Heat of the Night (12 page)

Taking and giving. The connection he'd sought and needed so desperately earlier, reestablished without sex and yet strengthened by their earlier frantic mating. Having gotten the animal lust out of the way, they'd exposed the other feelings, laying them out in the open between them. Understood and shared.

"Thank you," she whispered wearily, curling tighter against him.

Soon, her shallow, rhythmic breathing told him she was connected to the Twilight. She was at his home, where he longed to be. Dreaming.

He hoped it was of him.

Connor traversed the length of the rock-lined hallway to the main cavern with an impatient stride. As he drew closer to the grotto, the air grew more humid due to the large body of water that waited just beyond the craggy edge. There was a mildewy, mossy smell that permeated the air and made him long for his life of just weeks ago. A life above ground with women, beer, and a damn good fight when he needed one.

And a door for an entrance and exit. That would be nice.

He wasn't looking forward to the necessary dip in the icy water of the lake. It was near torture to make the ascent to the surface when one's lungs were seized by the frigid temperature. Unlike everything else in the Twilight, the water in the lake could not be altered by mere thought. No amount of wishing, ordering, or hoping made the liquid any more bearable.

So he simply saluted his men, checked to make certain that his glaive was secured in the scabbard crossing his back, and dove in.

Long moments later, Connor emerged freezing and gasping, crawling up the sandy bank while wracked by violent shivers. He
was struck by a feeling of déjà vu so disconcerting that he didn't realize he wasn't alone until he was tackled and knocked backward.

As a smaller, wirier body wrapped around his, his roar of outrage reflected off the surface of the water and released his mounting tension. Connor twisted and grappled with his assailant until the moment they both fell back into the lake in an explosion of water and slapping skin. He grabbed his assailant by the scruff of his robes and dragged him onto the shore.

"Wait!" Sheron cried.

Connor reached over his shoulder and pulled his glaive free of its scabbard. "We've been through this before, old man," he growled.

"We did not conclude our discussion."

"So start talking before I lose what's left of my patience."

The Elder pushed back his soaked cowl. "Remember what I told you about the slipstreams we established in the Temple?"

"Yeah."

"And how the only location in the Twilight that is secure from Nightmares is the cavern you have commandeered?"

"Yes."

"Nightmares infiltrated those streams, Bruce, melding with the Guardian in transit to form one being."

"Fuck me." Connor's grip on his glaive tightened and sweat dotted his brow. "Can they travel by themselves? Are the humans in trouble now? Have we finally screwed them all the way by infecting their world as well as their dreams?"

"Not so far as we know. Unlike the slipstreams in the cavern, these are opened only briefly, just long enough to make the jump. Then they are closed again."

"How did you figure out what was happening?"

"
We began by sending a guard through in a rapid cycle
—
in and out
."

Connor began to pace.

"It became apparent over time that some of the guards were not well,"
Sheron continued. "At first we assumed it was due to the location."

"Being outside the cavern."

"Yes. Then they began to change. Physically. Emotionally. Mentally. Eliciting fear and sadness in those around them seemed to be very important to them. They grew more violent and cruel. Their eyes began to change color. They stopped eating."

"Oh man…"

"We realized then what had happened. The Nightmares inside them were taking over, urging the Guardian into acts of terror so they could feed off those negative emotions."

Since the Nightmares had discovered the human subconscious through the fissure created by the Elders, they'd been using the power of the human mind as sustenance. Fear, fury, misery
—
these were easily aroused through dreams and fed Nightmares so well
.

Lowering his sword, Connor freed one hand to scrub at his jaw. "How many of those things are there?"

"There were a dozen in the original trial, but only one affected Guardian remained alive and you killed him today."

"Be thankful for small favors, eh?" Connor snorted.

Sheron removed the scabbard belt from his too-lean waist and emptied the water that had collected inside it. Then he sheathed his glaive and moved to a nearby rock, leaving a trail of droplets in his wake.

"What aren't you telling me?" Connor followed with glaive in hand. He didn't trust
Sheron as far as he could throw him. Not any more. Sad, considering he had once trusted the man with his life.

"What I came here to tell you." The Elder settled onto a large
rock and spread out his sodden robes as much as possible. "The trial was deemed a success before the symptoms of Nightmare possession began to present themselves. We were testing for successful round-trips, not side-effects. An additional contingent of guards and Elders were sent through before we understood the extent of the problem."

Connor's gut tightened into a hard knot. "Well, yank them all back, damn it!"

