The Protectors Christmas Box Set (sexy paranormal romances) (30 page)

“I suppose it would be difficult to forget something as important as that, wouldn’t it?” Stone said.

Faith frowned and rubbed her temples.

“But perhaps,” Stone continued. His steady voice carried with it a power that pressed down on the club like an oppressive hand. “Perhaps, it would be easier to forget me and Horace and what you witnessed last night and today.”

The spark in her pale blue eyes dimmed, and she nodded slowly.

“Yes, it would be easier to forget…” she said.

“You don’t need the pressure of things that seem fantastic, things that are impossible. Life is complicated enough. Don’t you agree?”

She nodded again. “Life is complicated…”

Stone flicked a glance in Horace’s direction. “You came to the club this afternoon to talk to Horace, did you not?”

“Yes, yes I did!” A glimmer of life returned to her expression. “I wanted to—”

Stone shook his head. “You wanted to resign your position as bartender. That was why you came here this afternoon, remember? You wanted to resign.”

The power behind Stone’s voice had been enough to overwhelm Faith’s excitement. Her rosy cheeks paled, as the life seemed to drain from her body.

“Now see here!” Horace protested. He didn’t want to lose a competent employee. Hell, he didn’t want to lose
her
. “It’s one thing to make her forget about what happened here, and quite another thing to force her to leave—”
To leave me!

He didn’t want her to leave him. Ever. But he couldn’t say that. He couldn’t reveal that much of himself or his feelings. So he quickly changed course. “You can’t force her to leave Club West.”

Stone lifted a staying hand. All the while, he kept his gaze locked on Faith. “Life is complicated enough, Faith, don’t you agree? You don’t need this job when you can get another one at the university.”

“Yes,” she said her voice as flat and empty as her expression. “That would make my parents happy. They worry.”

“And you wouldn’t want to worry them.”

“No.” The spark had completely dimmed in her eyes.

Horace felt her slipping away. Her memories of what had happened between them would soon be gone. Unlike last night, Horace didn’t feel so relieved about letting her go anymore.

“Wait,” he said. He wedged himself between Stone and Faith. “Wait.”

“I know you have feelings for her, but think this through. You can’t keep her.” Stone put his hand on Horace’s shoulder. “We both saw it. She’s still able to control your powers. We need to make her forget, to lock that knowledge away forever. Otherwise, she might attract the attention of the Council.”

And that
would
be a disaster.

Some members on the Council seemed to love power more than justice. Neither Horace nor Stone could predict the amount of trouble the power-hungry members of the council might make if they found out about Faith’s powers.

“You’re right. Damn, of course, you’re right. We can’t let her fall into the Council’s hands.” Horace started to step away and let Stone wash away her thoughts for a second time. “But how do you know it will work this time?”

“I’m pushing harder, deeper.” Stone’s expression darkened. “She’ll forget.”

Horace believed him. Stone’s push on Faith’s mind was so strong that the power fogged even Horace’s thoughts. This time, the process would surely stick.

Horace rubbed his temples, trying to hold onto the important thing he needed to tell Stone, the thought that kept nagging at him. But because of Stone’s magic he couldn’t seem to keep the words together long enough to put them into his mouth.

“You’re-you’re not going to harm her, are you?” he asked Stone, but that wasn’t what he was trying to remember.

“I’ll try not to.” Stone promised. Somehow, it didn’t seem good enough.

Stone may have vanquished the assassin from the club, but Ballou—whatever
it
was—hadn’t been destroyed. It was still out there.

Waiting.

The assassin’s warning haunted Horace.

“You’re now a package deal,” it had said, which meant Faith’s life was in as much danger as his. Only she didn’t understand what was going on…and would soon know even less.

Taking away what little she did know would leave her vulnerable. She would be as good as dead if Stone succeeded in wiping her memories clean.

And that’s what he’d been trying to remember!

Not only that, Horace had marked Faith twice. He couldn’t quite remember what those marks meant. And it made his head buzz to try and remember the importance of marking a woman, but he knew that what he’d done to her meant something. Something important.

