Wicked Thing (C.O.A Series Book 2) (45 page)

Melody saw what she was doing panicked and said, “Crap.” She closed the freezer door, knowing what Kayn was about to do.

Kayn tossed the orb into the mass of dark things and stepped out of the way as they turned to ash and became nothing, but piles of dust on the floor. Her grasp on reality instantly returned and she comically knocked on the freezer door.

Lexy opened it and said, “Are we back to normal now?”

Kayn laughed as she replied, “Yes we are,” and strolled out of the freezer to a freshly healed group of curious eyes.

Chapter 24
Over Again

T
hey all raided the vending machines, because that was really the only option and then wandered upstairs to find a room. They were all exhausted after being kidnapped and strung up in a storage container in the swelteringly hot desert. Lexy was tired for other reasons. The healing job she’d done before having to scale the wall of a ravine and then spending the day wandering aimlessly through the desert while seriously energy deprived had done her in. She was looking forward to a good night’s sleep. After they’d chosen their room, Lexy kicked off her flip flops, looked at Grey and flirtatiously said, “Want to have a shower?”

He blankly shrugged and answered, “Sounds like a plan.” She got up to follow him and when she turned the knob, he’d locked the bathroom door.
That was weird. Maybe, he was just too exhausted to even contemplate it?
Lexy stretched out on the bed and closed her eyes, planning to rest them for only a second and she fell into a deep comatose slumber.

She opened her eyes in the darkened room and heard the rhythmic soothing sound of Grey’s steady breathing. Lexy smiled as she realized that she’d fallen asleep without bathing. Usually, Grey would have at least given her a sponge bath but last night he hadn’t. He must have been absolutely wiped. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed and padded barefoot across the carpet to the bathroom where she decided a middle of the night shower was probably better than not having one at all. After a lengthy shower she realized she had no clean clothes to put on. She slipped her sandy clothes back on and carefully slipped back onto the bed so she wouldn’t wake her dead to the world Handler. After about twenty minutes of trying to rest she sat up and watched him sleep for a while. Lexy smiled as she gently shifted his long wheat colored bangs off of his face.

He opened his eyes grinned and whispered, “Are you watching me?”

Lexy smiled as she quietly replied, “I got up to have a shower and now I can’t sleep.” She stroked his hair again and added, “Go back to sleep, don’t worry about me.”

Grey stretched, yawned and said, “What time is it?”

She yawned her reply and then slapped him and he chuckled. Lexy leaned forward and provocatively whispered, “Maybe I just need this.” She kissed Grey’s lips and when their lips parted he had this puzzled expression on his face.

He knit his brow as he uncomfortably questioned the intimacy of her gesture, “What was that for?”

Oh, no. He was gone. She was going to be sick. Even though she’d known this moment was inevitable, it felt like her heart had just been smoked by a big rig.
She turned away from him, swung her legs over the edge of the bed, swallowed the hurt and sat there trying to control her reaction.

He touched her back and said, “Hey, Lex, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. I mean…I just don’t think of you that way.”

She blinked away the tears that had formed against her will and told herself to shut it down.
It’s over. You knew this was coming. Suck it up, Lexy.
Without looking at him she calmly stated, “It was nothing.”
But it wasn’t.
She laughed it off and sparred, “Come on, as if I’d be interested in you, Greydon. Get over yourself.”

He seemed relieved as he laughed, “I knew you were joking.” Lexy rose to her feet, glancing back at him to playfully stick out her tongue then she turned and briskly retreated into the bathroom. She locked the door and sat on the edge of the tub.
It had happened
. Lexy covered her eyes with both hands as she silently sobbed. She’d allowed the loss of their intimacy to gut her once again.
When had this happened?
It was then that it sunk in. He’d died in the car crash. If Azariah had seen him while he was in the in-between she would have asked him to make the choice. He’d probably thought he was helping her, by making the decision, his alone.
She knew how they worked. It was all about the selfless choices and greater good.
She heard the rapping sound of his knuckles on the door, followed by, “Hey, Lex. Are you okay? Listen, I know you have needs. You know Orin and Zach are both available, I just don’t think it should be me.”

