There was nothing he could say in response. His throat was too full of frustration and curses.
As the door shut behind her, he knew precisely why he'd stopped, and it had nothing to do with the interruption. Had he wanted to, he could have kept going.
But thing was, if he slept with her, he had to sleep with them all.
He reached up to the bedside table, got a blunt, and lit it.
If he slept with Cormia, there was no going back. He had to create forty Bellas... impregnate forty Chosen and leave them at the mercy of the birthing bed.
He had to be a lover to all of them and a father to all their children and a leader for all their traditions, when he felt as though he could barely get through the days and nights with only himself to worry about.
Phury stared at the glowing tip of the hand-rolled. It was a shock to realize that he would have taken Cormia if it had just been about them. He wanted her that much.
He frowned. Jesus... he'd wanted her all along, hadn't he.
But it was more than that. Wasn't it.
He thought of her brushing out his hair, and realized with a shock that she had actually managed to calm him in those moments - and not just through the strokes of the brush, either. Her very presence eased him, from her jasmine scent, to the way she moved so fluidly, to the soft sound of her voice.
No one, not even Bella, could ease him down. Make the cage of his ribs loosen. Allow him to take a deep breath.
Cormia could.
Cormia did.
Which meant that at this point he craved her on pretty much every godforsaken level he had.
And doesn't that make her a lucky girl, the wizard drawled. Hey, why don't you tell her that you want to turn her into your new drug of choice. She'll be thrilled to know that she can be your next addiction, used to try and get you out of your f**ked-up head.
She'll be thrilled, mate, because that's every lass's dream - and besides, we all know how you're the king of healthy relationships. A real golden-boy winner in that department.
Phury let his head fall back, inhaled hard, and held the smoke until his lungs burned like a brush fire.
Chapter Twelve
That evening, as night fell across Caldwell and did absolutely nothing to improve the humidity, Mr. D stood in the hot upstairs bathroom of the farmhouse and peeled off a bandage he'd applied hours and hours earlier to his gut. The gauze was stained black. The patch of skin underneath was much improved.
At least one thing was workin' for him, although it was only the one. Less than twenty-four hours as the Fore-lesser and he felt like someone had pissed in his truck's gas tank, fed his dog rotten meat, and lit his barn on fire.
He should have stayed just a soldier.
Although it wasn't as if he'd had the choice.
He tossed the dirty bandage into the drywall bucket the dead people evidently used as a wastepaper basket and decided not to replace it. The internal damage had been real big, going by how bad it had hurt and how far that black dagger had gone in. But for lessers, the intestinal tract was made up of useless meat. That his guts were a sure-fire tangled mess didn't matter none, long as the bleeding was stemmed.
Boy, last night he'd barely got out of that alley alive. If the Brother with the sissy locks hadn't been reined in, Mr. D was darned certain he'd have been deboned like a catfish.
A knocking from downstairs brought his head up. Ten o'clock sharp.
At least they were on time.
He strapped on his heat, picked up his Stetson, and hit the stairs. Outside, there were three trucks and a beater in the dirt drive and two squadrons of lessers on the front stoop. As he let the boys in, the f**kers topped him by at least a foot, and he could tell they weren't impressed none too good about his promotion.
"In the living room," he told them.
As the eight of them filed past, he flipped free the holster strap on his gun, palmed the Magnum .357, and leveled it at the last one in the house.
He pulled the trigger once. Twice. Three times.
The sound was like thunder; none of that subtle popping like you got with nines. The slugs went into the small of the lesser's back, obliterating his spine and blowing a hole through the front of his torso. The guy hit the ratty rug with a thump, a little cloud of dust wafting up.
As Mr. D reholstered his weapon, he wondered when the place had last been vacuumed. Probably back when it had been built.
"I'm 'fraid I have to get m' spurs on," he said as he stepped around the writhing slayer.
While oily black blood oozed out on the brown rug, Mr. D put his foot on the slayer's head and pulled out the wallpaper section the Omega had burned the target's image onto.
"I want to make sure I got y'all's attention last night," he said as he held the thing up. "You find this male. Or I'ma pick you off one by one and start with a new crew."
The slayers stared at him in collective silence, like they had one brain and it was spinning to come to terms with a new world order.
"Y'all stop looking at me and look at this right chere, now." He jogged the picture. "Bring him to me. Alive. Or I swear to my Lord and savior that I will find me some new hound dogs and feed strips of you to 'em. We all on the same page here?"
One by one, they nodded as the downed man moaned.
"Good." Mr. D pointed the Magnum's muzzle at the lesser 's head and blew that f**ker to smithereens. "Now let's get movin'."
About fifteen miles to the east, in the underground training center's locker room, John Matthew fell in love. Which was not something he expected to happen in that particular place.
"Kicks from Ed Hardy," Qhuinn said, as he held out a pair of sneakers. "For you."
John reached out and took them. Okay, they were hot. Black. White soled. Skull on each one with Hardy's siggy in rainbow colors.
"Whoa," one of the other trainees said on his way out of the locker room. "Where'd you get those?"
Qhuinn jogged his eyebrows at the guy. "Spank, huh?" They were Qhuinn's, John thought. Probably something he was really dying to wear and had saved up for.
"Try 'em on, John."
They're awesome, but really, I can't.
As the last of their classmates filed out, the door eased shut and Qhuinn's bravado eased off. He grabbed the sneakers, put them at John's feet, and looked up.
"I'm sorry for busting on you last night. You know, at A and F, with that girl... I was a prick."
It's cool.
"No, it isn't. I was in a bad mood and I took it out on you, and that is not cool."
See, this was the thing with Qhuinn. He could be out there and he could let his edge get away from him, but he always came back and made you feel like you were the single most important person in the world to him and that he was truly sorry for hurting your feelings.
You're a freak. But I really can't accept these -
"Were you raised in a barn? Don't be ruuuuuuuuuuuuude, my boy. They're a gift."
Blay shook his head. "Take them, John. You're just going to lose this argument, and it will save us from the theatrics."
"Theatrics?" Qhuinn leaped up and assumed a Roman oratory pose. "Whither thou knowest thy ass from thy elbow, young scribe?"
Blay blushed. "Come on - "
Qhuinn threw himself at Blay, grasping onto the guy's shoulders and hanging his full weight off him. "Hold me. Your insult has left me breathless. I'm agasp."
Blay grunted and scrambled to keep Qhuinn up off the floor. "That's agape."
"Agasp sounds better."
Blay was trying not to smile, trying not to be delighted, but his eyes were sparkling like sapphires and his cheeks were getting red.
With a silent laugh, John sat on one of the locker room benches, shook out his pair of white socks, and pulled them on under his new old jeans.
You sure, Qhuinn? 'Cuz I have a feeling they're going to fit and you might change your mind.
Qhuinn abruptly lifted himself off Blay and straightened his clothes with a sharp tug. "And now you offend my honor." Facing off at John, he flipped into a fencing stance.
"Touché."
Blay laughed. "That's en garde, you damn fool."
Qhuinn shot a look over his shoulder. "?a va, Brutus?"
"Et tu!"
"That would be tutu, I believe, and you can keep the cross-dressing to yourself, ya perv." Qhuinn flashed a brilliant smile, all twelve kinds of proud for being such an ass. "Now, put the f**kers on, John, and let's be done with this. Before we have to put Blay in an iron lung."
"Try sanitarium!"
"No, thanks, I had a big lunch."