Wild Hearts in Atlantis (12 page)

Easy enough to make people disappear from behind the authority of a badge. Even the FBI’s P-Ops division had discovered that, when they’d found traitors in their midst. The president fired the director of Paranormal Operations and half of his staff when that inconvenient truth had surfaced.

Quinn sighed, fully aware that her brain was jumping from thought to thought in a futile effort to quit thinking about Jack. If they couldn’t help him…but they would.
Alaric
would. She refused to question her unshakable belief in Alaric or even to peer more closely at the reasons for it. She didn’t have time to get involved with
any
man—and certainly not with a man who was bound by both sworn oath and magic to Poseidon. The sea god himself, swimming out of the page of legends and into the middle of her pain-wracked, screwed-up life.

She stared at the floor, unable to muster even a spark of interest as Alaric conferred with the older man. Archelaus. Although
older
might not apply. Just because the man looked to be at least a century old, appearances were deceiving with Atlanteans. A casual glance would put Alaric in his early thirties or even late twenties, until the one doing the glancing looked into the dark caverns of those emerald-green eyes.

Ancient eyes. Centuries of brutal knowledge, blood, and death had passed before them—those eyes which were always faintly glowing with the overspill of magical power he couldn’t quite contain. He was at least five hundred years old. Strong enough to be the most powerful high priest Atlantis had ever known, or so some said.

Differences of opinion on that subject had been emerging, however. Politics. Like she gave a flying crap about politics. Bottom line: he didn’t look like a man who’d lived half a thousand years…until you looked into his eyes.

He was nearly six and a half feet of pure, primal warrior. His black hair had grown past his shoulders; it had been a few inches shorter when she’d first met him. Not much time for haircuts when a man was saving the world, probably.

She laughed to herself. He’d saved her life and broken her heart. Strange that healing one bullet wound could accomplish all of that.

She closed her eyes but could still see his face, as if it had imprinted on her mind with the strength of a hammer into molten brass. A face too strong—too male—to be called beautiful, but too perfect to be called anything else. All hard lines and sculpted angles. The face of a man who commanded absolute obedience, unqualified respect, and…something else. Something he’d never wanted.

Terror.

Vampires and rogue shape-shifters alike were terrified of the rumors and the reality. Quinn had heard men call him the high priest of death—but they never called him that to his face, or even very loudly. That, by itself, was no bad thing in a warrior priest, to be feared by his enemies.

But it was more than that. Even Alaric’s allies sometimes feared him, and Quinn had seen how brutal a blow that was to him. Poseidon’s high priest would be called a wizard of the highest level if he practiced his magic in the human hierarchy. Hell, he blew the hierarchy out of the water.

Ha. Water. Atlantis. She’d made a funny.

Alaric shifted to capture her in his hot green gaze, and she wondered if he knew she’d been thinking about him. Archelaus said something, and Alaric turned his head back toward the man, giving Quinn the chance to study him unobserved. Even in ripped and bloodstained clothes from the battle they’d just fought, his body was a seductive delight, worthy of starring in any woman’s fantasies. All hard muscle and perfect proportion. Even she, who’d spent the past decade or so surrounded by warriors and soldiers in her rebel army, had to admit that Alaric was in a class all by himself.

And he could never, ever, be hers. Even now, devastated and destroyed by what had happened to Jack, she felt a dull pang at that.

He turned toward her again, and this time he stared a blazing path down her body. Probably looking for any injury he could heal with his magic. She, herself, wasn’t much to look at. It never failed to surprise her that an Atlantean god of a man would be interested in a scruffy, skinny freedom fighter who dressed in other people’s
castoffs and hadn’t worn makeup since she was sixteen years old. Back when the world was innocent of all the dark and twisted things that did far worse than merely go bump in the night.

Alaric headed toward her with that nearly vampire-fast speed of his, and he was kneeling before her almost before she’d seen him take his first step.

“Are you injured?” It was command more than question. The
Tell Me Now
was implied.

“No.” She lifted her chin, knowing he’d read her defiance. Not caring much.

His eyes narrowed, and he gently grasped her jaw in one strong hand, tilting her chin to the side.

“You lie. Blood is seeping from this scrape on your neck.”

A pulse of blue-green light shimmered briefly, and she knew from the accompanying warmth that he’d healed her.

She attempted a smile. Failed. Settled for truth. “Your manners could use some work. ‘You lie.’ Really?”

He released her chin but rested his hand against her now-healed skin, as if unwilling to break the contact. “How is stating fact a breach of manners?”

This time, she did smile, although it was a mere quirk of her lips. He was untamed and always would be, like the other feral man in her life.

“Jack,” she said, her voice anguished. “Alaric, will we ever find a way to restore his humanity?”

Her warrior priest turned his powerful gaze to the tiger, lying so still on the ground.

“I will do all in my power, Quinn, but I cannot lie to you. The chances are not good.”

Alyssa Day
is the
New York Times
and
USA Today
bestselling pen name (and dark and twisty alter ego) of Alesia Holliday. Previously a trial lawyer in multimillion-dollar litigation, Alyssa was delighted to give up the courtroom to finally put the voices in her head down on paper where they belonged. Writing as Alesia, Alyssa won Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA Award for excellence in romance fiction. Alyssa is a graduate of The Ohio State University and summa cum laude (Latin for “with much student debt”) graduate of Capital Law School in Columbus, Ohio. She and her husband, Judd, their two children, and their adopted rescue dogs have just moved to Japan for a while, where they’re having new adventures.

The Warriors of Poseidon Series by Alyssa Day

ATLANTIS RISING

High Prince Conlan’s Story

ATLANTIS AWAKENING

Lord Vengeance’s Story

ATLANTIS UNLEASHED

Lord Justice’s Story

ATLANTIS UNMASKED

Alexios’s Story

ATLANTIS REDEEMED

Brennan’s Story

ATLANTIS BETRAYED

Christophe’s Story

VAMPIRE IN ATLANTIS

Daniel’s Story

HEART OF ATLANTIS

High Priest Alaric’s Story

Specials

“Wild Hearts in Atlantis” from WILD THING

Bastien’s Story