Shadow Queen (3 page)

              In the heat of the night, I didn’t count on the turn of events involving taking on a hostage.  I ran to my room wanting to grab the books I borrowed from Maze last week.  She’d checked out several non-fictions on gods and goddesses and the constellations.  I listened to the mother of my dream and I heard the male counterparts and their theories, but I wanted to be sure.

              In my room, I snatched all three heavy bound reference books to my chest and turned back for the door stopping dead in my tracks.  Lee, the MIA traitor boy, stood with his back against my bedroom door.

              “What are you doing here?”  I darted my eyes to where my knives were hidden just under the mattress.  His far from novice eyes followed them.

              “I know where you keep your
cute
little knives, Anastacia.  I lived with you for two years.”

              I thanked him for the sad reminder inside my head and tried to redirect him.  “You are here why?” I smiled like I was all hearts and roses with him still.

              “I require your assistance.”

              I knew this would come back to haunt me.  “What?” I asked shortly.  Lee's ability to surprise me never failed to play on my curiosity.

              “I need—

             
Knock. Knock.

              “Are you okay, Kissa?”

              Crap.  “Quick,” I snapped in a whisper, “Hide.”

              I blocked my mind with such force I hoped it didn't give me away.

              I pushed then dragged him with my hands after dropping the books on the foot of my bed.  The flopping sound made Cas ask what I was doing.  I made Lee lie down and scoot under the bed.  My hand shot to his mouth when he cussed aloud.  I begged him with my eyes.  He made a grunting sound and bent forward.  His Hunter body would have never fit under a normal bed, but this one was raised.  I thanked the gods for canary yellow bedskirts.  Great, I was about to lie to Cas.  It was a good thing I was better at blocking.

              Taking an extensive deep breath, I opened the door.  “Sorry.  I was indisposed.”

              He glanced around the room like he suspected something and rested his eyes on the end of the neatly made bed all decked out in the same canary yellow.  All three books were a dark emerald green making them stand out to the naked eye.  I scanned the bed discreetly to see it from his position.  There wasn't a good enough reason to have delayed opening the door.

              I started to leave the room and take him with me, but he stopped me by taking my hand in his.  It wasn't a gentle touch, but possessive and appearing strangely like a warning.   His eyes were still on the books.  “Aren't you taking those with you?”

              Double crap.  “Uh, yeah.  Maze needs to return them.”

              Sure enough, Cas dropped my hand and successfully crossed the room to get the books making the sweat bead on the back of my neck.  I felt my eyes burn with wanting to case for evidence of my deceit at Cas' feet that were a mere inch from the bed post and the edge of the bed.

              I croaked out a “Thanks”.

              He gave me a strange glance and looked back across the room like he might see someone or something there. 
Like
a very still Valkyrie/Hunter/Traitor boy under my bed waiting for him to leave. I was going to dry heave if he didn’t leave soon.

              And what would I do when he did leave?   Go back?

              I couldn’t leave the guy under my bed or in.my.room.  Cas would
kill him
.

              I would just have to come back.

              Twenty minutes later I had Cas busy checking the kitchen for my dinner and Maze at my back making our way to my room.  I opened the door remissively and immediately pushed my eyes downward to check under the bed first.  I didn’t have the need to bend my head down because there Lee was, laying across my bed, reading one of my personal books, located in my bottom drawer and holding one of my knives I was certain was my #1 that would have been hidden under my pillow.

              Maze was in a bit of hysterics at seeing my confessed tale to be true.  She watched Lee with an expression she usually only wore for girl talk in private.  It shouted something along the lines of disbelief at what she really knew about Lee. She never really believed me about Lee's time at my court.  She always rolled her eyes and treated it like a fairy tale. 

              “Seems my princess will never escape the love advice of the girls of Hertfordshire.  I hope he lives up to Mr. Darcy's image.” Lee dropped the book by my pillow, curled my knife under his hand, and slid off the bed.  “I need your help Anastacia and now you’ve involved your friend.”

              Maze huffed breaking the silence between the two of us.  “You considered me a friend once.”

              “Still do.  Just know that I know where your loyalties lie in the safety of where my job lies sometimes.”

              I could have expanded on the duel meaning of the word “lie”, but I didn’t.  I wanted to know why he was here and get him out fast.

              “Start talking,” I pressed.

              "Once one's good opinion is lost, it’s lost forever."

              I got his point, but it couldn't be helped.  This isn't a storybook and he is not my dance partner and for the record, the only character he could play would be Mr. Wickham.  But he didn't want to hear that.

              I led off with a plea of only his name.  I wanted to end this conversation and get
him
OUT.  "Lee!"

              "You two really do know each other," Maze professed from the door like she was guarding it.

              With a second glance at my book he reminisced down memory lane when he said with little feeling, “I need your promise that when I stand before others and ask you for something that you will say no, no matter the consequences.”

              At first I wanted to laugh, but relaying the words back to myself made me feel it meant something darker was at work.

              “Why do you need me to promise this?” I said and then added, “For you.”

              “If you are presented with no alternative Anastacia, your survival is the most important factor in the greater scheme.  Just promise me you will choose you.”  Lee's fists were balled tight whitening more each passing second.             

              “As much as I want to hate you Lee, I don't.  But I am not sure why I should make a promise to succumb to something so selfish.”

