INVISIBLE FATE BOOK THREE: ALEX NOZIAK (INVISIBLE RECRUITS) (19 page)

Chapter
Forty-two

Some kisses you ease into. Some you dive. This was shouting halleluiah as I plunged over Niagara Falls with a smile on my face!

The rush started somewhere near the tips of my toes
then exploded my brain cells.

Hot. Wet. Deep. And we’d only started.

One of us moaned. Maybe it was both of us as he pressed me back onto the pillows and I held on to him every inch of the way.

His hands were in my hair, cupping my face, heating my bare skin
, and I couldn’t get enough. I didn’t want to come up for air long enough to get him naked but there was too much bedding, too many clothes between us.

I pulled back. My lips only, frantically demanding, “Here. Now.”

He snarled, which was the sexiest sound in the Universe when made by a frustrated man who wants you as much as you want him.

Then someone coughed.

We froze. His expression promised pain to someone. Skin drawn tight, nostrils flared, the blue of his eyes swallowed by the black of his pupils.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt. I can come back later.”

Kelly’s voice and the scent of chicken soup reached me at the same time.

I couldn’t help it. This time I was the one who laughed. It started as a small snort, waltzed into giggles, then became a full body chuckle I tried to muffle by pulling the duvet up to stuff in my mouth. It didn’t help.

Bran, ever the aristocrat, narrowed his heavy-lidded gaze at me, promising retribution for my enjoying his discomfort a little too much, stood with that slow, pompous dignity only mastered by Brits and male movie stars from the forties, and tugged his clothes into a semblance of neatness.

I could have told him it wasn’t working, he still looked like a frustrated, aroused Alpha male who was being thwarted.

I could see Kelly standing near the door, a tray acting as a flimsy barrier between her and Bran should she need one. She raised one brow at me, girl talk for should-I-stay-or-should-I go?

I smiled at her in return. What are good friends for except to save you from your own rash and potentially stupid mistakes. Yes, I wanted Bran. Would that have
complicated things? Enormously and that wasn’t even touching the heartbreak still splintering me at the thought of what Bran had done to my brother. That alone sobered me. Sobered and reminded me.

T
hank you Kels, and your sense of timing.

Kelly held her ground.
I owed her.

Bran gave me one last we’re-not-done-by-a-long
- shot look, which whooshed the giggles right out of me, nodded at Kelly and marched from the room.

“Oh my,” Kelly released one hand from the tray to wave
in front of her face. “Oh my, oh my, oh my.”

I scrubbed my hands over my face even as I mumbled through
my fingers. “Yeah, Bran has that impact on a lot of women.”

“
You lucky girl,” she smiled, adding, “You know you might be sending him mixed messages.”

“Seriously?” I meant it as a snide comment, mostly to myself
, but leave it to Kels to take it as a serious question.

“One minute you’re trying to kill him. The next
—” She actually blushed as she set the tray down beside me. “Just saying.”

“I know.” And boy did I. I hadn’t meant
things to get out of hand, but the road to Hades was paved with good intentions, or weak will, or both. “This soup smells great.”

Yes, I was trying to change the conversation and lord love her, Kelly let me. “Ling Mai has called
for a team meeting in about,” she glanced at her watch. Did anybody really wear a watch anymore? Now that I thought about it, Kelly always did. An old-fashioned one that looked like it belonged to someone she cared for some time ago. “In about twenty minutes,” she finished.

I choked on my sip of chicken
noodle soup. “Twenty minutes?”

“You’ve got plenty of time to get ready.”

“I don’t think there’s enough time in the world to get ready for facing Ling Mai.”

“Good point.” Not what I expected Kelly to say. “But on the bright side the fact she’s coming her
e to see and talk with you means you’re still on the team.”

Miss Sally Sunshine had a point. I refused to consider the word—yet—at the end of her comment.

I slurped my meal like an Olympic racer, ever so thankful that Kelly had tracked down my suitcase and brought me a change of clothes. I even took a shower, though I braided my wet hair before I quieted my nerves and braced my shoulders when the knock on the door came.

I’d joined Sabina, Bran and
Kelly in the front room of what looked like a hotel to rival Ling Mai’s. Only Bran would expect comfort and class from a safe house. Kelly went to answer the door but I stopped her. “I’ll get it.”

Movement gave some release from the ants crawling along my skin. Of course some of those ants were because of Bran who had been looking at me like a snack ever since I had walked into the room.

I know Kelly told me team meeting but I hadn’t really expected eight people marching into the room one after the other. Ling Mai led the procession, followed by Stone and Vaughn together, Jaylene, Mandy then Herc, and a new woman I’d never seen before.

“Who are you?” I asked, glancing back at Kelly.

“Your replacement,” came the whip-fast reply as her coal brown gaze locked with mine. Attitude in spades. But she was messing with the wrong Anglo-Native American chick, especially after she added, “You smell like a shifter.”

Suddenly Bran was at my side, one hand pressing against my shoulder hard enough to weld me to the floor. But that didn’t stop my tongue
. “I might smell like a shifter but I sure don’t
act
like one.”

Whatever was going on with my being a shifter or not was my nightmare to untangle, not her business to agitate.

I offered a take-no-prisoners smile, leaned a smidge closer to her with a small whisper meant only for her ears, “Meow.”

I thought she was going to start swinging right then, but either she had smarts she was hiding
, or a stronger sense of self preservation than she’d shown so far. Of course, Ling Mai interceded with a quick, “Alex, this is Nicki Yarblonski, our newest team member. Nicki, Alex Noziak.”

