A Spartan's Kiss (25 page)

“Tabithia?”

Yeah, mind on the game, Tabbie.
Aeros was screwing up her voodoo.

“Follow me.” Tab made a beeline for the bar. The bartenders weren’t any she knew. Tall, dressed according to the ‘vests and no shirt’ dress code of the club, they all looked more ready for a roll in the bed than for mixing a good martini.

“What can I get you, sweet?”

She resisted the eye roll and ordered two lemon drop martinis. Dare bumped into her side. The woman was on edge.

“Sit down, we’ll wait here. Evie will be here soon. Watch the act a bit. See what you think.”

Dare swung her head around to glare at Tabithia in disbelief. She’d already been watching the stage. “You think I can do that?”

“Well, I assume that’s what she thought.” Laughter spilled over the husky timbres of Evie’s voice, making light of Dare’s hissed question.

Ah, shit. Showtime
—and Tabithia hadn’t even got to sip her alcohol.

“Evie.” Evie, the owner and badass herself, stood only five foot four, if that, and wore enough makeup to make the glamour girls envious. Her eyes were lined with black, the line extending out at the corner to her dark hair line. She’d brightened the line with blue, making her appear like she wore a mask. Rows of twists held her hair back from her face with more of the blue worked through the locks to keep them in place. She wore a black corset lined in white fur along the shoulder straps. The laces of the corset continued on down the front of a gown that she looked poured into. Basically she rocked and made Tab feel grungy.

“This is Dare. I spoke to you concerning her singing. She simply wasn’t prepared for the glamour of your establishment.”

“Ah, I see.” Evie nodded and switched to Tabithia’s ancient coven’s tongue without missing a beat. “Too kind, Tabithia. I didn’t realise you frequented my establishment.”

Er, yeah. That sucked. Evie obviously knew a great deal about the Jade coven—and her. But Tab hadn’t walked in unaware. Evie had once been a coven leader—not of her Jade coven, but of an Irish family steeped in tradition. Tab had been able to uncover that Evie had left her coven when the members, hoping to gain immortality, had fallen to the Death Stalkers. Evie’s coven had toppled her leadership, entombed her beneath their coven’s ancestral home in Ireland and made deals with the Death Stalkers. Obviously, Evie had gained her freedom. Now she straddled the immortal world and held the keys to keeping different factions of immortals at peace—at least within her club.

Tab couldn’t discover how Evie had managed to create the club, let alone how she’d broken out of her early burial. The missing information made her uneasy but what was she to do? This was the only place on this plane of existence she could think to hide Dare.

“True. Your offerings are a bit above my pay grade.”

Evie’s red lips tipped upward in a smile that didn’t reach her light eyes. “Ah, I see. You seek your entertainment elsewhere. Pleasure is sometimes as painful as pain, my dear. You should give it a try.” She turned her attention back to Dare, and Tab swore she felt her heart start up again.

“You have power.” Evie tipped her head to the side and narrowed her eyes, assessing Dare in a way that made Dare square her shoulders and meet the other woman’s eyes directly. Good. Dare was timid, but underneath she hid a will of iron.

Evie nodded slightly and shifted her powerful gaze back on Tab.

“You seek a singer. I have one.”

“You have one. Interesting choice of words.” Evie nodded to their drinks. “Drink up. Feel free to mingle, my dear, while I speak with Tabithia. No one can touch you here.”

Dare stiffened, but nodded when Tab met her eyes.

“I’ll be back in a few.” This was not going as planned, was it? Dare nodded, seeming to realise they had to adjust the flow of bargaining.

“Why don’t we talk somewhere more private?”

Dare dug her nails into her wrist for a brief moment, but, with Tab’s hand out of sight, Evie couldn’t see. After a few seconds, Dare eased her death grip.

Evie sauntered away on impossibly high heels.

“Dare, calm it. We gotta roll with this, chica. Don’t look so scared. You did good.”

“What if…someone tries to take me?”

Tab blinked. This was what worried Dare? “No one, I repeat no one can touch you if you don’t want them to. You’re a witch—A. B? You’re in Evie’s club. She’d ban them, and believe me, no one wants that. So, C? You’re a powerful witch. So relax and do your part.”

Dare met and held her gaze for what seemed like an eternity. Slowly, she relaxed back against the bar and nodded. “Good to know.”

