How Beauty Met the Beast (9 page)

He could see it in her eyes when she remembered Catrina’s claims about magic. He didn’t want to believe in magic. Not some amorphous mind-altering kind, anyway. It added a whole new arsenal to what he fought against, one he didn’t know how to defend his friends from. One that could make him and his blackouts a dangerous weapon for the wrong side.

Good thing magic was crazy talk. He took a deep breath. At least, that was his hope.

They reached the stairs to the temple anti-chamber with its white marble, precise carving and bright paint. Of course, the crowning glory was the two-story statue of Ananke lording over the inner chamber. From this hallway they could just see her raised hand and spindle dropping a thread that snaked all the way to the ground. The statue was a monstrosity; one look at that thing and he’d known this was not his tribe—and that was before he’d understood that “thoughtless killing machine” was the job they wanted him for.

“Jolie, meet Ananke. Or her h [nkeughtlesand, anyway. We’re not going that way. Come on.” He pushed back his sleeve to uncover his Atropos tattoo, the same one every member of the hit squad sported.

“What’s that?” Jolie asked.

“A convenience,” he said, and scanned the tattoo against a hidden panel under the stairs.

A door opened, and Jolie looked from it to him, wide-eyed. “The tattoo is a key? You...”

“I told you they tried to recruit me.” As far as he knew, he was the only recruit to refuse their offer—and live.

“What, they hand out keys to applicants?”

She looked afraid. Of him. He hadn’t wanted to get into this; it was the less-important reason he hadn’t gone into his plan ahead of time. But if she’d whipped out a key to their underground chamber, he’d have questions too. He spoke quickly. “A doctor from The Order of Ananke offered to get me out of the hospital after my court martial.”

“You were court martialed?”

“I’d just been promoted to staff sergeant when the fire happened. I was the only one to survive, and I was in charge. Something was up, though, that night and during the trial, so when a guilty verdict and life sentence got handed out after a minimal investigation—I was still in the fuckin’ burn unit when they convicted me—I took the doctor up on her offer. That was before I realized what The Order of Ananke was about or that a group like this could even exist. But they treated me as if I was a sure thing.” He touched the tattoo. “They were wrong.” He strode into the stairwell that led down to the Order’s most sacred space. “You coming?”

“Did you do it?”

He froze two steps down as once again frustration overwhelmed him that he couldn’t remember that night. “Would I tell you the truth if I had?” He turned back to see her reaction.

She slowly nodded, accepting his non-answer. “Why haven’t they changed the locks since you left?”

He gave a grim chuckle. “They can’t. The dye in the tattoo is special. Catrina thinks it’s magic.”

Jolie’s eyebrows rose almost to her hairline. “This is what she was talking about? Magical tattoo keys? What are you not telling me?”

He leaned against the wall and crossed him arms. “Come on inside, we should—”

“What. Are you not. Telling me?”

He should have left her at her condo; this was not going to go well. “She thinks the tattoo was put on my arm as some kind of mystical mind control, and that’s why they trusted me with ‘the keys,’ because they thought the tattoo would make me their man.”

“Wouldn’t you have taken the job offer if you were under their mind control? Or is she worried that you’re some sort of double agent?”

“She thinks that instead of the mind control working like it was supposed to, the spell short-circuited or blew up or something, and that’s why I have blackouts.”

Jolie stared at him for a long moment with an unreadable face before shaking her head. “Thanks for telling me. Next time, don’t wait so long. Let’s go get Whitney.”

To his shock, she followed him down the spiral stairs and into the underground.

The underground temple was exactly as he’d remembered, with smooth obsidian replacing the upper temple [ upont size’s shining marble. A red Ananke stood at the apex of the colonnade, a serpent coiled around her torso and feathered wings spread like a demon. Two stone circles on the floor, formed out of Ananke’s scarlet thread wound into an infinity sign, represented a choice between two evils that fate sometimes forces on men. In those circles, The Order would place objects, or people, representing a choice they were about to force on a member. Like they’d tried to do to him.

Hauk leaned on his cane as he stood behind a black railing, uncomprehending exactly how he’d gotten himself into a freaky-ass cult. Sure, his rehabilitation under their care had been medically astounding. And yes, they’d saved his life when they extracted him from the hospital, where the doctors helped him gain enough strength to start a life sentence in prison. Plus, Hauk had been a polytheist since he was sixteen, so goddess worship was nothing new.

But what the fuck was with the twelve-foot-tall, snake-eyed, winged lady? ’Cause she was disturbing.

His
theoros
, the contact they’d given him within the order, whispered in his ear, “Ananke has seen fit to give you an easy choice, my friend. You must be blessed.”