Oh, was he frigging serious? Now, she was absolutely livid
. She gave him a viciously cold response, “No thanks, I’m saving myself for Tiberius.” Her spiteful comeback was met by dead silence on his end and she knew the verbal dagger she’d tossed at him had hit its intended mark. Lexy cringed as Grey dramatically slammed the motel room door. She wandered out of the bathroom and sat down on the edge of the bed.
They’d both handled that situation badly
.
She knew she needed to go and find him. She’d just apologize and try to get over it. He hadn’t done anything wrong. She was the asshole in this scenario.
Lexy left the room fully intending on kissing his ass but as she stepped out into the hallway she saw him duck into the room Melody had gone into earlier. She started to walk down the hallway, paused in front of the fire alarm and thought of pulling on it but what would that serve to accomplish? He couldn’t remember that he loved her and Melody was completely innocent. Feeling emotionally defeated, Lexy descended the stairs and wandered over to the vending machine at the end of the hall. It had been strategically picked over and everything she wanted was already gone. She sighed…
wasn’t life frigging hilarious, it was even screwing up her choice of potato chips.
She waved one of her hands in front of what she was willing to settle for and it dropped into the metal bin below. Lexy sat down on the floor in the hallway and tore open the package of plain bland chips. She hadn’t even put the first chip in her mouth when she felt someone watching her and looked up, it was Grey.

He sheepishly smiled and asked, “Can I sit here with you?”

Confused, she nodded her silent consent and he got his own bag of less than satisfying chips out of the picked over vending machine and sat down beside her.

Grey grinned and sheepishly began to speak, “I’ll be the one to start then…I’m sorry, I panicked when you kissed me. Maybe, it’s because it’s not supposed to happen? I just need you to know that it wasn’t that I didn’t like it and if that’s what you want I’m in.”

Oh, Lordy. She was going to bang her head against the wall until she knocked herself out. She couldn’t keep doing this with him.
Lexy didn’t know what to say, but she knew she needed to change the subject so she blurted out, “I slept with Orin.”

Intrigued by her risqué confession her Handler scolded, “You’re a naughty little fibber, you acted like nothing happened between the two of you.”

She shoved him and whispered, “You say nothing to anyone. It’s private and I don’t even know if I want it to be anything.”

He motioned like he was zipping his lips. He tossed away the imaginary key, smiled and promised, “I won’t say a word. This is a good thing. Oh, I get it, the Tiberius comment was a joke. Well, I feel like an idiot now for making that kiss a bigger deal than it was supposed to be. See, that’s why you have to tell me these things, I just made a complete and total ass of myself.”

What had she just done? She felt a little bit guilty. She’d just launched herself into a relationship with Orin in Grey’s head. She should admit to it all and confess everything right now because in her experience little white lies always got out of hand rather quickly.

Instead of a confession, Lexy opted to just change the subject as she questioned, “So, it didn’t work out with Mel?”

“We had an argument. I knew I wasn’t going to get any sleep until we hashed it out…plus I think she might be into someone else.” Grey explained as they started to make their way back to their room. Once there, they both lay their heads on their pillows. Greydon was off to sleep in no time at all, completely unaware of the excruciatingly painful vacancy the loss of their intimacy had caused in her heart. She ached for his touch. This time she had to fill that vacancy and take advantage of the distance they had when his memory had been freshly erased. It was time to start the healing process…again.

Markus and the others showed up in the morning but didn’t stay long. They left them a couple of running vehicles and ditched the new kid with them because they were rushed to leave for what sounded like a Correction of some kind, up north. Dean was officially Ankh and Lexy honestly wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Perhaps it was because she still wanted him to be Molly. On a positive note, the new guy helped them dispose of the bodies, and burn the once demon infested hotel to the ground like an old pro. He’d been with Trinity for a while and he’d obviously been trained well. After they were finished they piled into the vehicles and travelled back to the hotel the others had been kidnapped from to retrieve their belongings. They separated into their usual driving shifts for the motorhome and the truck and the group began their own journey up north.

