Seduced by the Storm (28 page)

"God,
no." Dev was on his knees, cradling Oz’s head in his lap, putting his hand
over the bubbling chest wound in a futile attempt to staunch the blood. He
could call ACRO, get one of the healers over here…that would take care of
everything.

"I’m
going to save you, Oz," he whispered. "Don’t you dare give up on
me."

"I’m
not giving up." The words came from Oz with great effort as he stared into
Dev’s eyes.

"Why
would you do this?"

"It’s
the only way Darius was ever going to leave you alone, Devlin. He’s trapped
with me. He’s dying. And he can never hurt you again."

"Let
me get help."

Oz
shook his head, weakly. "It won’t work. This is the way it’s supposed to
be. The way I’ve always known it would be."

Dev’s
blood ran cold. "What do you mean?"

"From
the day I met you, I knew I’d die for you." Oz sucked in a gurgling
breath. "I knew one day I would have to die to save you. And I fell in
love with you anyway."

The
sob rose in Dev’s throat, but the howling and screaming in his ears had stopped
and the house had gone quiet, and for once it was just the two of them in the
room together. "No, Oz. We’ve got to get you help. Please let me do
that."

"This
happened too soon…expected a few more days," Oz ground out. "You’ve
got to tell Creed for me, tell him what I did. Why."

"Yes,
of course I will."

"Kat
stays," Oz said, a sudden last fierceness rearing its head. "I
brought Kat in for his protection—I can’t leave him in the world alone, without
her."

Dev
couldn’t argue—not with a dying man. His heart began to crumble in his chest
and he could barely breathe, let alone talk as he just held Oz for the last
time.

"I’m
going to send you someone," Oz murmured.

"Shut
up. Shut the fuck up, Oz." Dev could barely see through the tears in his
eyes.

"Listen
to me—you’re not spending the rest of your life grieving for me. No way."
Oz took a deep, shuddering breath and his eyes closed for a second.

"Don’t
do this to me," Dev begged, but Oz wasn’t about to be deterred. His eyes
opened and he took Dev’s hands off his chest and held them, the blood
connecting their palms.

"After
midnight. Sometime after the worst of the winter passes, I’m going to send
someone to you. And you’re going to resist it—hard. And so is he."

"There’s
not going to be anyone else for me."

"Going
to send you one of the most handsome men," Oz whispered, his voice fading
and growing slurred. "He’ll need you as much as you’ll need him."

"Oz,
please. Stay with me for a few more minutes."

"The
love will always be there, but the grief shouldn’t."

Dev
could barely bring himself to do it, but he bent down, pressed his mouth to
Oz’s cool lips, a final good-bye. "I love you, Oz. Always and forever. So
you go do what you were destined to do."

Oz
gripped Dev’s hand one last time. "Destiny’s a bitch, Dev. But I’d do it
all again."

"Me
too," Dev whispered, and in that second, Oz was gone. And then he heard
screams—horrible screams.

It
took him a few minutes to realize they were coming from him.

CREED
HEARD the screams from the driveway of Dev’s house, had to practically crawl up
the driveway because of the pain in his chest. And then, as suddenly as the
pain had started, it lifted, and Kat was clinging to him.

"It’s
all right, Kat," he whispered. "I think it’s all right now."

But
they both knew he was lying. He beat on the door for a few minutes, rang the
doorbell insistently but got no answer. Not caring any longer, only wanting to
get rid of the heaviness in his heart, he walked around the back by the pool
and attempted to shatter one of the sliding glass doors.

The
glass was shatterproof, bulletproof…and still Dev wasn’t coming to see what the
commotion was.

Creed
didn’t stop pounding on the glass, trying to get through it with chairs from
the deck, even the umbrella pole, and finally, finally, Dev was at the door.

He
was covered in blood.

Creed
rushed over to him. "Shit, Dev, we’ve got to get you to the hospital."

"It’s
not my blood."

"Whose—no,
it can’t be." Creed pushed past Dev and followed the blood trail up the
main stairs to Dev’s bedroom, where he found Oz’s lifeless body on the ground.
The gun was still in Oz’s hand, and as Creed bent down, he automatically
pressed two fingers to the man’s throat to check. Just in case.

"He’s
gone, Creed." Dev’s voice came up softly behind him.

Creed
stood swiftly, turned to Dev. "What the hell happened here?"

"Darius,
the spirit…he came back."

"No,
he was gone. Oz took care of him."

Dev
gave a wan smile. "Oz took care of him so I could get help. He knew Darius
would come back. He’d always known."

Creed
stared at the man who’d been his mentor in so many different ways, and the pain
in his chest began again, spread around his heart and made it hard to breathe.
Hand on his chest, he knelt by the body and felt Dev’s arms pulling him to his
feet.

"Breathe,
Creed. Fucking breathe, all right? You’re blue."

Breathe,
Creed. Breathe,
Kat begged him.

"There
are things I need to tell you…about Oz. Things he wanted you to know," Dev
said, and Creed drew in a deep, painful breath, over and over, until the
light-headed feeling stopped and he was able to stand up by himself.

"We’re
not going to do this here," Dev said. "I can’t look at him this way.
When we’re done talking, I’ll call over to medical—they’ll come and help."

Creed
nodded, followed Dev out the door of the bedroom. Dev closed it behind him and
then sat on the floor of the upstairs hallway, as though betraying his earlier
words of not wanting to be near Oz’s body.

"Oz
did things in his life that he thought he had to, things that made the most
sense. I know it might not seem that way to you," Dev said, drew in a deep
breath and paused. "Fuck, there’s no good way to say this. Oz was your
brother, Creed. Your blood brother. You weren’t put into the cave as a
sacrifice. Oz was the one who put you there."

