Tempted (21 page)

“I’d rather wash your back, but no problem. Your wish, my lady, is my command.” He bowed his head and saluted me, his hand over his heart.

“Thank you.” The words came out soft. His expression of respect and trust suddenly making me feel close to tears.

“Hey.” His smile faded. “You look kinda sad. Is everything okay?”

“I’m just glad you’re my Warrior.” What I said was the truth, if not all of it.

His smile was back. “You are one lucky High Priestess.”

I shook my head at his unending cockiness and blinked the ridiculous tears from my eyes. “Just get everyone together for me, ’kay?”

“’Kay. Want to meet in the basement?”

I grimaced. “Definitely not. How about you ask Sister Mary Angela if we can meet in their dining room? Then we can eat and talk.”

“Will do.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ll see you soon, my lady.” Eyes shining, he saluted me formally again before hurrying from the room.

More slowly, I entered the bathroom. Mechanically, I brushed my teeth and got in the shower. I stood for a long time just letting the hot water pour down over me. And then, when I knew I could keep my emotions calm, I thought about Kalona.

I’d relaxed in his arms.
I hadn’t been reliving one of A-ya’s memories, or even under her influence, but I’d let myself go when he touched me, and the result had been as terrifying as it was revealing. It had felt right to be with him—so right that I’d mistaken him for my oath-bound Warrior! And it hadn’t seemed like a dream. I’d been too awake; too close to full consciousness. Kalona’s last visit had shaken me to my core.

“No matter how hard I try to fight against it, my soul recognizes him,” I whispered to myself. And then, as if my eyes were jealous of the water already running down my face, I began to cry.

To find the dining room I followed my nose and my ears. All down the hallway leading to it, I could hear familiar voices laughing amid the clanking of plates and silverware and I wondered briefly if the nuns were really cool with what amounted to an invasion of teenage vampyres-to-be. I paused outside the wide, open-arched entry to the big room, checking out how the nuns were getting along with the kids. There were three rows of long tables. I’d expected the nuns to be clustered together, naturally segregating themselves from us, but they weren’t. Sure, they tended to be sitting in twos and threes, but they were surrounded by fledglings—red and blue—and everyone was chattering, which totally killed the ste reo typical image I had in my head of the nuns’ dining room being a place of prayer and quiet (boring) reflection.

“So are you going to loiter or are you going to actually go in there?” I turned to see Aphrodite and Darius standing behind me. They were holding hands and looking very glowy and, as the Twins would say, happy-smappy.

“Merry meet, Zoey.” Darius saluted me formally, but his smile gave his respectful gesture a warm, casual feel.

I threw Aphrodite a see-someone-has-manners look before smiling at the warrior. “Merry meet, Darius. You two look pleased with yourselves. You must have found someplace to get some sleep last night.” I paused, glanced at Aphrodite again, and added, “Sleep or whatnot.”

“They assured me they
slept
.” Sister Mary Angela emphasized the word as she joined us in the doorway.

Aphrodite rolled her eyes at the nun, but didn’t say anything.

“Darius explained to me that the fallen angel has been visiting your dreams, and that Stark seemed to be able to stop him,” said the nun in her usual manner of getting right to the point.

“What’d Stark do?” Heath skidded to a stop and gave me a giant hug, planting a kiss squarely on my lips. “Do I need to kick his butt?”

“Not likely you could,” Stark said, joining us from inside the dining room.

Unlike Heath, he didn’t grab me, but his look was so warm and intimate that it seemed to touch me as thoroughly as Heath’s hug.

And suddenly I was feeling very guy-claustrophobic. I mean, a buffet of boys sounds like a good idea in theory, but I was quickly finding out that, much like straight-leg designer jeans, it’s only in theory that the idea is good. As if to reinforce my thoughts, Erik chose that instant to join us. Venus, the red fledgling who was Aphrodite’s old roommate, was practically Velcroed to his side. Ugh. Just ugh.

“Hi everyone. Man, I’m starving!” Erik said. He blazed the big, warm, movie star smile that I used to heart so much.

