Risk (A Mageri World Novel) (16 page)

E
lla had nodded
off on the car ride home. When Simon dropped her off, he handed her his phone, saying he had two more and she could go ahead and keep this one. He needed a way to get in touch with her since the Ice Queen wouldn’t buy her one.

God, how Ella loved that nickname. It was so appropriate for Hannah, even though she felt a twinge of guilt. Ella had a love-hate relationship with her Creator. Well, not so much love, but she was the only one who’d been there for Ella after the murders. It was impossible for her to hate someone who had given her the gift of immortality.

“Don’t send me frivolous text messages,” Simon had warned. “But whenever you do, I’ll respond. Unless I’m dead or locked in the trunk of a car without my clothes. Speaking of…”

Ella watched him make a call, and she could understand some of what he was saying, even from the side. Simon had a tendency to look all around when he was talking, and she also picked up on expressions and physical cues. Whomever he’d called was supposed to go check out the car where they’d locked the two men in the trunk.

Naked.

Ella had never laughed so hard as when Simon stripped down the men and tucked them in that small space. He said he’d handle them later after they’d cooled down, unless the car got impounded.

When he slammed the trunk, Ella wished she could hear their shouts. It was strange to feel apathetic about someone’s life, but these men had tried to kill her. Anyhow, it wasn’t as if they could die of a heatstroke in the back of a car. It took a lot more than that to kill a Mage.

Ella went to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water. She sat down for a spell, the phone in front of her just in case Simon decided to send her a message. It was good to feel like she was in the twenty-first century again, so she could hardly take her eyes off it. After a while, she made her way across the house to head upstairs.

“Where did you get that?” Hannah asked rhetorically, reaching for Ella’s phone.

Ella clutched it tight and held it against her chest. She could’ve answered, but Ella didn’t want to open that door with her Creator just yet. She was still too pissed off to have a normal conversation with her.

Hannah closed her eyes and sighed, the tension erasing from her expression. “Your days with Simon have come to an end. I’ve made other arrangements to see to your safety.”

Safety?
Ella thought. That seemed like a strange thing to say.

“Sometimes sacrifices have to be made,” Hannah continued. “My only concern is that you’re alive, but I never imagined you’d be in my care for all eternity. That was never the plan. The gods must be laughing.” Hannah scowled when she noticed spatters of blood on Ella’s pants. “It’s foolish to keep putting you in danger when you’ll never be able to fend for yourself.”

Ella blinked. What the hell was she talking about?

Hannah seized her wrist and led her across the house toward her private office. When the door opened, a man rose from his chair and turned to face them. He had on a casual brown suit with no tie, his hair just as greased back as Ella remembered from the party.

Bride. Oh God. Suddenly it clicked.

When Ella tried to wrench her arm away, Hannah tightened her grip. The man smiled, and Ella behaved like a stubborn horse, digging in her heels and gripping the doorframe.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Hannah said, followed by a flurry of other words, but Ella had stopped paying attention.

Her Creator looked away and said something to Boris, who simply folded his arms and smiled in amusement.

Hannah finally let go, and Ella held on to the doorjamb as if the world were blowing away. As much as she wanted to run, it was more important for her to stay long enough to find out what kind of arrangement this was.

The man with the creepy mustache swung his eyes back to Hannah, and Ella read his lips. “Are you sure she’s mentally stable?”

Hannah shifted her body in response, but Ella lost sight of her face.

“Shy, you say.” He studied Ella like he would a cow going to auction. “I’m very smitten with the shy ones. I think we both know the aristocratic whores I bedded did me no good. Yes, she’ll receive my undivided attention.”

Hannah turned to look at Ella, speaking to the man. “Do I have your word she’ll have the utmost protection?”

“Don’t get any ideas about a contract,” he replied, letting his arms fall to his sides. “Bonding isn’t something I take lightly.”

“Tell that to your five previous wives,” she countered.

“No need for the low blow, my dear. You know how important having a family is to me, and nothing would please me more than taking one of your Learners. Why, she’s practically my sibling.”

Ella shuddered. If this guy was one of Hannah’s progeny, then it didn’t say much for the people that Hannah chose.

“Boris, you’re a repugnant man.”

He smiled and approached her, caressing her neck with his fingers. “You didn’t find me so repugnant beneath the sheets.”

She knocked his arm away. “That was over four centuries ago. You were an insolent Learner who almost got me killed. I risked everything to get you out of that country.”

Something dark flickered in his eyes, but Hannah didn’t seem to notice.

“Everything. Yes, Hannah. I owe you a debt for all you have done.”

