Elementally Priceless (3 page)

As we pulled into a fast food burger joint, Agent O’Shea and his partner who I didn’t recognize pulled in beside us.

“Oh fuck,” I whispered, the wind blowing out of my sails. If Caleb freaked out about a sword strapped to my back, what would he do if he found out Agent O’Shea was on my case for murder?

Caleb whipped toward me, a frown on his beautiful lips. “No one likes a potty mouth on a girl, Rylee. It’s really quite vulgar. You should fix that.”

I all but swallowed my tongue. He didn’t like a potty mouth, and what was I? Hell, I’d been holding back, or at least, I’d been trying to. I kept my weapon clad back facing away from Agent O’Shea as he stepped out of his black sedan. He was young for an FBI agent, maybe in his late twenties with dark hair and the classic dark suit and sunglasses.

He’d been on the original case when my little sister had gone missing. His first case from what I understood. Even from behind those dark sunglasses, I felt his eyes fasten on me and my nerves jangled in response. One day he would be the death of me, I just knew it.

“Adamson,” he barked and I cringed. “What are you doing this far out of your area?”

Caleb looked at me. “You know this guy?”

My lips twisted as I fought the nausea O’Shea stirred in me. “Old family friend.”

Even from there, I easily saw Agent O’Shea’s eyebrows rise. Then he gave a slow smile and my guts churned even faster. He was going to do some asshole thing in front of Caleb. Just because he could.

“You didn’t tell your date the kind of person you are, did you? About your rap sheet?”

Oh, fucking hell. I had to cut this now or I was going to lose my ride.

“Piss off, O’Shea,” I snapped, forgetting I had a sword strapped to my back as I turned and headed toward the burger joint.

“Stop right there. You have a permit for that weapon?”

My feet froze, obedient to the voice of authority even now. A sharp breath escaped me. “You know I don’t.”

“Hand it over, Adamson.”

“Son of a bitch,” I muttered, thinking Caleb was too far away to hear. He paled as I stripped the sword from my back and held it blindly toward O’Shea. Apparently, I hadn’t been as quiet as I thought. Oops.

“Any other weapons?”

I glared at him, let him see how very much I hated him. “Why don’t you go do your job, you lazy ass excuse for a cop? Aren’t there real criminals out there you should be chasing down, instead of stopping at burger joints for another fix for your gut?” Something in me snapped and I reached out, backhanding his stomach, expecting it to be soft and squishy.

Nope, wrong again. It was hard and he tensed with the slap I gave him. I snatched my hand away and strode once more toward the door of the burger joint. I was not letting O’Shea take this salvage from me.

“Either you hand over the rest of your weapons, or I’ll write you up for assault of an officer,” O’Shea said, stopping me in my tracks. I turned to him, his confidence in having put me into a corner written all over the smirk on his lips. Biting back any retort, and every swear word in me, I handed over both knives, keeping only my Swiss army knife. Which was stupid since it would be next to useless in a fight. Again, I strode for the joint, fighting both anger and embarrassment, both of which were making me want to cry.

“You shouldn’t be rude to cops. They’re here to help us, you know, keep the peace, keep criminals off the streets.” Caleb said as we stood in line for our meals.

The door behind us dinged, and I prayed it would be just some average Joe, here for a quick bite to eat.

But I felt O’Shea’s heavy presence at my back and stiffened. “I wouldn’t be rude to cops if they would stop harassing me.”

“I don’t harass criminals. I hunt them down.” O’Shea’s voice slid over me, and I fought the swirling emotions. He had no idea what he was saying, what he was doing. And then Caleb put a hand on my lower back and ushered me forward. The heavy buzzing in my ears of my emotions rushing through me kept me from ordering and Caleb did it for me. All I could think about was the guilt I carried. I was responsible for my sister’s death, I knew I was. But no one could prove it. O’Shea really wasn’t far off the mark and we both knew it.

The truth ate at me, and one day I would pay for the mistakes I’d made.

I peeled out the money from my back pocket and put it on the counter for the meals without a word.

How the hell I managed to choke down the burger and drink, I don’t know. With my throat tight and my stomach rolling with nausea, I was surprised I didn’t throw it all back up.

Through it all, Caleb did a running commentary, his voice soothing and easing its way through me. As we stood to leave, I spotted O’Shea. He gave me a tight smile and a wave.

I flipped him off.

Caleb steered me out of the restaurant and onto his bike.

“I don’t know why they’re bothering you, but I don’t think you deserve it.” His stormy gray eyes caught mine, holding them for a half second before he leaned in and kissed me.

Now, it wasn’t a real kiss, no open mouth, no heart pounding, ridiculous amounts of love rushing through my veins. But it was 
Caleb.
 And that made it fucking amazing. Even if I couldn’t say that in front of him.

“Thanks,” I breathed as he pulled back.

He grinned and swung onto his bike. “Come on, let’s help this friend of yours.”

I swallowed hard and swung my leg over the back of his bike. “O’Shea will probably follow us.”

Caleb, eyes sparkling, gave me another grin. “Then we’ll just have to lose him, won’t we?”

I tightened my grip on him as we sped out of the parking lot and onto the highway. He was surprising the hell out of me. First he says not to be rude to cops, and then he tells me he can lose them?

There was no point in worrying about it, since he was on my side and helping me out.