Through my peripheral vision I could see Heath and Stark gawking at Erik and his Venus leech, who was definitely suckerfished to his side, which was when I remembered that neither of my other guys knew I’d dumped Erik. I stifled a sigh of pure irritation and instead of ignoring him with the icy attitude I’d have liked to throw his way, I planted my own fake smile on my face and beamed.

“Hi, Erik, Venus. Well, you guys have definitely come to the right place if you’re hungry. Everything smells super-good.”

Erik’s smile faltered for just an instant, but his acting skills were way up to the task of making it look as though he’d moved on, like, fifteen seconds after we’d broken up. “Hi, Zoey. Didn’t see you over there. As usual, you’re surrounded by guys. Damn, it always was crowded around you.” With a sarcastic chuckle he pushed past me, bumping Stark with his shoulder.

“If I shot an arrow and thought about an ass, would it surprise you that I hit Erik?” Stark asked me in a pleasant, nonchalant voice.

“Wouldn’t surprise me,” Heath said.

“I can tell you
boys,
from personal experience, that Erik does have one nice ass,” Venus said as she moved to follow Erik into the dining room.

“Hey, Venus, I have two words for you,” Aphrodite said.

Venus hesitated and glanced over her shoulder at her ex-roommate. Aphrodite smiled her best mean-bitch sneer and said, “Re. Bound.” She paused and gave a bitchy smirk and then said, “Good luck with that.”

It was about then that I noticed every eye in the dining room was turned to us and all the conversations had skidded to a halt.

Erik made a possessive little motion with his hand and Venus practically trotted up to him. Slipping her arm through his, she mashed her boob against his elbow. And then the whispers started like someone had lit them with a match.

“Erik and Zoey broke up!”

“Erik’s with Venus!”

“Zoey and Erik aren’t together!”

Well, hell.

“I never did like him.” Heath kissed me on the top of my head and then ruffled my hair like I was two years old.

“You know I hate it when you do that!” I said, trying to smooth back my hair that was already too poofy because apparently nuns didn’t believe in flatirons.

“I never liked him, either.” Stark took my hand and kissed it. Then he looked Heath in the eye. “I don’t like it much that you and Zoey are Imprinted, but I don’t have a problem with you.”

“I’m cool with you, too, dude,” Heath said. “But I don’t like it much that you slept with Zo.”

“Hey, just part of the job description of being her Warrior, keeping her safe and all.”

“Okay, vomit,” Aphrodite said. “By the way, testosterone dorks, you should know Z dumped Erik—no matter what kind of spin he tries to put on it. Keep in mind she could do that to either of you if you get too damn annoying.” She unwrapped herself from around Darius, marched over to me, and looked me in the eye. “Ready to go in there and face the pain-in-the-ass masses?”

“In a sec.” I turned to Sister Mary Angela. “How’s Grandma this morning?”

“Worn out. I’m afraid she did entirely too much yesterday.”

“Is she okay?”

“She will be.”

“Maybe I should go to her and—”

I started to walk away from the dining room, but Aphrodite
caught my wrist. “Grandma’s going to be fine. Right now I can promise you she’d rather have you figure out what we’re doing next than stress about her.”

“Stress? Did someone say they were stressin’?” Stevie Rae jogged around the corner of the hallway with Dallas at her side. “Hey there, Z!” She enveloped me in a big hug. “Sorry that I snapped your head off before. I guess we both have been stressin’ too much lately. Forgive me?” she whispered.

“Of course,” I whispered back and tried not to wrinkle my nose as I hugged her. She smelled like basement and earth and something else stinky I couldn’t identify.

“Hey,” I said quickly under my breath to her. “I dumped Erik and he’s hooked up with Venus—in front of everybody.”

“Well, that sucks like your mama forgettin’ your birthday,” she said out loud, not paying any attention to our audience.

“Yeah,” I said. “It definitely sucks.”

“You gonna go in and face him, or turn tail and run?” she asked with a wickedly cute smile.

“What do you think, Ado Annie?” Aphrodite said. “Z doesn’t run from a fight.”

