Beyond the Gates of Evermoore

The whole thing was suddenly beyond uncomfortable. I pulled up the dry part of the T-shirt to wipe my face, realized I’d just exposed most of my body, then edged my way toward Damien’s bedroom.

“And where are you going?” Broderick demanded in a hard, unplacable accent.

“To get dressed?”

“Stay here in a minute,” he ordered. “We need to work this out before you go anywhere.”

Ahhhh. So that was it. I glanced at Damien, then back at Broderick again. Now things really were getting weird.

“Look,” I told them, putting my hands up defensively. “I don’t know what’s going on here, and I’m sorry if I got in the middle of something. As far as I knew, Damien was single. Ready to mingle.”

I couldn’t believe I’d made the joke. It was a one-in-a-thousand shot at levity in a terrible situation. One that fell utterly flat.

“Single?” Broderick looked astonished. “Is that what you think?”

“He never told me he was involved with—”

“Why does she think that?” he yelled, whirling on Damien. “What the hell have you been telling her?”

He was seething now, his big shoulders square and tight. I could see the muscles in his neck, flexing. The outline of his jaw…

Shit.

I gulped hard. All of a sudden there was a lump the size of a baseball in my throat.

He looks just like Alex.

“I haven’t been telling her anything,” Damien countered. “And we’re damned lucky I ran into her at all.” I could see him getting angry now also, or at least trying to. It was a false anger though. A defense mechanism more than anything else.

“Lucky?”

“I brought her back here to protect her, Broderick. I found her in an alley. She was being attacked.”

The taller blonde stopped for a moment. This seemed to change things.

“Who?”

“Boone and Christophe.”

Broderick stiffened. So did I.

“You knew who those guys were?” I demanded of Damien. “And you didn’t say anything?”

He looked disappointed. Like I’d found out something I shouldn’t have. Yet there wasn’t any deception, none that I could sense anyway. It felt almost something like he’d wanted to tell me, but just hadn’t gotten the chance.

“So you brought her back here?” Broderick was asking.

“Yes.”

“And where did she sleep?”

At this, Damien and I both looked at each other. Probably just a little too quickly.

Broderick’s hands were fists now. Controlled fists, but still fists. “Where did she sleep, Damien?”

His voice was low. Gravelly. Seething.

Damien heaved a resigned sigh. “In my room.”