Page 40 of Never Run from an Immortal

Rae couldn’t hide her surprise this time. “They’re bringing him here?”

“It’s the safest place in Demesia.”

She met his silver eyes, knowing he was doing all of this out of desperation, but appreciating it anyway. Rae tried to focus her thoughts with little effect; they were a match for the storm going on around them as she opened the passenger door. All the spells had depleted her, but nothing she couldn’t sleep off. No worse than what she’d slept off before anyway. “Thank you,” she murmured before stepping out into the rain.

Thunder cracked, followed by a streak of lightning, and Rae couldn’t hide her flinch as she made her way up the steps to the manor, certain Aidan was watching her. Two days. Two days she’d wasted being a stubborn asshole by not handing over Zeke’s data. Two days and Nim could already be dead.

Rae still didn’t trust her husband one bit, but it was time to ask for his help.

Chapter twenty

Aidan watched Rae walk away, waiting for the rain and the wind to clear away the aroma of her blood from inside the car. She’d blocked him out tonight. It had been the scent of her bleeding he’d caught first on the air a few blocks away, then he’d settled into Reed’s mind and knew precisely where to find them both.

He’d pulled into the courtyard just in time to watch her hurl two metal objects from her hair into the humans attacking Reed, metalsmithing tools if he had to guess, like she’d done it a hundred times before. Knowing Rae, she probably had.

At the perimeter of the manor grounds, Aidan felt his First Unit’s presence, Reed among them.

Good work tonight, he told his team as he checked in with Baelin, his eyes fixed on Reed as the Fae exited the First Unit’s vehicle. Aidan hadn’t told Rae all that he’d seen sifting through Reed’s thoughts and memories, how badly Nim had been injured when Reed had last seen her. He needed her focused on the taskthey’d agreed upon, not distracted with her friend. Tonight had been evidence of that.

Beck was the first to approach, the Vampire’s head snapping in the direction of Rae’s room where Aidan could feel her rummaging around in her backpack.

“Eat first, report later,” Aidan told him, slipping into the manor past a waiting Shaw. He would deal with Beck later. The last thing Aidan needed was a house full of hungry Vampires with Rae wounded. A few spots of crimson stained the stairs as he took them two at a time; no doubt Shaw would be scrubbing away at them in the next few minutes. He tapped his knuckles against Rae’s door, but the only reply was a hiss and a slew of cursed grumbles.I can break it down, Farren.

The door swung open, though Rae stood beside the dresser on the opposite side of the room. More magic. Her wet hair still clung to her face, her neck, her chest. It was difficult to tell what colour she’d opted for today; right now it looked almost black against her skin. She held a needle in her hand, a small reel of thread in the other, her backpack discarded at her feet.

Aidan cleared his throat, shutting the door behind him and sliding the lock in place once more. Rae raised an eyebrow at him in question. “You’re bleeding all over the carpet. Unwise in a house full of Vampires,” he told her.

She rolled her eyes, shouldering her way into the bathroom without a word, and Aidan followed her in, biting back the questions he had for her, like what the Hel she thought she was doing blocking her location, blocking him out. She was trying to keep her emotions locked down tight, but the adrenaline of the night had caught up with her, her heartbeat a rapid flutter in her chest.

“Sit,” Aidan barked, flicking his chin at the sink.

Rae didn’t protest, sliding onto the basin as if there wasn’t an open gunshot wound bleeding freely down one arm.

“You don’t sit like a metalsmith,” Aidan remarked as he ran a towel under the cold tap. A barely-there laugh escaped him. “Thief. Faction leader.” He had no reason to comfort her, no reason other than her discomfort unsettled him. He cast the thought aside as he motioned for Rae to hold out her arm.

She hesitated for a moment, a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth before she angled her body towards him. “I was a dancer in a past life. My father thought it would be an attractive quality in whatever marriage he eventually arranged for me.”

It was the first she’d spoken since leaving the car, and with her words, her composure slipped a little, the adrenaline giving way to exhaustion.

“Another role to add to your repertoire,” Aidan said with a smirk, though there was nothing light about a father wanting to sell off his daughter. Anger spiked through him at the thought. He took her wounded arm, carefully cleaning around the damaged skin and ignoring the burn in the back of his throat from the proximity to her blood. It wasn’t a deep wound; she’d been lucky, but deep enough she hadn’t healed it with a spell. A few stitches would be enough.

He felt her attention on him the entire time. A wise choice. Vampires were predators, and Rae would have been reminded of that daily. Demesia was a diverse city, but the Vampires had been running it for decades.

Her hair was still dripping, her skin icy cold where Aidan’s fingers curled carefully around her bicep, and almost as soon as the thought occurred to him, she shivered. Rae didn’t acknowledge it, and he wondered what he’d find if he could pull back her mental defences, what she’d be feeling underneath it all. It was quiet, with her, he realised, as he paused his work to wrap a clean towel around her shoulders. No thoughts and feelings assaulting him from every direction. Peaceful.

She nodded her thanks at the towel; Aidan told himself it was a practicality. If she was shivering, it would interfere with his sutures. He thought of how she’d hurled those metal tools at the humans again, his canines threatening to extend at the memory of it, but he swallowed down the burn in his throat. “I can’t decide if you’re an incredible liar or just an exceptional individual; whether you don’t actually know how to get my abilities back, or you never had any intention of doing it.” He knew what she was; he wanted her to say it. To hear her confirm she was a Witch, just like her little friend.

“Which do you think?” She’d settled on a deep blue for her eyes, until she changed them again, but there wasn’t a hint of fear in them as Rae stared up at him, her face inches from his.

“I think the answer is probably a little of everything, Farren.” Her heart hammered in her chest. It didn’t matter how good she was at controlling her feelings, this, she couldn’t hide from him. “Is Nim your sister?”

A flicker of something else fell from her before she covered it up. Regret, maybe. She broke his gaze, using the towel to dry her hair. “Did you know Witches can store magic in anything?” she asked quietly. “Objects, trees, people. A little bit like Calder did, but on a much bigger scale. It’s a very well-guarded secret.”

“Why tell me then?”

Rae paused. “So you know that I’m not bullshitting you.”

Aidan studied her face. The swell of her lips and the curve of her mouth. The way she watched him just as closely as he watched her, something he’d found himself doing more and more lately. And then he reminded himself why she was there. Of their agreement. “Because you need more money.”

---