Jessica Andersen - Dawnkeepers

Now it was his turn to wince, only he didn’t. He just kept looking at her as though weighing a major decision. After a long moment, he held out his hand to her. “Come with me.”

The action pulled back his sleeve to reveal his marks, both old and new. If it hadn’t been for the rainbow mark, she might’ve kicked him out. Hell, if there’d been a MAC-10 handy, she might’ve shot him. That was how furious she was over his deception, how disgusted she was to discover that she hadn’t just repeated old patterns by falling for a wealthy, too-slick charmer who hadn’t fallen as hard or far; she’d dropped right back into the familiar rut of falling for the cheater, damn him.

But the rainbow glyph reminded her that this wasn’t just about her heart or her anger. It was about the Nightkeepers too, and the goddess. It was about the end-time war and the new part she was apparently destined to play.

“Shit.” She scowled at him. “Fine.” She didn’t take his hand, instead marching past him with her chin up and the burn of tears in her eyes.

The hallway was deserted; all the others were undoubtedly sleeping off the magic. Hell, she should be, and so should Nate. But she had a feeling that the restless, overtired energy that had kept her awake until his arrival was driving him, as well. She could feel the power of him at her back as he followed her the short distance to his suite.

She paused at the door, turning and raising an eyebrow. “You sure about this? Big step for you, inviting me back to your place.”

Before, when they’d been together, she’d figured he’d kept her out of his space because he was a private sort of guy, and because the communal living at Skywatch made him want to guard a space that was his alone. Now, knowing there was someone else, she had a sneaking suspicion she knew what she’d find in his rooms: pictures and mementos, evidence of his other life.

Been there, done that, hadn’t meant to ever do it again. Then again, the writs said that what had happened before would happen again. She just hated proving it this way.

Reaching past her without a word, Nate opened the door and let it swing wide. He nudged her. “Go on. You asked.”

Yeah, she had. So she headed into his suite, braced for pictures of him with another woman, the trappings of a man she didn’t know, the private life he hadn’t yet managed to leave behind.

Instead she got bachelor quarters.

The walls were still the stark white all the residential rooms had been painted after the renovations necessitated by the destruction of the Solstice Massacre and the decay from the compound’s having sat empty for twenty-four years. The rug was the same neutral beige the contractors had laid down, and there wasn’t much in the way of furnishings in the main room aside from a couple of big chairs that offered far more in the way of comfort than style. A gigantic flat-screen TV took up one wall, and wire racks on either side were crammed with electronics. More electronics, a laptop, and a jumble of notes took up the low coffee table that was the only other piece of furniture in the room.

There was no artwork or pictures, nothing personal about the room. There was nothing that spoke of the Nightkeepers, either, she realized, which fit with his personality but gave her a weird shimmy in her stomach when she realized just how detached he’d remained from it all. Sure, she was pretty heavy into the symbolism, but even total-slacker Sven had put up a couple of framed coyote posters and bought a hand-loomed Navajo throw with a repeating coyote-and-cactus motif. Nate’s sitting room, though, didn’t have a hawk in sight, as though he were trying to cut himself off from the bloodline, from his Nightkeeper identity.

She’d known he didn’t want to be there, not really, but she figured he’d been working through it.

Now she realized that wasn’t the case at all. He hadn’t even moved in, really; he was just marking time.

Turning to look at him, she found him standing just inside the door, which he’d shut at his back. His eyes were dark and hooded; his expression gave nothing away. She raised an eyebrow. “You wanted to show me something?” Glancing at the closed bedroom door, she added, “If it’s in there, the answer is no.”

“Really?” He sounded only mildly interested, but his body was strung tight with tension. “Could’ve fooled me a few hours ago.” He crossed to her, predator-quiet, getting inside her space and leaning close, so she could feel his body heat and the promise of the power they could create together.

She steeled herself to push him away when she wanted to grab him and drag him close. But instead of reaching for her, he moved past her, snagging a remote control off the coffee table and using it to turn on the TV.

The entire wall lit, going blue for a second, then flashing to the static intro screen of a gaming console. He leaned down and hit a couple of buttons on the laptop, and a new graphic popped up: a decent-looking intro screen to what she guessed was a computer game. She didn’t know much about gaming, but this one had a front panel that showed a dragon-prowed Viking ship, its occupants locked in battle with a variety of mythological creatures. A storm slashed across the scene, blurring the details, and the title read: Viking Warrior 5: Odin’s Return .

She glanced at Nate. “One of yours?”

He looked surprised. “You knew?”

“I know you own Hawk Enterprises, which develops computer games for a couple of larger distributors.” She also knew his approximate net worth, and the location of the condo he used every other weekend when he returned to Denver for “business” she now suspected was named Hera.

He looked more amused than upset. “You did a background check.”

“Jox already had the basics.” She didn’t mention that Izzy had brought her the info behind the royal winikin ’s back. Izzy had wanted Alexis to know about Nate’s criminal record, had wanted to stress that the members of the hawk bloodline weren’t realiable—that Nate wasn’t a proper match. To the winikin ’s annoyance, Alexis had been more interested in his life outside the Nightkeepers, and what kept drawing him back to Denver. The file hadn’t contained that info. Now she was halfway wishing she’d hired someone to do a deeper check, one that’d included known associates.

He frowned. “If you already knew, then why did you ask who Hera is?”

“The info didn’t mention a girlfriend.” The last word stuck in her throat.

“That’s because she’s not exactly a girlfriend.” Hesitating only briefly, he tapped another key, skipped over what looked like an animated introduction to the game, complete with lots of blood and guts, and fast-forwarded through a scrolling legend of the A long time ago, in a galaxy not so far away, blah, blah variety. When he stopped fast-forwarding, the screen showed a computer-generated image of a stacked, Valkyrie-big woman wearing what amounted to a leather-and-metal bikini that left zero to the imagination. “This is Hera.”

It took a moment for the surprise to penetrate, another for Alexis to look past the horned helmet and see the resemblance.

Then she froze, because it was way more than a resemblance.

She could’ve been looking into a computerized mirror, one that reflected her physical appearance exactly down to the pixel, then added an edge of the go to hell confidence she’d always wanted and never quite managed to project. The woman in the faux Viking costume could’ve been Alexis’s twin.

Or rather, she could’ve been the woman in the dream-visions, the one who was a better version of the real Alexis.

Shock flared through her. “Who modeled for this?”