Tempest (6 page)

When Sansha asked Ana
to join her, I tensed. “That’s not why we’re here.”

Sansha shrugged one,
bare shoulder then disappeared to make her offering. I directed Ana
to sit down. To my dismay, Luke sat on the other side of her.

Sansha returned, only
to sit in a chair across from us. Her gaze went between Ana, Luke and
I. “Well?” I asked a little impatient. She knew why we were here;
would there be others after Ana?

“Yes,” she answered
what I wanted to know. “Now, you only have two options and you know
the easiest route.”

“No.” I stood up,
defensive that she would still suggest us going through with it.

“You know the
consequences of the two worlds colliding. Besides, if it’s not you,
then you know it will be someone else.”

There was a very
delicate balance between the under- and mortal- world. Did she know
that I was falling for Ana? Is that why she spoke about two worlds
colliding? Why did she have to be so cryptic?

“Sansha, we know what
we need to do and we’ll get it done,” Luke stood up, and I was
enraged that he acted like he had a say in the matter.

“Why don’t you two
go outside and discuss this?” Sansha suggested.

“Yes,
Luke
.
Let’s discuss this outside.” It looked like
now
would have
to be the time I told Luke just what exactly Ana meant to me because
Hunters could never kill another’s mate.

Luke stopped when we
were just outside. “Well? Nothing you can say to me can change my
mind. I know you have it in your head to not go through with this.
That doesn’t mean I don't have plans of my own.”

I didn’t know just
how sinister Luke could be until now. “You will not touch her,” I
warned.

“And what makes you
so sure of that?”

“Because she is
mine
.”

I saw the recognition
cross his features. I left him dumbfounded as I stormed back through
the front door, not wanting to waste any more time here.

“Let’s go.” I
offered my hand to Ana.

As soon as Ana started
to get up, I knew something was off. My eyes shot to Sansha and the
potion she was holding in her hand.
No.

“What did you do?”
I accused Sansha. Did she understand the war she would have caused,
if she had really done what I thought she did? Ana swayed slightly
and my hand shot out to steady her. “Are you alright?”

“I am fine.” She
was smiling so genuinely at me. I was relieved to know that whatever
Sansha had given her wasn’t meant to kill her. If that was the
case, she would have been dead by now.

I leaned in to whisper
into her ear. “Follow Luke out to the car. I will meet you there in
a moment.” In lack of self-control, I brushed her ear with my lips
as I pulled away.

She nodded and I
watched her briefly, following a stunned Luke, before turning my fury
back to Sansha.

“What?” She feigned
innocence. “You’ll thank me later.”

“What did you give
her? An uncrossing potion? A power spell?

“Just somethin’ to
help her remain compliant. It will wear off in a few hours.”

“If one hair on her
body is harmed because of her—“

“Your protectiveness
intrigues me.”

“Stay out of it. I
just came to know why LaLaurie wants her and who is after her.”

“I can’t answer
either but maybe she can,” Sansha pointed indiscriminately behind
me. I looked to see her finger was either directed at the painting of
Marie Laveau voodoo Queen of New Orleans or out the window where Ana
was trying to get in the truck.

“Who can? What does
that mean?”

She shrugged. No wonder
others had rumored her crazy.

I grunted. “Did you
know this was all going to happen when you sent me to New Orleans?”

She shrugged again but
opened her mouth to speak. “I would be careful leaving her alone
with him.”

“Why? What is he
planning to do?”

She shrugged again like
the matter wasn’t urgent.

“Good bye, Sansha.”
I didn’t know what she saw but she was right, I shouldn’t leave
Ana alone.

When I hopped back in
the truck, Ana held a lazy, sensual smile that made my heart skip.
“Hayden!”

“We’ve got a
problem,” Luke said as I started the engine.

If Sansha gave her the
potion I thought she indicated, then Ana should be knocked out within
minutes.

I looked at her,
clearly trying to fight its effects. Her eye lids kept blinking as
she tried to keep them open and I cursed at myself again for leaving
her alone with a voodoun. I was just so enraged with what Luke and
Sansha implied that I couldn’t think. I usually made calm and
well-thought out decisions. I hated that I kept making mistakes when
it came to her.

