Kiss of Vengeance (True Immortality 2)

Uneasiness shifted through Rose. “Did you do it?”

He nodded, expression grim. “I regretted it, so you can remove that judgy little pinch between your brows.”

“What happened?”

“I met the vampire and surmised he’d been lying about fighting an all-powerful being to cover up that he’d gotten his arse kicked by a fucking werewolf. Unbeknownst to me, Alice had caught his eye.”

Rose considered this. This woman secured Fionn, attracted another guy, and then caught the eye of an indolent vampire. “She must be an intriguing lady.”

“Alice is very attractive.”

“Is that it?” Rose scowled. “A woman just has to be beautiful to warrant attention?”

He gave her an impatient look. “First, I said attractive, not beautiful. Many women are attractive. Beauty, being in the eye of the beholder, is harder to define. Second, Rose, I have no interest in relationships, which means a woman only has to be two things: physically appealing to me and sexually free. If that offends the feminist within, I could give a fuck.”

“Charming.” Did she really describe him as noble earlier?

“Anyway, this vampire was more than intrigued by Alice. He turned her. She came to me, said it was against her will, and I tried to help her come to terms with her new reality. But in truth, she was there as his spy. He’d heard I was a powerful warlock but beyond that, I was a mystery. He was a collector of information and he sent Alice to find out more.”

Oh shit.

“I left her in an apartment I’d rented in London. I told her I was away on business, but really, I just needed some time away from her. I went home to Ireland. I’ve never left any personal item behind around a mistress—but she’d stolen a silk handkerchief from me. They used it to trace me and she followed me there. By the time I found her, she’d already relayed information about my vault.”

“What happened to her?”

Seeing her fear, Fionn shook his head in disappointment. “My home is my sanctuary. It’s spelled. It’s almost impossible to find, but if a person stumbles upon it, they forget about it as soon as they leave. The only people the spell does not work on are Bran and the staff who worked there for generations. Bran has no spell on him but the staff were spelled to be unable to speak of me or my home.

“When I found Alice, I broke her neck. While she was unconscious, I had her removed. When she woke up, she had no memory of the place, but it was too late. She’d already sent the information on.”

“Shit. So Alice came back and broke into the vault?”

“Alice is dead. Along with others who returned to my home.”

Horrified at the casual way Fionn relayed this information, Rose couldn’t hide her reaction. There was a ruthlessness to him that she couldn’t pretend didn’t exist. It was confusing. Worrying.

“It would never be a safe place again. Someone could find out what I was. What good would that do? And why should I explain myself against a woman who betrayed me for a chance at immortality? That was their deal. He didn’t turn Alice against her will like she’d said.” He curled his lip in anger. “He offered her immortality to get to me.”

Betrayed again.

How could a person who had been continually betrayed through the centuries trust anyone? Let alone a woman he’d just met?

Rose didn’t think the punishment fit the crime, but then again, this world had different rules from the human one. Conflicted, she looked away. “What happened next?”

“While I was chasing signs that pointed to Niamh Farren being in Budapest, Alice’s vampire enlisted twenty lone vampires, killed my guards, my housekeeper, and my steward. They then used an industrial-sized steel laser to cut through the doors of my vault. Along with An Breitheamh, he stole valuable artifacts I’d collected over the years.”

She thought of all the people who had died during that attack and didn’t feel so much sympathy for Alice. “I’m sorry, Fionn.”

His expression remained annoyingly blank. “Bran hacked the vamp’s phone. Deleted Alice’s original texts and searched his entire system to delete any information on my home. As soon as he and his vampires left my home, they had no idea where they’d gotten all the artifacts. That didn’t stop me. I delivered retribution for the people they’d murdered, people I’d sworn to protect and failed to do so. I killed every bloodsucker that entered my home, and I’d do it again.”

Fionn tensed, as if he’d said more than he’d meant to. Cursing under his breath, he looked away, seemed to gather himself, and turned back to Rose with a calmer expression.

“The vamp had sold most of the items by the time I tracked him down, including An Breitheamh. Bran has found pieces here and there that I’ve stolen back. An Breitheamh seemed lost to me until I received word of it being in Barcelona.