Hannah turned away and pretended to straighten a few books on the shelf. Ella found the action out of place in the conversation, as if she were concealing something.

Boris folded his arms. “This will appease both of our needs and allow me to repay the favor you have long deserved from me. Everything I am I owe to you.”

Hannah’s back was still turned, but Ella could tell she was talking. Then she faced him, and her brows twitched as if she were considering the offer. Watching the dance of words and body language was mesmerizing, and Ella realized that she could interpret so much more in a conversation than a hearing person.

“How do I know you won’t tire of her as you have the others?”

Boris put his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels. “Indulge me. She’s too fascinating for me to get bored with, and should I tire of her company, then I’ll return her to your doorstep. I simply cannot be in your debt forever, and if you don’t find a place for her, she could very well end up living with you for a long, long…
long
time.”

Hannah studied Ella, and that’s when she knew the deal was final. Her Creator was going to give her away like an old sofa. Hannah appeared to trust Boris, but Ella wasn’t sure how to feel about that. They were both keeping secrets, and Boris didn’t seem to like Ella. Yes, they had danced, but his demeanor had been cold and detached.

When his gaze slid toward her, she cringed.

“I should pack her things,” Hannah said.

Now? My God, this can’t be happening!

Ella dashed out of the room toward the stairs. She ran all the way up to her floor and then down the hall, sweat collecting on her forehead as she slammed the bedroom door.

But couldn’t lock it. Hannah didn’t approve of locks.

Her hands were shaking. This couldn’t be happening, and yet it was. Creators had complete control over the fate of their Learners, and those decisions were supported by the Mageri. Since Hannah worked for the Mageri, there was no way in hell she could get out of this. Ella had learned from day one that human laws no longer applied.

She frantically sent a text to Simon: PLEASE HELP. I NEED YOU.

Her heart quickened to a hummingbird’s pace as she anxiously awaited his reply. She sent three more, but he didn’t respond.

Ella paced in circles, staring at the screen. Simon had promised he’d answer. Then she thought about the men they’d locked in the trunk. His friend was supposed to check it out, but what if Simon changed his mind and decided to do it himself? What if those guys had somehow gotten loose and…

No, she needed to think straight. Ella muscled her dresser in front of the door to keep Hannah from entering. With time running out, she went through Simon’s call log, searching for the last number dialed. It belonged to Levi Cross, so she sent a message.

A couple of minutes passed before Levi replied that Simon wasn’t answering his home phone or his emergency number. When she saw the door crack, she leaned against the dresser and pushed back. Ella sent a quick reply to Levi that she wanted to meet him at the address Simon had given him, where they’d left the two men locked in the trunk of a car.

Ella wasn’t used to carrying a phone around. She looked down at her leggings with no pockets and didn’t think she’d be able to carry the phone while climbing out the window. She quickly peeled off her shirt and reached into the dresser drawer until she found a white button-up. It had a front pocket wide enough for the phone—not as deep as she’d like, but it would suffice.

She made a break for the window and opened it, stepping onto the ledge. Battered by the wind, she turned to face the outside wall and quickly moved to the right. Simon had taught her to stay calm no matter what because adrenaline could work against you. Ella hurried before Hannah pushed her way into the bedroom. Then again, her Creator was probably busy calling one of the servants for help because she was afraid of chipping a nail.

Ella could have tapped into her Jumper skills, but she wanted to make the jump to the tree on her own. With the agility of a cat, she pushed off the wall and spun around midair, locking her hands around a narrow branch. She swung for a moment, wishing Simon had been there to see it. He probably would have cheered. As fast as she could, Ella descended the tree and ran to the nearest car, which happened to belong to Boris.

He’d left the keys in the ignition.

Stupid immortals.

T
he setting sun
grazed the horizon, smearing colors of lemon, tangerine, and cherries across the indigo sky. After revealing some of his past to Ella, Simon figured he’d just as soon avoid sleeping while the ghosts were fresh on the haunt. When he needed to forget, he immersed himself in work or fun.

He pulled into the parking lot across the street from the Red Door and then shut off the engine. The silly humans were lined up to get in, not realizing that their day would never come. A warm breeze drifted inside his open window, and he reclined his head, eyes shut, wondering what the hell he’d been thinking when he opened the door to his past and told Ella some of his secrets. Not the darkest of secrets, but regret was beginning to sink in—and embarrassment. Now she’d look at him differently—like a man to be pitied or laughed at in secret.

He groaned, rubbing his face with the palms of his hands. “You’re such a bleeding idiot.”

“On that we can agree,” said a voice from the left.

Simon opened his eyes, startled that he hadn’t felt anyone’s energy. When the dagger sank into his left shoulder, he figured out why.