I sped up, needing to
get a start on evacuating so we could stop for the night. Ana
suddenly grabbed my shoulders in order to hold herself up.

“What the hell,
Hayden? What else could go wrong?” Luke barked. I figured she must
have grabbed onto Luke’s as well and he was awfully touchy about
it.

“Sansha said it would
wear off in a few hours. Supposedly, it was for our own good.”

Luke shook his head,
“Our own good.
Right
.”

I looked at Ana who was
still awake but swaying. “She needs some food. It may wear off
quicker that way. How are you feeling, Ana?”

“I feel really,
really
good.”

I smothered a grin. “I
know you may be feeling a little funny and I’m sorry. It will be
over with shortly.”

“Hayden,” she
leaned toward me pulling my jaw to face her, “you worry too much.
I. Am. Fine. See?” She waved her hand up and down her body and I
couldn’t help following it with my eyes.

She must have noticed
the darkening of my eyes because her brow creased briefly then
softened as she leaned in closer to me. I turned my gaze back to the
road and felt her nose against my cheek. I could have easily kissed
her, and she would have let me. Or the potion would have let her let
me. What was the difference? It would still be her kissing me, right?
But suddenly that wasn’t enough.

I felt her soft, warm
breath against my neck before she pulled away. “You smell really
good, has anyone ever told you that?”

I laughed, “No.” I
tried to reconcile this version of Ana with the quiet, shy girl I saw
the first day in the lunch room. Both were appealing but it was
refreshing to see Ana away from all the realties.

“Well, I’m glad to
be your first. The first.” The sound of her laughter filled the
car. “I don’t know why I said that. Oh! Music.”

I smiled as she
fidgeted with the radio.

“No,” Luke grabbed
her hands and that seemed to sober her. “Let’s just see if we can
be quiet, ok?” Luke was still holding onto her hands long after she
nodded. He suddenly realized it and released them as if he was
burned.

Ana looked at me and we
shared a secret smile.

“Why hasn’t she
passed out by now?” Luke was trying hard to be irritated.

“I’m not sure,
we’ll have to get something in her stomach.”

“How far away are we
from civilization?” Luke mumbled.

“It’s ok, Luke!”
Ana patted Luke’s back and that shut him up real quick. I laughed
as I heard Luke stop his breathing and stare straight out the window.

“So you like music?”
I asked Ana, wanting to get as much information about her while I
could.

“Yes,” she was
still trying to keep her eyelids open while twirling a strand of
golden hair between her fingers. I was getting a glimpse of
‘Care-free Ana’. Of the Ana she was without all the confusion and
aloofness, and I was liking it. I thought of how it would be with
just us and our time, not clouded with the supernatural.
Something…normal.
I really need to get this stupid grin off my
face.

“What else do you
like?”

“Hmm,” she seemed
to ponder this, still touching her hair, tempting me to run my
fingers through it to test its softness, “like, my favorite
things?”

“Sure.”
Yes.
Please tell me anything that could help me win you over,
I
thought eagerly.

“Well, you already
know one of my favorite books.”

Did she wink at me?
“Yes, I do. And you mine.”

“If I recall it was a
very
interesting selection.” She chuckled more to herself
and I once again wondered what pieces of the puzzle she put together.
“I love the feeling of being able to breathe and be weightless
underwater, I love my grandma’s red beans and rice, I love the
color purple, and I love New Orleans. The people, the culture,
everything,” she breathed.

“You like to dive,
then?” I already knew this about her. The information Troy had
gathered on her revealed from her w-2 that she was employed at the
St. Bernard Parish Community Center as a part-time Scuba instructor.
She has been PADI certified for three years and, according to her
passport, has put it to good use.

“I love it.”

Perfect,
I
thought. I was confident now that she was going to love where I was
taking her.

She continued after a
yawn, “My dad is a salvage diver…among other things.” She
paused as a laugh escaped her. “I used to travel with him on
business…the good ol’ days.”