“Then Bran found out about the auction. It’s being held by Oliver Schneider, a German businessman who also happens to be a powerful warlock. Schneider must know of An Breitheamh’s historical importance and that some ‘fanatics’ believe enough in its power to pay a lot of money for it. Three times as much as he paid for it.

“But Schneider also knows it was stolen from me. The man he believes it was stolen from was the man Alice believed me to be—Edward Kent, an English warlock. Schneider may not know my real name, but he knows I’m a man.

“You, Rose, are not a man. So, you need to break into that vault.”

Steal an ancient iron dagger from a highly secured vault in a five-star hotel in Barcelona? An ancient dagger that was the key to opening Faerie if plunged into her heart?

God, she missed bartending.

Heaving a sigh, Rose leaned across the table. “Explain that whole ‘man’ thing to me. Tell me what I need to do.”

Fionn’s room is neat as a pin, Rose thought as they strolled into it after breakfast. She’d left her bed unmade, her dirty clothes sprawled over a chair, and the bathroom was a mess of toiletries.

Fionn’s didn’t even look like it had been touched, let alone slept it.

Must be the soldier in him, she mused, glancing around as she followed him to the desk in the corner.

“What are we doing?”

“Bran hacked into the hotel’s system. He sent over schematics of the hotel and vault.” Fionn laid his iPad on the desk, the screen showing a partial of what looked like plans. Then, Rose watched in awe as he drew his hand over the iPad and across the desk. As his hand glided, it appeared as if the iPad was a printer, miraculously churning out paper with the schematics on them.

Despite the gravity of the situation, Rose couldn’t help but smile.

Fionn glanced up in time to catch it. He frowned. “What is it?”

She shrugged, still grinning. “Dude, that is very cool. Don’t you think that’s cool?”

He blinked as if shocked. “Did you just ‘dude’ me?”

“Did you just make an iPad print out schematics of a vault with a wave of your hand?”

Fionn rolled his eyes and turned to the drawings. “Focus, please.”

It occurred to her, for not the first time, that Fionn didn’t seem to appreciate his talents. Now, she wasn’t stupid. She realized as a human he’d hated the fae and being turned into one was probably a fate worse than death. However, he had not chosen to stick iron in his own heart and end his fae existence. He was still here. Which meant Mr. Mór had turned his bad fate into a purpose. If he could do that, couldn’t he eventually grow to love being his own version of fae? Rose bumped his shoulder with hers. “You need to learn to find the joy in your abilities, Fionn.”

He grunted. “Concentrate or die.”

Assuming that wasn’t a direct threat (she hoped), Rose leaned in to look at the plans, brushing her breasts against his arm. Although he did a good job of pretending not to notice, Rose caught the little tick of a muscle in his jaw. God, he was fun. Trying to suppress her smirk, she asked, “What am I looking at?”

He tapped a finger at the edge of the plans. “The va

ult is underground. Far underground. We must be inside the hotel to travel to that level. Once there, you’ll travel into the vault.”

“Why am I traveling in?”

“Because according to the information Bran has sent over, the vault is alarmed with a spell that will trigger if a man, other than Schneider, steps foot inside it.”

“Again, why am—”

“Man, Rose. Not woman. Man.”

Indignation flooded. “That sexist asshat. What? He thinks a woman can’t steal from him?”

“The only person he’s expecting to steal An Breitheamh is me. A male.”

“Yeah, who could, and is, enlisting a female to help him. What is this guy’s problem? He thinks a woman can’t best him?”

“Yes.” Fionn turned his head to meet her eyes. “From everything I’ve heard of the man, he thinks exactly that.”

She was affronted. “Misogynistic dipshit. Chauvinist pig. Bigoted dickwad. Sounds like someone needs a good kick to the jewels, if you ask me.”

Fionn studied her a second. They stood so close her breath caught. Then a definite glimmer of amusement crept over his face. “Let’s leave the jewel-kicking out of it. At least physically. Metaphorically,” he said, looking down at the drawings, “we’re about to show the bastard that you never underestimate a woman.”