and shook her head.

Iri sat beside her, his dark face turned to hers. The yellow
moko
swirled with a life of its own. “I am sorry for the trouble I caused you and Gavin. I had to protect Whetu. A parent sometimes does desperate things for his child. It is often not a choice, but an imperative.”

She dragged her gaze to his. Warm golden eyes returned her stare—like sunshine, but filtered through thunderheads. Cloudy with a slight chance of honesty. “You’re referring to Jack as well as yourself, I take it.”

He shrugged and looked away. “It is human nature to protect what we love.”

“But you’re not human, and neither is my father—at least not a hundred percent.” Which made her…what?

“Perhaps, then, protectiveness is an innately mammalian characteristic, a trait embedded in evolved DNA. Either way, it demands our attention. We do what we must. Even if it involves giving up our children for their own good.” He glanced at the sky. “Or trading our lives for theirs.”

She shivered. Maybe Jack’s early departure from her life when she was a baby was the kindest gift he could have given her. If he and Mother had stayed together, none of them would have survived the resulting friction burns.

She looked down the beach in the direction Gavin had taken off. He was long gone, but the trail of his footsteps remained. Her chest ached.

“I accept your apology, Iri. Let Gavin help you rescue your daughter. Give him the location of the door, and leave us the hell alone. I’m tired of the drama. I have whales to save.”

Iri nodded. “I understand.” He got to his feet and started to walk away.

I hope you get Whetu back,
Zoe thought to him.
No daughter should grow up without her father.

Iri paused but didn’t turn around.
Thank you.

A sudden gale kicked up behind him. His shoulders sagged. He evaporated into tiny yellow particles, and the wind swept him away.

* * * *

A Just Breathe song blared to life. Zoe sat up, fumbling in bed for her phone. Gavin’s voice scream-sang, ‘Are you just a dream? You fill my life with colors I’ve never seen…’ That new ringtone made a hell of an alarm clock. She threw back the covers. Something clunked to the floor. With a grunt, she leaned over, hair brushing the carpet, and snatched the cell.

“Hello?” She sat up, squinted through the darkness at the bright red numbers on her bedside clock, and rubbed her eyes. Who was calling at five a.m.?

“Zoe, it’s Randy.” His voice strained.

Randy never let anything get to him. Something was wrong. She stood up. “What is it? What happened?”

“I got a call from a guy at the National Parks and Wildlife Service office in New South Wales. They have a newborn humpback calf in Sydney Harbour.”

“What?” Zoe’s hand shook so hard, she almost dropped the phone. She paced the floor, heart coughing in her chest.

Randy sighed. “No mother in sight. They’ve asked Cetacean Research Network to get involved. I’m flying over from New Zealand today.”

Blood rushed in her ears. With a flip of a switch, her amorphous worry focused into a sharp bolt of anger. “You’re not coming here though, right?”

“No.” He exhaled loudly.

“No, but—?”

“But I need you to meet me in Sydney tomorrow. Assuming we haven’t resolved the problem by then.”

She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Okay, I’m gonna need some details. I’d love to help, but I can’t just drop the research here.” Especially since Iri was gone. But now wasn’t the time to tell Randy she’d pushed Iri out of the nest.

“You’ve got experience with whale rescue. This could be a matter of life and death for the calf. Your team can handle the research without you for a day or two.” He paused for a long moment. “And there are some things we need to talk about.”

Calf rescue, no problem. She’d head down to Sydney right now if she had to. But no way would she get sucked into another game of he-loves-me, he-loves-me-not ping-pong with Randy. So. Totally. Over it. “I told you, we’re through—”

“It’s about the VP job.”

She froze. “I see.”

“Yeah, so if you could meet me tomorrow, I’d appreciate it. We need your expertise and your gentle hand. There’s a 6:45 a.m. flight out of Hervey Bay with a connection in Brisbane. You can be in Sydney by ten, and at the harbor before noon.”

“What’s the calf’s status?”

