The Aetherfae (17 page)

“What’s wrong?” Candace asked.

“The sensation of being watched…” I whispered, “…I’ve felt it the entire time we’ve been in Ireland. I feel the sensation right now.”

NINETEEN

KILLINEY HILL

T
he instant I mentioned the odd feeling, the sensation of being watched disappeared and I wrapped us in an Air Barrier. I felt Gavin channeling energy, and his entire body tensed. I put my hand across his forearm. “It’s gone.”

“In London you said the sensation felt different,” Candace whispered while scanning the dark wood-paneled walls.

“Different?” Gavin asked.

“Yes. It’s different. When Mara was close, the hair stood up on the back of my neck and I felt her—when she was watching me I knew she wanted to hurt me. This is more like…it’s less of a feeling and more of an…well, I don’t know how to explain it…it’s like an impression, or a fading memory. Does that even make sense?”

Gavin nodded once very slowly. “It’s time you change your scent again. This is the perfect place to do it.”

“With people watching?”

Gavin shook his head. “They won’t see a thing. I’ll compel them to see you exactly as you are now.”

“Gavin, if that’s the case, can you change me back to the way I used to look. I’d like to recognize myself in the mirror again—will that be safe?” Candace asked.

“You’d be less recognizable as a brunette or even a different race, but I’ll let you decide—the moment you leave Dublin, you’ll be under the protection of the Sidhe.”

“We aren’t right now?” she asked.

“No. The Seoladán for this part of the world is just south of here in the hills. Dublin is neutral ground,” Gavin said.

Candace took his hand and looked around us again. “Then we need to get out of Dublin.”

Gavin nodded. Candace’s eyes darkened from pale blue to hazel, and starting at the roots, her hair straightened and turned back to the familiar dark Auburn. Gavin looked at Ronnie.

“I’d like to look the same as I did, but can I keep the bod?”

Gavin laughed lightly and took Ronnie’s hand, transforming him back into something more familiar. Haunting mint green eyes and pale skin stood in sharp contrast to his thick, coal-black hair. I thought he looked much more handsome as a brunette.

“Well, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I’m going to miss the Draco look,” Candace said, wincing like Ronnie was hard to look at. “But at least you get to keep the body enhancements.”

“You’re one to talk,” Ronnie quipped.

“I look exactly like I did before, thank you very much.”

Ronnie began laughing. “Whatever. I’m not the only one with a new chest.”

Candace flushed and crossed her arms protectively. “Oh shut up. They’re exactly the same size as they’ve always been.”

“Oh, don’t get me wrong, you do look better this way, but puh-leaz, I’ve seen you every day of your life since kindergarten.”

“I am exactly the same. Shut it.”

“Anything you ask, Candy.”

I was laughing when Gavin asked, “And what about you?”

“I hate to admit this, but when I was little, I always wanted to look more like my friends. I used to hate the ugly comments and the nasty names, but I’m not that little girl anymore. I’m absolutely ready to look like myself again.”

His warm eyes were intense, and focused squarely on mine. “You’re beautiful to me regardless of what you look like—I see past the skin and the hair, but I can’t think of anything I’d rather see right now than
your
face and
your
eyes looking back at me.”

Candace sighed, “And you’ll never get old and fat, either.”

His words sent my heart racing long before he took my hand. His smile broadened as my skin darkened to golden brown and my hair grew to the middle of my back. Despite the low light, my loose black curls had more luster than I remembered. Gavin exhaled slowly, a deep humming sound coming from his chest. I felt lucky that Gavin had picked me, but more than that, I loved the fact that he always acted like the fortunate one.

We left Doolin’s a few minutes later and walked back to the hotel where Candace and Ronnie left Gavin and me alone in the lobby.

“So, how angry at me are you?”

I didn’t look at him, but there was no mistaking the long exhale. “I’m not pleased, but I understand why you kept your injuries from me. Something else is bothering me—please, tell me how Mara found you?”