Good to know? Bridget save her. “Just do your part.”

“I’ll sing. Better than they are.” She nodded with her chin and sipped her drink, eyes already on the stage, sizing up the competition.

“Good. Good.” For the first time since leaving Aeros buried in the jungle, Tab felt like something might be going right.

And maybe, just maybe, I’ll see my Spartan before he finds me.

My Spartan? Holy shit.

She took off after Evie’s disappearing back, her heart beating with more excitement than she should allow. But heck, what if Aeros could forgive her for leaving him, taking his prize and burying him under a pile of rock? Heck, things weren’t that bad, were they? He might have got out without getting buried after all.

Evie opened a door to a darkly lit hallway. Tab followed her in, trying to tamp the excitement so she could get her bargaining up to snuff.

“So, you want to hide a witch from a Greek god.”

The ‘oh shit’ moment lasted much longer than Tab wanted but, hit with the double dose of Evie’s words and Aeros sitting in the shadows watching her from Evie’s private office, a girl could be forgiven.

Tab thought she did pretty damn good just keeping her jaw from dropping.

Chapter Sixteen

A little while earlier…

“You’re not going to like it, but I found Tabithia.”

Aeros’ grip threatened to break the steering wheel of the SUV. Slowly, one finger at a time, he eased the tension in his hands.

“Tell me.”

“Evie’s. She just rolled up on her bike with a redhead. They argued a bit outside the shop, then both entered. Five minutes ago tops.”

Five minutes. Five minutes she’d been in Evie’s club surrounded by sex-hungry immortals wanting to hook up—wanting to hook up with her. Sonofabitch.

He was out of the SUV and at the entrance before he registered his feet hitting the pavement. The bouncers both took one look at him and unlatched the door. His hands slapped against wood, nearly breaking the door down on his way past. Two steps inside and a small woman behind a desk gave him one look and motioned to an ornate door. Cool air hit him as soon as he pushed the double doors open. Cool air and perfume, smoke, liquor and bodies.

Holy fuck. He could feel his temperature rising, causing sweat to drench his silk shirt and make the material of his slacks cling to his legs. If she came here often… He couldn’t even finish the thought. His men had discovered Tabithia partied. She often partied for weeks at a time. He’d called her. Texted her aunt. Texted her. No response.

She knew he was coming for her and yet she hid? The music took on a sexual, driving beat and across the crowd he spotted her bright head. A rush of possessiveness flooded him. She looked amazing. Dressed in leather pants that hung low and hugged her hips and thighs with a strip of red curving over her ass and down the inside of her thighs, she looked sexy beyond belief. He’d seen her naked, but this was…this was dangerous sexy. Her back was bare except for the leather top wrapping around her upper ribs. He spotted her tattoo curling up around one curvy hip. Blue flashed when she turned her head, and he squinted at the swirl of colour decorating her neck. She looked ready for sex. Or battle. Either option had his temperature boiling.

A flare of fire heated his blood, warming his already overheated body. He was just about to go grab her and shake the living shit out of her for being here when his vision of her was obstructed. Blinking, he lowered his gaze to meet a woman’s. Short, comely, with purple eyes decorated with blue and black lines that ran into her temples and disappeared in her hair—this woman had to be Evie. She barely stood tall enough to reach his chest, yet she smiled up at him as if she knew a secret he didn’t.

“Evie.”

One delicate eyebrow rose, but otherwise her face remained expressionless. She reminded him of a porcelain doll he’d once seen in a Parisian shop—cold, fragile yet beautiful.

“Very good, Spartan. Most people never see past what’s in front of them.”

He didn’t respond. It wasn’t a question, but he knew she wanted something. Instinct said it had to do with Tabithia.

Through the crowds, he spotted her slim back again. Why was she here? What did she hope to gain here? A man?

Gods help him if she was looking for a man.

“She’s here to try to hide the girl. Should I let her? Hide this witch from a god, and in exchange have her sing for me? Do you think it a good trade, Spartan?”

“Tabithia wants to hide—”

Evie snapped her slim fingers. “Enough. Follow me, and we can both find out why she has come.”