Only two kinds of Breed could sneak up on him like that. Vampires didn’t give off energy, and while Simon didn’t trust them, he hadn’t made many enemies in that department. Every Mage had the ability to conceal their energy, and some of them could hide every drop of it. Apparently, James Dmitry had that talent.

The stunner instantly worked its magic, rendering him paralyzed.

James smacked Simon on the cheek playfully. “That was too good to be true. My Creator warned me about you, but Jesus H. Christ. That was like catching fish in a barrel.”

Simon used his peripheral vision to watch James as he walked off and parked his car in the adjacent lane. He opened Simon’s door and dragged him out of the car, the heels of Simon’s boots leaving faint marks on the concrete. Simon concentrated with all his might to gain some kind of control of his limbs, his eyes, a finger, his cock—anything.

The back of his head thudded against the concrete, and he stared up at the darkening sky, his phone vibrating in his pocket.

James lifted the lid of his trunk and looked around. “You know, that’s one thing I like about being a Mage. If I were doing something like this in the parking lot at Taco Bell, everyone would be calling the cops. But on the Breed side of town, people just don’t give a shit what you do.”

While he listened to James run off at the mouth about his brilliant capture, Simon began mentally piecing together the clues. James had been the one following them, but he wouldn’t have orchestrated the attack from earlier that afternoon. That meant Boris was behind all this. Even as Simon was being stuffed into the trunk, he deduced that none of this was about him. Boris was a wanker to the nth degree, but there was nothing personal between them that couldn’t have been settled centuries ago. Simon felt like a knight on the chessboard, taken out of play so the enemy could capture the queen.

James slammed the trunk lid, and after a moment, the car started up.

Simon’s nose began to itch. The one thing he hated about paralysis was that there was always an itch he couldn’t scratch, and the more he thought about it, the more maddening it became. Not unlike this entire situation. Then his earlobe began to itch.

As a distraction, he focused on the pain from the dagger lodged in his shoulder. The moldy smell in the small compartment made Simon want to retch. James must have stored his dirty underpants in here.

When they hit a bump, Simon rolled to the right.

Bugger. If he keeps driving like this, I might knock this blasted thing out of my shoulder before the ride ends
, he mused to himself.

This must have been what it felt like to be Ella for all those years. Not the paralyzed limbs part, but the inability to communicate. Of being trapped in his own head with all kinds of questions and answers—denied even the simple joy of telling his abductor to sod off.

When the car finally lurched to a stop, the brake lights went out and he waited in darkness, his ass now itching.

The lid flew open, and a petite, short-haired blonde examined him. “Is that all?” she asked with a Southern accent. “You made it sound like you took down Goliath.”

James shoved her aside. “Shut up, Pippi. Looks can be deceiving.”

She snorted. “You got that right. When we first met, I actually thought you had a big dick.”

Simon mentally awarded two points to the pixie, who would probably be yanking out his toenails with a pair of pliers in about thirty minutes.

Centuries ago, Creators desired progeny who were strong and loyal—men who would protect them as an army would. Motives were different in today’s age, where intelligence was valued more than brawn. Boris was scraping the bottom of the barrel to find the dumbest minions he could.

Pippi stood on the sidelines, blowing a giant pink bubble while James pulled Simon out by his feet. Pain lanced through his back when he hit the ground.

She stepped closer and nudged at Simon’s family jewels. “Does everything freeze up when they got one of those in ’em?”

James wiped his brow. “Why don’t you find out? I’m sure Boris would appreciate you humping our prisoner.”

She slapped his chest with the back of her hand. “It’s not like he’s ever said anything about me humping on you.”

“Maybe that’s because you’re always sucking his dick.”

Pippi’s face tensed, and she thrust her palm at his face, blue light shooting into his eyeballs.

“Dammit!” he shouted, turning away. “I told you not to do that anymore!”

She blew on the tip of her index finger as if it were the smoking barrel of a gun. “Quit your bitching. The blindness is only temporary. You don’t have to be such a baby about it.” She knelt down and poked her finger in the spot where Simon had a dimple. “You’re a cutie pie.”

He might have to play that card later. Based on her attire of tight black shorts and a mesh shirt over a red bra, she was once a small-town girl who now craved attention. She wasn’t the brightest marker in the box, but she might be more easily influenced than James the Unendowed.

“Pick up his arms,” James said, still rubbing his eyes. “I’m going to get you back for that.”

She snapped another bubble and stood up, grabbing Simon by the wrists. “You just do that and those midnight visits to your room are going to stop.”

“I can get my own piece of ass,” he muttered, lifting Simon by the ankles.