“Who’s Ado Annie?” Heath asked.

“Dunno,” Stark said.

“That’s a character from the musical
Oklahoma
!” Sister Mary Angela said as she tried to stifle a giggle by clearing her throat. “Shall we have breakfast?” Smiling, the nun headed into the cafeteria.

I sighed and had the urge to run shrieking down the hall in the opposite direction.

“Come on, Z. Let’s go in there and get somethin’ to eat. Plus, I got stuff to tell y’all that’s gonna make your boyfriend issues seem like nothin’.” Stevie Rae grabbed my hand, and swinging it, pulled me into the dining room. Trailed by Stark, Heath, Darius, Aphrodite, and Dallas, we found seats beside Sister Mary Angela at the same table where Damien, Jack, and the Twins were already sitting.

“Hey, Z! You’re finally up! Check out the seriously yummy pancakes the nun cooks made us,” Jack bubbled at me.

“Pancakes?” My world instantly brightened.

“Yeah! There’re plates and plates of this stuff
and
bacon and hash browns. It’s better than IHOP!” He glanced down the table and yelled, “Hey! Pass the pancakes!”

Platters started to clatter our way, and my mouth began to water. I seriously heart me some pancakes.

“We like French toast better,” Shaunee said.

“Yeah, it’s not as mushy,” Erin said.

“Pancakes aren’t mushy,” Jack said.

“Merry meet, Z,” Damien spoke up, obviously defusing a pancake debate.

“Merry meet,” I smiled at him.

“Hey, except for your poofy hair you look lots better than you did before,” Jack said.

“Thanks. I think.” I said it through a big bite of pancake.

“I think she looks amazing,” Stark said from where he was sitting a little way down the table.

“Me, too. I like Zoey’s bed head,” Heath grinned at me.

I was rolling my eyes at both of them when Erik’s voice drifted across the room to me.

“Really,
really
crowded over there.” His back was turned to us, but that didn’t stop his voice from projecting obnoxiously.

Why couldn’t breakups be easy? Why couldn’t Erik just not be a butt?
Because you really hurt his feelings
flitted through my mind, but I was sick of being worried about Erik’s feelings. He’d been a possessive jerk! And what a damn hypocrite. He’d called me a ho, but it’d taken him less than a day to hook up with someone else. Jeesh.

“Wait, Erik’s with Venus?” Jack’s voice caught my attention.

“We broke up last night,” I said, nonchalantly forking pancakes onto my plate and waving at Erin to pass me the platter of bacon.

“Yeah, that’s what Aphrodite told us. But now he’s with
Venus
? Just like that?” Jack repeated, staring at Erik and the aforementioned Venus, who was spider monkeying all over him so much that I was shocked that he could eat. “I thought he was a nice guy.” Jack sounded totally young and disillusioned, like Erik had just burst his perfect-guy bubble.

I shrugged. “It’s okay, Jack. Erik’s not really a bad guy. We’re just
bad
together
,” I said, hating how upset Jack looked. Wanting to change the subject, I announced, “Aphrodite had another vision.”

“What did you see?” Damien asked her.

Aphrodite glanced at me, and I nodded almost imperceptibly. “Kalona burning up vamps and people.”

“
Burning
them?” Shaunee spoke right up. “Sounds like something I should be able to discourage. I am Miss Fire.”

“Right you are, Twin,” Erin said.

“Brain sharers—
you
weren’t in the vision.” Aphrodite jabbed her syrupy fork at the Twins. “Fire and blood and horror and whatnot were. You two were probably shopping.”

Shaunee and Erin narrowed their eyes at Aphrodite.

“Where was Zoey?” Damien asked.

Aphrodite’s gaze found mine as she answered. “Zoey was there. In one of my visions that was a good thing. In the other, not so good.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jack asked.

“The vision was confusing. Seemed like what I saw was a double-edged sword.”

To me it was obvious that she was stalling, and I was just opening my mouth to tell her to go ahead and tell them everything when Kramisha, who was sitting down the table to my right, raised her arm and waved around the piece of paper she was holding.