"We cannot. By the time we comprehended the error, the Guardians had altered so much they were incapable of returning upon their threads. They were no longer the same individuals who departed. We were able to retrieve only the unaffected ones."

"What the hell have you done? How many of those things are out there?"

"Ten of the lot were unable to return. We have sent twenty more through since then. A gamble. Those who are unaffected will hunt those who are and put them down. Cross will expect the Guardians to search for him, but there is no way for him to know about the hybrids."

Before the rebellion, Aidan had been Captain and Connor had been his lieutenant. Together, they had run the Elite with faultless precision. Life had seemed so simple then. Now, everything was complicated.

"Why are you telling me this?" Connor asked suspiciously.

"Cross's death is not something I want."

"But you want the Key dead," Connor argued. "And you'll have to kill Cross to get to the Key, I promise you that."

"We will manage that when the time comes."

"Like hell you will!" Connor launched himself like a missile, flying through the air and slamming into the Elder's chest with his shoulder.

The Elder would make a great hostage. They tumbled, rolling across the sand
—

Gasping, Connor jolted awake, which also woke the warm curvy woman lying in his arms.

"Hey." Stacey's voice was husky from sleep. In the faint glow from the muted television, he saw her head turn toward him. They lay on the sofa; him against the back, her against him. "Are you alright? Did you have a nightmare?"

He pushed up and climbed over her carefully. "Yeah."

"Want me to make you some hot tea or something?"

"No." Bending, he kissed her forehead. "Go back to sleep. I just remembered something important and I better write it down before I forget it again."

Connor moved over to the breakfast bar, turned on the recessed spotlights above it, and grabbed the notepad he'd seen there earlier. Then he pulled a chair back from the dining table, borrowed the mechanical pencil lying atop Stacey's textbooks, and turned his attention to finding a clean sheet of paper.

As he flipped through pages of lovingly drawn renderings of Aidan, Connor's heartbeat slowed. His breathing deepened and became more regular. The pictures of Aidan before him were not of the same Aidan he'd been fighting alongside for centuries. The Aidan captured by Lyssa in detailed pencil lines appeared younger and happier. His eyes were bright and the lines of strain less apparent.

Connor studied the images for long moments, then he heard movement on the couch. He pivoted to find Stacey curled on her side, her eyelids fluttering as she drifted back to sleep.

He smiled, once again noting how the chill created by his dreams faded just because she was near. It was amazing what the feeling of female comfort could do for a man. He could see how Aidan's relationship with Lyssa had changed his friend in wondrous ways.

Which only made Connor more determined to succeed in his mission.

He was here for a reason. His actions in this plane of existence would keep the people he cared about safe. It also kept the promise he'd made long ago—to protect the Dreamers from the mistakes of the Elders.

Refocused on his task, Connor returned his attention to the blank paper before him and tried to collect his thoughts.

Aidan didn't remember the conversations they'd had in his dreams. There was no reason for Connor to think that his own brain was any different, which meant the two "meetings" with Sheron were products of his imagination.

Still, despite knowing how dreams worked, he had a very hard time believing that the fantastical story Sheron had told him was a product of his mind. He didn't think up shit like that. He considered himself more brawn than brain.

Unless the Elders had a way the Guardians didn't know about… Or perhaps Wager had gleaned more information from the data chip?

Confused and a bit horrified by the many possibilities—not the least of which was the idea that what he'd dreamed might be the truth—Connor began to write.

It was the sound of a door opening and the distant rumbling of a garage opener motor that woke Stacey. Groggy and too comfortable for words, it took her a minute to comprehend where she was. Scrubbing at heavy-lidded eyes with her fists, she shifted a little and found herself wrapped in a heavy cocoon of large, sleepy male.

Her brain geared up slowly, piece-by-piece registering the heavy arm and leg that were slung across her, the soft lips and warm breath that caressed her shoulder, the morning hard-on that poked insistently into her buttocks. They were on the couch in the living room, spooned on their sides, Connor's chin above the top of her head, his big body half draped over hers. She normally needed a thick blanket to stay warm, but his body heat resembled a blast furnace at her back. Despite her silky spaghetti-strap pajama top and matching pants bottoms, she wasn't cold at all.

Blinking, Stacey looked through the dining room into the kitchen and discovered two faces bearing equally shocked expressions staring back at her. "Uh…"

Horrified at the thought of Connor smelling her morning breath, Stacey snapped her mouth shut and attempted to extricate herself from his embrace. He was dressed, too, of course, but that didn't make the situation any less embarrassing. There was no way they'd ever be able to pretend that nothing had happened between them.