“But not anymore?”

She shook her head,
gently stirring the scent of lavender in her hair. “No, not so much
anymore.”

There was a hint of
sadness to her tone and I knew there was more to the story. I decided
not to ruin her mood by asking about who her father had evacuated
with that morning .

Ana looked at me, still
with the same dreamy expression.

“Why don’t you lie
down?” I suggested guiltily.

“I don’t want to
lie down. I’d rather talk to you.”

Who could argue with
that?

“Look, we can get
some food up here to the left,” Luke interrupted, reminding me that
he was there.

I looked to the place
he was referring to, “it’s a bar.”

“A bar?” Ana
sounded a little too upbeat about it. And that was only part of the
problem.

“It has food,” Luke
shrugged, “and I really need to get out of this car,
Hayden
.”

So touchy lately. “She
doesn’t even have shoes on…” Ana was still barefoot, having
lost her flip flops when I pulled her through the window. And I
forgot to pack shoes for her!
I could always carry her in…

“In all the time you
spent in that shack, you forgot to pack her shoes?” Luke said out
loud what I had been thinking. Luke shook his head in both wonder and
disappointment. “Look, we’re in the boonies. I am sure shoes are
optional, as are a full set of teeth.”

I pulled into the bar
and forced the gear harshly into park. “Fine. Let’s just make
this quick.”

As it turned out, going
into a populated bar was not a good idea, even if Ana wasn’t lucid.
She ended up passing out on the table and I had to carry her out.

As Ana turned fitfully
in her sleep for the twentieth time, I pulled off in Biloxi. She
needed a bed, and a good night’s sleep to help her get through
everything that had happened in the last 24 hours. We pulled into a
popular resort and I let Luke out to arrange our room. I parked the
car in the ramp, and was relieved when I didn’t have to worry about
who would see me carrying Ana in because the place was empty.

My phone vibrated in my
jeans and I pulled it out to read the room number Luke had texted me.
“You have got to be kidding.”

As I went to the top
floor of the hotel, I thought about how Luke was always trying to
defy me at every turn. He either wasn’t thinking how it would look
to rent the penthouse suite, or he just didn’t care. I was betting
on the latter.

“What? They are
closing the hotel down in the morning because of the Hurricane
warning; we are lucky we got a room. Fortunately, I can be
very
convincing.”

“I’m sure,” I
mumbled as the door clicked shut behind me.

I made my way to the
bedroom and Luke followed. Holding Ana with one arm, I pulled the
covers back on the bed and laid her in it. I re-covered her and
fought the instinct to kiss her pink, slightly parted lips.

Pure male satisfaction
roared through me at the simple act of taking care of her. I finally
was able to pull away from her, meeting Luke’s stormy hazel eyes
instead.

His eyes narrowed at me
for a while before he asked, “She really is the One?”

“Without a doubt.”
And I caught him watching her sleeping form questionably for a while
more.

“Now, what?”

I shrugged. “I’m
sure you can find something to occupy your time until the morning.”

“Right.” Luke
grabbed the remote and hopped in the bed next to Ana’s.

* * *

When the dawn neared,
it occurred to me that Ana would have needs she would like attend to
before we continued on our journey. I reluctantly left Luke, who was
now occupying the couch and went to grab her belongings from the
truck.

I returned to find her
bed empty but was relieved to hear the water running in the bathroom.

I knocked hesitantly on
the door to let her know I’d brought her her things and some new
shoes.

She cleared her throat.
“Um, thanks. Just leave them by the door.”

I set them down and she
opened the door no more than necessary to pull her black duffle bag
inside.

I waited in
anticipation for her to emerge. What was she doing in there? I knew
she couldn’t be attempting escape—I had already made sure that
wasn’t possible. The thought bothered me, though, that she would
want to leave. I knew I had amends to make, but there was no way I
could let her go.

When I was about to
check on her again, she came out. The dress I had seen in her closet
now hung on her body, looking better than I could have imagined when
I packed her clothes. “Wow,” spilled from my lips, sending a
delicious flush across Ana’s cheeks.