He couldn’t let Faith go. At least, not until they untangled the mystery of why someone would want to kill the both of them.

“She’s part of this,” he said. He put his arm around Faith’s shoulder and pulled her to his side. “Until we figure out why, we need to keep her memories intact.”

Stone didn’t look convinced.

“That monster tried to kill her,” Horace reminded Stone. “It could have shot you. It had every opportunity to shoot you, but it clearly said you weren’t on its hit list.”

Faith’s expression remained vacant. Stone needed to release her and let her have her own thoughts again. And that would happen only if Horace was successful in convincing Stone to release her.

“You were working to vanquish Ballou from the club, and yet it pointed its gun at Faith and pulled the trigger. Don’t you think we need to find out why?”

Stone chewed on his lower lip and frowned. It wasn’t a promising sign. “I’ve already pushed several of her memories away,” he said after a long span of silence. “It might be dangerous to stop now.”

“What do you mean?”

“Her memories are fractured. Look at her.” Stone waved his hand in front of her face. “She’s not able to process any of this because there are too many holes. I’ve never tried to reverse someone’s memories. For all I know, I might end up entangling her in this haze forever.”

“No.” Horace knew he was being stubborn, but he didn’t care. “I won’t let you take her away from me. Not like this. Not yet.”

Impulsively, he slanted his lips over hers and claimed her.

* * * * *

Faith felt like a fairytale princess and the dashing hero’s searing kiss had just broken through the evil wizard’s spell that had bound her. She blinked several times as her thoughts pushed through the thick haze that had clouded her mind. She liked that image of Horace. A dashing hero prepared to fight for his lady. A prince riding on a glorious white steed.

The hero image suited him.

Gradually, Faith’s mind cleared. The fog and the fairytales floated away. She didn’t need the power of Horace’s kiss to hold her thoughts together anymore. But her arms tightened around his neck all the same. She enjoyed the feel of his lips against hers, and she didn’t want him to stop.

After all, if they stopped kissing he’d probably try to break up with her again. He seemed to do that every time they stopped kissing.

Didn’t two people have to be dating to break up? She decided she’d use that argument the next time. And there would be a next time. She felt quite confident he would try to wiggle out of this relationship of theirs every chance he got.

But oh, but he could kiss!

She could feel the brush of his lips and the touch of his tongue all the way down to the curl of her toes. She opened her mouth to him and encouraged him to deepen the kiss. He took her cue and plunged into her mouth, stirred her desire. Naturally, she wrapped her legs around his waist while feeding on the sensual movement of his seeking tongue.

But like all beautiful things, their kiss couldn’t last forever. Feeling breathless and more than a little unbalanced, she found her footing again.

“You okay?” he asked. He gently caressed her cheek.

Not willing to trust her voice to be steady, she nodded, slowly.

That made him frown. “Are you sure?”

“If I say no, will you kiss me again?”

Stone shouted a laugh. “She’s okay. And I think we should get out of here before the police arrive and start asking questions.”

“Where should we go?” Horace asked.

“The café.”

Those two words—harmless in and of themselves—had an ominous ring when coming from Stone’s lips. Horace gave Faith a long, assessing look and then nodded gravely.

The café
.

God help her.

“I don’t understand. Why are you so reluctant to talk to the police? What are you afraid of?” Faith asked as Horace led her toward the bar’s exit.

“I’m not afraid of anything,” Horace said.

“The police are an inconvenience we don’t need right now,” Stone explained.

“An inconvenience?” Faith blocked the exit and crossed her arms over her chest. “The Chicago police are professionals. You should trust—”

Horace lifted her into his arms and carried her through the doorway. “Trust me. The police, no matter how competent, can’t help us. Not with this.”

“Why?” Someone had tried to kill the both of them. Faith’s every instinct screamed that they needed to call in the professionals. “Someone needs to investigate. Why not the police? Or the federal government? Or better yet, the military? Someone needs to be called in. Why are you fighting me on this?”