“Play nice, ladies,” Stone said, then when we both cut
as-if looks his way he added. “If you’re going to draw blood do it on your own time. Not now.”

Got the message. I grabbed the only remaining spot in the room, one Kelly saved me, that also put me right next to Bran. Beginning to wonder what side Kels was on.

Ling Mai cleared her throat. “Nice to see you alive and well, Miss Noziak.”

No she
wasn’t. Dead I was no longer a pain in her ass. Alive? Alive, I caused complications.

Bran nudged me
, which was his subtle way to tell me to play the game. I gave a tight smile and nod. There. That was mostly polite.

“After contacting the librarian for some more information on this Zaradian demon
, it appears this threat should be taken seriously.”

As if I hadn’t already? Oh, yeah, she hadn’t had gangs of angry Weres attacking her regularly for the past few days, so maybe that explained why she was a little slow on the threat assessment issue.

“Miss Sabina, I notice you’re still with us,” Ling Mai continued, doing a total about face and making every gaze whip to Sabina’s.

Oh, no you don’t. No throwing the teen witch to the wolves, metaphorically.

“She’s here because whoever wants me also wants her. If I’m not available, they’re going to go after her and the demon will be released.” Sabina would probably die, too, and I made sure my tone said just that.

Ling Mai’s expression
was a cross between how droll, the screw-up-speaks and not-our-problem.

Stone was the one who stepped in to avoid a second dust up. “Alex has some valid points. We’ve agreed the primary goal is to stop the release of this demon.”

“And all we know about the process is that a witch is needed to make that happen. Sabina and I have been targeted as witches who possess whatever talents they want.”

“How do we know other witches aren’t also being held?” New Girl said, slurring the word
witches
just enough to indicate what she really meant.

“Because they keep coming after us,” I replied, g
lancing at the rest of the room, a duh tone in my voice.

Ling Mai interceded
, “If the demon is successfully called—”

“Holy shit,
humans are screwed,” Herc blurted out, earning an eye roll from Stone.

Sabi
na leaned toward me to whisper, “Is that what she meant?”

I nodded.
“Yup. We’re all about to get screwed if Z-demon dude gets here.”

“Then why didn’t she just say that?”

“She’s speaking Ling Mai speak. You’ll get used to it.”

Not that she’d be hanging around that long. If the demon came
, none of us might be around for long.

Ling Mai continued, “Which leads me to believe we should inform the Council of Seven about what’s happening.”

It made sense. So why did goose bumps crawl up my skin?

Bran spoke up. “There’s another key element we’ve been missing
and haven’t discussed. Something that needs attention before the Council is notified.”

Leave it to a warlock to add more fuel to the conflagration.

“Such as?” Ling Mai asked.

“Who is behind wanting this demon unleashed? We have to stop him
—”

“Or her,” I mumbled, thinking about Bran’s cousin Dominique
, who had been one nasty villain that got her comeuppance when I killed her. A fact Bran still held against me, just as I held his killing my brother against him. Had I mentioned Bran and I had a complicated relationship?

“Or her
,” he didn’t miss a beat. “We also have one additional piece of intel that can give us a clue to who is behind this scheme.”

I had no doubt I looked as confused as my teammates,
as Bran looked at me. “The Irish male voice you heard while you were being held captive. He seemed in charge?”

I nodded, remembering I
’d actually rooted for that guy. He seemed like my protector then. And now? Colin Farrell voice was behind using and destroying me as well as the bigger point of unleashing horror and havoc on the world.

My taste in men obviously needed some work.

Bran continued, “I say if we can find this man, we’ll be that much closer to stopping the demon.”

“What
then?” Mandy demanded. “We accost every Irish-accented guy in this city on the off chance Alex will recognize his voice?”

She didn’t have to say it that way.
I had no doubts I’d recognize his voice again. But she was right about the needle in a haystack mission. Paris was a ginormous city and who knew if he was even still here? Bad guys could fly in and out just like ordinary tourists.

I caught Bran watching me, waiting for me to reach some conclusion he already understood. When I realized I was shaking my head
, he glanced around the room. “We need to go further back than the attack on Alex.”

Now he was really losing me. I was used to being Johnnie-on-the-spot. Or Jane-on-the-spot, but I was in a fog here.

Bran was using his CEO voice, the one that sounded like it was okay to be clueless, just trust him and he’d lead the way.

I felt a rather heated flashback on where I’d like him to lead me but he was already explaining.
Thank the Spirits, as I subtly fanned myself.

Bran gave me a wicked, I-know-what-you’re-thinking
look before prodding. “Before someone kidnapped you, they kidnapped your brother.”

That fast the ice-cold tsunami of reality hit me. I knew what happened next. Van died.
And here I was lusting after his killer. How screwed up shallow could I get?

“Someone has been
manipulating all of us, not caring who was killed.”

I tried to pay attention
, though my emotions were locked in on Van’s death. He so did not deserve that. He was one of the good guys.

“What’s the common thread among what’s been happening?” Bran asked
the room at large.

“Alex,” Kelly piped up.

But Bran wasn’t finished. “And?”

I think we were all at a loss until I started thinking a few things through. The drug dealer
, Vaverek, used Bran’s cousin Dominique to test a nasty designer drug. Van’s capture by Vaverek led to my enlisting Bran’s aid to find Van. But Bran had his own reasons to help, as he wanted the ones who embroiled his cousin in a plot that led directly to her death. Van led to Vaverek, and Vaverek led to someone higher. Someone with connections to the Council of Seven.