Not waiting on an answer, hell, he didn’t know if he had an answer, he looked over at Tabithia and saw her talking to the woman Ares wanted. For the first time, he examined the woman causing him such hell. A few hands shorter than Tabithia, red hair reaching her chin, she didn’t look Ares’ type. Slender, with small breasts and a tiny frame, she looked nothing like the women the war god brought to his home. Her green eyes flashed, and she tipped her head to the side slightly, considering something Tabithia was saying. She and Tabithia shared blood. The woman was of her coven, then. The resemblance wasn’t too great but there all the same.

“Come, we must hurry. Your woman grows impatient.”

His woman. The tightness in his chest eased, but his fist tightened. When he got his hands on Tabithia, he would prove just how true that statement was.

“What the hell is he doing here?” Tab just knew that wasn’t what she wanted to say, but that was what came out.

Aeros had the nerve to grin and fold his hands over his stomach and cross his long legs out in front of him. He looked incredible—sexy. Dressed in a silk shirt that lay against his hard chest the way she wanted to, he gave her a hot-looking glower and she shivered. His slacks looked expensive and well-tailored and didn’t hide the disturbing bulge at his hips.

She swallowed and glared at his handsome face.

“He got here right after you, Tabithia. I thought, if we were going to negotiate, I might as well have all the players.”

Damn.

Aeros nodded to a gilded, velvet chair. “Sit down, Tabithia.”

Well, fuck. Aeros really, really needed to stop talking.

“Here.”

Unable to stop her legs from walking, she moved across the room and sank back in the chair next to Aeros, settled in, and mimicked his stance down to crossing her legs. Resting back in the chair, she rolled her head to gaze up at him, knowing her lazy posture would no doubt irritate him. If his darkening face was any proof, she’d hit him square.

“Great. So, how was the jungle?”

He sprang up like she’d hit a switch and nearly made her bite her tongue off. His chair hit the floor, and he took one step towards her. “You never answered my calls, or responded to my text, Tabithia.”

She shot upright. “That’s because you didn’t bother to call. Don’t lie to me, you never—”

“Touch her, and you’ll face my wrath, Spartan.” The quiet words spoken so calmly really had some power to them. Even Aeros heard it. He swung his head to look at Evie, and, after a moment, he nodded curtly and reached down to pick up his chair. He sat down with a none-too-subtle grumble under his breath.

Touch her? Tab glanced at Aeros’ dark expression, immediately recognising the anger there.
Ah, shit.

“We’re here to discuss a new singer for my club. You’ve not come to my club often and never for more than drinks. Do you feel qualified to bargain with me, Tabithia?”

Well, when she put it that way, no. Next to her, she could almost feel Aeros settle back in his chair. For some reason, she sensed his anger had gone down a few notches. She refused to look at him, though, and concentrated on Evie. Her power was substantial, but Tabithia couldn’t tell if it was Evie’s power tingling through the room or that of the realm they had entered when they’d first passed through the doorway of the club. Either way, Evie packed a powerful punch. Powerful enough to hide Dare from a god?

“Look I got what you need, so… I guess I am qualified. What’s he doing here?”

Aeros slapped his big hand down on his thick thigh and growled. “Tabithia—”

“He’s here to guarantee I can have my singer.”

Aeros turned his head to face Evie, and, wow, did Tab feel sorry for Evie. The captain did not look pleased.

“The witch has to come with me.”

“Tabithia?” Evie asked.

“No, the other.” Aeros blew out a breath, then grinned at her. Gods, his smile was too much. She felt her toes curl in her boots. “I’ve been sent to bring her back to Ares, but I don’t know her name.”

Tabithia swallowed twice before she could manage to say, “Dare. It’s much longer, but I thought shortening it would be easier on us all.”

Evie laughed from behind her enormous desk. “I like it. And she can sing. Amazing that Ares would let her go. But he didn’t let her go, did he? And that, my dears, is why I needed you both here.”

Tabithia peeked over at Aeros’ firm profile and was reassured to see he appeared as confused as she was.

“I need assurances that Tabithia speaks for Dare. That Ares will not claim foul after I set my bargain.”

“Ares wants her back—”

Tabithia sat up. Aeros was acting like a lap dog for that dickwad, Ares. “Ares can go suck an egg. He can’t have her. And you shouldn’t ask for her. I thought you were not into kidnapping women and all that. Protect the weak, right? Hero stuff.” Aeros opened his mouth, but she held up her hand. She wasn’t done. “I am not handing her over, so don’t even ask.”
Or order
, Tabithia added silently.