Darkness, Kindled (Fire Spirits 4)

She was a client.

Just like any other.

He caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Obviously, his client had decided to play hooky.

Her hair blew behind her in the breeze as she marched down the steps and out into the school parking lot. His silent footsteps mirrored hers. He kept a watchful eye on her as she made her way home since clearly her mind was not on the path in front of her.

As she approached a main road, Jai heard the traffic in the distance and turned around to see the truck speeding toward them. Heart in throat, he whipped back just as Ari took a step off the sidewalk.

Fu—!

Using his preternatural speed, he sped toward her, clamped his strong hands down on her shoulders, and hauled her back just as the horn of the truck blasted past.

“Jesus Christ,” she cursed, shaking from the fright.

And then she turned to look for her rescuer.

If he wasn’t still pissed off at her for almost killing herself, Jai might have laughed at the astonishment on her face.

Her nose wrinkled, though, as if she could smell something, and it suddenly occurred to him she could probably smell his cologne. He took a couple of steps back.

As seconds passed, the look on her face transformed from surprise to abject fear.

He refused to feel guilty for not showing himself. He was under orders to simply watch her for now.

Plus, he’d just saved her ass. He had nothing to feel guilty about. He shot her another annoyed look before turning to watch the approach of a vehicle. Jai’s eyes narrowed as it slowed toward them.

“I’m insane. I’m literally now going mental. I—”

“Ari, what are you doing?”

A girl dangled out of the driver’s side window of the car.

“Rache?” Ari asked.

Rache grinned. “I saw you ditching and decided it looked like fun, and it’s not like we can really get in trouble now, right?”

What a fantastic attitude,

Jai thought sourly. He had never willingly missed a day of school. Knowledge was just as important to him, if not more so, as his combat skills. Knowledge packed the greater punch than his fist.

“Come on, get in. I’ve already texted Staci and AJ to ditch and meet at your house. I thought we’d go to the store, buy some snacks.”

Jai knew what her answer would be before she even skipped to the car. She didn’t want to be alone.

Jai followed them but obviously couldn’t go into the house. When more teens arrived, though, he almost thanked the Ifrit for barring him. An afternoon of listening to mindless prattle? No, thanks.

Still, he walked around the back of the house to look in through the kitchen windows. He told himself that it was just to make sure she was okay.

He told himself that what he felt wasn’t intrigue.

It wasn’t empathy.

He didn’t feel a connection.

But he was lying to himself.

She was a contradiction. She was multifaceted. She was beautiful, well-off, and surrounded by friends. Yet it was all on the surface. It wasn’t her life. Did she sense she was different?

Was that it? Would she be able to handle what was coming?

Jai didn’t know.

What he did know, what pricked his chest with an ache anytime he thought too deeply on it, was Ari Johnson was the loneliest girl he knew. And in a day, or weeks, or months, her life might become chaos. There could be a constant barrage of Jinn beings in and out of her life, and Ari Johnson was going to wish for just a day to be lonely once again.

“Tempted”

Smokeless

Fire, Chapter 25—Jai’s Perspective

As soon as the door shut behind Charlie, Jai’s eyes zeroed in on Ari’s face. She was staring at the front door, looking utterly lost.

The urge to comfort her, as easily as Charlie had tried to, was overwhelming. To hold her close and promise her that everything with Derek would be okay—that she would be okay.

But you didn’t treat a client like that, especially one as important as Ari. That would blur the lines between them even more than he’d already let them blur. He would just have to offer her comfort in the only way he knew how.

When she turned back to look at him, her strange eyes glittering in the dark hallway, the inescapable beauty of her winded him.

Time to go.

Jai strolled toward her, careful to keep his expression blank. When he stopped before her, the fight to remain impassive was almost as great as the fight he’d just had with Pazuzu. Voice soft, expression tight, he told her, “Well … I’d better go. Just use your mind if you need me, okay?” And then because he couldn’t bear the absolute forlornness in the tremble of her mouth and limpid pools of her eyes, he added, “I’ll be back tomorrow. You still have a lot of decisions to make.” This was only the beginning, Jai realized, a knot in his gut for her. “This isn’t over, Ari.”

Her body shifted infinitesimally,

softening toward him the way a girl’s body did when they wanted you to kiss them. His heart lurched and then kicked into super speed as she let the walls behind her eyes down, the light in them—the light in them that she felt for him—pouring out of her. “I want to thank you for coming for me, for protecting me.”

Shit.

Heart pounding against his ribs, Jai took an unconscious step back, as if physical distance could halt the confession in her eyes.

She wanted him.

Ari Johnson wanted him, giving truth to all the suspicions he’d had that her feelings for him were changing.

Beautiful and exotic she may be, but the one thing Ari wasn’t was enigmatic and mysterious. She was transparent and honest and too young to mask her emotions. She wore her heart on her sleeve and suddenly, Jai was angry at her for putting him in the position where he’d end up stomping all over it.

He was angry that she’d put him the position of being completely and utterly tempted, despite his better judgment.

Clearing his throat, Jai replied with perfect control. “Just doing my job.” Leave it at that, Ari, leave it.

The strength in her grip as hauled him by the arm toward her took Jai by surprise. He found himself close enough to breathe in her sweetness, to feel the heat of her warm, supple body so close to his.

Damn it, she was trying to kill him.

Hadn’t they been through enough for one day? He opened his mouth to speak but the hurt pleading in her eyes stalled him.

“Don’t,” she whispered, her lush lips trembling in the most distracting way. “Don’t act like you’re not my friend, Jai. After everything … you are my friend.”

Jai felt a pang in his chest and had to resist the urge to rub a hand over the spot. He had to say something reassuring, friendly, but also something that clarified exactly what they were to each other in professional terms.

Ari licked her lips invitingly.

The blood whooshed in Jai’s ears and he found himself counting to ten in an attempt to gain control.

Then he felt her body shiver and that shiver sent off a montage of R-rated images Jai had managed to keep at bay for days. Frustrated and barely holding onto the last remnants of his control, Jai gripped hold of her upper arms and pushed her back into the front door, needing her to understand, to stop! “Stop it,” he whispered harshly against his body’s attraction to her. Hell, her lips so were close. His breathing grew shallow from the exertion of controlling his desire for her. Her head moved ever so slightly toward him, telling him she wanted him to lose control; she wanted him. She wanted him. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?” Ari whispered huskily, sending a streak of white-hot lust through him, lust that only quadrupled as she brushed her lips across his.

Jai jerked back from her, his lips tingling. He cursed, almost hating her in this moment for doing this to him.

His grip tightened along with his determination to make her see sense. “You know what,” his voice ca

me out much hoarser than he’d intended, betraying his reaction to her. Despite that, he had to make her realize that nothing could ever happen between them. She was his client. He was a well-respected Ginnaye.

His reputation would be destroyed if he screwed around with an eighteen-year-old client whose uncle happened to be one of the Seven Kings of Jinn. If that happened, Luca would win. Jai would be nothing, just as his family had always predicted. That couldn’t happen. Ever. He would lose everything important to him and Ari would end up with another broken heart. Jai refused to do to her what Charlie had done.