BROKEN BLADE Read online

  I could see the concealed entrance where we’d entered. I hadn’t been aware of it until Doyle had brought me through just moments earlier. As the wave of heat grew stronger and hotter, I tried to decide. Did I run for it?

  Doyle wouldn’t stop me. I knew that.

  Not his fault.

  Closing my eyes, I twisted the top of my water and lifted it to my lips.

  Damon.

  My heart raced. It had been three weeks since I’d seen him. It seemed like longer. But it wasn’t long enough. I couldn’t—

  The door opened. My hand convulsed on the water and the plastic crumpled. Lowering my gaze, I stared at the water and sighed. Dumping it in the recycler, I dried my hands off. I was surprised to see they weren’t shaking. That was nice, I thought. At least I could face him without showing how much of a mess I was.

  He’d know, of course.

  Damon always knew.

  My heart bumped against my ribs as I turned around and saw him standing in the door. His hair had grown out longer than I’d ever seen it, maybe even close to an inch all over. Eyes the color of thunderheads stared at me as I stood there. A muscle pulsed in his jaw.

  The silence was weighted, a heavy burden settling on my shoulders as I fought the urge to back away. Run. Hide.

  Nearly a month had passed since he’d barreled his way through the wards at TJ’s. An eternity seemed to stretch out between us, words hung unspoken, the pain in my heart, in my soul, so vivid and all consuming, it all but doubled me over.

  Doyle was the one to shatter it. “Kit needs some information on somebody in the Clan.”

  Damon shot me a look and then focused on Doyle. “What for?”

  “Work.”

  Damon looked back at me, taking in the gun, the K-bar strapped to my thigh and although he didn’t say anything, I suspected he was fully aware of the fact that I was pretty much loaded for bear. His gaze dropped to my belt—at least that was what I figured he was looking at, although some part of me, the part that wasn’t instinctively cowering in fear, felt a warm, shivery little tingle spark, then spread. I rested my hand on my belt and stroked the silver wire of the garrote, needing something to ground myself.

  “You looking to kill one of my cats, kitten?” he asked tiredly.

  “No.” I shouldn’t have thrown the damn water out. I needed a drink. My throat was dry. Stroking the wire, I made myself think about the girl. Her scared eyes… the silent plea I’d seen there.

  Looking down at the scrap of paper I held, I rubbed my thumb over it. An easy job, TJ. Supposed to just be an easy job, I thought. And here I was. Standing in front of a man I still dreamed about even though I tried to convince myself that part of me was dead.

  “I just need to find a kid.” Wow. I sounded nice and level. Almost like myself. Not bad. “There’s a girl who needs to talk to him.”

  Feeling the weight of that gaze, I made myself look up. He hadn’t moved. But Doyle had. He was on his feet and heading out the door. Leaving—

  The muscles in Damon’s arms bunched hard, rigid for a moment and then I watched as he relaxed, bit by bit. I had to make myself do the same thing. I wasn’t going to be afraid to be someplace alone with Damon. I wasn’t.

  I wasn’t afraid of him, either. There was no reason to be. He hadn’t hurt me and I knew that. The pulse slamming away in my heart, fluttering in my wrists, the adrenaline crashing through my veins, my body would get the message in a minute, too, and I would calm down.

  I wasn’t afraid to be alone with him.

  I wouldn’t let myself be afraid.

  Spinning away, I shoved my hands through my hair and locked my fingers behind my neck. “I just need to know who he is, Damon. I’m not looking to bring him any trouble and I’m not—”

  The rest of the words caught in my throat as I spun around and saw him standing closer.

  Not too close. Ten feet separated us, easily.

  One hand curled into a fist at his side, beat against his thigh. “Why you need to talk to one of my cats, Kit? If you aren’t looking to kill him, then it shouldn’t be that hard to give me a reason.”

  “And what if I am here to kill him?”

  It popped out of me for no real reason. Other than the fact that I needed to distract my brain. Nothing did it quite the way my smart mouth and trouble could.

  “You already said you weren’t here to kill him,” Damon pointed out.

