Marked (Eternal Guardians #1)

  ***

  Casey couldn’t remember ever being so tired. She was sore from the attack in her bookstore, emotionally spent and mentally whacked out. As she followed Helene up the wide staircase, she tried not to think about everything Nick and Theron had just told her. It was ludicrous, wasn’t it? Other races didn’t exist. And mythological heroes were just that…mythological, for crap’s sake.

  But even as she fought what they’d told her, she had the strangest sense she was wrong. It explained so much about who she was and where she’d come from and why she’d never connected with anyone in this world.

  And holy cow, she needed a lobotomy if she was so easily buying into all this.

  They reached the top of the staircase, and Helene gestured down a long hallway lined with closed doors and lit with candles every ten feet. “I think you’ll like the blue room. It’s very peaceful.”

  For the first time, Casey noticed the girl’s limp and wondered if she’d recently been hurt, possibly by those beasts they’d encountered earlier. “Are you all right?”

  Helene smiled. “I’m fine.”

  “But your leg—”

  Helene stopped and lifted one pant leg. A metal bar was anchored in a Nike running shoe. “Titanium. It’s new and I’m still getting used to it. My last prosthesis bugged me to no end. This one’s lighter.”

  Casey tried not to stare as the girl dropped her pant leg and kept moving down the long hallway. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I—”

  “It’s okay,” Helene said. “I’ve been without my leg for a hundred years.”

  Casey’s jaw nearly hit the floor. “You’re a hundred years old?”

  “One hundred and thirty-six, to be exact.”

  The hallway spun. Casey reached a hand out to steady herself. “How is that possible?”

  Helene’s arms were suddenly around her, supporting her, as she helped Casey inside the room. “Whoa there. I take it Nick hasn’t explained that part to you yet.” She eased Casey into a chair Casey vaguely registered as being white and incredibly soft. “Our lifespans are relatively long. Not as long as an Argolean’s, of course, but it’s one of the reasons we live here in the colony and not with humans.” A wry smile slid across her pretty face as she crossed the room to an armoire. She opened the double doors, fiddled inside for a few moments and came back with a mug of steaming tea, which she handed to Casey. “A one-hundred-and-thirty-six-year-old woman who looks like she’s thirty? That might garner a little attention in the human world, don’t you think?”

  Casey took the tea and brought it to her lips. A familiar scent surrounded her as she took a deep drink. “I smell lavender.”

  “Yes,” Helene said. “It’ll help you rest.”

  “You use it for healing,” she said, as images of her night with Theron flickered through her mind.

  “Among other things.” Helene crossed to a gigantic four-poster bed done all in light blue fabrics and folded back the plump covers. Crisp white sheets beckoned, promising respite. “There’s a small button on the wall next to the door. If you need anything, just push it and someone will come running.”

  “So modern?” Casey asked, remembering the candles.

  Helene smiled. “Yes. It’s not the Ritz, but we do have electricity and indoor plumbing. A main generator powers the colony, but because we’re not self-sufficient and everything costs money, we try not to overburden it. Candles are cheap and soothing, so we use those quite a bit. Up near the surface we have a lookout station complete with surveillance equipment, satellite phones and everything we need to connect with civilization.

  At Casey’s perplexed expression, Helene came around the bed. “I imagine you have a thousand other questions, but for now, try to rest. When you wake, Nick will tell you anything you want to know. Now sleep, Casey. And don’t worry. Tonight nothing will harm you.”

  “Thank you, Helene.”

  Alone, Casey leaned back in the plush chair and studied the room she’d been given. Pale blue walls on three sides matched the comforter on the bed. Two club chairs separated by a small side table occupied the corner. An enormous stone fireplace, already burning, took up nearly one whole wall. But the far wall held the most interest. It was made entirely of stone, and a small, naturally occurring opening formed a porthole-type window that had somehow been sealed with glass and covered by a variety of branches which, she imagined, camouflaged the opening from the outside. One look out into utter darkness signaled that this part of the cavern must form the edge of some massive cliff.

  So strange to be in a room in a cave. Kind of like the Anasazi tribes in the Southwest. Big villages built deep into the rocks for protection.

  Tired to her bones, she rose and pulled the small blue drapes to block out the darkness, blew out the candles on the walls, then tumbled into bed, not wanting to think about what had happened to the Anasazi. Or about hiding places or predators. Or kings or countries or gods or heroes. She just wanted to think about…nothing.

  But it didn’t work. As soon as she closed her eyes she saw the fight in her grandmother’s store. The fire. And…Theron.

  Why had he really come back for her?

  Not to finish what they’d started in her house, that was for sure. Not that she even wanted to anymore.

  Liar.

  Casey rolled to her side and closed her eyes tight. Stupid thoughts. Where Theron the Wonder Hero was concerned, she needed to watch her back, be on guard, not let him get to her the way he had the first time they met. The way he’d manhandled her on the hike up here was proof of that, wasn’t it? If he was his race’s idea of a hero, she wasn’t so sure she wanted to know more about her lineage.

  She let out a long breath as her muscles relaxed one by one and sleep tugged at her. And though she fought it, she pictured Theron’s face. His dark eyes. His lush lips. The perfectly shaped nose and the small scars from battles fought and won. Saw, clearly, the smoldering look across those chiseled features when he’d bent and kissed her with the slightest brush of skin against skin that night at her house. And felt the rush of arousal in response that heated her blood.

  Damn, but for all her posturing she was in deep trouble. Even with all that she’d lost today, she had a sinking suspicion events hadn’t turned her world upside down. He had. And that feeling had nothing to do with daemons and heroes and kings and half-breeds. It had to do with one man who, somehow, had wormed his way into her soul from the very moment she’d laid eyes on him.

  Chapter Fourteen