Horace’s lips remained stubbornly sealed as he carried her to his obscenely large and luxurious black SUV. He set her down and opened the passenger door for her. Stone smiled when she glanced in his direction, but remained just as tight-lipped.

Well. Fine. Faith brooded—for all the good that it did her. Horace didn’t appear to even notice that she was giving him the cold shoulder as he drove to this café Stone had mentioned. Stone followed in his own car.

By the time Horace pulled into a parking space in a part of town Faith rarely visited and knew nothing about, Faith had worked herself into an impressive temper. She had no intention of going anywhere with him, not unless he planned to tell her why they shouldn’t talk to the police. When Horace stepped out of the SUV, she refused to move. Instead, she crossed her arms over her chest and stared forward.

With a frustrated huff, Horace came around to her side of the SUV and opened the passenger door. Faith bit her lip to keep herself from saying something nasty. She shouldn’t put the blame completely on his shoulders. They didn’t know each other well enough yet. At least, he didn’t know her well enough to understand that her opinion shouldn’t be ignored.

“I know you’re upset with me,” he said quietly.

How kind of him to have noticed. Even so, she refused to budge from the soft leather passenger seat of his SUV.

“You don’t understand the situation, Faith.”

“And do you plan on ever explaining it to me?” She didn’t like the bitchy tone of her voice. She blamed him for it.

“I’m taking you to the heart of things so I can explain,” he said, his voice still low. “I’m bringing you somewhere no human has ever been allowed to go before.”

She couldn’t have heard that correctly. She turned toward him. “
No human
?”

“That’s what I said.”

“So, this place you’re taking me, this café?” she asked with great care. “You’ve never been there either?”

His dark blue gaze touched hers. They reminded her of a midnight sky. Faith had to struggle to not lose herself in eyes like that.

“Faith…” He sighed deeply. “The Oblique Café is like a second home for me.”

“But you said…?”

“Yes, I did say that.”

She swallowed deeply, but her voice still wavered when she whispered, “
Not human
?”

“Come on,” Stone said as he walked up behind Horace. He sounded entirely too cheery for the situation. She leaned forward to take a good look at him. Was he human? “They’ll be waiting for us.”

“
They
?” she asked.

Stone looked human. And Horace looked even more human! All the parts had been in the right places. And yet, he’d made her feel things that she’d never felt with another man. Could that be because he wasn’t…he wasn’t…? She couldn’t bring herself to even think it.

“You better give us a minute,” Horace said.

Stone’s gaze bounced between Faith and Horace. “Is she going to be okay with this?”

Horace dragged a hand through his hair. “I don’t know.”

“You need to make it okay,” Stone said. It sounded like a threat to Faith’s ears. “I’ll do what I can to help, but she’s your responsibility.”

“I know,” Horace grumbled.

Nice.
She felt so welcomed, so wanted. And about as desirable as a big, fat credit card bill.

“Take me home,” she said once Stone had gone on toward that crazy café of his, leaving her alone with Horace. “In all my life, I have never been a burden. Even when my parents were neck-deep in research and too busy to spend much time with me, do you think I whined and insisted they stopped their important work to pay attention to me? No, I didn’t. I helped them out by organizing their books, or by interviewing the tribal children, or by simply staying out of their way.”

Horace didn’t say a word, but she could feel the tension humming between them.

“Take me home,” she said, more forcefully this time. Her neck had begun to ache from staring forward when what she really wanted to do was to turn her head and look at him.

“No,” came his flat refusal.

She waited for him to explain why. She should have figured he wouldn’t be so accommodating.

“Then I’ll walk home.”

That was a bluff. A petulantly made one at that. She’d slipped on a pair of sandals that she rarely ever wore because the heels were a little too high and the straps a little too tight. Her feet would be ripped to shreds before she managed to make it a block. She couldn’t possibly walk clear across the city to get home.

“Like it or not, your life is in danger,” he said with a long sigh. “Even if I wanted to send you away, I couldn’t. Not anymore. There is a reason that gunman wants the both of us dead. And the people waiting for us inside the café are the only ones who can help us figure out why.”