Hours later, though, I still hadn’t put it from my mind and worse, my one day with Caleb acting as my chauffeur was almost up. And with the way Jonathan’s threads felt as I Tracked the kid, we weren’t even close to finding him. Still south was what I was getting, and the threads were beginning to bend further west. What the hell had I gotten us into?

“So, Rylee, you want me to just drop you off here?”

Caleb had pulled over to a roadside motel and I swung off his bike. “A deal’s a deal.” I handed him almost all of the cash I had left, leaving myself a $20. “Here, that should get you home.”

“You aren’t seriously going to expect me to leave you here, are you? What kind of a guy do you think I am?”

The fading light kissed his features and I so badly wanted him to stay with me. Not because I thought I needed help with the salvage. No. I just wanted him.

Yeah, that was more honest.

“Look, I don’t know how much further he is, and I said I would just—”

He put a hand up, stopping me. “You think I don’t know a little bit about you and Giselle? You think I don’t know that you rescue kids when you think no one is looking?” He reached out and touched a finger to my jawline. “I want to help you, if you’ll let me, pretty girl.”

My heart hammered so loudly I wasn’t sure he’d hear me speak over the sound. “Why didn’t you say anything when I first asked you?”

He gave a sheepish shrug. “You always go with Giselle. I didn’t think you were allowed to go on your own.”

“I’m not a child,” I said, my spine stiffening.

He held up his hands. “I don’t think of you as a kid. Honest.” His smile curved those oh-so-kissable-lips and he leaned close. “And if I’m being honest, I’ve been waiting for a chance to get to know you better.”

Yeah, okay, that did it. He curled a hand around my neck and pulled me close. This time the kiss was anything but polite.

Hot and sweet, I struggled to keep my knees locked so I didn’t fall over. Sure, I’d been kissed before, but not like this. Like the world had stopped moving and—

A sharp twist of pain shot through Jonathan’s threads straight into me. I jerked away from Caleb with a gasp and fell to my knees. I clung to the thread I Tracked, feeling the kid somewhere out west go from perfectly fine to hurt and scared in a matter of seconds.

“Rylee, are you okay?”

I shook my head and pushed myself to my feet. My whole body shook with the effort, and I did my best to paste on a smile. “If you really want to help me, we can’t sleep, the kid is in trouble.”

Caleb lifted both eyebrows, his eyes intense, drawing me in. “I wasn’t really thinking about sleeping.”

Blushing, I almost forgot about Jonathan for a moment before I caught myself. “No, I have to help him.”

Letting out a sigh of what could only be frustration, Caleb gave a slow nod. “Let’s go then, I don’t think you’ll let up till we find him.”

A pang of disappointment twanged at my senses, but I pushed it away. No point in feeling sorry for myself. We had a kid to rescue.

Lark

THE SWORD I
 held looked remarkably like a katana, something I’d never attempted in my five hundred years. I was more of a ‘short sword and big knives’ kind of girl when it came to what I made. A katana was as delicate looking as it was dangerous. Yet the metal spoke to me, told me what it wanted to be, and like always, I’d had no choice but to listen. I rolled the sword in my hands, the balance perfect, the handle resting in my palm like it was a part of me.

Working the metal always reminded me of Griffin, of how he’d shown me the beauty and art of working the metal without the aid of my innate ability with the earth.

Tom let out a snore across the room, gagged and rolled over, pushing a pile of rocks I’d been collecting loose. They clattered to the floor, but he didn’t wake up.

I had a problem and no one could really help me. Being neutral was far easier said than done, and technically Orion had asked for help and I was somewhat bound to help him. If someone was clever enough to track down an elemental, then they tended to get the help.

Hades and hellfire, I did not want to help Orion. He wasn’t the first demon I’d dealt with, and I doubted he’d be the last. The only thing saving me, if my help came back to bite me on the ass, was my probationary status. I was not to leave Death Valley without permission, and I sure as hell wasn’t asking permission to help a demon.

“Disgusting demons and their games.” I laid the katana on the still warm anvil, left my shop, and stepped into the blinding sunshine only Death Valley could produce.

Hands on my lower back, I stretched, each vertebrae popping one after the other. There was only one place I was going to get answers, and it wasn’t from the supernaturals or elementals around me.

Barefoot and wearing nothing but cut-off jeans and a white tank top with coal smudges, I headed toward a quiet spot in the valley, one where the tourists didn’t tend to flock. Presentation wasn’t important when dealing with the mother goddess on a regular basis. She wasn’t big on pretentious assholes. But she could be seriously pissy, like any woman, and I hadn’t spoken to her in a long time.

Which could prove a problem when it came to asking for help.

In the middle of the desert with the sun beating on my head, I folded my legs and sat. The ground was hot, baked to a crisp, and though it was not pleasant, I let the heat seep into me, linking me with everything that was nature and all that flowed through it. The connection didn’t take long to open me to the female entity, who at times, I thought of as my real mother.

Little Larkspur, what trial do you face now that would bring you to me?
 A heavy dose of sarcasm and irritation flowed from her to me. I swallowed hard and spit it out.

“A demon has asked for my help.”

Demons are not all bad, you know that. No more than all elementals are good.

“This one is bad; he’s already proven it by taking a witch hostage. Something that is, last I checked, a big no-no.” I didn’t know for sure, but I suspected he was going to be a serious pain in my ass. Orion had been climbing the ranks in the demon world for a lot of years from what I knew. I had no doubt he was about to make a bid for their throne. I might have to say I was neutral, but in my heart I most certainly was not. There was no way a world run by demons would be good for anyone, elementals included.