Chapter Twenty-Three
Carter
I rubbed at my temples even though I knew it wouldn’t do anything to resolve the headache that hounded me.
It had started about the moment I’d spotted Marleena in our trailer, after I’d gotten back from dinner in the main cafeteria. She’d been sitting there, on the couch, like someone had welcomed her in.
If she weren’t a guide, I would have probably dragged her out by her hair.
The audacity to come into my space like that?
It felt like an insult that I struggled to allow to pass. However, even I had my limits, and hurting a guide who hadn’t done anything worse went too far. It meant I’d simply kicked her out with a few stern words.
“Where is she?” Kenyon complained from his spot on the couch. “The training should have been over hours ago.”
His words made me think about something that had been mulling around in my head for the past hour. She should have been back. I thought perhaps she was visiting a friend—she’d spent time with that Kaidan asshole—but she’d never stayed out so long after dark.
I’d ignored it, telling myself I wasn’t possessive or paranoid.
It was a fucking lie, but it made me feel a bit better when I said it to myself.
“Fuck this,” Ingram said, pulling out his cell and pressing a few buttons on the screen. After a moment with no answer, he frowned. “You don’t think…?”
“No one would dare touch her here,” I answered, but even I couldn’t say that for sure. People made stupid decisions all the time, after all. Plus, with the Guild still sniffing around…
I pulled out my own cell phone and dialed the number. When she didn’t answer, I dialed it again. Let her see just how long she could ignore me.
By the fourth call, she answered.
“What?”
“Where are you?”
“I’m out.”
“Where?” I pressed, tone having none of the jovial attitude I preferred to lead with.
“I don’t think I need to tell you that. You’re not my guardian.”
Might as well be…
“You know this place isn’t entirely safe.
Come on, Blizzard, where are you? You need us to come escort you on home?
” I knew my tone was mocking, that it was hardly the way to coax her to obey, but I couldn’t help it.
Something about her rebellion annoyed me more than usual.
Perhaps it was because she wasn’t here, safe, when she did it.
“I’m not coming back tonight.”
I noted that she didn’t call it home, seeming to make the choice on purpose. I also noted that I really didn’t fucking care for that.
“And why is that?”
“I don’t need a reason, do I?”
“Where are you?”
She didn’t answer, the silence cracking between us. Shear’s words came back to me, the idea that she’d placed walls between us, that she wanted to keep her distance.
Good fucking luck with that.
Where it hadn’t bothered me much when Shear had said it—I’d just chalked it up to him being overly paranoid and all in his feelings—the reality of her pulling away now hit me hard.
“We’ll be right there.”
“You don’t know where I am.”
“It’s adorable that you think that would stop us.” I hung up, not needing to hear another word from her. Instead, I opened the tracking app. I hadn’t mentioned that I’d installed it on her phone, seeing no reason to have a fight over it. Times like this proved exactly why I’d done it.
Could never be too careful, after all.
A pin showed at another trailer, one in the high-end area like us, but a smaller one, made for a single person.
I frowned as I stared at it. That was that fucking guide’s spot, wasn’t it?
She’d said he was her friend, but a part of me couldn’t quite accept something that simple. Nothing was ever that simple, after all. Shove people together and things happened, no matter if they were male, female, guides, espers or civilians.
At the end of the day, they were all just horny apes hoping to fuck one another.
I glanced over at Ingram, the perfect example of that fact.
“Why do I feel like I was just insulted?” he asked, but got up anyway. Whether or not he knew what was going on, he seemed more than willing to go with.
That was how it worked in a squad, though. I could show up and say I needed help killing someone, and Ingram would ask which bat he should bring. We were bound together too tightly to ever do anything else.
Which also meant when our guide was being a rebellious little pup, we’d go gather her up together as well.
Kenyon followed, asking questions. Shear stayed silent and standing near the back. “Where is she? Why do you think she didn’t want to come back?”
I didn’t answer—it wasn’t that far to the other trailer, and it wasn’t like they wouldn’t figure it out when we got there.
Besides, I didn’t have the answers he wanted anyway. I didn’t know why she’d done this, or what would happen, or how to resolve it. I only knew that Yun staying out at someone’s place all night was not in the cards.
I knocked—harder than I needed to—when we reached the trailer. In fact, anyone with a brain wouldn’t even dare open the door with me pounding like that.
Not that that would bother me. Fuck, I’d snap the handle without an issue. Boundaries didn’t mean shit when it came to Yun.
The lock clicked and the hinges creaked as the door opened to show—yep, the fucker Kaidan. He had his arms crossed and an eyebrow lifted. “Isn’t it a little late for you to be banging on my door?”
Even facing four espers, Kaidan didn’t appear the least bit worried.
It only annoyed me more.
Still, I smiled. “Just came to pick up our stray.”
“A stray?” He peered behind himself as though he had no idea who I was talking about.
It reminded me that Kaidan here was far from just a pretty face—and I wouldn’t even call him pretty. Instead, he seemed more than willing to play along with my bullshit.
“I don’t think I’ve found any strays.”
“See, I’m rather attached to this one, so I’m not leaving without seeing her.” I stared him down, meeting his smile with my own, neither friendly.
He didn’t flinch, didn’t seem as though my threat meant a damn thing to him.
Before he could respond, though, the stray we were talking about appeared just behind him. “It’s fine,” Yun said.
Kaidan looked over his shoulder, his gaze softening in a way that proved he truly cared for her.
I wasn’t sure if that look made me relieved or angrier.
“You don’t have to go.” He leaned in closer to her, though I could still easily catch the words.
“Don’t do this, Yun. You can stay here as long as you want. ”
“I’m not going to cause you problems.”
“It’s not a problem.”