  “Well, that’s not my plan.” I shrugged and absently reached down and stroked my hand down the butt of the Desert Eagle. The weight of it wasn’t as comforting as my sword, but it was there. “But you probably know by now that my plans have a habit of going to hell and I do better if I don’t operate with one.”

  His eyes narrowed on my eyes and then he shoved a hand back over his hair. “Okay. Explain what the problem is so I can understand why you think you might or might not have to kill him so I can decide if I need to help you or not.”

  “I don’t recall asking for your help,” I said sourly. I’d come here to ask for Doyle’s.

  “You’re in the Lair,” he pointed out. “You want information on one of my cats? You’re going to need my help.”

  Now that rubbed me the wrong way. “You know, I was doing shit like this on my own, without your help, for a long while and I often had to do it when I wasn’t fucking the damn Alpha,” I snapped.

  “You’re not fucking him now either.” Something flashed in his eyes. Pain. Regret. Misery. A low, ugly curse left him and he turned away.

  As he moved over to the couch, I rubbed my thumb along the surface of my belt. I think this would be easier if I just wrapped the garrote around my fist, pulled tighter until the wires dug into my skin and sliced me open. Quick. Just get it over with quick.

  He sat on the couch, elbows braced on his knees, staring at nothing.

  Easy job. I just need to find a kid…

  Swearing, I stormed over to him and threw the phone number down on the stone-and-glass coffee table in front of him. “I need to know who use to have that number. He hooked up with a girl—she’s mostly human. Not entirely. That’s a good thing, otherwise you might be dealing with Banner instead of me. She’s pregnant.”

  A hiss escaped him and he jerked his head up, staring at me. “Mostly human?”

  “Yes.” I held his gaze for a minute, to prove that I could more than anything else. “She won’t catch it.” If she’d been fully human, it could be a touch and go thing in the first few weeks after sexual activity. It could lay dormant in the body and not emerge until some major stress was placed on the body—pregnancy would do it. But the girl was months pregnant and more; she wasn’t going to be able to catch the virus. The magic in her blood wouldn’t let it take root. It was the same reason I couldn’t catch any of the were-viruses. The blood we’d been born with wouldn’t let an invasive virus take over.

  He scrubbed his hands over his face. “How did it come to this?”

  “She lost contact with him for a little while. They were dating—sounds like her dad is a prick and a half and she’s scared of him. Whoever the cat is, she broke up with him. Didn’t realize she was pregnant until recently, but when she tried to reach him, the number had changed.” I shrugged and moved around, pacing the living room, keeping a wide distance between me and him. Getting close to him was more than I could handle right then. “I don’t know if she’s too nervous to try and come out here, if she’d rather talk to him on the phone or what. But she did try to call and get in touch with him and...”I paused, felt that tug of anger unfurl inside me. “Sam answered the call. Told the girl that if she wanted to talk to a cat, she needed to grow some balls and come down here.”

  I slanted a look at him. “I don’t like that woman, Damon. I don’t like her at all.”

  A muscle in his jaw pulsed. “She’s a bitch, but the clan doesn’t exactly give out phone numbers just because a human girl calls up looking for one.”

  “And what about when your girlfriend calls to talk to
you after a fight?” I don’t know if I’d meant to talk about that or not. But the words ripped out of me and…and they were just there. Thrown out like a sucker-punch and now they hung between us like an ugly, red stain.

  Silence struck, heavy and weighted, crackling with more tension that I could stand.

  Damon came off the couch in a smooth, controlled motion, his eyes locked on my face and everything inside him seemed…quiet.

  Too quiet. All of that caged, restless energy was sucked down and he just stared at me, unblinking. It was damned unnerving.

  Seconds ticked by and finally, he said softly, “What did you just say?”

  “You heard me well enough,” I muttered, spinning away from him. Crossing my arms over my chest, I focused on the cold, empty fireplace.

  “Kit, what did you just say?” Damon asked, his voice still calm and gentle.

  Lulling me…and it worked. I shot him a nasty look. “Oh, come off it. Are you going to give me the kid’s name or not?”

  “My question first, Kit,” he said quietly.

