Clayton's Jade (Runes Stone Series) (4 page)

“Well why don’t we schedule that right now.  How about tomorrow between …..”  She could feel the air shift around her then they were in this void.  Looking around both of them there was nothing.  Well, I guess you really couldn’t call it a void because a faint light was coming from somewhere she just couldn’t see where. “WHERE THE HELL ARE WE?!”

“Everywhere and nowhere.  Now we can talk without interruptions.  You need to listen up.  Number one your attraction to him is going to get worse.  Number two you are in heat. Number three and this is the most important one you need to make a choice on something in your life or the decision will be taken from you. The only thing I can tell you is that is has to do with you being in heat. Don’t ask for any more details because I am not allowed to give you any.   I’ll be here to talk if you need to in the future.”

“Are you kidding me?  That is just what I need going on right now, is to be in heat!  Damnit, damnit, damnit!  How long am I going to be in heat? Does it affect the attraction that I feel for Clayton?”

“I can’t tell you the answer to either of those questions.  The one has to run its course the other you have to figure out on your own.  I can see different paths, but I can’t tell you which one to take. With all the things hitting you today I didn’t think you would recognize the signs of what was going on.  I believe that you should have all the information before you make any decisions.”

“What de….”   She felt the air shift around her again and then they were back in the living room.  Glaring over at Vie she thought very loudly
,
that is so not fair!

I never said I was going to be fair about anything just truthful.
 
If she thought it was weird that someone could hear her thoughts, it was scary as shit to hear someone else’s in her head. Good thing there was a sofa to land on when her legs went out from under her.  When she hit the couch she felt all of the injuries from earlier in the night hit her.  She would be glad when she healed tomorrow.  That was going to take some getting used to.  “You really need to talk with Clayton like that so he knows what its like.  Holly crap is that going to take some getting used to”    It was the weirdest sensation.  It felt like something sliding around inside her head and she couldn’t shake it out.  It was like a rain drop sliding down your face before you wipe it off.  That was the closest comparison that she could come up with.

“I hate to break it to you, but Odin does that to me all the time.  First time he did it I fell just like you.  I didn’t get to land on a sofa.”  The look on his face said that where he landed was not too pleasant.  His nose was all mushed in as if there was an unpleasant smell in the area.

“Where exactly did you land if you don’t mind me asking?”  A soft giggling started over by Vie.  The longer it lasted the louder it got.

“It’s not funny Vie.  The rocks hurt and the shit stunk!  Do you have any idea how long it takes to get the smell of shit out of your clothes before soap was invented?  Weeks!  That’s how long, weeks!”  Vie forgot that she was in the air she was laughing so hard that she landed on the floor with her tail between her legs and faerie dust settled on the floor where her wings had hit.

Covering her mouth so she wouldn’t laugh didn’t work.  Between Clayton’s story and Vie’s surprised landing there was no hope.  The sounds of laughter rolled out of her mouth and it was so loud that it scared her.  She didn’t realize that her voice could get that loud.  In fact she knew it didn’t.  What the hell was going on?  How did her voice get so loud?

“Well I think we found out one of your active powers.  If you get mad or laugh to loud we are in trouble.”  She could see that Clayton was happy and worried at the same time.  He was happy that she had an active power and worried that she didn’t know how to use it.

“I can’t handle this.  I am going to bed before anything else happens.  This day has been insane.  I’m afraid if I stay awake shit will just keep happening.  Break time.  Time out.  I’m outta here.”  She quickly walked back to her bedroom and slammed the door shut and locked it.  Yep just me myself and …what the fuck??! There, in her room were Vie and Clayton.  Vie had blinked them in.  “Come on guys. That is so not fair!  Can’t you give me some me time. Please?  I will go to sleep and dream.  Then we can go get some bad guys and all be happy. K?”  Just go away and let me have sometime alone that’s what she wanted to scream but didn’t.

“No. With your loud voice, you should able to stop people or rather time.”  He could see her shock as she processed what he said.

Slowly turning to look at him right in the eyes “What?”  That was crazy.  “Do you mean to tell me that I could freeze you both in place right now?”  Now this had possibilities.

