Heart and Soul (26 page)

The room had been warm, almost humid: a combination of the fire and the hot, sexual power that pulsed from him. But now it was downright cold. Goose bumps roughened her flesh, and she began to rub at her arms with her palms.

“I will not return just to end a bloody disagreement.”

Disagreement.
Kelsey made a choking sound, something halfway between a laugh and a sob. “There is no disagreement. I haven’t even discussed it with them. There is no time.”

“But you have the time to come and try to drag me back to England. Again.”

Kelsey didn’t have any comment. Had he always been this damned bitter? She didn’t know. It didn’t seem that way, but in the past few months, a lot of them had changed. Wrapping her arms around herself, she moved closer to the fire, trying to let the heat seep into her frozen bones.

Malachi spoke again, his voice impatient as though her silence had lasted too long. “What in the bloody hell is so important that it brings you halfway round the world? Dressed like it’s a balmy spring day, no less.”

Kelsey rubbed at her temple with two fingers. A headache had taken up residence there, and now her head was throbbing viciously. “It’s complicated.”

Feeling his eyes on her, she met his stare, hissing out a breath as the chill in the air turned to downright icy as his aggravation mounted. And it wasn’t just the cold. It was so damned thick with tension and anger, Kelsey could barely breathe through it.

“If you use short words, I just might be able to understand,” Malachi said slowly. She wasn’t fooled by his soft voice, and she had to force herself not to step away from him.

Rubbing her hands up and down her arms, she said, “Will you cut it out already? I’m freezing.”

For the longest time, all Malachi did was stare at her, his midnight eyes glowing eerily, his face still and impassive. Then he lowered his lashes, hiding his eyes from her, and the tension melted away, the temperature slowly returning to normal.

“I am still waiting.”

Kelsey blew out a shallow breath. Okay, this was going to be the really hard part.

“Two days ago, the Council brought Morgan Wakefield to Brendain. She’s been judged, and the sentence is to be carried out tomorrow night.”

He smiled, his lips peeling back from his teeth and revealing the long, deadly fangs that had yet to retract into their sheaths. Midnight-blue eyes gleamed with an unholy light as he murmured, “Good. I pray she suffers.”

Wincing, Kelsey tore her eyes away from him. Nerves had her reaching for her hair again, and she began to plait a few strands together. “This is part of the problem. I . . . ah . . . look, I talked with her. Something strange has happened. The sentence has been passed, but I can’t let it happen.”

Shoving away from the wall, Malachi stalked toward her. As he glared at her, his eyes began to glow. The midnight blue gleamed like the sun shining through stained glass. Once more, the temperature in the room dropped until it was nearly as cold as it was outside. “Get out,” he whispered.

Fear wrapped a fist around her throat, but she wouldn’t let herself back away. It was a dangerous man she was facing, and as much as she wanted to run, that was the worst thing she could do. “Malachi, can you just calm down and listen to me?” she said, keeping her voice as level as she could.

Slashing a hand through the air, Malachi snapped, “Get out.”

Kelsey bit her lip, small, pearly white teeth sinking into her plump lower lip. For half a second, Malachi was tempted to take out his fury on her—on that long, lithe body. Take her to the floor and tear her clothes off, fuck her until the fire in his blood cooled.

But he didn’t. He wasn’t ever going to be responsible for another mark on her flesh. Tension knotted his muscles as he paced the room. Every single movement seemed to pull his body even tighter, and he was certain the rage was going to spill out of him in a red-hot explosion.

She was talking again, but he’d stopped hearing her words a few minutes earlier. He knew she was still talking, but none of it made sense.

All he knew was that she wanted him to help her with that bitch. Morgan—just the sound of her name was enough to unleash the beast of hunger inside him. His fangs dropped, and he could feel his rage spiraling out of control.

“No.” He forced the word out of a tight throat. He lisped a little around his fangs as he turned and stared at her. “I can’t listen to this. Just go, Kelsey.”

Tears glowed in her eyes, and she held out a hand. “Damn it, Malachi. You’re not listening to me. Didn’t you hear a word I said?”

Malachi stared at her hand, shaking his head as he slowly backed away.

“If you won’t leave, then by God, I will,” he muttered. He didn’t even look at her.

He just disappeared into thin air and didn’t take back his mortal form until he was standing on the edge of the beach, miles away. As he stared at the icebergs that dotted the smooth surface of the water, one tear rolled down his cheek.

CHAPTER FOUR

Kelsey paced the room, rubbing her hands up and down her arms, chilled to the bone. Not from the cold, though. The fire had the room plenty warm.

She was chilled from the inside out.

What she’d expected to happen, Kelsey really didn’t know, but it sure as hell hadn’t been this. She’d felt a lot of emotions when faced with Malachi, nervousness, apprehension—lust that burned hot enough to melt steel.

But she hadn’t ever really been afraid of him before. Not until just now.

“He didn’t even listen to me,” she muttered. Once she’d told him she needed him to help her convince the Council to revoke the order, it was like she’d been talking to a wall.

Stopping in the middle of the floor, she blew out a breath and jerked her hands through her hair, linking her fingers at the nape of her neck. Despondent, she stared at the stark, practically bare room.

No time for this.
There was a clock ticking. She could all but hear the seconds ticking by as she stood there, worrying. Since Malachi wouldn’t—or couldn’t—help, she had to figure out somebody else. She could get the girl out of the dungeon, even away from Brendain. But Morgan—Agnes . . . “Damn it, I don’t even know what to call her,” Kelsey growled.

Nessa. It was Nessa. Calling her by Morgan’s name was horrific, an insult to the woman that Kelsey knew.