“Uh-huh.” In one circle at the foot of the statue, one of his doctors sat, nodding arrogantly. In the other circle was a man with a rifle. Aimed at Hauk.

His
theoros
continued, louder this time, “Wesley Haukon, you have long been destined for initiation into the mysteries of Ananke, called into her embrace for special duty as a Hand of Atropos. Accept your destiny, and we shall repair your body and give you a new face, one you can show in public. Or fight your fate and, like many heroes before you, lose.”

Hauk took a new look at his doctor. They were going to fix his face? Make it one that wasn’t hunted for mass murder and desertion? Make him able to live a normal life again? At Brooke Army Medical he’d been told reconstruction was impossible, that he would be hideously scarred forever. But he’d seen strange things here. They might be able to do it.

He looked at the statue again with new eyes and saw the beauty and pristine detail that had gone into her carving. Since he’d been here, everyone around him spoke of fate, destiny and necessity as if each life was planned meticulously in advance. Hauk believed in a type of fate, insomuch as most of life was out of his control and no one could entirely leave the past behind. But he also believed that the choices he made based on circumstances out of his control, or no longer in his control, were what made him a worthy or unworthy man.

A pretty-boy assassin at somebody else’s beck and call, or an ugly dead man? His fate sucked either way. But that didn’t deny him the ability to choose.

And he didn’t take well to men claiming friendship while pointing a gun at him.

“What say you, Wesley?” The
theoros
sounded so smug, so sure of Hauk’s answer.

Hauk turned with a friendly smile and clamped a hand on his shoulder. “I say you and your little toga club can go fuck yourselves. I’m out of here.”

He launched himself over the rail as the gun went off.

The bullet had grazed his hip, and that was the last thing he remembered until members of t [ me/i>

And now, here he was again, watching preparations for Reginald Benoit’s own choice between two evils. That bastard deserved the mental torture.

The girl locked in a gilded cage surrounded by Ananke’s thread, howeve
r, did not. He pulled one of Tally’s special keys out of his rucksack and pressed it into Jolie’s hand. “Put this in the lock on Whitney’s cage. Turn the dial until the cage opens. Get the girl out the way we came in. If it gets bad in here, do not wait for me.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Create a distraction.”

Chapter Eight

Hauk strode to the center of the room, all cocksure swagger, as one by one the agents milling about like drones turned to look at him.

How many men just waltzed right in to enemy territory, outnumbered and with no evident exit plan? He was either stupid as hell or his absolute command of the situation was hella sexy. Jolie wasn’t quite sure which. But when every eye had turned to him, she ran the path between the black columns to get to her niece. “Whitney!” she stage-whispered as her fingers fumbled for the lock.

“Aunt Jolie?”

“Sh-sh-sh. We’re getting you out.”

“Holy shit!”

“Language, missy! You’re twelve.” The key fit in the lock, but nothing happened. Jolie clicked the knob blindly as she turned to see what Whitney was cussing about.

Hauk was surrounded. No guns were out, thank God, but the cultists brandished tripods and censors and other detritus from the room, while Hauk was barehanded.

A cultist swung a metal pole. Hauk ducked. Grabbed it. Yanked.

The cultist landed on his face, and Hauk now had a weapon.

The lock clicked. Jolie stashed the key in her pocket and opened the door.

Whitney leaped out into her arms. “Aunt Jolie! Thank you!”

“Let’s give Hauk a moment and then we’re outie, okay?”

“Is that Hauk?” she pointed and Jolie nodded. “What’s wrong with his face?”

“He was in the Army and got hurt fighting for us in Afghanistan.”

“Oh.” Whitney’s nose scrunched in disgust. “I guess he’s a good guy, then.”

“The best.”

Whitney hopped out of the cage and flipped her black hair back into perfect place. Hauk was handling his opponents handily. They were going to do this.

“Stop!”

Jolie rubbed her brow. She’d thought too soon.

The speaker stood in the doorway with the commanding presence of a prince. Steely gray hair set off an aristocratic face, which his high-dollar suit supported. Jolie vaguely recognized him from her father’s dinner parties as one of the rhetoric-spouting jackasses she avoided. She’d always thought of him as relatively harmless compared to most of her father’s powerful friends and business associates.

But something about the way he held and caressed a golden drop spindle, much like som ^ me/ier beone would a pet cat, gave her the wiggins.

“What’s that?” Whitney whispered.

“I have no idea.”

The combatants stopped in midfight to look at him. Hauk lowered his weapon.

“Jolie. How kind of you to join us after declining the invitation last night.”

She laughed bitterly. “After your boys were so kind, I simply couldn’t stay away.”

She could swear he smiled, though the twist of his thin lips was hardly friendly or kind. “A bit rough with you, were they? Considering where they found you, can you blame them?”