  My heart slammed once against my ribs as I glared at him. “Forget it, Damon. Okay? Are you going to help me with the kid or not?”

  “In a minute.” He started to pace around the room, not circling me exactly, because he kept too much distance. “We need to back up a bit…you’re going to answer my damn question this time, or I’m going bring Sam in here and I’ll get the answer out of her. I can tell you now, she won’t answer the first time I ask.” As he circled in front of me this time, he came in closer, stopping just a few feet away. His gaze locked on my face and the look in his eyes was enough to have my heart slam against my ribs, just from the sheer intensity of it. “I want answers and I’m going to get them, so if you don’t give them to me, I’ll drag them out of her. And she’s stubborn, so I’ll probably have to break a few bones, starting with her hands and then I’ll work my way up. If that doesn’t do it, I’ll snap her neck.”

  He wasn’t calm now. Rage danced across his face and it was an icy sting on my skin. Swallowing the spit that had pooled in my mouth, I said, “Well, that will do you a fat lot of good, breaking her neck.”

  “Baby girl...she’s a cat.” A slow smile curled his lips. “She’ll live through it. If I’m careful, she could even heal. I’m not overly worried about her healing, though. Are you going to tell me or do I get to get some practice in on breaking bones?”

  Son of a bitch. He’d do it, too.

  I might have serious rage piled inside me towards Sam. I realized it wasn’t fair—it was like being mad at Damon for him not being there when I was kidnapped. But emotions don’t much care about being fair. Maybe I could eventually handle how I felt about what happened between us; I don’t know.

  And shit, I was fooling myself. I wasn’t going to get over what had happened with Damon and me. I’d deal with it. I’d accept it. I’d move past it. But get over it? That wasn’t going to happen.

  Sam was a different issue altogether—I wasn’t about to accept how pissed off I was with her, and I don’t care that it didn’t make sense. Still, I didn’t necessarily want to see him batter her into the ground.

  Maybe I’d feel better if I hurt her a little.

  But there was a difference between what I would do and what he was planning.

  Absently, I pulled one of the blades out from my vest and started to toy with it. I was slow—it had been too long since I’d let myself find comfort in any of my weapons. The silver wasn’t a blur in the air over my hands. A couple of times, I almost dropped it before I found the rhythm again, but it was comforting just to try.

  “I don’t see what you’re so fucking pissed about,” I said, focusing on the blade instead of what I felt. Instead of the fear, the anger and the shame. “I told everybody up on the mountain that I’d called. Sam just passed on your message.”

  “My message,” he said, his voice hovering just above a growl.

  I moved my hand wrong and the blade caught my palm. I snagged it with my left hand, lowering it as I stood there.

  “Kit,” he whispered, my name a ragged snarl on the air.

  I ignored him, staring at the blood welling from the gash across my palm. It was deep. Tucking the blade away with my good hand, I closed my fist and watched as blood seeped through my fingers.

  A booted pair of feet drew near and I looked up, saw him reaching for my wrist. My heart slammed against my ribs and his mouth went flat. “I just want to see your hand,” he said softly.

  Translation: I’m not going to hurt you.

  I didn’t need the translation. I already knew he wouldn’t hurt me. Doesn’t mean my body was automatically ready to listen. It’s amazing the damage that a few days, a few weeks can do.

  Most of my life, I’d just been a thing—something that was just there for the battering and the abuse. I’d made myself stronger.

  It pissed me off that Jude had taken that from me.

  Take it back, a voice inside me whispered. Maybe you’re broken, but you can fix yourself. You did it before.

  Because I knew it was what had to be done, and because I couldn’t do it if I kept flinching away from everybody who came near, I uncurled my fist and let Damon take my hand.

  “I’ve never seen you slip up and grab the blade wrong.” He gently inspected my bleeding palm.

  “I didn’t get enough caffeine this morning.”

  He snorted and tugged on my wrist, guiding me back to the bar. The first aid kit under it probably didn’t get much use; it was entirely likely he’d put it there for me. Damon, like most shifters, healed with amazing speed and kits like this were wasted on him. He gripped my wrist with a steely grasp, slowing the flow of blood. It hurt but it wasn’t too bad.

