Nothing.
Relief settled in me. Robur was right. No one, not the Autarch, and not even Malik, had bypassed the Wards. The rose petals had to be a vamp illusion, however real they seemed. I turned to go and double-check, but stopped as the shadow of a tall figure appeared outside the Warded dome. Someone was on the roof, and this early it was unlikely to be one of my neighbours, not least because they usually kept their distance.
Pulse hitching in wariness, I clenched my hand, ready to release Ascalon, and dropped my sight.
The magical dome winked out.
Finn stood outside the Ward.
Chapter Twenty-One
‘Hey!’ Finn’s moss-green eyes sparked emerald, faint lines creasing their corners as he smiled.
Stunned surprise laced with joy at seeing him again made my heart leap, then my anger and hurt boiled up. I started to demand what the hell he was thinking of turning up expecting a welcome as if we’d last seen each other yesterday—
Suspicion froze me. Finn was supposed to be in the Fair Lands with Nicky, his pregnant daughter, until she had her kid. He wasn’t due back for at least another two months. So he shouldn’t be here. Wouldn’t be here . . . Unless, while my inner radar pinged him as fae, this wasn’t Finn.
I curled my fingers around Ascalon’s ring, and narrowed my gaze. The sharp points of his horns standing a couple of inches above his dark blond hair were the only thing about him that said he was satyr and not human, but then he was wearing Finn’s usual clean-cut handsome Glamour. Or almost. The lines at his eyes were new, his face was thinner, and the angle of his jaw was more defined, making him look early thirties. Though, like any fae, how old he looked was irrelevant, the real Finn (who at a hundred and eight was one of the youngest in the satyr herd) had always looked around my age: twenty-five.
The fae’s smile faded, and something else . . . disappointment, wariness, or maybe a touch of anger . . . took its place. ‘I thought you’d be happy to see me, Gen.’
He sounded like Finn too. ‘How do I know you’re Finn?’
He frowned, then comprehension lit his face and he touched his palm to the Warded dome. It flashed bright vermilion and he hastily snatched his hand back.
Yeah, the Ward packs a punch. But then this guy was fae, he’d know that. So why the hell had he hurt himself like that?
‘Third time’s the charm, Gen,’ he said, holding his hand up; his palm was black where the Ward had seared his skin. ‘Except it wasn’t, was it?’ He gave me a lopsided grin. ‘Ricou said we were lucky not to kill each other. Remember?’
I did. Tavish had sicced me with a Chastity spell that manifested as a black handprint on my stomach. Finn had tried to remove the spell using his fertility magic. We’d been in the back of a luxury limo cocooned in our own little world by Privacy spells, and the knowledge than no one would interrupt us. If we hadn’t both ended up knocked out by the clashing spells the third time he’d tried, things would’ve gone a lot further than they did . . . And yeah, only Finn would know he’d said ‘Third time’s the charm’ right before our ‘lucky’ magical coitus interruptus.
The memory lodged a ball of hurt in my chest. Why the hell did he have to remind me of that particular moment; the last time we’d had fun and been happy together? Damn satyr could’ve picked any number of things.
‘Ricou can be a drama queen at times,’ I said flatly.
Finn’s shot me a searching look but all he said was, ‘So, you’re sure it’s me now?’
I wanted to say no. I wanted to shout at him to go away. But my curiosity spiked . . . or maybe a moment of errant masochism: I also wanted to know why he’d cut me off.
I stepped through the Ward, shivering as the recognition magic pricked goosebumps over my skin. There was one last check— skin to skin. Stealing myself for his touch, I stuck my hand out, ‘Nearly.’
He nodded and clasped my hand in his, taking a deep breath and rolling his shoulders like he was shrugging off a heavy cape. The mouth-watering smell of blackberries swam on the air and his familiar magic bloomed inside me. I gasped as it filled me, then swallowed back a scream as it ripped spiked thorns of desire through my core and almost took me to my knees before Finn gathered me to him.
‘Um. You okay, Gen?’
I leaned against him, not sure my legs would hold me, breathing in his warm berry scent, feeling his heart echoing my own heart’s fast thudding, and concentrated on crushing the need thrumming through my body. Bastard satyr had sicced me with enough of his sex-god energy to power-up a fertility rite. Boy, was I thankful that Mad Max’s Poultice spell had done its job. Damn fertility magic would’ve had me desperate and begging again. Especially as my libido thought Finn was exactly what it needed, and wanted nothing less than to act on the promise of pleasure still jumping along my nerve endings. Only no way was that going to happen, not when he’d cut me off.
Finally I fought myself back under control, and pushed away from him. ‘What the fuck was that for?’
‘Well, I wanted you to be sure it was me,’ he said sounding contrite, but a flicker of satisfaction crossed his face. ‘Sorry.’
Rage sparked. ‘No. You’re not.’
‘Hey, I am sorry, truly, Gen. I’ve . . .’ He lifted a hesitant hand as if to touch me, then let it fall. ‘Okay, yeah, maybe I took advantage. A bit. But I didn’t mean to hit you quite so hard. The magic’s been playing havoc with me recently, and I’ve . . . missed you. Forgive me?’
I’d missed him too. The feeling slammed into me, twisting through my anger. And I knew better than most how the magic could play tricks on you.
Finn’s mouth turned down. ‘Things haven’t been easy with Nicky, either. Not that that’s an excuse, but it hasn’t helped.’
Yep, I could imagine that coping with a pregnant teenage daughter wasn’t easy, especially one whose pregnancy had been forced on her by a deranged baby-making wizard. Not to mention Nicky ending up in the mad wizard’s clutches was down to her own mother, Finn’s ex and my Witch-bitch nemesis DI Helen Crane. Helen’s betrayal of him and their daughter was something else he’d had to deal with. The Witch-bitch was an evil piece of work if ever there was one.
I shoved my hands in my robe pockets, warring between wanting to hug him for the nasty stuff he’d ended up dealing with, and pounding on him for siccing his magic on me. For bringing back memories I’d buried. For cutting me off. But concern for Nicky, and for him, made me ask ‘How is Nicky?’
‘She’s fine.’ His shoulders slumped. ‘Well, not fine, but okay,’ he added, then the wariness darkened his green eyes again. ‘We need to talk, Gen.’
Yeah, we did. I clenched my hands in my pockets. ‘You’d better start then,’ I said, trying to keep my anger out of my voice.
Finn flinched, so obviously I wasn’t successful. He waved at my bedroom window. ‘Can we go inside, Gen?’
No. But the excited rustling coming from the silver birches silenced my kneejerk denial; we’d given the trees enough gossip already. And I did want to hear whatever he had to tell me.
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘But I have to go first then pull you through the Ward.’ Only we have to touch again. I’m not sure I’m ready. Or if I want to.
He nodded as if he’d heard my reluctant words or more likely noticed my hands were still shoved in my robe, then he cast an assessing eye over the dome. ‘Looks complicated.’
‘It is.’ I grimaced. ‘And sensitive.’
‘Sensitive?’
‘Yeah, it’s set to activate if it senses we’re under threat,’ I said, then as talking was easing the anger tensing my muscles I added grudgingly, ‘Turns out it can’t tell the difference between fear and excitement. The Ward went into lock-down after I signed up Harrods.’