“On Earth, in jujitsu, it is called ki. The inner focus and force of personal energy,” Asia answered the unspoken question. “I mastered it long ago. And maybe it’s because Julian is my kindri or maybe it’s just me, but whatever it is, it’s more powerful than you are, and I am not going to let you forget it!”
Asia lunged for the other woman and Kloe was forced to defend herself. The resulting clash of energy rocked the little house like a C-4 detonation. Items in the house rattled, shattered, and fell, and the house itself shuddered on its foundations.
“I’m going to kill you,” Kloe snarled. “You’re a poison to this plane. You must be destroyed!”
“Yeah, good luck with that!” Asia backhanded Kloe across the face, and then focusing all of her ki, she hit her with a rigid palm in the dead center of her breastbone. Once, about three years ago, Asia had taken down a 350-pound man with the exact same maneuver. She figured if it worked then, it would work now.
Kloe hit the floor like a marionette, all loose limbs clattering numbly around her. The Ampliphi gasped for breath, trying to force what would not come naturally as the impact of the strike against her chest kept her from succeeding. Asia stepped over her, a looming virago ready to prove what a human being was truly capable of when pushed to her breaking point.
“So? Nothing to say? You who would rather let children starve to death than get over your petty emotions? When was the last time you fed the people of this colony? Hmm? The day Julian and I made love? You’re blackmailing him, punishing him by punishing his people, and you’re supposed to be revered? These people are supposed to respect you? More like they live under the thumb of your terrorism! You sick, psychopathic bitch! Have you nothing to say for yourself?”
“Greison,” she ground out, a sudden smile of satisfaction coming over her.
Too late Asia whirled to see the second Ampliphi that had entered through the open door. Greison was on her before she could react defensively, so she tried to act offensively.
“Let’s see what you’ll have to say when I am through with you!” he snarled at her.
Julian felt the first blast tear through the village and knew instantly where the central point of it had been. He’d run as fast as he could, leaping dangerously from one level to the next. He burst into Kenya’s house just as Greison made his threat and grabbed hold of Asia. Julian knew the very instant he saw him what he was going to do to her.
“No!”
Julian was across the room and on Greison in a heartbeat. As faded as he was, Julian didn’t know how he was going to have any impact, didn’t know how he was going to stop him from erasing everything that Asia was. But it was pure fear and the energy of his outrage at the thought that allowed him to strike Greison. He grabbed hold of the male Ampliphi with both hands and dragged him back away from Asia. It was watching Asia drop to her knees limply, as if she’d lost all use of her backbone, that made him scream out in primal fury. And as Asia had done to Kloe, the impact of his emotional energy bludgeoned Greison until he was flush and solid. It gave Julian a target to take out his fury on, and he unleashed it with everything that was in him.
“What did you do to her?” he raged in Greison’s face. “Did you take her? Did you take her from me?”
“You’re too late,” Greison emanated even as he struggled to remove Julian’s hands from around his throat.
“You didn’t have enough time,” Julian said savagely. “You don’t know her like I do! Did you even bother to find out what had happened here? Who are you to pass summary judgment on anyone? Who are any of you to treat others the way you do?”
“She had her hands on Ampliphi in violence, just as you do now! If anything deserves summary judgment, then that is it!”
“If you’ve hurt her, I swear to all that is precious in the land that I will kill you!”
“Face it, Magistrate. She is gone! Well and truly gone! And good riddance! We will send her back to where she came from now and let them deal with her. And this world can get back to the business of peaceful life!”
“I will never let her go!”
“You have no choice! These Ampliphi judge her to be too violent for our world. She will go back or she will be nightfly to thousands of men! You decide,” Kloe said with triumph.
“There is always a choice.”
The heavy, resounding statement was taken straight out of Julian’s mind. Only he did not speak or emanate them. He looked up to the Ampliphi who now stood in the doorway.
Christophe. The one Ampliphi who could possibly overrule the heavy-handed sentence these two were now trying to pass down on his beloved Asia.
Or what was left of her.
“They are Ampliphi,” Christophe pointed out, “but they are also answerable to a body of their peers.”
Julian’s eyes slid closed, unmanageable tears rolling down his cheeks. He tried to continue grasping at the beautiful rage he needed to punish Greison for what he had done, but he knew that the powerful Christophe was subverting the worst of the emotion, taking it from him and diffusing the power of it.
With a sound of disgust he released Greison and threw himself over to where Asia lay sprawled across the floor. He gathered her up tightly into his arms, clutching her to him as if somehow the power of his hold could make her memories keep root within her mind.
Greison had taken everything that she was.
All her breathtaking strength, all her powerful fighting spirit. All of her undeniable passion. Greison had taken all hope of Asia ever finding a place in her heart for Julian. And it was all his fault. He should never have given up on her. He should have been stronger. Stronger than her fear. Stronger than the things her jaded eyes had seen that had made her so damn hard in the first place. He should have trusted the bond of kind to come through for him in the end.