  “Are you going to explain or do I need to get ready to break bones?” he asked again as he started cleaning up my hand.

  “You’re always ready to break bones,” I muttered. “I think it’s one of the things you miss from when you weren’t Alpha.”

  Once he had the blood cleaned up, he swiped the wound with an antiseptic wipe and then applied a couple of butterfly strips to keep it closed.

  “I also miss how much easier my life was. And you haven’t answered. Ten seconds, Kit.”

  Through my lashes, I studied him. “I don’t care to be bullied,” I said softly. “Just be aware of that.”

  “If I wanted to bully you, I just would have called Sam in here and started breaking right away.” He leaned in a little closer.

  Close. So close—closer than he’d been in months and the smell of him flooded my head, made my heart race.

  His thumb stroked over my wrist, just above the bounding pulse. “I didn’t do that, because I’m trying here. But I’ll get an answer.”

  Blood roared in my ears and I barely even realized what he was talking about for a few, blissful seconds. I only knew that he was close. The mantle of his energy, as warm as the summer sun, beat down on me and I didn’t feel cold; I didn’t ache, and I didn’t feel empty and alone.

  Seconds spun away and I swayed forward without realizing what I was doing. Damon’s eyes widened and then he groaned just as my lips met his.

  His free hand came up, pushing into my hair.

  One hand on my wrist. His hand cupping the back of my head. His mouth on mine, again.

  Bliss...for those few, short moments. Stroking my tongue across his lower lip, I whimpered as he opened, shuddered as the taste of him hit my senses and the hunger for him flared to burning, forceful life.

  More...

  That was all I could think.

  I needed more—

  I moved against him, blind and deaf to everything. Even the fear inside had faded away. Nothing mattered.

  Damon growled against my lips but didn’t move. Even when I shoved my free hand under his shirt, he didn’t move. I raked my nails across the muscles that ridged his back, felt him shudder. Against my belly, I could feel the heated warmth of him and it sucked all of the oxygen out of m
e.

  Tearing my mouth away, I gasped for air.

  Damon muttered my name, the low, ragged growl a velvet caress. He moved his mouth across my cheek. My jaw…

  You’re mine.

  Pain ripping through me…

  As his mouth brushed over my neck, all desire disappeared, crushed under a brutal, unwanted reminder. Terror slammed into me and I struck out, driving my fist into a hard, warm body.

  The hand fisted in my hair fell away and I was free, backpedaling and tripping in my haste. I ended up falling, landing with my weight on my injured hand. A scream rose in my throat but I bit it back.

  The pain shot through me and although it was a nasty way to clear to the fog of terror, it worked.

  I found myself sitting on the floor, staring up at Damon.

  And he looked horrified.

  For the longest time, neither of us spoke and then he spun away. “Fuck. Kit, I’m sorry—”

  “No.” I swallowed, closed my eyes. Now that the terror had faded, now that the adrenaline rush was leveling out, my brain settled back into its normal rhythm and I knew what had caused it.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again. I watched as he lifted his hands, drove the heels of his palms against his eyes while the muscles of his back strained and swelled against his shirt.

  “Damon, stop.” I stayed on the floor, folding my knees. Because it was easier to think if I didn’t look at him, I stared at my palm. I’d made it start bleeding again. “I’m the one who kissed you, remember? And I was fine, but...”

  I stopped and reached up, touching my neck.

  Realizing he had turned back around, I looked up at him. “Every damn time he touched me, he bit me. When you touched my neck, it just put me in a bad place, okay?”

  “I shouldn’t have—”

  I glared at him. “Shouldn’t have what? I kissed you and it felt pretty damn good so would you stop...”

  Thick black lashes fell over his eyes, shielding them from me.

  “Stop what?”

  I shoved to my feet and headed back over to the first aid kit. The strips were nasty with blood again. Peeling them off, I tried to figure out just what to say. What I could say. What I should say. Damn it. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” I said softly. “And if I could find a way to turn off everything in my head that made me freak out, I’d probably have been very happy to keep going just as we were. But if you keep...”