Chapter 16
Chapter sixteen
Terms of Embrace
“This seems as good a time as any to let you know,” Jon said as they watched Bishop’s broken form groan in front of them, “we’re heading out by nine tomorrow. Foxe is itching to get home to his family, and Herb only took so much time off work, so we have to get moving.”
Lance nodded his understanding. He was well aware his pals would already be in the thick of their planned cartel hunt if it hadn’t been for the stunt Deputy Parker had pulled.
They’d been delayed a handful of days, and it looked like that was working in his favor, because it’d been grating on him to think he couldn’t be out there with them. “Departure point?”
Jon turned his head enough to arch a brow. “You thinking you’ll be up for it?”
Lance smirked. “Should be right as rain by morning, at the rate my power’s been restoring.”
“That’s good to hear.”
Bishop twitched, his head lolling to one side, as if he were attempting to roll over. Seemed he was still at least semi-conscious. Lance was almost impressed.
“I’ll text you for coffee in the morning,” Jon said. “Maybe you can let Jen borrow your new car?”
Lance played with the thought for half a second before returning.
“How about Lynn and I come over, Lynn returns Jenna’s SUV, and Lynn borrows my new car while I’m away?
” It made much more sense to him that his girl was the one behind the wheel of his car, rather than their women playing car-swap unnecessarily.
Jon chuckled. “That also works. Still nine.”
Lance stepped forward, rolling his shoulders for the last round. “I think we can manage nine. You ready?”
Jon moved behind him and the faintest pressure in the air—a sense Lance had learned powerless humans did not have—assured him Jon had gotten to work on the final stage. “All set,” Jon said.
Lance dropped into a crouch over Bishop’s bruised, bleeding, and muddied form. He tapped the side of the bastard’s split, purple, and swollen cheek, prompting the man to pry open his eyes. As much as he was capable, at least. It was enough. “You understand why this is happening, don’t you, Gav?”
Bishop made a gurgling sound and one of his hands twitched. It wouldn’t have been a concern even if the man could move properly, which he could not, so Lance paid it no attention.
Lance grabbed a fistful of Bishop’s shirt collar and hauled Gavin Bishop up for one final face-to-face.
“It wouldn’t have been enough to lock you behind bars and hope you stayed there for the next thirty years.
It wouldn’t even have been enough to cut off your shrimp-dick and shove it down your miserable throat.
I’ve met some truly nasty, fucked up people, Gav.
Guys who were born crooked down in their souls.
And I ain’t saying you top the list, but you’re definitely gonna share space with ‘em down in Hell.”
He stood, lifted Bishop completely off the ground, and turned to where Jon waited.
It was a surreal sight, seeing a partially visible dome of rainwater curved around the large hole the men had dug.
The dirt beneath was dry—also a bit mind-breaking, considering that the rain had intensified while they worked—and, as always, Jon merely stood there. Looking like he wasn’t even doing shit.
Lance had always thought his own gift was badass.
But meeting Jon, and standing beside Jon when his friend learned and expanded on all the things he could do with his own ability, had humbled Lance a little.
Electricity was a flashy, dangerous, and impressive thing.
It’d given him a handful of convenient sub-abilities, made him faster both physically and mentally, and enhanced his body’s natural healing and immune responses.
He could read heat signatures, read heartbeats, and generated a higher-than-average body temperature that kept him warm when most were not.
But Jon could flick a finger and rip a man apart at the atomic level and it was fucking unfair.
On the other hand, they made a damn good team.
Lance trudged forward, stepping one moment in mud deep enough to slosh over the top of his boots and the next moment onto dried dirt.
Rain pelted his backside, but no longer his face.
It would never not be weird. He shrugged it off, held the broken and bleeding lump of male he’d thoroughly pummeled earlier over the hole, and said, “If I see you when I get to the other side, I’ll kill you again. ‘Til then.”
Bishop’s mostly open eye managed to widen, dilating enough to indicate some level of awareness, and he made a groaning sound like a protest right as Lance let go.
The man plummeted like a sandbag to the ground, cracking something Lance had failed to break when he landed some twelve or thirteen feet later.
Lance was pretty sure he saw a bit of red trickle away from the body.
“Time to wrap this shit up and call it a night,” Jon said.
He tossed Lance one of the shovels he’d brought, and the two got to work tossing the dirt back into the hole.