“Yeah. I can.”

Hauk made his way to her, casually twirling the pole as he moved. “We’re leaving. The three of us. Is this gonna be a fight, or are you going to do the smart thing?”

Now it was definitely a smile twisting his mouth up, but Jolie didn’t like it one bit. “Yes, we have learned from our mistakes, and this time we’re going to do the smart thing.” He held the drop spindle aloft. “Ananke, we your servants call upon your power. Bind your followers to your will and ours by the thread that you spin.”

He released the spindle. Instead of crashing to the ground, it spun and dropped slowly as a glowing scarlet thread stretched from nothing.

“What’s that?” Whitney asked, her voice thin and face pale.

“I have no fucking clue.”
But he’s standing between us and the door.
Jolie looked around for a second exit. Nothing. She looked up the statue.

There. Behind Ananke’s head, a skylight glowed with afternoon sun. Nobody had a gun or other projectile weapon. She bet she and Hauk could climb faster than anybody in the room. She squeezed Whitney’s shoulder. “Think you can get up the statue?”

The girl’s eyes widened, but she nodded.

“Go.”

Whitney sprinted for Ananke’s foot and hoisted herself up. Hauk strode for the man, murder in his eyes.

The glowing spindle touched the ground.

Luminous red strands shot from the spindle to Hauk and to the other men in the room, catching them all in a web. Hauk kicked the spindle. It crashed to the ground and careened around the room, shooting red thread likes sparks. Jolie ran to her niece and propelled her up to the goddess’s belt. From there, it was an easy climb to the shoulder.

Hauk grabbed the old man around the neck. “You will let us pass.”

“No,” he choked out. “You will do as I command. Seize the woman and put her in the cage. Then seize the little girl.”

Fat chance of that happening.
Jolie grabbed the obsidian thread and pulled herself up, aiming to meet Whitney at the top.

Someone grabbed her by the hips. “Get off me!” She kicked out, but he took the impact without shifting and roughly yanked her from the statue. She fell back, sprawling painfully on her ass.

Hauk stood over her, eyes glowing crimson.

“Hauk? Hauk! What the hell?”

He reached down to grab her again. She slapped at him. He ignored it and jerked her to her feet. Had Catrina been right? If Hauk switched teams, they were screwed.

His empty stare and rough touch shot panic through her. “Stop! Hauk. Please. You’re hurting me.”

He paused, shook his head as if trying to clear it.

“That’s right, Hauk. It’s Jolie. We’re on the same team.”
Oh, please...please listen...

“Jolie, Jolie,” the head priest intoned. “Our normal methods of persuasion may not have worked on him, but he can’t resist anymore.”

“Why? Because you have red yarn? I have a red corset. Corset trumps yarn in the male brain.”

Hauk’s fingers squeezed her shoulders painfully, but he didn’t push her toward the cage.

“Come on, Hauk,” she murmured to him. “No thong in the next show if you lock me up.”

“I have the power of a goddess. He will obey
me
.”

But Hauk still froze, fighting for himself.

The crazy guy huffed in irritation. “Fine. Wesley Haukon, get that brat off the statue. Everybody else, get Benoit’s slut of a daughter and cage her up.”

The slur was lost on Jolie at the sound of that name. Hauk was his last name? He
had
been her mysterious stranger behind the sheet. The fantasy and the nightmare were the same man.

Hauk’s shoulders slumped and his grip on Jolie slackened as the other thugs surrounded them. He was losing.

Steeling herself, Jolie trapped his chin between her hands and forced Hauk to face her. “Wesley of the Divine Tongue, I need your help.” Closing her eyes, she kissed him.

Hauk stilled again then leaned into her touch.

“That’s right. Come back.” She kissed him more forcefully, trying to get through—

—and was grabbed again. Two men had her arms, dragging her away from Hauk. The kiss broke. Hauk stood before her, confused as the red evaporated from his eyes and the iris of one became a ghostly ice-blue. He saw the men holding her.

And went nuts.

His kick caught one man behind the knee, sending him sprawling. A punch, and the other’s nose exploded in blood. Hauk pushed Jolie down, grabbed a pole from the ground and swung.

“Grab the kid! Do what I say!” Gray-hair screeched.

Hauk threw the pole like a spear. Gray-hair’s assistant knocked him to the ground just before he was impaled, and the two crawled for the door. Hauk took a step to follow.

“Hauk! Up!” Jolie grabbed Ananke’s red thread and climbed.

He stopped, gut-punched an approaching cultist, grabbed a censor from the ground, swung the chain and nailed another combatant.

Marching footsteps approached from the hallway. Troops, probably armed.