“It’s swimming slowly and going up to docked boats, probably looking for its mother. Fetal folds are still visible on his side. Can’t be more than a few weeks old.”

She covered her mouth. Oh, God. Vines of panic wove their way up from her feet.

“How can I help?” A storm of maddening tingles gathered inside her nostrils. She pinched the bridge of her nose.

“At the moment, the calf seems stable. Officials and whale watch operators are looking for the mother outside the harbor. But if we don’t find her or can’t lure the baby out to a surrogate at sea, we’ll explore other options. Either way, we’ll have to evaluate the animal’s condition up close. You’re hands-down the best woman for the job. No one understands whales better.”

He had no idea. “Okay. I’ll be there.”

“Thanks, Zoe. I know you’ll—”

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” She hung up.

Calves didn’t just randomly lose their mothers without help. Something happened to that mom, and Zoe had a sinking feeling the Fyres played an active role in her ‘disappearance.’ If one of those monsters killed that humpback, there would be a lot worse than fiery hell to pay. She could take a lot of shit, but nobody messed with her whales.

Once she pulled herself together, she called Gavin.

“G’day, love,” he said.

There was that word. The one she’d
thought
he was going to say last night in her dream.

Forget it.

“Hey. Sorry for the early call.”

“I was planning to ring you after we landed.” His voice was tight.

No apology for running off in the Dreaming and leaving her high and dry once again? This day was off to a craptastic start.

She rubbed her eyes. She had to get over herself. The jealous girlfriend crap was so juvenile.

But she couldn’t help how she felt.

“Looks like I’ll be joining you in Sydney tomorrow. Any chance you could pick me up at the airport? If you’re too busy, I’ll just grab a taxi.” A side order of smoked sass slipped out with that last sentence.

Silence.

“I think it would be best if you stayed here.”

What? She straightened. “I’m going down there to work. There’s a calf without a mother in Sydney Harbour. I already failed one baby in Antarctica. No way in
hell
I’ll let it happen again.”

Another stretch of quiet phone static. What was up with him? This wasn’t just her job. It was her
life
. Being a Sentinel, he should understand that.

“It’s not safe there.” She couldn’t read his tone.

“Is Jack with you? Is that why you’re being so enigmatic?”

“Uh, yeah. How about I ring you tonight and let you know what’s happening then?”

Her lip curled. “Fine.”

She punched the ‘end’ button and dropped to the edge of her bed.

It was starting. Just when things began to make sense. Just when her job returned to some semblance of normal. Just when she stumbled into happiness with Gavin, everything fell apart.

Caught in the web of Gavin’s Sentinel responsibilities, Iri’s shifting allegiances, Jack’s unexpected appearance in her life, and Randy’s controlling behavior, she was a hapless fly at the mercy of them all.

The goddamn men in her life would be the death of her.

Chapter Thirty-four

That afternoon, south of Sydney, a two and a half meter wave roared toward the shores of Maroubra Beach, carrying three dark, surfboard-less figures. They appeared as calm as the surf was wild when they landed in the shallows. The trio walked off the breaker, turned around without a sound, and swam back out.

“Guess we found the Tongans.” Gavin flipped his sunnies on top of his head.

“Don’t those guys know they’re supposed to keep their Elemental status quiet? When people see them coming in without boards, they’re gonna start to wonder.” Jack’s gray eyes squinted against the sun.

Gavin leaned against his beat-to-hell board and slid a hand over Lucy’s slick white and navy surface. He missed the old girl. Hadn’t used her in a few years, but he was chuffed she was still in working order when he and Jack picked her up from home.

“The Tongans don’t give a shit about rules. Never have.” He pushed the surfboard into Jack’s hands and took his shirt off. Using a trick Jack had taught him, he tunneled his toes through the sand, turned his feet into Earth receptors, and sucked heavy strength from the grains. He didn’t expect trouble from the Tongans, but he might need extra Earth energy should a conflict arise. His aura glowed green with tinges of red, yellow, and blue. He grabbed Lucy from Jack and headed toward the water.