“Him you could, however it wouldn’t work on me.   We will have to work with you on that.  You will have to learn how to control it.  Tomorrow will be soon enough to start that.  Goodnight.”  Then she was gone.  Now she just had to deal with Clayton. 

Her tummy felt like it was full of butterflies. What did she do now? What did she want? All of these thoughts were flying around in her head when he stepped closer and leaned in and brushed her lips with his. It was a light questioning kiss and it sent tingles all the way to her toes.   Her body took over her thought process.  Her lips parted and his tongue slipped in which triggered a desire that she had never felt before.  Putting her hands around his neck she ran them up into his hair and pulled his head towards hers.  His hands slipped down to her hips and pulled her up to fit her more closely to him.  He really wanted her.  Feeling him growing hard against her she realized he was very large.  Lightly pushing against his chest she tried to back away, but he pulled her in closer.  It was too much. She needed to get away and think. 

Just as he had gotten her fitted against his body perfectly to feel every curve on her luscious body, she was gone. Where the hell did she go?  Looking down and feeling her rub against his leg he realized what had happened.  “Well that’s one way to make sure I don’t get out of control.  I do believe I will hit the shower now.  Hopefully you have ice water for cold.  I do believe the colder the better.  I will see you in the morning.”  Turning around he left the room closing the door behind him.

For right now it was probably better that she ended it like she did.  It was too soon for both of them.  They had all put her through enough for the day.  He figured tomorrow would be more of the same.  Unfortunately she had to be ready yesterday.  In the morning they would start with working on the new power then work in some hand to hand combat and see where they were after that.

CHAPTER 4

Turning on the cold water he stepped in. after about ten minutes he realized that it was not going to help him this time. It was going to be a long night.  Knowing that he wasn’t going to get any sleep, he took out his computer and brought up the topographical maps to this area and more precisely to her land.  He didn’t have enough people to set up a defense, but he had some technology that might give them a warning.  With shifters being involved it was going to be harder to configure.  Looking at the layout of the land it was going to be impossible to completely defend but he might be able to set up a warning system of sorts.

Emailing his colleague he asked him to send priority overnight micro surveillance equipment.  He figured out that when they arrived he would have to spend one night putting all the devices up around the property, then configure it to looking for certain patterns.  Until then he would put some of the mini cameras around the immediate area.  It wasn’t perfect, but it would have to suffice for the time being. Going into his bedroom he changed into some shorts and a t-shirt.  He had found out years ago it was much easier to climb if your clothes weren’t catching on everything.

Grabbing his car keys so that he could to get into the trunk of the car, he got out to the car, opened the trunk, and unscrewed the area where the tire was.  He had several things stashed in there just in case of an emergency. There were several bags, each one was a different color.  He grabbed the yellow one and put the trunk back together.   Taking the area map he printed from the computer, he started walking the perimeter.  At about every fifty feet he put a camera up.  Some of them were at eye level and some he climbed the trees to put them in.  He had slivers all over his body somehow some of them had made it through his t-shirt.  It must have been too thin.  At least he was almost done.

After putting in the pin cameras, he went to the center of the property and put up a relay transmitter so that he could receive images at the house. When he was about half way up the redwood tree the whole front of his pants ended up ripping out by the time he realized it was too late.   He decided in that moment that he would never climb another tree while going commando. By the time he was done he really hated climbing redwood trees.  They may look majestic and ah inspiring but, they were not tree hugger friendly.  Asking for help was not one of his strong points and he definitely didn’t want anyone knowing about this.  He had slivers in places that shouldn’t have slivers and they itched.  With his luck he was going to be allergic to them. 

If he remembered correctly there was a roll of duct tape lying on the kitchen counter.  After getting back into the house, he walked into the kitchen and grabbed the tape.  Heading into the bathroom the main question he had was how to use the tape to pull out the slivers without pulling out all the hair on his body.  Squeezing them out or tweezing them out was not going to cut it.  That left the tape.  Going back into the kitchen he grabbed the bottle of tequila, he was going to need it.

