Shadow's Pleasure: The Shadow Warder Series, Book Two (A Paranormal/Urban Fantasy Romance Series) (26 page)

“What if they had?” he asked, keeping his tone even. “What would have happened to you then?” Sorcha drew an audible breath. He wondered if she would lie. Kiernan wasn’t sure of the true answer, but he knew he’d feel it if she lied to him.

“I would have been in trouble. It’s hard to say exactly what would have happened. That would depend on the power and intent behind the trap. But I would have been in trouble.”

Kiernan watched the coffee fill the glass pot, drip by drip. She’d spoken the truth. Was that enough? Before he could speak, she went on, taking one halting step closer.

“I went slowly. I did the best I could to feel for anything that shouldn’t have been there. Caerwyn isn’t herself. Her head is in pretty bad shape. But I swear I was careful to make sure her mind was clean before I went in.”

Kiernan didn’t say anything. He stood there, looking down at the coffee maker, trying to decide if he was still pissed at her. She’d spoken the truth about the trap. In the end, maybe she hadn’t been as reckless as he’d thought. And she was clearly very sorry.

Soft footsteps sounded on the floor beside him. Kiernan looked over to see Sorcha next to him. She laid one hand on his arm and leaned in, her sweet, smoky scent tickling his nose.

“I don’t know how else to say I’m sorry. I know I scared the hell out of you. I never would have done it if I’d thought about how it would affect you.”

“We’re partners,” he said, finally ready to let her off the hook. “You need to start thinking of us as a team.”

“I’ve spent most of the last decade focused on myself. How I could survive. How I could fix my shield. Escape Steven. Get back in the field. I’m out of the habit of thinking about my partner.”

“It’s more than that,” Kiernan said. He poured them both mugs of coffee.

Sorcha looked up at him, confusion clear on her face. “More than what?” she asked.

Kiernan studied her face, her clear green eyes, and then shook his head. “You still don’t get it,” he said, not surprised when Sorcha’s eyes slid away from him.

“Are we okay?” she asked, looking at the countertop.

Kiernan wrapped one arm around her upper chest, pulling her into him. For an empath, she was pretty dense when it came to what was happening between them. It was actually kind of funny, when he thought about it. Dropping his head, Kiernan whispered in her ear, “Yeah, Scorch, we’re okay. Just promise me you’ll talk to me before you try anything like that again. If you’re going to put yourself in danger, I want to be there to watch your back.”

“I will,” she said. “I promise.” She wrapped her arm around him, pressing the side of her face into his chest.

Kiernan held her there, inhaling her scent of sweet fire, wondering what the fuck he was doing. Was this going to be his life? Bonded to a Shadow, mixed up in whatever the fuck was going on with Michael? He didn’t owe these people anything. There was no reason he couldn’t jump on his bike and take off for greener pastures. Shake this trouble and start over. As he’d told Conner a week ago, he didn’t need the Warders to fight Vorati.

But there were the missing Shadows, his best friend was having a baby, and he was bonding with a beautiful, badass Shadow who could make fire with her bare hands. Who made him laugh. Made him hard with a look, and set him aflame when they made love. Literally. This was a once-in-a-lifetime woman—and given a Warder’s lifespan, that was saying something. Sorcha was his. She might not get it yet, but Kiernan could work with that. As long as he kept Sorcha by his side, Kiernan would make sure everything went his way in the end.

Chapter Fourteen

Kiernan walked behind Sorcha, scanning the street, moving slower than the foot traffic around them. Despite their lack of sleep, they’d made good progress so far that morning. Starting behind the strip mall where Aiden had attacked them the afternoon before, Sorcha had followed Caerwyn’s traces with an assurance she’d lacked on their previous efforts. When he’d asked her what had changed, her response had been unsettling.

Eyes looking everywhere but at him, Sorcha said, “I was searching for traces of Caerwyn as she was. In the dream, I felt Caerwyn as she is. They’ve changed her. Her mind—her soul—it’s fractured. Damaged. I know what to look for now.”

Sorcha had turned back to the street and continued forward. Sometimes she led them off course for a distance before catching the error and correcting it. But for most of the morning, they’d moved at a consistent pace.

Sorcha should have been happy with their progress. Instead, she was distant. Edgy. Kiernan didn’t like it. Unfortunately, the bond growing between them didn’t give him a window into her mind. He’d thought she was okay after their fight. But he couldn’t tell if this distance was because she was still angry with him, frustrated over the still-missing Shadows, or something else. He’d been giving her space, staying just close enough to keep her safe.

His phone rang in his back pocket, the vibration startling him. Kiernan answered after a quick glance at the screen. “Got anything for me?” he asked Cameron.

“Not much. We need to meet.”

“The club again?” Kiernan asked. Despite what had happened the last time, Kiernan didn’t want to take Sorcha back to Cameron’s club. She was unsettled enough without throwing the Delectavi into the mix.

“No. Too many eyes. You eat yet?”

“Nope,” Kiernan said.

“Does the Shack work? Back room?”

“Give us twenty. See you there.” Kiernan hung up the phone and started for Sorcha. She’d stopped her search and stood in the middle of the sidewalk, seemingly oblivious to the lunch crowd moving around her. “Did you lose it again?” he asked.

“Yeah. We had a good run, and then—” Sorcha sliced her hand through the air. “Just gone. Again.”

“Cameron called,” Kiernan said. He reached for her hand, enclosing it in his. He expected her to pull away.

Instead, she took a step into him, fingers curled around his. “Any news?” she asked, eyes bright with hope.

“Don’t know. He wants to meet us for lunch.”