“You couldn’t get a piece of ass at a donkey auction.”

Above him, the dimming sky was changing from a deep shade of blue to black velvet with diamond accents.

What were these buffoons up to?

Simon’s left arm was killing him where the tendons stretched around the knife blade. They moved him inside a small building that looked abandoned—not big like a warehouse, but a remnant from the early twentieth century. Maybe a print shop or a bakery. With his head upside down, he saw what looked like a brick hearth, large enough that he could imagine loaves of bread going into it.

Or a body. A Mage could die by incineration, so that didn’t exactly give him the warm fuzzies.

They dropped him on the gritty floor.

“Put that on him,” James barked out.

“What am I, your slave?”

“Maybe I still can’t see too well,” he growled.

“Fine.”

When Simon heard the familiar clink of chains, he stilled. If he hadn’t been paralyzed, then he certainly would have been from the shackle wrapping around his neck. When the cold metal locked into place, he slipped back in time. Maybe talking about the past with Ella had summoned the demons from his nightmares.

Simon watched particles of dust float off the decaying floor as he exhaled. The chain jerked his neck when Pippi gave it a hard tug, but he was powerless to react. His heart pounded like a drum, and a fire burned in his belly, reviving memories of a distant life. He listened for the footsteps of his Creator above, but the logical part of his brain told him it was impossible. Not only had he killed Julian, but he’d burned the body and buried the remaining bones. A Mage couldn’t recover from that, but the rising tide of panic made him regret not having scattered the bones across miles of land. What if sunlight could heal them after centuries, regenerating the body slowly with prolonged exposure?

Shut up, Shut up.
Simon shoved his demons back into the fucking closet where they belonged. The last thing he needed was to psyche himself out. The concrete chilled his right cheek, and his left shoulder had finally gone numb.

A cloud of dust went up his nose, and he involuntarily sneezed three times, saliva running down the side of his mouth.

“I didn’t know you could sneeze with a stunner in you,” Pippi remarked. “Huh. Maybe some things are reflexive after all.”

“Don’t even think about it,” James said, his fingers typing a text on his phone.

Pippi hopped onto a table and sat down, her scrawny legs swinging from the edge. “Well? What do we do next?”

James set down his phone. “Strip off his clothes.”

“Oooh!” Pippi squealed with delight, her red Mary Janes clicking on the floor as she jumped down.

James folded his arms. “Don’t get any ideas. Boris said there’s been a change of plans and he’ll be here in a couple of hours.”

Simon felt a tug when she pulled off his boot.

“Why are we stripping him down?” she asked. “So if he escapes, he won’t run far with his pecker hanging out?”

“Something like that. I’m going to bleed him so he’ll be too weak to run.”

Simon’s other boot came off, and then Pippi rolled him onto his back, tugging at the zipper on his leathers.

“Just admit it, James. You want to see how he measures up.”

“Sometimes I wonder why the hell Boris chose a girl as trashy as you to live forever. I thought Creators had standards.”

“Clearly not if he chose you.”

When Simon’s pants reached his ankles, Pippi gasped.

“Jesus. Will you look at that?” Her eyes sparkled, and her pink lips stretched into a smile. “He’s
huge
. I’ll never judge a book by its cover again.”

All Simon wanted was for them to remove the dagger. His voice was his weapon, and without it, he was unarmed. He quelled his rage and kept a cool head, taking in his surroundings. He couldn’t care less about losing his pants, but his phone was still in the back pocket.

Little Pippi lifted him up by his underarms and positioned him so his back was against the wall. He slumped over, his chin resting against his chest.

She grabbed a fistful of hair and lifted his head. “Maybe Boris will change his mind and make him my love slave.”

“Quit horsing around.” James searched the cupboards and retrieved an old wooden bowl. “Once we drain him, then I can take back my knife. Those aren’t easy to come by, you know. You hold him while I drain. Boris doesn’t want a mess, so don’t let him fall over.”

“Great idea!” She straddled Simon. “I’ll use my body to keep him still,” she said, wiggling her bottom over Simon’s crotch.

He didn’t feel a wink of pleasure, especially with the shackle around his neck. Those two things were a combination that never went together.

His surroundings were rustic, and he took it all in. A wooden table, a few iron pokers with ashen tips and a shovel in the corner, boarded-up windows, a long piece of wire hanging from the ceiling that might become useful, and a few moths fluttering around a corroded trash can.

As James neared with a blade aimed at his neck, Simon wondered how long his chain was and if he could reach his pants. He had a sheath attached to the belt with a dagger in it.

If they were keeping him alive, then they wanted information. Eventually they were going to take the stunner out, and when they did, Simon would be ready.