Several shots of tequila and a half hour later his arms and legs looked like a patchwork quilt. He still had chest and private area to go.  Looking down at the bottle he didn’t know if there was enough tequila for that.  Two more swigs and back to work.  Damn did this suck! After he finished his chest, he grabbed the bottle and took a large swallow from it.  Then reaching over grabbed a rag and shoved it into his mouth.  Taking a section of tape he placed it next to his dick,  patted it down to make sure it was sticking. Then he grabbed the edge of the tape between his thumb and index finger he ripped up towards his chest while screaming into the rag the entire time.  If this is what women did to themselves during a bikini wax they were insane!  Looking at the other side and the top he decided to just get it over with.  Pulling two pieces of tape off the roll, he placed them in the appropriate places and pulled. Then he felt nothing as it went dark.

Kaylee had just jumped through the window to get back into the house when she heard a thump.  Shifting back, she pulled on sweatpants and a tee-shirt then went in search of the noise.  After going through the whole house she realized that the light in the bathroom was on and the door was shut.  Knocking on the door, “Are you ok in there?”  Not getting a response she tried to twist the doorknob, no luck.  Using her mind she tried to call for Vie.  Maybe she could pop in and see how he was doing and no one would be the wiser.

Vie must have heard the whole idea because the next thing she heard was gut busting laughter coming from the bathroom.  When the door opened she understood why. Clayton  lay naked on the bathroom floor and there were long patches of red angry skin missing hair while thinner strips with thick dark hair remained.  If they had been square you could have played checkers.  That was the closest comparison she could come up with.  Then she saw the roll of duct tape mostly gone and the tequila bottle with about two swigs left in it.  All across the floor lay strips of tape with hair and something that was red.  Picking up one of the used strips of tape she looked at it more closely.  Redwood slivers.  Why was he that close to a redwood?  Everyone around here knew better than to try and climb them.  So he wasn’t from around here.  Putting his hand on the tree should have been the first hint. 

Should they move him to the bedroom or let him wake up in the bathroom? “Clayton, time to wake up.” Pushing at his arm while she was talking to him she asked,   “What do you think we should do Vie?”  In some ways she felt sorry for him. How had he endured that pain?

“I am going to move him into the bedroom and cover him up.  Then I have to decide whether to I fix his patch problem or not.  I have to admit that part of me would like to see the reactions of others.  The other part of me wants to fix him.  I have the power to heal.  I have to be careful when I use it.  If I use it now I will not be able to use it again for another day.  It drains me to use it.  What do you think?  Should I use it and fix what he did to himself or leave it?”

“I believe that you should heal him. The first reason is that there are still slivers in him that will get infected.  Even if he is immortal some areas where the infection could occur were never meant to happen.  The second, no living thing should have to walk around looking like a quilt gone wrong.”  While Vie was moving him to the bedroom she ran to the living room to grab her camera.  Even though she shouldn’t take his picture, the evil side of her had to.  “Vie would you please just cover the one area and step back before you heal him.  I have to do this. “

“Ohhh, I so like the way you’re thinking.”  Snap. A bright light flashed in the room. The screen on the camera showed that the picture had turned out.  “Do your thing, Vie.”  Vie looked down at the camera and smiled.  Odin might even want one of those.  Clayton was never going to hear the end of this one.  With one hand on his forehead and the other on his chest Vie closed her eyes and began chanting. 

The sounds that came from Vie did not make any sense. They were a guttural noise.  As she watched Vie started to glow.  When the glow faded Vie was covered with the patches.  Clayton was clear and healthy.  “Crap.  I didn’t realize that you would end up like him.  How long does it last?”

“It depends.  Probably about fifteen hours then my skin will be healed.  It will drain me to heal myself.  I will not be able to do much of  anything.  At the most, though I can get you out of a bad situation if it’s an emergency.  There is always a cost to healing.  The more severe the wounds are the worse I am.”

“I will make sure and tell Clayton about this.  I wonder what the hell he was doing up in those trees.  It must have been important for him to go through this.  I will make sure to find out when he wakes up.  You go wherever it is you need to go and get healing.  If we need you we will call for you.”  Kaylee just hoped that they wouldn’t need her. 

“Fine I will go and heal, however you need to get back to bed and get some sleep.  You have a very long day tomorrow.” Then Vie was gone.  No matter what that was going to take some getting used to. 

The bed was calling to her and she was not going to ignore it anymore.  She needed the blissful peace of sleep after her day.  If only her dreams would co-operate for once.  Laying her head on the pillow she curled up into a ball and promptly fell asleep.