The horror in Lyssa's voice roused exasperation in Stacey. Too much was too much.
"I know you love animals and all, Doc, but pulling over to bury roadkill is just nasty."
"Let's get back to the topic of you doing the nasty," Lyssa said with undisguised eagerness.
Stacey laughed. "This is so high school."
"Isn't it? So what happened?"
Blowing out an exasperated breath, Stacey gave up trying to be evasive and began to explain what she didn't quite understand.
"Man," Aidan muttered, scowling. "Your night with Stacey is going to come back and bite me in the ass."
Connor's jaw tightened and his arms crossed his chest. No way in hell was he getting chastised for his private business. "I hate to tell you this, Cross, but my sex life has nothing to do with you."
Cursing under his breath, Aidan cleared a spot amid Stacey's textbooks on the dining table and set a black duffle bag down. "When your sex life includes Lyssa's best friend, it does."
"Oh? How so?"
Aidan shot him an arch glance over his shoulder.
"Here's how it will go: You're going to piss Stacey off for one reason or another. She's going to complain to Lyssa. Lyssa will complain to me. I'll say, 'Leave me out of it.' And she's going to say,
'You're sleeping on the couch.'"
"You're leaping to conclusions."
"Conclusions based on historical knowledge,"
Aidan said, unzipping the bag and withdrawing the contents one by one. "That's why I stopped double-dating with you, remember? One of us would fuck up and we'd both end up paying."
"This is different."
"Yeah, it's worse. I've got Lyssa for the long haul, Lyssa's got Stacey for the long haul, and Stacey has good reason not to trust men. She's got a taste for guys like you."
"What is that supposed to mean, dickhead?"
Connor growled.
"Lyssa told me Stacey has a history of hooking up with men who don't stick around." Aidan pulled a metal cup out of the duffle and set it gingerly on the table. Considering the thing looked the worse for wear, Connor understood it was important.
He stepped closer to check it out.
"When I first got here," Aidan continued, still emptying the bag, "Stacey was so wary of Lyssa getting hurt, she lent her a pepper spray pen. Told her to shoot me with it if I turned out to be an alien or something weird."
"Huh?" Connor picked up the cup and examined it. "She knew you were an alien?"
"No." Holding up a data chip, Aidan asked, "Did you bring a reader with you?" At Connor's negative head shake, he cursed and dropped it on the polished wood surface.
"What's up with the alien reference then?"
Connor was confused.
"It was a joke. Stacey's got a twisted sense of humor."
"Oh." Connor grinned and put the cup back.
"The point is, she armed Lyssa against me, because she was worried I'd hurt her somehow.
She's tough."
"Yeah." She was. Connor knew that. He also knew she was tender and vulnerable. He'd seen a glimpse beneath the shell. "I like that about her."
Aidan tossed the now empty duffel onto one of the dining chairs. "You won't like it so much when she sprays you in the eyeballs with that shit."
Resting one palm flat on the tabletop, Connor leaned over and said, "You're pissing me off, Cross. Why are you so damn sure I'm going to fuck her over?"
"When have you ever been interested in settling down with one woman?" Aidan shot back. "I've known you for centuries. You've never wanted anything more involved than getting laid."
"Neither did you," Connor retorted.
"Obviously, I've changed."
"And I suppose—according to you—I never will?"
"What are you talking about?" Aidan snapped.
"Why are we arguing about this? Just leave her alone. That shouldn't be difficult for you. It's not as if you're hard up."
"Thanks for the glowing endorsement." Snorting, Connor reached for the cloth bundle. "Not that it's any of your damn business, but I wanted to spend more
time
getting
to
know
Stacey. She blew me off. Don't worry about my feelings, though. I don't have any."
If he hadn't been in a bad mood, Connor might have found amusement in Aidan's disbelieving glance. But he felt shitty and so it wasn't funny. It sucked. The whole thing sucked. "Forget it, Cross,"
he grumbled. "I can't change what's already been done and it was over before it started."
"Good." Aidan watched him unwrap the linen and reveal a grimy, dirt-covered blob.
"What is this?"
"Hell if I know. We'll clean it and see." Pulling out one of the chairs, Aidan sank into it with a weary sigh and began to remove the medical tape that held a large bandage to his thigh.