              He swallowed hard making his neck constrict just above where his gray button down collar was open, “Because you won't have a choice.”

              He did know something. He knew what Borgon was going to do next, but he would never say.  I feared for one long painful flash of the future that I could lose Lee. I never once wanted him truly harmed.  I just wished him to come back from the darkside.

              “I know what your thinking.  I can't go back from all this.  Believe it or not, I do all of this for you alone, Anastacia.  It's always been about you.”  His jaw twitched.  Maze busied herself with putting my book back in the drawer, then closed herself in the bathroom.  We both sat in silence hearing the door click.

              “Then why put me in this situation?”

              “Because I can't get out of this one.  I only have enough time if I leave right now to return and not give the edge that I've been here.  He knows where my loyalty truly lies and he's about to use it against me.”

              I panicked and scooted closer forgetting myself and grabbing his shirt where the buttons were left open, “If you think for one minute Dyer Lee about sacrificing yourself for anyone or anything, I will kill you personally before the knife deals the final blow.  I am not worth being a martyr over.”

              The bathroom door opened and a scared squeal emerged before it shut tight again.

              “You're wrong,” he stood still letting me hold on to him and looking down from his towering height, “you are worth more than anything in this world.”

              “Wake up,” I shook him but not very well considering he was part Hunter.  “You need to leave that piece of crap and come back.  Stop listening to his lies.”

              “If I hadn't, you'd not be where you are now and you know it.”  His tone was serious enough I believed him one hundred percent even if I didn't admit it.

              “Regardless.  I want you back.”

              His eyes closed causing me to let go of his shirt.  I stumbled and staggered my words all at the same time, “I mean I want you safe.  Safe.  I just want you safe.”

              “I can't do that.”  He started moving towards the door where he couldn't leave from.  “It's late.  I need to go.” 

              In haste and out of pure fear, I hugged him.  He never brought his hands up, but I felt his body breathe into mine.  It was all I could give.  I couldn't understand why he was being so stubborn but I knew from all that has happened to me in the last year or so that nothing made complete sense.  At least not when so many secrets led your life and the others you cared about held them in out of caring for me.  It was hard to stay angry with them.

              I couldn’t just walk him out of my bedroom and I couldn’t scale him down the wall spidy style.  And I wasn’t a Vampire who could...fly.

              "How did you get in?"

              He smirked, shining his perfectly straight teeth.  His amusement at my expense for getting him out undecided was humorous to him and seen as a opportunity to see me sweat.

              I’d just have to sneak him out the door and hope for the best. 

              Hope wasn’t on my side today!

              Maze snuck out of the bathroom she'd been hiding in to give us "privacy” then left first saying she would talk really loud to whoever she saw if it was a person that would suspect us as “up to something”.  I didn't comment to her or ask how she knew to exit.  The answer was obvious.   Lee was behind me and using all the best efforts at bugging the hell out of me.  He kept purposefully knocking into the back of me “accidentally” letting his hand fall against my butt.  On the third time I smacked him silly across the face to prove my point but it backfired when an angry Cas stood stark still on the other side of the Sun room door I was passing.  Lee’s hand was strategically still where he’d left it.

              Oh, he was in for it now.  And so was I.

              Vampire anger just wasn’t the same as Hunter or Were or even Valkyrie.  They all held a uniqueness of their own.  I still held that Cas’ Vampire wrath was the deadliest of the crew. 

              “You will take your hands off of her or I will
cut
them off,” he said precisely enunciating each word like the cut of a sword. 

              Lee moved so slow I felt the depression of how much he’d held on.  Gross.  I wanted to slap him again.

              “If you want me to do the errand, you better ‘fess up to sneaking to my room.”  I wasn’t going down alone.

              Lee laughed too loud, “Oh, Anastacia.  He already knows more than he has told you.  He isn’t one of the daft idiots you tricked so easily with your charm for years.  He knew of the talk, just not the when.”  He turned to Cas who was not hiding the fact that he was now wrapping his hand indiscreetly around the rather personal dip of my waist and pressing in.  “I did follow her to her room.  I acquired the needed favor from her for which she gave me permission.  You two hash it out however you wish but I’m leaving.”  He turned back to a stunned
me
.  “I will collect sometime soon.”

              Lee gave a fleeting look down at Cas’ protective grip on my hipbone and left down the stairs.  For a Hunter, who'd grown to gigantic proportions, he was soft footed and worthy of his alias.  I never heard his exit.

              Great.  The wrath of the Vampire was going to come down on me  alone.  And he actually let Lee go.  Probably to take it out on me.

              I was in so much trouble.

              Cas pointed towards my room. 

              “But Maze,” I hopefully bargained my friend’s boredness.

              His long finger pointed still.

              I picked up my heavy leaded feet and half dragged myself back to the guilt complex.

“FYI Cas, you don’t want to do this.  You can’t just scare me into doing what you want.”

“I can’t?”  He held out the same hand to the open door frame of my bedroom.  It was not an invitation.  “On the contrary,  I know very well...what I want.”

My instant on blush surfaced.  “I...I...ah Cas.”  Mocking my insulted nature wasn't helping either.

A certain low growl emerged as the door slammed shut and I found myself against the backside of it.  “Then stop making moves without me and forcing me to point out that you.are.mine.”