The first days after Grey forgot his love for her had always been nothing less than torture. Her heart was still all in and he was on the prowl with no filter to lighten his repetitive blows to her ego. When his flirtatious behavior was more than she could take she always knew that she held the trump card and that winning hands name was Tiberius. If ever she wanted him to feel just a touch of the agony she was going through she’d toss out his name in conversation. Of, course a few of them were now aware of what she was going through. Frost would try to run interference with Grey knowing how much he was hurting Lexy because he knew what it felt like. Kayn and Lily also knew everything but Melody, Haley and Astrid did not. The drive was nothing but the never-ending tedium of spinning tires and blindingly boring highway. They’d been doing nothing but arguing and had hit the point where there was no purpose in even attempting to have a conversation. By the time they travelled over the border and into British Columbia everyone was mind-blowingly exhausted. They set up the campsite and they only had one day to rest before the two groups would split once again leaving the newbies to either sink or swim. Frost and Kayn’s relationship had been moving along in leaps and bounds and they were leaving the group to spend the night together. Watching Frost with Kayn gave her hope that someday she’d be able to find a way to move past her love for Grey. Lily seemed to approve of the union and that somehow made everything seem right. She glanced over at her Handler and her eyes softened. Grey took the look as a flag of surrender and he wandered over to stand beside her and passed her a cold beer. They watched Frost and Kayn drive away and as they disappeared, Grey whispered in her ear, “Well, this virgin sacrifice feels way less shady than the last.”

Lexy had to hold her hand over her lips, and press them together to stop herself from spraying a mouthful of beer all over the Ankh that were sitting in front of her at the picnic table. She gave her Handler a playful shove and all was forgiven. They spent the night playing board games, roasting wieners and marshmallows over the fire pit and fixing their reality stunted bond. By the time they left the newbies the next day, all was settled and their harmonious friendship had returned. They had to take Dean with them because the five needed to find their way and he might throw them off of their game. Lily had this adorable friendship going on with the dark featured, chocolate eyed charmer who was quite obviously into dudes. Once she figured that part of his persona out Lexy found it intriguing and she began to allow herself to attach to him. When she found out they were headed into the city to meet up with Markus and his crew she knew she was going to have to find Orin and let him know that she told Grey about their little one-night stand. She sincerely hoped Grey’s knowledge of the booty call wasn’t going to make things awkward, but she couldn’t be absolutely certain he wouldn’t blurt it out if there were a few too many drinks involved.

They pulled into the parking lot of the five-star hotel they’d be staying at for a couple of nights, on Lucien’s dime. Apparently a few members of their clan were meeting up with Lucien and his entourage this evening at his club. The rest of them were free to hang out in the background and enjoy his hospitality. Lily was notably excited because the hedonistically attractive Lucien had always been one of her favorite distractions. Whenever they’d met up with the King of the Lampir in the past, Lily was his for the remainder of the evening, or he was hers
… She wasn’t really sure how that worked out
. There was always a plan in place and tonight it was Lily’s duty to find out how involved Lucien was in the Lampir plague. The rest of them were along for the ride.

They’d initially thought it was one town and one rogue Lampir but in the following weeks Markus and his group had dealt with three Lampir hybrid infestations, each one with a different immortal species in the mix. It was beginning to look like someone higher up in the Lampir community had a flexible interpretation of the immortal code.

The mirrored lobby of this particular hotel had always appealed to her, not to look at herself but for people watching purposes. Their bags were brought up to their rooms and they were all sent to the hotel’s spa where they soaked in the mineral pool and then they were off to the stylist where her freshly washed hair was rewashed and conditioned then styled as though she were a Hollywood actress preparing to go to some kind of fancy event with gloriously seductive waves in her crimson hair. Lexy was presented with her outfit for the evening and helped into it. She looked into the full length mirror. Tonight, she was the lady in red. The red knee length slip like dress hung from her curves in a glorious way and there was a sexy slit that stopped at her thigh. The champagne was flowing and the tapas they brought around on a tray every once in a while took the edge off of her appetite. When she saw Grey she couldn’t stop the grin from forming on her face. They’d convinced him to cut and style his hair, but there was still some length to it, he hadn’t allowed them to get too carried away. They’d dressed him up too.