Connor set the blob on the table before following suit and withdrawing a chair for himself.
"What happened to your leg?"
"Some whacked-out chick happened to it." The cotton fell away from damaged skin, exposing a puckered pink scar beneath a row of perfect stitches. Aidan's eyes lifted and met Connor's.
"She was one of us, I think. She had Elite boots on and," Aidan waved his hand over the pile on the table, "all of this was hers."
"Whacked out, eh?" Connor groaned and ran his hands through his hair, lacing his fingers together at his nape. "As in creepy eyes and a serious need for dental work?"
Aidan stilled. " That's why you're here."
"Yep."
"She had razor-sharp teeth and pitch black eyes.
No sclera at all. How the hell is that possible?"
"According to the dreams I've been having, she's what happens when the Elders screw up."
"Dreams?"
"I know." Connor heaved out his breath. "I don't know if my imagination is smarter than I gave myself credit for or if someone in the Twilight is communicating with me. In any case, I've had two almost-identical dreams. In each one Sheron finds me by the lake and tells me that the Elders tried to replicate the Medium slipstreams from the cavern inside the Temple and Nightmares infiltrated the streams, merging with the Guardians who made the journey, which created those
'whacked-out' things. He called them hybrids."
Growling, Aidan rubbed at the back of his neck.
"We need to know if that's true or not."
"No shit." Raising his brows, Connor asked, "You did kill her, right?"
"Right."
"Good. That's one down."
"Fuck." Aidan's hand fisted, wadding up the bandage. "How many are there?"
"Sheron said they sent ten Guardians through the first time and twenty the second time. There's no telling how many of them were infected.
Remembering the games he used to play during training at the academy, I'm guessing they sent more than that and he's keeping the real number to himself."
"I agree." Standing, Aidan moved to the kitchen and tossed the waste in the trash. "I need coffee,"
he muttered. "Lyssa and I haven't slept in two days. I spotted the redhead yesterday afternoon and we've been running nonstop ever since."
" Red hair?" Red wasn't a natural color in their species. Pure white… various shades of blond and brown… hair so black it looked liquid, yes. Any shade of red, impossible.
"Yeah. It's what first caught my eye. Neon red.
You couldn't miss it. It threw me off, because no Elite would deliberately draw attention to themselves." Aidan snagged a bag of coffee beans from the freezer and tossed it on the counter.
"Now, I'm guessing the Nightmare's need to feed is what drove her to do it. Similar to waving a cape before a bull to bring it close enough to kill."
" If we want to put stock in my dreams."
Aidan grimaced. "It might be crazy, but what else have we got to work with?"
Connor watched his friend move around the small galley kitchen with quiet efficiency, pulling mugs from the dishwasher and filling the coffeemaker with water.
"You look happy," he noted. Aidan had a loose-limbed grace and easy smile that hadn't been seen in ages. In fact, that inner contentment had been absent for so long, Connor had forgotten Aidan ever had it.
"I am," Aidan said.
"Do you ever get homesick?"
"All the time."
The ready reply startled Connor. "You don't show it. You look centuries younger." The silver strands that once lined Aidan's temples were far less numerous. They were now barely noticeable unless one was actively searching for them.
"You've been in my head. You know why."
Yes, Connor knew why. Having melded with Aidan's subconscious, he had experienced Aidan's existence in live action and living color. He had felt the way Aidan did when Lyssa was near, felt the emotions she aroused with a single touch or a loving glance, felt the depth of Aidan's hunger when Lyssa made love to him with wild, fervent abandon. Their connection was hauntingly intimate. The few times Connor had met with Aidan in the dream state, it felt like trespassing to share those memories.
"I'm sure you hate it here," Aidan said, looking at him over the breakfast bar, "but I'm glad you came. There's less to be homesick about with you around. Plus, I realize now that I need help and there's no one I trust more than you."
Connor looked away, unsure of how to reply.
Aidan was like a brother to him, but he didn't know how to say it. "You know I'm always looking for an opportunity to throw down and kick some ass," he hedged gruffly. "Wager's the go-to-guy when it comes to figuring out the technical aspects of what's going on. I'm the muscle. Always have been. Really don't think I have it in me to be anything more than that."
