CHAPTER 21 #2
I couldn’t believe I was even considering it, but there was nothing I could do to help Armand, and Kani had already proven to know what he was doing.
I met my friend’s eyes again, and there was a cunning glint as he returned the stare that reminded me of the words we’d exchanged that first night around Rolla’s fire.
“How are we supposed to know the way?” My voice trembled.
Kani shook his head. “No way. Just up.”
“Lachlan.” One single word and Zephyr had my whole attention. His eyes were hard, lips pressed tight, and he looked at me like I held the answer to every question he’d ever posed.
If only I did. “This is madness.”
A dip of his sharp, bearded chin.
“We shouldn’t.”
But the captain shocked me once again. “Your call.”
I turned towards Armand, now standing, held upright by Kani’s firm hold under his shoulders. His nod was solemn. “You know what to do. People are counting on us.” But which people were? “Get the stash. Don’t waste this opportunity.”
Still, I hesitated.
Then, if only barely, I nodded. I’d also want him to continue the mission if our roles were reversed. Zephyr returned the gesture, then walked away in the direction of the camels’ stables we’d strode past earlier.
Guilt sat heavy, twisting in my gut like the snake who’d almost gotten me, but had gotten my friend instead.
“Armand, if you get worse . . .”
Armand stopped me with a crooked grin. “Takes more than venom to take me out, D. Might even get a scar out of it and finally impress you.”
A half snort, half sob exploded from my chest.
“You don’t want to impress me,” I accused, voice breaking around the ball lodged in my throat.
“I always want to impress hot people.”
I appreciated his attempt at lightness, but guilt still sat heavy on my gut.
Kani adjusted his grip, and I glanced over my shoulder in time to see Zephyr approach with a camel in tow.
The guide met my gaze. “Take right ahead. Stay on it. Not wander.”
I nodded. “Understood.” His dark eyes didn’t waver, but the image of him bending over and sucking the poison from Armand’s calf was ingrained in my mind. “Thank you, for what you did. And for taking him.”
His free fist closed over his heart in a gesture I took for ‘You’re welcome’.
The camel moved with a steady rhythm, its hooves kicking up red dust as it carried Armand away.
Kani led it with steady hands, his silhouette straight despite the weight tied to his back.
The guide looked over his shoulder, exchanging a glance with Zephyr, who stood with arms folded tight across his chest, watching the curve of the camel’s hump as it weaved between the dense, rust-colored trees.
Then the captain called, “Starnesk.”
It must have meant something to Kani, for he blinked once solemnly, then faced forward once again.
Armand also turned, his head lolling slightly but he still managed a wink. “Don’t let him order you around,” he called, voice hoarse. “And Davina? Bring me a present.” The wistful smile on his lips was the last thing I saw as they disappeared from sight.
And just like that, all the determination I’d felt over completing the mission once and for all drained out of me like sap from the trees surrounding us.
For the first time in my life, the familiar, relentless drive to succeed disintegrated into a million particles that went up into the air, blown away by the breeze rustling the leaves above us.
Because all of a sudden getting to that mountain meant spending who knew how long alone with Zephyr, no Armand or Kwabena to act as buffers or distractions.
And I was fooling no one, least of all myself, in saying there wasn’t something about him that unsettled me.
It made my skin heat, and my thoughts slip whenever I caught the full weight of his gaze on me.
Perhaps I was overthinking it, and it merely was the danger of the mission I was feeling.
The knowledge that we were both an inch away from betraying the other at every turn.
There was no point in pretending we hadn’t been given the exact same orders: collaborate for the sake of intercontinental relations, but if there is the slightest chance for our respective governments to gain an inch on the other . . .
Armand had been right. Contracts were barely more than powerless ink on paper, gone with the flick of a flame as soon as the tides turned.
Playing that game was hard enough as it was with Armand around to have my back. Embarking on this with Zephyr and Zephyr alone . . .
A few steps into the forest, the silence began to press in. It grew thick and heavy, like the air before a thunderstorm. The trees swallowed sound in that eerie way only deep vegetation did, each footfall muffled by layers of roots and moss.
He broke it first. “Perhaps we should have gone back.”
I didn’t look at him. “What?”
“You’re not operating at full capacity right now,” he countered. “Your mind is with Centurion Bleuombre. He nearly died in front of you. You’re going to spend every minute of every hour worrying about him.”
I stopped walking, turning slowly toward him.
“I would have, even if we’d gone back with him.
At least this way I can try to find that damned stash while I worry.
” There’d been no further discussion around that fire in the doctor’s house, and who could have lit it, but I wasn’t so naive as to think it wasn’t a shadow in our wake.
We stopped at the base of a sloped ridge, where the trees parted just enough for golden light to pierce through, the ominous shadow of Keftara visible up ahead.
Zephyr turned toward me, eyes narrowed. “You’re as ruthless as they promised.”
I blinked. “Excuse me?”
He stepped closer, just a little. Close enough that I could smell the dry sand of his vest and the faint trace of sweat clinging to his skin. “It’s like everything is just a means to an end for you, no matter the consequences.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
Where the Hell is this coming from?
I was too shaken, too charged to think it through before snapping, “That’s rich, coming from you.”
A flash of annoyance tightened his jaw. “You know nothing about me.”
“I know enough. You’re one of those who keeps everything buried so deep you’ve forgotten what caring looks like.”
We were standing too close now. The shadows of the Evergreen Mahogany trees draped over his face like falling silk, and his green eyes were emeralds gleaming through them.
His voice dropped. “And you think caring so much about a fucking mission that you become ruthless to your own is any better?”
The blow landed, but I swallowed the reaction, lifting my chin. “Better ruthless than useless.”
It was a farce. I knew Armand’s wellbeing would be a weight on my conscience on every single day to come, but I wasn’t about to let this asshole rule that over me.
His gaze dropped briefly to my mouth, then snapped back up. “Charming as always.”
“Your pleasure.”
His lips curved into an almost smile, though it never bloomed. “Must be exhausting, needing the last word that badly.”
I stepped past him, my shoulder brushing his as I did, then glanced sideways at him. “Must be harder for you. Wanting and not having the guts to take.”
He did smile then, brief, sharp, and devastating. I felt it cut clean down to my toes before I turned my back on him and started walking toward the looming shadow of the mountain.
A beat passed, then his voice drifted after me. “Careful, Lachlan. That sounds like you want me to try.”
The heat that flushed my cheeks had nothing to do with the sun filtering through the canopy. “Shut up and walk, Kentar,” I said, not trusting my voice with anything more.
And he did.