Spirit

Hunter refused to look away, but he didn’t have much of a retort.

He had to clear his throat to speak. “How do you know that?”

“Please. I saw the look on your face when I said Kate was hitting on everyone. Don’t worry, I think Quinn is about to yank her fingernails out by the roots.”

Another rattle and creak, and more footfalls were coming down the wooden steps.

Honestly, was everyone going to check on him?

Kate.

And Nick, followed by Quinn.

But seriously, it was a miracle he was able to look past Kate. She was wearing this tight sky-blue top with inch-thin straps and a ruffle at the bottom—and the bottom ended right at the base of her rib cage. Tight black jeans sat just below her belly button, exposing a solid few inches of very toned midsection.

He couldn’t have said what Nick and Quinn were wearing if someone held a gun to his head.

Kate snapped her fingers in his face. “My eyes aren’t that far south, slugger.”

He refused to let her make him blush. “Then you shouldn’t have worn that outfit.”

“I heard you were giving ass-kicking lessons down here.”

Her voice was challenging, and that was a lot easier to take than anything else. He still had no idea what she was doing here. Had she texted Nick last night just to screw with him?

“Sure am,” he said evenly. “Interested in an ass-kicking?”

Quinn had moved close to Nick, and just now she was murmuring something that made him laugh.

“What was that?” said Hunter.

“I said you should just go find a bedroom and get it over with.”

Kate smiled and stepped closer to Hunter. “I’ve got time if you know what to do with it.”

He wasn’t sure if that was an insult or a come-on. His eyes were right on level with the button on her jeans, and it was suddenly hard to think. “Told you, I’m busy with ass-kicking.”

She stepped forward until she was straddling his knees, then sat.

He tried to force his brain to think about other things, but his brain was more than content to think about the curvaceous female in his lap.

She leaned forward to whisper in his ear. “Come on, baby, teach me something I don’t know.”

Her voice was full of suggestion and his body wasn’t complaining.

And that’s exactly why he needed to shut her down.

“Sure,” he said, loading his voice with just as much suggestion—but adding a touch of mockery. “Want to learn how to drive a stick?”

Quinn snorted.

Kate was just staring at him, as if trying to sort through the innuendo. Some of her easy confidence stumbled a bit.

Good. It was nice to know she could falter.

While she was off balance, he put his hands on her waist and lifted her, setting her to the side and shoving a hand into his pocket for his keys. “Come on,” he said. “Try not to tear up my clutch.”

He was already on the steps, but she was just staring after him. “Your clutch—? What are—”

But he was already through the door, heading for his jeep, not bothering to wait to see whether she’d follow.

Kate had half a mind to let him just leave. It would serve him right, and she sure wasn’t the type to go scampering after a boy just because he snapped his fingers.

But the whole reason she’d come here was to talk to Hunter privately, and here he was giving her the perfect way to do just that.

She caught up to him beside his jeep. His dog was already in the back, flopped out on the backseat.

“Get in,” Hunter said.

He barely gave her time to obey, because he was throwing the car into gear before she even had the door closed.

Her heart was skipping to some rhythm she couldn’t figure out, but she pulled a stick of gum out of her bag like she was bored, then rolled it into her mouth. “Are we running from something?”

“No, I just needed to get out of there.”

“Trouble in paradise?”

“Tell me, Kate, do you have absolutely no self-confidence, or are you just completely full of yourself and you don’t give a shit about anyone else?”

She almost choked on the gum.

Hunter came to a stop sign at the end of the road and turned to look at her. “What are you really doing here?”

“I was invited.”

“Yeah, and how’d you drum up an invitation? Did you send Nick Merrick na**d pictures of yourself?”

She wanted to punch him, but some part of his words were ringing true, and that stung like crazy. “What do you care if I did?”

He turned back to the road and hit the accelerator.

“Jealous much?” she said.

His jaw was so tight she could make out the lines where muscle met bone. “If we’ve decided the problem is Calla and a bunch of middle schoolers, you shouldn’t be hanging out with the Merricks.”

“They invited me!”

“You could’ve said no, you know.” He cut a glance her way. “Or is that foreign territory for you?”

“I’m a little sick of you acting like I’m some big slut.”

“Oh, I’m the one acting like you’re a big slut?”

She didn’t give a crap that he was driving, her fist was just flying in the general direction of his face.

He caught her wrist one-handed, and he wasn’t gentle about it. In a flash she saw that kid lying on the field, passing out from the pain in his arm.

She was about to pass out from the pain in her own.

Kate got ahold of his keys with her other hand, and killed the engine while they were still moving.

Then she used the fistful of keys to stab him in the crotch.

She was lucky he didn’t flip the car.

They ended up on the side of the road. Casper was standing up on the backseat, one paw on the center console. Hunter’s hands had a death grip on the steering wheel, and his forehead was between them.