Yun smiled, but it felt dim, forced, as she shook her head. “No. This was only a temporary thing anyway. It’s really okay.”
For a moment I thought Kaidan wouldn’t move, that he wouldn’t let her pass, but after one long look at her, he stepped aside. “Call me tomorrow,” he ordered.
The idea of anyone else giving her orders had me ready to act rather petty before an elbow in my side—no idea who did it—got me to rein in that temptation.
“Of course. Sleep well.” Yun came down the steps, but she didn’t look directly at any of us. Instead, she moved toward the trailer, steps steady, not too slow nor too fast.
It was like she did exactly what she knew we expected, but not a thing more. I let it go, preferring to do this behind closed doors. Let her get her little hissy fit out now.
The moment we got into the trailer, she headed back toward her room.
Ingram moved around her, using the shadows to block her path as Kenyon shut the door at the back of the group, closing us in.
“Where are you going?” Ingram asked.
“To bed. You wanted me back—I’m here. Now I’m going to sleep.” She didn’t yell, didn’t even appear hurt. Instead, she offered a flat expression as she faced Ingram.
“What the fuck is wrong?” Ingram asked, then closed his eyes and gentled his voice. “What happened, Spark? You were fine this morning, so obviously something got under your skin. What was it?”
She still refused to meet Ingram’s gaze—or anyone else’s—even as she answered. “Nothing. Why? Did you need something? Did you need a guiding session?”
Guiding session. The way she said it had all the feeling that she’d have for taking out the trash.
It made it clear she didn’t want to do it, which went to further prove something had happened.
We’d gotten to the point of almost daily guiding sessions, and Yun sure seemed to enjoy it, so what the fuck had happened?
Sure, I didn’t like that she was taking it out on us, but I also wanted to know what had caused this. I wanted to take apart whoever had fucked with her—and thus, with us.
“This isn’t about guiding,” I said.
She turned, the look she gave me as cutting as a razor. It made me nearly miss the uncaring distance—this sure wasn’t uncaring. “Of course it isn’t.”
I found myself smiling, the edges sharp as ever.
Maybe I shouldn’t have given her that look, but something about her attitude set me off.
It was one thing if she snapped at me, if she put distance, but this?
It was different, it was shutting down, and it bothered me in a way I didn’t know how to handle.
“What’s the problem with that? Last I checked, you really enjoyed guiding.
Is that it? You feeling lonely? You wanting us to give you a good seeing to?
” I ran my fingers down her arm, the touch light but teasing.
I’d much prefer working this all out with sex anyway. I didn’t like dealing with bullshit like emotions, so I’d take this to a bed anytime.
A sharp pain went through my fingers, as though I’d touched a live wire, and I yanked my hand back. It took a moment for me to recognize just what that was—a very low version of her protection power.
She’d fried espers with that, but she’d just set a clear boundary with me.
Though she chose not to really harm me, which means she doesn’t hate me.
I nearly rolled my eyes at that guess. It felt juvenile and foolish.
Still, I turned my hand around to look at my fingers and huffed.
“Let’s calm down.” Kenyon stepped forward, his voice easy.. “Let’s just talk this out.”
“I don’t have anything to say,” Yun pressed.
“Right, go figure that Blizzard there puts up an ice wall,” I muttered.
Kenyon cut me a sharp look, but it didn’t stop anything.
Instead, my words must have landed. Even without meaning to, I’d found the thing to say, the place to jab that would truly hurt Yun. It had always been a skill of mine, but not one I’d ever hated before that moment.
“You’re such an asshole,” Yun whispered, her voice quivering.
I’d seen her angry before, seen her panicked and afraid, but this?
This was hurt, and it made me despise the part of me that had done that to her.
I might not know what had gotten to her this time, but I knew I’d driven a stake deeper in with my own actions, ones I couldn’t even understand.
Just why the hell had this all gotten to me the way it had? What the hell was wrong with me?
It all kept me silent as I stared at her eyes, glassy with the tears she tried so damn hard to hold back.
“This is how it always is with you, right? You demand everything from me. You want my body, my heart, my mind, all of it. You want me to guide the way you want, and you want me to listen to you, and to come when you call, but you don’t give me a damn thing in return.
You crawl around in my head, you know everything about me, but you don’t tell me shit about yourselves!
” Her voice rose, but even the yelling wasn’t all anger.
No, a much bigger portion of agony remained, like each word hurt her as much as she wanted to fling them at us.
“You want me to guide you, you don’t want me to go anywhere else, but you go around fucking whoever you want, getting guided by anyone else. ”
That shook loose my thoughts. Guiding by someone else? “What are you talking about?” I asked, no humor to my voice, just confusion.
“Don’t treat me like an idiot,” she said and shook her head.
“Tell me you don’t care if I see it, tell me it doesn’t matter, that you can do as you please, but don’t act like I’m too stupid to see that guide leaving the trailer earlier.
” She wiped at the tear that had escaped with a guttural laugh.
“I don’t even know why I’m surprised or upset.
It’s not the first time I’ve gotten thrown away, when I didn’t live up to expectations, and it won’t be the last. You just should have told me first, gotten rid of me instead of making me fall—”
It all came together for me, what she’d seen, the cause for the spiral, all of it.
It really was my fault. We’d managed to poke at a very old wound of hers, made her doubt herself, then I’d lost my temper with her instead of trying to make it all work out, instead of hearing her out or offering any sort of grace.
So I cut off her tirade, since it was going nowhere good. I stepped in, cupped my hand on the back of her neck and pulled her against me. I kissed her, silencing her with my lips.
Pain seared through my lips, through my hand, but I didn’t relent.
If she wanted to burn every synapse in my brain, well, she was welcome to. Fuck knew it was all hers now anyways.