Atlantis Rising

Chapter 16

Riley was still grumbling under her breath a good ten minutes after Conlan had shown up and unlocked the door to her room. She'd read him the riot act. Just when she'd started to trust him and believe in all his crazy Atlantean royalty stuff, he'd pulled a prison warden act on her.

But after he'd sketched out the bare-bones truth about the vampire threat, some crook named Reisen who'd stolen a precious artifact, and apologized five or six times, she'd calmed down.

It was insane, but she knew she could trust him. Amazing how being able to feel a man's emotions cut through the doubt. This was mainly about protecting her.

She'd switched to subverbal grumbling after tasting the coffee he'd brought as a peace offering. It was hot, sweet, and delicious.

Words that could also describe Conlan. She peeked up at him through her lashes. How unfair was it that the man looked even better in the morning? All that muscle hadn't diminished one bit in the light of day. Worse, she noticed new things about him. Like the faint blue highlight to his black hair. It didn't look like a salon job, so it must be an Atlantis thing.

She tightened her hands on her coffee cup, mostly to keep from reaching out to touch his hair.

It was a compulsion. A craving. It felt the way her addict clients had described the need for their drug of choice.

Conlan paced back and forth in the room, mostly ignoring her. Or at least not looking at her. Considering the tension in his massive shoulders, she'd bet big money that he wasn't unaware of her.

She was clean, at least. The small bathroom attached to her room—her prison cell—was well stocked with an assortment of soaps, shampoos, and conditioners. Brand-new toothbrushes wrapped in plastic lay in rows in a drawer under the sink.

The thought of it pissed her off all over again. "So, bring a lot of women here, do you?"

He stopped pacing and whirled around to face her. "What? What are you talking about? I haven't been to this house in more than a decade. It belongs to my brother."

She nodded. "It figures. Like brother, like brother, right? You're just a couple of good old boys who kidnap women and drag them to your evil lair."

"Are you on some sort of medication? Or are all human females as completely illogical as you are?" He looked genuinely puzzled, which almost made her smile.

"So you spend a lot of time protecting humanity, just not much time having conversations with it. Us. Am I getting the gist of this?" She drained her coffee cup, placed it on the small table next to the wall, and nodded at the door. "Also, are you going to let me out of here anytime soon? Not that being abducted hasn't been great fun, but I have a date with Detective Ramirez."

She flinched at the sound of the low rumbling growl that started in his chest and worked his way up out of his throat. "You're not going anywhere, Riley," he said. "And if you like this Ramirez at all, you'll forget about going on any dates with him. I seem to be somewhat unstable even hearing of the idea."

The look on his face was possessive and predatory all at once. He suddenly resembled a feral jungle animal defending its territory.

She so hadn't had enough coffee for that. "Are you going to start peeing on the walls next, to mark your territory?" she asked, all sweetness and light. "Because we had a tomcat who did that when I was a kid."

She smiled up at him. "My dad had him neutered."

One moment, he was standing across the room from her, and the next he was right up against her body, crowding her backward until her butt hit the dresser. "I've already faced one female who wanted to neuter me," he whispered in her ear. "Trust me on this. If I could survive her, my balls are infinitely safe with you."

She bit her lip, flustered. The scent of him, oddly like sunlight on seawater, clean and bracing, filled the bare inch or two of space between them. She had the oddest urge to bury her nose in his neck and simply stand there, inhaling him.

She raised her hands to his chest, instead, blocking him. "I didn't—I mean—your balls are safe—oh, heck. All I meant was that I have to go to the police station and make a statement. Detective Ramirez is the lead on the case."

Conlan's shoulders relaxed, and the aggression he'd been radiating went down a notch. Cautiously, Riley lifted the mental shields she'd placed around her emotions earlier. She and Quinn had practiced for hours as kids, at first building pretend brick walls and then, as they grew older and more sophisticated, pretend titanium doors in their minds.

Quinn had claimed all her doors were made of kryptonite, but Riley had just laughed. "It's not like we're ever going to face any superheroes, Quinn," she'd said one day when they were on opposite ends of their twelfth year.

"You never know," Quinn had replied, dark and dramatic as always.

"What is kryptonite?" Conlan asked, fingers twining around a strand of her hair.

"What? How did you… oh, right. I opened the door," Riley said, at first startled and then resigned. "Well, since it's already open, let's go for broke."

With that, she lifted her hands to his face, braced herself, and for the first time in her life sent her emotions, her thoughts, and her curiosity winging inside of another person.

And was nearly brought to her knees.

Strength. Courage. Honor. Duty.

Glimpses of the past.

A man, graying, with Conlan's eyes, stood next to a woman so beautiful that Riley gasped.

Mother. Father.

Shift: A boy, it had to be Ven, and another, the scary healer guy, maybe? She wasn't sure, since the boy with the green eyes so like Alaric's was smiling.

She didn't think the healer had ever smiled.

All of them riding horses, laughing.

Shift: Rows of men, all huge, muscled, gorgeous, naked to the waist, sparring with swords and daggers in some kind of arena.

Shift: Fires. Knives. Teeth, no, fangs. Pain. Searing, agonizing, ripping pain. She was dying—no, he, he, it was Conlan, they were torturing him, they were killing him…

"No!" she screamed, her hands falling away from his face as she fell backward into the strength of his arms. "No, no, no, no, no."

As he lifted her gently, held her in his arms, all she could do was sob.

Conlan stared down at the woman crying in his arms and felt the walls he'd built around his heart start to crumble. He literally heard the crashing sounds of the bricks and mortar, and all he could think of was how badly he needed to get away from her.

As he started to release her, she clutched at his arms and looked up at him through pain-drenched eyes. "Damn them for what they did to you. I hope you track them down and rip their bloody guts out. I'm so sorry, Conlan. I should—I should never have intruded on your privacy."

She slowly reached up to touch the scar at his throat. "I'm so sorry," she repeated, whispering. Then her eyes narrowed and she met his gaze again, her expression ferocious. "I hope I get a chance to run into any of the ones who hurt you. They won't hurt anybody else, ever again."

He blinked, unable to remember when words had touched him the way hers did. She wanted to protect him. She wanted to avenge him.

The cracking sound of those walls he'd built up inside himself turned into an avalanche.

He tightened his arms around her again, burying his face in her hair. "Never apologize to me for your grace and your light, mi amara aknasha."

She pulled away a little and looked up at him through the tears running down her face. "What does that mean?"

He shook his head, the lump lodged in his throat rendering him unable to form the words in English. She'd really think he was insane if he let her know he'd called her his beloved empath.

Speaking of insane, he probably had about ten seconds before Ven came pounding on the door. He sucked in a huge breath and pressed a kiss to her forehead, then dropped his arms and stepped back. "Riley, I know this must feel like you got dropped into the middle of one of those horror movies Ven loves so much, but you have to trust me—"

Riley flashed a brilliant smile at him, wiping the tears off her face. "Trust you? Are you kidding? After what I just saw, I'd trust you with my life."

Relief washed over him, loosening the clenched muscles in his neck and shoulders. "Good," he said, trying to smile. "Because you may have to."