“I think I might have to kill you,” he said. “Just as soon as I can stand up straight.”

Her heart found that odd syncopated rhythm again. “You deserved it.”

Hunter turned his head and looked at her over his fingers. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said those things to you.”

His apology took her by surprise more effectively than if he’d run off the road again. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had apologized to her.

And he’d done it so simply, like it was nothing.

But beyond the apology, she couldn’t get past the realization that he hadn’t struck back. She could still feel tenderness in her jaw from where Silver had knocked her around, and here Hunter took a solid hit with something like . . . grace.

She cleared her throat. “Are you just apologizing because you’ll never father children?”

“Probably.” She made like she was going to jab him again, and he winced, then almost smiled. “Nah. I mean it.”

She looked back at the road. A few houses sat down the way, but right here nothing but trees lined the roadway, and the jeep had kicked up a bunch of red and yellow leaves. The air swirled through her hair, just this side of chilly, making her want to tuck her hands under her thighs to warm her fingers.

She still couldn’t figure Hunter out, and she kept her hands where she could use them.

“What were you doing over there, really?” he said.

“I wanted to ask if you’ve seen Silver.”

That took him by surprise, and he straightened, little by little. “No. Why? Did something happen?”

“He didn’t come back to the apartment last night. He texted me to say he was working on something.” She didn’t add the rest of Silver’s commentary, how he’d told her to be a good little girl and stay out of trouble.

She couldn’t decide which she hated more: his condescension or his violence.

She examined her fingernails. “I thought maybe he was working on something with you.”

“Jealous much?”

She glared at him and wished it were something as simple as jealousy. “This is my job. You’re the one living with the enemy. I earned this position.”

“How?”

His eyes were intense, and there was no mockery in that question.

The answer was simple enough, but she faltered, trapped by his eyes.

When she didn’t say anything, Hunter volunteered an explanation for her. “Silver said you avenged your mother. That you killed the Water Elemental who killed her.”

She made her voice hard, until the edge almost hurt as the words passed her lips. “I did. So you see, this is my job. I earned it.”

He looked back at the steering wheel.

She studied him, the sandy blond hair that fell forward along his cheeks, the piercings in his eyebrow and ear, the foreign tattoos. She wanted to touch them, to find out if they were warm from his skin, to let power flow between them the way it had before.

What the hell was wrong with her? Weren’t they fighting?

“I haven’t talked to Silver,” he said. “Really, I thought I was going to be stuck here all weekend, waiting for school on Monday so I could try to question some of the other middle schoolers.”

She wondered just how he would have “questioned” them. “Gonna go break some more arms?”

“I didn’t break his arm.” He sounded bitter. There was a long pause. “I couldn’t have.”

No, he didn’t sound bitter.

He sounded disgusted.

She studied him in the sunlight. He looked over. “I’m not trying to take your job, Kate.” Then he flung himself back in the seat and ran his hands through his hair. “God knows I don’t want it.”

Her lips parted, and she was aware of breathing, but she couldn’t have said a word if she’d wanted to.

He didn’t want it?

His thumbs were running over the ridges in the steering wheel again. “I don’t want anyone else to get hurt, so I’ll do what I have to do. But that doesn’t mean I like it.”

“I don’t like it, either,” she whispered.

He glanced over. “Then what was all the bravado about your job?”

“What else am I supposed to do? All I’ve ever heard is that full Elementals are supposed to die before they can hurt anyone. And we’re supposed to be the ones to do it, because our connection to the Fifth element is what allows us the greatest connection to the spirit, to follow through and do what’s right.”

“I know,” he said, almost gently. “I drank the Kool-Aid, too.”

They sat there breathing the air for the longest time, until she shivered and regretted the cropped top.

Hunter put a hand out. “Keys?”

Sheepishly, she handed them to him. He started the engine and kicked on the heat—which seemed counterintuitive with the top down. But warmth rushed out of the vents, and she put her hands against them. “Thanks.”

“Sure.” Then he shrugged out of his pullover and handed it to her.

She took it in surprise, glad he was looking at the road as he pulled out, instead of at her. The fleece fabric was warm from his body, and it smelled like him, some faint delicious musky scent like a hint of cologne or body wash. She hugged it to her chest and inhaled.

After a minute, she looked over. “Where are we going?”

“Anywhere you want.” He threw a glance her way. “I can still teach you to drive a stick if you want.”

His tone was easy. Amiable. Almost desperate for some kind of normal.

Had her admission let them find some kind of truce?

She reached out a hand and clicked on the radio. “Just drive.”

CHAPTER 25

“This feels kinda like that scene in Look Who’s Talking,” Tsaid Kate.

Hunter smirked. “Put your hand on my stick?” he quoted.