Nicholas didn’t look at him, but drained his glass in two gulps. “And now?”
“And now I realize just how much power a mere woman can wield.”
“And those are just the ones without Druid magic.”
They shared a look of amusement, but neither of them could seem to summon so much as a smile. “Once I touched her… I never would have been able to do her violence.”
Nicholas poured himself another glass and topped off Julian’s as well. “Then it’s a damn good thing your touch is so lethal.”
The Library door banged against the wall, and the Tiffany glass chandelier overhead blazed to life with a flip of a switch. “That’s it!” Drustan’s voice boomed over the groans of his comrades. “I’m taking away your Pavarotti. You’re bumming me the fuck out.”
Julian stood and took a threatening step toward War. “Touch Pavarotti, and I’ll give your precious Claire chronic, oozing boils on her unmentionables.”
“She’d still have a mouth.” Nicholas grinned.
“What crawled up your ass and died?” Drustan shucked his sweat soaked shirt, uncovering a torso marred with the scars of millennia of warfare, and threw it in the fire.
“I have a right to a moment of melancholy,” Julian challenged. “I’m the only one who could carry out our task.”
Drustan picked up the bottle of Burgundy and made a face. Putting it down, he strode to the sideboard and pulled a local microbrew from the chest of ice. “Think again, Mon Ami. Aerin de Moray is alive and kicking. Well, swearing…for a woman, she has the mouth of a sailor, a soldier, and a trucker. Combined.”
Nicholas’s dark chuckle was one part surprise, two parts smug superiority. “Is she now?” He stood, draining another glass of wine before turning to Julian. “You were saying?”
It took Julian a full minute to recover. It wasn’t humiliation that choked him, nor was it anger at the news. But elation.
“It isn’t possible,” Julian said slowly.
“I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it myself,” Drustan insisted.
“I touched her suitcase. I shook her hand. She should have been dead within the hour.”
“You’re sure it was her?” Nicholas asked.
Julian nodded. “I took the photograph of the others you sent me. There was no mistaking that she was one of them.”
Aerin was alive. He’d look into her silver eyes again before this was all over. He’d hear the smoky alto of her voice. He’d breathe in her scent that reminded him of thunderstorms and the clean winter wind.
“How did she survive, Julian?” Drustan demanded.
“I—she shouldn’t have.”
“Is she with them?” Nicholas asked Drustan, standing and punching his arms back into his suit coat.
“Yup.” Drustan cast an accusatory glare at Julian.
“Don’t you dare look at me in that tone of voice,” Julian thrust his finger at War. “If you’d used the proper sword to thrust into Claire, we wouldn’t be in this situation.”
Dru’s eyes flared with his legendary temper. “Hey, fuck you, pansy ass. At least I did more than shake her hand.”
“Indeed,” Julian said with his signature chill. “You managed to lose both your weapon and your wits to her.”
War attacked but ran into Nicholas’ bracing shoulder. “We don’t have time for this shit. These witches are more powerful than we thought, and we need to come up with a plan.”
Drustan growled at Julian but put his hands up in an ‘I’ll behave’ gesture. “We need to put an end to at least one of them before they find the Grimoire and we’re all fucked nine ways to Sunday.”
Julian acquiesced as he followed his brothers toward the garage door. “Upon that, at least, we agree.”
“First things first.” Drustan grabbed a clean, black tank on his way out, pulling it down over his belted jeans. “I’m getting my fucking sword back.”
“And your man-card along with it.” Nicholas laughed.
“I got my man card right here.” Drustan cupped himself.
“You may need it,” Julian said soberly. “It seems to be one of the only effective weapons against this cadre of witches. If we are to defeat them, it may have to be through one of the oldest and most dissolute means known.”
Both Conquest and War gave him almost comical matching stares of suspicion.
“The art of seduction, mes frères, is just as lethal and dangerous as the art of war.”
31
Someone was working on the inside of Aerin’s throat with a belt sander. It was the first pain that returned her to semi-consciousness. The second was a sinus headache. Then neck pain, joint pain, muscle pain…well…everything pain, really. Her stomach clenched with emptiness and