Sweat beaded on my forehead. “She can track me…
could
track me when I tracked her.”

He was quiet for several seconds. “Are you certain?”

“We caught a flight from St. Louis to New York. While we were onboard, I projected to find her and…” I paused.

“And?” he pressed.

“And somehow she saw me flying.”

Immediately he seemed to figure it out. “I feared as much when you tried to explain what happened—I wanted to ask you more when you were projecting, but you seemed frustrated by trying to explain yourself. It’s clear to me—she destroyed those aircraft looking for you.” He took a deep breath and exhaled loudly.

“Yes, but she didn’t find me. We landed safely…”

His voice was louder than normal. “And then what did you do?”

My stomach churned. “We rented a hotel room in Queens, and from there we did an internet search for an empty warehouse in Brooklyn.”

“Empty?”

“One for lease or sale. I found one, a huge one, and drove down alone. Then I projected again.”

“Do you mean you intentionally lured her?” He sounded disgusted, and it upset me.

“I had no choice,” I snapped. “She was killing innocent people to get to me. Besides, she’d already figured out I was in New York.”

“How?”

“I don’t know how. Maybe she could tell which way the plane was headed. Maybe she got lucky. Or maybe she could track me the same way I tracked her—I’m probably not the only person who knows how to astral travel, and if a human can learn it, surely a Fae can.”

“I’ve considered that. Tse-xo-be thought it might be possible for us to project—many Ohanzee have tried it, but none have been successful.”

“All I know is that when I projected at the warehouse, she was sitting on top of a building a few miles away. It was like she was waiting for me. She was a tracker, after all.”

He spoke softly. “I’d feel better if I knew for sure how she found you. If there are Fae who’ve learned how to project, it might explain…”

“I know. That might explain why I feel like I’m being watched all the time, but that doesn’t explain how I was healed—I can’t use my abilities, so a Fae—”

“What? If you can’t, then neither can a Fae?” he finished my sentence. “You’re assuming that a projecting Fae is unable to control the elements with his or her mind because you can’t. That’s a dangerous assumption. You’re powerful but you’re very young and inexperienced with the elements,” he said in a whisper.

“Thanks for the confidence boost.”

He chuckled lightly. “You need rest now. Let’s get you to your room. We can talk more in the morning.”

The soft thud of the door meeting the frame set the butterflies whirling in my stomach—that night was the first time in two years we’d been alone. While I didn’t know how I was going to learn to create Aether, or what I’d do with it once I did, my trepidation disappeared. I still mourned my father’s death—it was an ache in my heart—but at that moment there was only room in my mind for Gavin. I created a Clóca barrier and pressed it to the walls, hiding us from the rest of the world—and prying eyes—I hoped. As he turned around, my heart raced even faster. He tilted his head forward, his square jaw just above his chest, and gazed at me from just beneath his masculine brow. It was such a sexy look I forgot we’d been arguing.

At no point in the last two years had I voluntarily allowed my real thoughts and emotions about him out. I had kept them locked safely behind the impenetrable barrier in my mind, hidden from Fae and human alike. At that moment, though, I wanted Gavin to know exactly what I was feeling, to see the images racing through my mind. The devilish smile and the smoldering look in his eyes meant he knew what I was up to and had already tuned in to my mind.

He sauntered over to me, at least that’s the best way to describe it. Thighs rippling under the fabric of his jeans, muscular arms draped loosely at his sides, he seemed completely relaxed…except for his eyes. They were fixed, intense. He was in my mind compelling me to relax. The tightness in my chest dissolved in a warm sensation that seemed to caress my entire body. I felt like I was on the verge of shivering, but my body simply didn’t want to expend the energy. The sensation was intoxicating.