“I could eat,” she said. A sigh escaped. Falling into step beside him, Sorcha kept ahold of his hand.

“The truck’s not far,” he said. “We’ll get some food in you soon.”

“I thought it was too dangerous to meet Cameron in public,” Sorcha said after a few minutes of walking.

“It is. This isn’t really public. A friend of ours owns the place and we’re meeting in the back room.”

“Hmm. How far is it?” She rubbed her palm over her stomach. “I’m hungry.”

“You’re always hungry,” Kiernan said, poking her in the ribs with their joined hands. “You should be twice your size with all the food you eat.”

“Hey, I’m using a lot of energy while tracking,” she said, laughing. “I don’t usually eat this much.”

“I’m sure that’s true,” Kiernan said.

She shoved her shoulder into his chest. “You’re supposed to be good with women. Don’t you know you shouldn’t tease us about how much we eat?”

“I do,” he said. “But you’re gorgeous. And I don’t care how much you eat. You’d be beautiful to me if you killed an entire buffet on your own.”

At his suddenly serious tone, Sorcha fell silent. Finally, she said, “You’re hiding a lot of sweet under all that swagger, aren’t you?” She peeked up at him through her thick lashes.

Kiernan grinned down at her. Yep, he was getting to her. “Don’t tell anyone. I have a reputation to uphold.” He looked straight ahead, catching the laugh on her lips out of the corner of his eye.

“Yeah, I know about your reputation. Everywhere we go we run into your reputation.” She turned her face to his and gave him an angelic smile. “What about our lunch spot? Did you sleep with the hostess there too? Just so I know ahead of time.”

A laugh spilled from Kiernan’s chest at the thought of Chuck, the rough, burly owner of the Shack. Not exactly his type. And if Kiernan had looked sideways at Betsy, Chuck’s sidekick in the kitchen and wife of twenty years, Chuck would have beat him to a pulp, Warder or not.

“No, you’re cool. The Shack is barren ground. Now the bar across the street—that’s a different story. But we’re not going in there.”

“Probably a good thing,” Sorcha said.

She fell silent again. He still held her hand, but she was staring off into the distance. Kiernan couldn’t tell if she was thinking about their conversation, or if this was more of the weird mood she’d been in. “Scorch,” he began, “I know there have been a lot of women—”

“Don’t,” she said, cutting him off.

“I just want to tell you—”

“You don’t have to explain. I’m sorry I got weird the other night. It was stupid. Neither of us is a virgin. Though you probably have a whole lot more experience than I do. My talents made it hard, sometimes. Touching, I mean.”

Kiernan didn’t know how to respond to that comment.
Good
was what he was thinking, but it didn’t seem like a smart thing to say.

“Are you going to sleep with anyone else while we’re…” Sorcha pointed from Kiernan to herself and back again.

Why was it cute that she couldn’t just come out and say it? “Of course not,” he said, trying not to be offended that she’d asked.

“Then who you’ve been with isn’t my business,” she said.

Kiernan found himself wanting to protest, with no reason. Her comment was more than fair. Did he want her to be jealous? Maybe a little. This relationship stuff was making him irrational.

“So, you didn’t tell me where we’re going for lunch,” Sorcha asked, changing the subject.

“The Shack. It’s a hole in the wall. The best barbecue in town.”

“Good. I love barbecue,” she said as they arrived at the truck.

Kiernan unlocked her door and opened it. Watching her climb inside, he said, “I bet you do.”

“Why, because I’m such a pig?”

“No,” Kiernan said, leaning in to press a kiss to her lips, lingering over the touch without pushing the kiss deeper. There would be plenty of time for that later. “Because it smells like you. Sweet and smoky. I’m going to be hard all through lunch thinking about the last time I smelled something sweet and smoky.”

Kiernan didn’t hide his grin at the sight of her cheeks flaming pink. Shutting her door, he rounded the truck, feeling better than he had all day.

Sorcha’s cheeks were burning. She didn’t know why she should be embarrassed. So she’d set them on fire when they’d had sex. It wasn’t a big deal. Nothing had been damaged. And Kiernan didn’t seem to mind. Sorcha wasn’t used to being teased by men. Usually, they took her too seriously. Probably because she had to be so careful about how she touched and was touched. It created barriers, made it hard to relax. With Kiernan, everything was easy. She liked the teasing, even though she was blushing.

Kiernan started the truck and then took her hand in his. Another thing she liked. She’d never been with a hand-holder. Again, the touching problem making her life weird. It was funny how things most women took for granted, like teasing and holding hands, could be so important to her. Sorcha warned herself not to make too much of it. Kiernan was just being himself. The fight with Aiden had shown that he was as deadly as any Warder soldier, but when he wasn’t in the midst of a battle, he was a friendly kind of guy. Teasing and holding hands probably weren’t a big deal. Still, the barbecue comment was nice. The smoky part was kind of funny. And calling her sweet was, well, sweet. Sorcha could do with some sweet in her life.

They pulled into a narrow alley behind a line of businesses facing a busier street. The truck slowed to a crawl for a few hundred feet before Kiernan eased them into a tight parking area. Stopping the truck, he got out, coming around to Sorcha’s side. She was halfway out of the truck before he got there. Kiernan scowled down at her briefly before he took her hand in his and led her to the screen door at the back of the building. The delicious scent of barbecued pork drifted out, as sweet and smoky as Kiernan had said. Sorcha’s stomach rumbled, an embarrassingly loud growl.

“Relax, Scorch. I said I’d feed you,” Kiernan said tugging her to the door. The main door behind the screen was open into the restaurant kitchen. Without knocking, Kiernan opened it and led Sorcha inside.