The dirt Jon so kindly dried as it fell, of course.
They wanted to make sure the body had been sufficiently buried before the rainstorm that turned everything into mud. Mud made things sloppy.
Lance wasn’t sure if Bishop died when he hit the ground or not, but he was sure as shit dead by the time they patted the dirt down to level. He was sweating despite the rain and his leg, which was a good eighty percent healed, had started to ache from the exertion.
When they finished repacking the hole, Lance stepped back, took the second shovel from Jon, and watched his buddy hold out one hand.
Like something out of a fantasy film, the water that had remained held apart collapsed inward, immediately soaking the ground.
The resulting splash carried over into the nearby trails of mud and obscured any tracks they might have made.
“That ought to do it,” Jon said.
Lance grinned at him. “I owe you one.”
“Nah. Fucker deserved it.” Jon took his shovel and they trailed the tools behind them on their way back to the truck, before tossing them into the bed.
Jon jogged around to the driver’s side as Lance paused and faced the secluded but semi-exposed area they’d chosen for Bishop’s grave.
There were a couple of trees, and still several yards before the mountain dropped off into a ravine.
Lance smirked, glanced up at the dark clouds that continued to pelt the earth, and extended his arm. Energy sparked in his chest, but instead of shooting from his palm, he pulled it down from above. Because who the fuck ever questioned a lightning strike?
He split the oldest tree in two, both halves swaying and crashing to the ground. And with the impact, any remaining evidence of their presence would be lost.
Jon shook his head as Lance climbed into the passenger seat. “Seems like overkill.”
Lance flashed him a grin. “You think?” He waited until the scene was behind them, and Jon had switched his lights on, before asking, “Any thoughts on what to do with the bastard’s car?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jon replied. “Dumbass parked at the Inn and hoofed it down to Lynnette’s house, right?”
Lance nodded, remembering that part of the explanation they’d gotten out of him. Bishop had thought it was clever.
“Car’s probably already gone,” Jon continued. “That place is the one neighborhood in this town that can’t get its act together. By Monday it’ll either be some shmuck’s new ride or torn apart for whatever someone thought they could sell the parts for.”
Lance whistled. “Ouch. Remind me not to stay there.”
“Speaking of,” Jon said, “where’m I dropping you?”
Lance made no effort to stop the grin. He knew it was late, though it’d been a minute since he’d checked a clock, but that didn’t change his answer. “Lynn’s.”
It was dark when Lynnette blinked her eyes open, and her tired mind took a moment to reboot.
Hadn’t she left a hall light on? She frowned.
She’d tried to stay up, to wait for Lance to come back, but it had inevitably grown late.
She wasn’t sure what to make of that. Had something gone wrong?
Had he just changed his mind? Had he pushed his leg too far and collapsed?
She remembered worrying about all those things, and a few more, and the fog of sleep finally fled.
Something tightened around her middle and warm air, like exhaled breath, tickled the side of her neck beneath her ear. “It’s just me, Lynn. Sorry to wake you.”
Her heartrate spiked, but she didn’t have to question that voice or what it did to her.
“Lance,” she breathed. She felt the warmth of another form settle in at her back, cocooning her, as his thick arm pulled her flush to his chest. The pillow under her head moved and his other hand curled into view, fingers hooking over the arm she’d had raised when she’d laid down.
She was completely engulfed by him. It ought to have startled her, overwhelmed her, or at least agitated her that he’d taken the liberty of climbing into her bed and beneath her comforter without her vocalized permission.
But he wasn’t actually touching her anywhere indecent. He wasn’t grinding the semi-hard erection she could feel behind her up against her ass. He wasn’t, really, being inappropriate.
He’d come back. As she’d asked.
Lance pressed a warm kiss to the skin beneath her ear even as some strange, horrifying emotion burned behind her eyes. “Go back to sleep, sweetheart. I promise I’ll behave.”
Lynnette swallowed down the emotional surge and asked, “Are you all right? What time is it?”
He chuckled, the sound deep and rumbly with the way she was tucked so close to him. “It’s late,” he replied. “And I’m good. Better now that I’m back with you.” He moved his head and pressed a kiss to her temple. “Everything’s good, Lynn. Promise.”
The breath stalled in her throat as she realized what he was saying.