He stopped a few inches from me and flashed a devastating half-smile. Despite the induced relaxation, my body tingled as my lungs quickly expanded and contracted. I didn’t want him to speak, just to touch me. He read me. The soft, warm connection of his lips brushing against my neck ignited the nerves in my skin and tingled all over my body. Without a second thought, I ripped his shirt over his head and pulled the sleeves down his muscular arms, exposing him from the waist up.
Oh my god…

Before the desire to be pulled into his arms fully registered in my brain, he’d seen it in my mind and carried out my wish. His face inches from my throat and his hands exuding a warm energy that penetrated my flesh, he traced the curves of my back and shoulders and exhaled against my neck, causing a new eruption of sensations. His skin, wrapped over thick, muscular flesh, felt warm and smooth under my fingers as I traced the ridges of his chest and stomach. I felt consumed by the need to have his skin against mine, to eliminate the space between us, and he sensed it, slipping my blouse off and pressing himself to me. He read every nerve ending in my body, seemed acutely aware of every chemical rushing through my veins, and played off of them.

With each desire my mind conjured, he reacted instinctively and then countered by treating me to feelings and sensations I didn’t think possible. All of my senses went into overdrive. The sweet taste of his lips and the clean, masculine scent of his skin mingled in my brain with the groans and deep sighs from his chest, and it all drove me crazy. I couldn’t remember feeling as much pleasure in my life as I experienced at that moment. My Clóca barrier fell. I couldn’t concentrate long enough to create another, and honestly I didn’t care. Every fiber of my body celebrated when he scooped me off the floor and slowly carried me across the room.

* * *

Daybreak came with soft light filtering through the thick drapes. As Dalkey woke, the sounds of the city began to invade my new world.

“Do we really have to get up?” I asked, running my hand over Gavin’s muscular chest just a few inches from my face.

A soft laugh rumbled through his throat. “Your friends are up. They’re about to head downstairs for breakfast.” He laughed again. “They’re making bets on when they see us this morning. Candace says not until 10:00 am, and Ronnie…well, you don’t want to know what he just said.”

I felt my face blush. “Seriously, you can hear them?”

“Seriously, I can hear everyone in the building. The Russian couple downstairs, the Americans trying to get their children ready across the hall. All of them.”

“That’s crazy. Isn’t it completely annoying?”

“I can always dial it back if I want to. So, are we getting up?”

I twisted my head to face him. Staring into the amber flecks in his brown eyes, I wanted to stay where I was, but we had to travel to County Limerick and find Sara.

An hour later, the four of us climbed into a small Opel sedan to begin our trek. Ronnie climbed into the right side to drive, and Candace sat beside him, with Gavin and I in the back seat.

She fastened her seatbelt and slid her seat forward to make room for Gavin. “This is a tight fit. Are you sure we shouldn’t get a bigger car?”

“The roads are incredibly narrow—this will feel huge very soon,” Gavin said.

Ronnie mumbled, “Wow, this sucks. Everything is on the wrong side.”

“I’ll be happy to drive, Ronald. We’d probably be safer,” Candace countered.

Ronnie shot her a quick look and cranked the engine to life. “Fat chance. You’ve never actually driven a car.”

“Did Gavin erase your mind? I own a car—drive it every day.”

“A Miata, please…” he said, putting the sedan in drive. “It’s not really a car if you can run slalom through a picket fence. When we rent something that runs on nine volt batteries, you’ll be first on the list.”

Candace snorted, trying not to laugh.

Curving and lined with rock walls, Killiney Hill Road felt incredibly narrow, and with Ronnie focused more on the gearshift than the light traffic, the road seemed even smaller. Gavin was right. We wound our way through the crooked streets to the first roundabout.

“Oh, fun. This is nuts,” Ronnie said.

“Just keep to the left. You’ll be fine,” Gavin said patiently. “Turn left at the first street. That will take you to the M50.”

“Is it wider? Please, tell me it’s wider.”

Gavin laughed. “It’s a dual carriageway.”

“A what?” Ronnie asked.

“A major four-lane road.”

I only began to relax when we drove out of the city thirty minutes later. We crossed a reservoir on the M4 and I sensed the Sidhe on the boundary of their territory.