“Hauk! Let’s go!” She reached Whitney, who cowered behind Ananke’s wing. “Window. Go.”

“It doesn’t open.”

“Shit. Lemme see.” She would break it if she had to. Jolie climbed over Ananke’s shoulder to where she could reach the glass.

Thick and sealed solid.

“Hauk!” she screamed. And turned to find him right beside her.

He reached in his backpack and grab cpace screambed another mechanical doohickey. Slammed it on the window. Dove on top of her and Whitney, covering them with his bulk. A blast sent glass flying outward into the yard.

Hauk scooped up Whitney and pushed her through then helped Jolie manage the small gap between statue and window. He turned back, as if to go down the statue and keep fighting.

“No! Hauk. Stay with me.” She grabbed his shirtsleeve, tugging him back to her.

He looked down at her hand, then back at the fight.

“Please don’t leave us. There might be guards outside.”

He nodded, somersaulted through the window and came up on his feet.

“Jesus Christ, what happened to you?”

Of all things, he smiled at her. “I have a god, too.”

“And he hands out PCP. Excellent. Let’s get the hell out of here. Whitney. Come on.”

Hauk grabbed her niece’s arm and ran, and Jolie sprinted to keep up. Their rope was where they’d left it. Jolie went up first. Hauk tried to pick Whitney up to carry her, but she squirmed out of his grasp.

“I got this.” To Jolie’s pride, the girl hauled herself into the air.

Gunshots sprayed the wall. Jolie yelped and climbed faster. She mounted the top and reached down. Whitney grabbed her wrist and Jolie yanked her up.

She looked over the other side. The wall was high, but any lyra dancer knew how to take a fall. Jolie jumped. Rolled. Came up. “Whitney, hang off the wall! I can catch you.”

“Cheer camp, Aunt Jolie,” the girl grumbled and then dropped off the wall, landed in a safe pile and rolled up to standing. “Geez, I’m not a kid anymore.”

Jolie grinned as Hauk crested the wall. She took a moment to admire the breadth of his chest as it rose above her. God, his shape...

“Aunt Jolie? Where to?”

“My car. It’s...” She pointed toward it as Hauk’s legs pushed over the wall.

A shot echoed. Hauk stiffened and let go. His body dropped to the ground, out of control.

“Hauk!” Jolie dropped beside him. “Where are you—” Blood soaked his shoulder. He could recover from a bullet to the shoulder, right? “Can you get up?”

He pushed himself up painfully and lurched forward. “Go. I’m fine.”

Jolie pressed her key ring into Whitney’s hand. “Start the car.”

“Got it.” Her niece sprinted off in the direction Jolie had pointed.

Jolie slung an arm under Hauk’s good arm and helped him up. Together they jogged forward as his pace accelerated. When they reached the car, Whitney was in the back with both doors open and the engine roaring. Within seconds, the little GT-R was blazing around the hairpin turns of the country road on their way back to Austin.

Hauk settled back into his seat uncomfortably, muttering in some language Jolie had never heard before.

“How’s your shoulder?”

His fingers twitched, nervous energy rolling off him. His bulk seemed to fill the car even more than before. His hand slapped down on Jolie’s thigh as his eyes turned to her drunkenly. “No doctors. Lemme sleep.”

“No doctor? You got s cor?his eyeshot!”

“No. No doctor. Go someplace safe.” With those words he passed out.

“Hauk? Hauk!”

“Oh my God! Is he unconscious?” Whitney leaned forward. “He’s not bleeding anymore!”

Jolie took her eyes off the road long enough to check Hauk’s shoulder. It was hard to tell, but it looked like Whitney was right. His chest rose and fell in an easy rhythm, and he looked awfully peaceful for someone with a gunshot wound.

“Who quits bleeding that quickly after they get shot? And what was up with him? His eyes were all whacked out! And what was up with that creeptastic place with the ugly statue? And how did you know to find me there?”

Jolie took a deep breath. “Hauk knew to find you there. As for the rest of it? The world just got a lot bigger for me, too. How ’bout we keep all the weird parts between you and me?”

In the rearview mirror she watched Whitney nod a slow assent. “We’ll need a good story to tell everybody.”

Jolie couldn’t help a small smile. Looked like her niece just might be a bad girl, too.

* * *

“Next time you need to sneak an unconscious two hundred and fifty pound man into your fifty-fifth story apartment, don’t ask for me.”

Jolie propped Hauk’s hip against her own as she inserted her keycard into the elevator, then shot Travis a saccharine smile. “And here I thought you liked a good story.”

Whitney flipped her hair and grinned at Travis, whom she clearly thought was cute. “It’s not so bad. But I’m strong. For a girl, I mean. I’m a cheerleader.”