Creed
thought about the man who’d always been a nontatted version of himself, an
older, wiser version, a brother in arms—but that’s not what Dev was saying.
"As in…my real brother?"

"Yes."

"So
he left me in the cave? All these years, that fucking curse story—he left me
there?"

"Yes."

"Bullshit,
Dev. That’s bullshit. Because if it were true, the psychics here would’ve
known, someone would have told me."

"It
was Kat’s job to block all of them out. She’s the one who makes your mind
unreadable."

Something
rose up in Creed, something dark and violent, and he wasn’t sure if it was Kat
who was angry as hell or if it was him. But there was no separating the two at
this moment.

"He
wanted to tell you himself," Dev began. "He thought he had more
time."

"Time
for what?"

"The
reason Oz told you that there was a certain window of time for you to get rid
of Kat was because he knew, for certain…he knew that he was going to die."

Creed
stared at Dev, who stared back with clear, red-rimmed eyes. "He predicted
his own death?"

"Not
to the day, but he knew. Knew when Darius came back after the mole was
discovered what sacrifice he’d have to make. He did that for me. He’s lived
with that since he was nineteen years old, maybe even earlier. He said he knew
about me before he even met me, knew he was going to take his own life to save
mine. And he still loved me. God, he should’ve hated me for what he went
through, the way I pushed him away."

"Jesus."
Creed felt the pain beginning again, and he rubbed his chest, realizing it was
the same spot where the bullet had gone into Oz. "Wait a minute…the window
of time…because Oz is dead—"

"The
window is closed, Creed. I’m sorry. So fucking sorry. But Oz didn’t want to
take Kat away from you now, didn’t want to strip you of her protection. He had
to make the decision so fast—you have to understand, he did it for your own
good."

"No,"
Creed heard himself say. "This can’t be possible. I was supposed to get to
choose—both Ani and I, together. We’re so close to that total commitment, we
just need a little more time…I thought we had time."

"I’m
sorry, Creed. But the only person who could separate you from Kat was Oz."

Creed
heard the sob tear out of his throat, and blinded by tears and rage in equal
parts, he felt his way down the steps and out Dev’s front door. Dev didn’t bother
to try to stop him, and Creed got onto his bike and took off down the road, at
a speed not meant for someone who could barely see.

But
at that point, he didn’t care about anything. Any hope he had of living in
peace with Annika was over anyway. Kat would never let that happen and he would
be powerless to stop her. Oz had ensured Creed’s protection…and in the same
breath had taken away the love of Creed’s life.

While
ML’s personal chef cooked up some food for him and Faith, Wyatt strolled along
the back deck and down to the beach.

It
was nearly midnight—the moon, brighter than it had been earlier, cast shadows
on the water, and his muscles, loose and relaxed from the sex, buzzed as soon
as he saw the water.

He
stripped off his shirt and took off at a dead run toward the water, tore
through the small waves, let the current take him out as he stayed underwater
and held his breath for as long as he could. When he broke the surface, he
shook his head, floated on his back and stared up at the sky.

He
loved the water, the weightlessness, the push and pull on his skin. He was
comfortable out here—could spend hours just floating, diving, letting the waves
caress him like a lover. There were no problems when he was out here, nothing
he couldn’t solve.

"Wyatt!"

He
turned, saw Faith standing at the edge of the water, the white foam rushing
over her bare feet and legs, and he smiled to himself as he swam in.

"What’s
up?" he asked as he approached her from the surf.

"Food’s
ready."

"Excellent.
I’m starving." His stomach growled as if in response to his words.

"You
didn’t have enough of the water earlier?" she asked.

"Never
enough," he told her, wrapped his wet body around her dry one as she
laughed. Together, they strolled up the beach and sat outside on the deck where
the food had been laid out. One of the housekeepers brought Wyatt a towel and
he dried off a bit before sitting down, and they ate in silence. It had been at
least twenty-four hours since either of them had eaten—Wyatt had learned to turn
off his response to hunger and pain early on, but now that he was able to relax
for a bit, he was ravenous.

When
his belly was full, he leaned back in contentment and watched Faith eating the
last of her meal.

"Delicious,"
she said. "I think I need a personal chef of my own."

"Can’t
cook?"

"Not
worth a damn. I never had the time or the desire. ML must do well for
himself."

"ML
does all right," he concurred. "He’s cool, and he’ll get us where we
need to go."

"That’s
good."

He
noted that she’d put her choker back on. "So, where exactly do we need to
go?"

She
played with the beer bottle for a second, and then decisively put it down on
the table. "I checked in with the men who have Liberty. They want me to go
to Belfast. Once I’m there, I’m supposed to ring them again."

He
nodded, drained his own beer and tried to get rid of the growing feeling that
none of this was going to end well.

"Wyatt?"

"Yeah?"

"You
mentioned your family—that there were problems. Are you in contact with them at
all?"

"They’re
all dead. I wasn’t ever close with them, anyway. They put me in the
institution," he said quietly, and realized he was holding the neck of the
beer bottle in a fierce grip. He set it down and flexed his hand and wished the
conversation was over. "They weren’t special-ability types, they were oil
riggers. And my telekinetic skills were supposedly just part of a teenage
psychosis—one the doctors assured my father they could rid me of. And they
tried everything."

"It
must’ve been horrible," Faith said. She’d moved to the chair next to him,
rather than across the table, and he glanced at her before he continued.

"Lots
of crazy people in this world, but that doesn’t mean they should necessarily be
locked up for it. Most of them aren’t violent—and if they are, they mostly do
damage to themselves because they feel like freaks. I can think of a whole lot
of operatives who thought they were freaks at one point too, but without them
around, the world would be a really unsafe place."