“She’s Nessa,” Kelsey said, taking a deep breath and blowing it out softly. She closed her eyes and murmured it one more time. “Nessa.” Tears stung her eyes as she let herself fully acknowledge what had happened. Her dearest friend in the world was alive.
How
it had happened, she didn’t know. But when she’d touched the woman’s hand, it hadn’t been a stranger she had touched. It hadn’t been an evil, cold-hearted murderess, either.

It had been Nessa. There was a whole new mess of problems they would have to deal with. Kelsey could handle that, once she got past this first one. This first mountainous one.

For one, she didn’t seem to realize just how much time had passed. Nessa seemed to be frozen in a time that was several hundreds years gone. And there were that odd look that kept coming into her eyes, a look that made Kelsey wonder about her sanity.

Then there were the few moments Nessa seemed lucid, sane. And clearly aware of what was happening around her, what was going to happen. Although she didn’t seem to care. It was as though the death looming before her didn’t bother her.

But none of that mattered. Kelsey could handle all of that.

She didn’t exactly know how, but she would deal with it.

Some of the turmoil inside her calmed, and she forced her thoughts back on track. Kelsey could get Nessa out of the dungeons before the Select came for her. She could get her away from Brendain, but she couldn’t elude the Select forever, and she couldn’t keep them from coming after Nessa.

Couldn’t protect her. Not without fighting back. And the only way to stop the Select was to kill them. Kelsey couldn’t kill anybody. She was a healer, not a fighter. Taking a life would scar her, possibly beyond repair. And killing one wouldn’t do anything—they’d just keep coming.

That was assuming she
could
kill one of them.

Kelsey needed a fighter. And somebody who could also see who Nessa was. Somebody who hopefully the Council would listen to.

Malachi was out. Hell, he could have fought the Select with - out breaking a sweat. And fighting might not have even been necessary, not with Malachi. But if he wouldn’t listen to her so she could explain, there was no way she could take him near Nessa. He’d kill her, seeing only Morgan.

Elijah Crawford’s lands were out. Although he had a couple of powerful warrior witches serving him, they couldn’t hope to equal the Select. Not yet. And that would be the first place they would look for Kelsey.

Rapping her knuckles against her head, she muttered, “Think.”

Face after face flashed through her mind, but she dismissed them all.

Varesh was a damned fine warrior, but he would consider what she asked a betrayal. Annika wasn’t strong enough yet. Flopping down on the couch, she propped her chin on one fisted hand and stared at the floor.

“So many damned Hunters. And not one . . .”

Her voice trailed off as another face popped into mind. His silvery gray eyes seemed out of place in his dark, lean face. Those eyes shimmered with barely banked power.

There were stories that he had driven one of the instructors at Brendain into retirement, he was so damned stubborn. And he’d been an exceptional witch—so exceptional he’d passed his instructors’ level before the first year of training was out. They’d ended up bringing Agnes back to Brendain to teach him. It was rumored that the Select had tried to recruit him.

He’d chosen the life of a Hunter over the Select. Then he’d left the Hunters after less than fifty years of service.

As powerful as he was, if he had wanted to, he could have stayed with them for two or three centuries. But Vax Matthews had chosen solitude instead.

Kelsey could understand that. Warrior or not, he was still a witch. Taking lives wasn’t as easy for witches, whether they were warriors or not. It was well-known among the Hunters that witches didn’t always last long in the field.

But he was still a powerful bastard.

And he’d known Nessa.

More, he’d been approached to serve the Council. There was a possibility they might listen. Tobias would listen. Perhaps Vax would be enough to convince Andreas.

It would take an earthquake, famine, or flood to convince Niko, but if Andreas believed them, then it didn’t matter. Yeah, it was possible.

“Better than standing here and wasting time,” she whispered.

Pushing to her feet, Kelsey took one last look around the house. She could smell Malachi, a deep, wild, musky scent that made her blood burn. Slowly, she breathed it in. As it flooded her system, her heart kicked up a few paces, and her skin started to feel hot, stretched too small.

“Maybe its better this way,” she muttered.

After all, if Malachi had listened to her, she would have been placing herself in very close contact with him for an indeterminate amount of time. Definitely not the way to keep her obsession with him under control. She was going to have a hard enough time dealing with it now that she knew exactly how that hard, cool body felt against hers.

Shoving those thoughts aside, Kelsey moved to take care of the fire. Once it was out, she paused, wondering if she should leave Malachi some sort of note.
And say what? Sorry I freaked you out. Please don’t tell the Council . . .

No. She’d just leave. And the sooner the better. She didn’t want to be here when Malachi came back.

For a minute, she stared out the window at the blowing snow.

Then she pulled the image of Vax’s face to mind and focused.

 

 

VAX SENSED THE DISRUPTION OF AIR ONLY SECONDS before the witch appeared. It was a subtle, controlled entrance, one only a powerful witch was capable of. Years of instinct had him reacting offensively as he rolled away from the pretty brunette in his bed.

Kylie Rossberg reached out for him, her eyes unfocused, her pretty red mouth parted, her lips swollen. Vax had only a moment to focus on her and force her mind into unconsciousness before turning to face the witch.

It definitely wasn’t somebody he’d been expecting.

But Kelsey Cassidy was a sight better than somebody he’d have to fight. Especially with a mortal lying just a few feet behind him. Planting his hands on his hips, he glared at her and demanded, “You got any idea how to call first? Or maybe go to the door and knock?”

A bright pink flush settled on her cheeks as she glanced first at Vax and then the brunette sleeping behind him. The scent of sex was heavy in the air, and judging from the look in Kelsey’s eyes, she knew exactly what she had just interrupted. “Ahhh . . . I haven’t ever seen your house, so I didn’t know where the door was.”