“Your wish is my command,” he murmured, as he wrapped his arms around me and swept us both into fire.
“So, let’s retrace your steps,” Rory said, half an hour later. “After you typed the notebooks up, what did you do with them?”
“Nothing. I left them all on the coffee table.” I thrust my hands on my hips and glared at the room in frustration. It wasn’t offering up any clues. “You didn’t move them, did you?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Me? Tidy something up? Are you serious?”
“Okay, silly question.” But if neither of us had moved them, what the hell had happened? Why would anyone steal four notebooks when five had been sitting there? It didn’t make any sense.
“You didn’t knock them over or anything, did you?” Rory said. “I have a vague memory of you running into something and swearing like a trooper one morning.”
I blinked, suddenly remembering hitting the coffee table and scattering the notebooks the morning Sam had woken us early. I’d picked them all up and thrown them back on the table, but I certainly hadn’t taken the time to count them. Had I missed one?
I scrambled over to the coffee table and began searching under both it and the nearby sofas. Rory joined in, and five minutes later, we found the damn notebook. It had somehow slid all the way into the kitchen and was resting under one of the cabinets.
Relief slithered through me, but it was tempered by the knowledge that the game wasn’t over yet. Jackson was still in the hands of the sindicati, and who knew whether this new and darker Sam would uphold his end of the deal.
“So what happens now?” Rory said.
I tucked the notebook inside the waist of my jeans, making sure it was not only secure, but touching skin. “I go back to Sam, and you go get the laptop. I’ll ring and let you know where to meet us.”
His expression was dubious. “Do you really think you can trust Sam?”
I half shrugged. “I have no other choice.”
He caught my hand, tugged me closer, and dropped a sweet kiss on my lips. “Be careful. And take flame form, not firebird. There’s a chance people will think we’ve simply thrown something burning out of the window.”
I nodded, stepped back, and called to the fire. In very little time, I was back on the street and walking back to Sam’s car.
“So?” he said, the minute I dropped into the passenger seat.
I pulled the notebook out of the waist of my pants, but flipped it away from him as he tried to take it. “I want you to promise you’ll uphold up your end of the deal once I hand this over.”
“Red,” he growled, eyes narrowed. “I said I would, and I will. Now stop playing stupid games when lives are at risk.”
“It’s the whole lives-at-risk bit that’s making me play them,” I replied. “We both know PIT is working on the bigger picture and wouldn’t really care if the smaller elements—like Jackson—fall by the wayside.”
“As I’ve already said, if you want to risk your neck saving Miller’s useless ass, then go for it. Neither PIT nor I will interfere, as long as we can ensure the information on that computer is secure. Now, give me the notebook.”
I hesitated, then shook my head. “After we meet Rory and you’ve put the virus onto the computer.”
He glared at me, his expression so savage it was all I could do not to shrink back in fear. But fire flickered across my fingertips, touching but not burning the notebook. For several seconds, neither of us moved; then he tore his gaze away and I started breathing again.
“Fine,” he said, voice clipped. “Where are we meeting him?”
I released a somewhat shaky breath and doused the flames. “Head for Spencer Street.”
He started the car and did a quick U-turn, wheels spinning. I grabbed my phone and sent Rory a text, asking him to meet us at Black Sugar, a café a stone’s throw away from Southern Cross Station. Putting Sam and Rory in the same small space probably wasn’t a great idea, but it wasn’t like I had much choice. Besides, I doubted Sam would start something in public—not given how much he and PIT seemed to value their anonymity.
Sam stopped in the parking lot near Southern Cross Rail Station, and in silence we walked down to Black Sugar. The place was packed, but we managed to find a spare table at the back of the room. Sam took the chair closest to the wall—a position that allowed him to see not only the entire room, but the entrance as well—leaving me either the chair opposite or the one to his left. Both were entirely too close to the man for my liking, but I chose the latter, simply because I didn’t want to have my back to the entrance.
But as I sat, his scent spun around me, warm and enticing. And even the darker notes so evident within it couldn’t stop desire from spinning through me.
I closed my eyes and fought the wash of useless regret. This was my life. This would always be my life. It was no use wishing for anything else, because—as far as I knew—no phoenix had ever been able to break the curse and live a happy life. Not with the love of their life. Not ever.
It certainly wasn’t about to happen in this life, with this man.
You’d think after spending so many lives in the exact same position, I’d be used to it. But there was something about this man that called to me in a way few others had. Even with that darkness.
“Red,” he said, voice holding a slight edge. “How long do we have to wait?”
My gaze met his. The edge, I realized, was desire, barely controlled. It made me want to lean closer, to see if it was possible to kiss away the ash and the darkness and unveil the man that still lay beneath them somewhere.
I didn’t. I might be occasionally reckless, but even I wasn’t that foolish.
“Not long.” I leaned back in my chair, though it didn’t really improve the distance between us or diminish the desire to kiss him. “Rory said it would take him twenty minutes to get here, so unless the traffic is hideous, he should only be a few minutes away.”
Sam pulled his gaze from mine. After a second, he said, “When you meet with the sindicati, watch your back. They have a liking for sharpshooters perched up high.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
He shrugged. “I don’t want you dead, Red, no matter how much I hate what you did to us.”
I opened my mouth to argue, then closed it again. There was no point in trying to explain. Not anymore.
“I don’t want me dead, either,” I said instead. “It would be damnably inconvenient to die early in two consecutive lifetimes.”
He glanced at me, eyebrows raised. “You get to live again, so why does it matter?”
“Because dying before your allotted time makes rebirth a bitch.” I glanced toward the door and saw Rory. His gaze met mine, flicked briefly to the man sitting beside me, then returned. His expression didn’t alter, but tension rode him. It was evident in the set of his shoulders, in the brief clenching of his free hand as he made his way toward us.
I cleared my throat, but before I could say anything, Sam murmured, “Well, well, the boyfriend arrives.”
“And that statement proves just how little you understand about phoenixes—and Emberly.” Rory came to a halt in front of us, bright sunshine against the darkness of the man beside me.
“So you deny you’re her boyfriend?” Sam growled. “That you were—and still are—lovers?”
“I deny nothing.”
Rory’s voice was as even as Sam’s, yet it hinted at the anger that burned just beneath the calm exterior. The heat of it rolled over me, as fierce and as frightening as the darkness that lurked within Sam, but for a very different reason. I knew that anger, knew what it was capable of. Knew that if there was one flaw in the control Rory had over his fire, then it was me. Or rather, his desire to protect me from whatever life and fate threw at us. As much as he ever could, anyway.