Instead, like Greison, he had thrown it all away.
“Judged by their peers?” he demanded hoarsely as he clung to the limp body of the woman he loved more than he would ever fear the Ampliphi again. “Judged from what? The only witness to what they have done here has been destroyed! They will not be made to answer for this any more than Kloe was made to answer for what happened in the prison! You mark yourselves as above and beyond judgment. There is no justice among the Ampliphi!”
“Oh, but there is,” Kloe rasped. “Your kindra has had a taste of Ampliphi justice!”
“You will be quiet, Kloe!” Christophe bellowed. The leader of the Ampliphi looked to Julian, who seethed until he shouted up to the heavens above him, making Kloe and Greison both shudder with the impact of all of that wrath. Christophe stepped into the room and rode the powerful wave of negative emotion, the strength of it beating at him as he tried to absorb and dissipate the tempest before it shook the village from its very foundations. “Don’t listen to them, Julian. Remember what you know of me and the other Ampliphi. Remember that they do not speak for us all. And if nothing else, find faith in me that I will serve you and Asia well. I won’t let this pass unanswered. I swear it to you.”
“Your promises mean nothing to me,” Julian said hoarsely. “They mean nothing to me because they will mean nothing to Asia. He has destroyed her mind. Robbed her of everything that made her what she was.” Robbed her even of the last harsh things he had said to her. Stolen away every memory of every touch they had ever shared. Gone. All of it gone.
“There is yet hope,” Christophe said gently, coming to kneel across from Julian, coaxing him through the will of his mind into meeting his eyes. “You said it yourself, Julian. He didn’t have enough time. He would have you think otherwise, but I can feel the doubt in his mind. Try to hold on to that small hope until she wakes. Then we will know the depth of the crime done here. Julian, take her home. Watch over her while I tend to these.”
Julian didn’t want to hear Christophe’s words of hope. It was too painful…too tormenting. What if he held hope and it was all for nothing? How could Asia have ever been strong enough to fight off Greison’s at
tack?
And then he knew the answer.
Fighting was Asia’s forte.
The proper question should have been, how could Greison ever have hoped to defeat the indefatigable spirit that was Asia Callahan?
Chapter 18
Julian laid Asia out very gently in his bed, taking care to smooth her hair out from beneath her head and shoulders. He brushed a hand down her leg to straighten her skirt against her body. He had to fight back wave after wave of fear, trying to hold on to the hope that Christophe had given him, the hope that he knew Asia herself had given him just by being who she was. The same things that had once caused him never-ending frustration were now the things he prayed remained intact and able to fight for what she deserved.
She had tried to warn him again and again about the flaws in the Ampliphi, and he had lived with it for so long he had grown numb to it. Or…he had not lived with it enough until now. As soon as he had been of an age he had volunteered to become the liaison between his colony and the Ampliphi known as Kloe. And while all his training had shown him how temperamental she could be, he had simply accepted it as the way things were. He had seen the rest of the Ampliphi accept it and tolerate it. It was what it was.
Or so he had always thought, until he came home and found himself on the wrong end of Kloe’s good graces. Then he had seen just how unfair and spoiled she could truly be. Now she had manipulated Asia into acting rashly, and Greison had been forced to come to Kloe’s aid. No one laid hands on an Ampliphi in anger. No one. Not without paying a price. Asia had known that when she had gone after Kloe. But all it took was one look at Kenya’s limp body and he knew exactly why she would think to take on a creature so powerful.
Asia, who had so little knowledge of how these things worked, had somehow been powerful enough to take Kloe down.
He touched her face with gentle fingertips, leaning over her to brush a kiss against her still lips.
“Please be here,” he whispered over her, reaching for her hand to clutch it to his chest over his racing heart. “Please remember me. Remember you. Be here. I am begging you, zini. Nothing else is going to matter to me without you.”
And if she was gone…if she was wiped blank and they decided to send her back for her so-called crimes, he would go with her. He would elevate Lucien to Magistrate and do what he had continually demanded of her. He would give up his world and his place within it to follow her and be the one source of support he knew she was going to need. With no parents, no sister to care for her, she would have no one to help her recover from this.
No. She would be here when she woke. She would be Asia. There to frustrate him for another day. There for him to battle so he could earn his place in her heart. No matter how much time it took, no matter how stubborn she was, he would be there to make his way through. He would teach her that she could trust him. That she could have faith in him.
That she could love him.
Asia opened her eyes, looking up at the strange round roof above her, so truly fascinating in shape and size. Then she looked at the rest of the room, finding it all so plain and empty in its way.
Then, with a surprised breath, she turned her attention in an about-face to see the man lying in bed beside her, his long boy’s lashes resting heavily against his cheeks as he slept. His dark hair fell over his forehead recklessly, perfecting the image of a guileless and innocent boy. She turned to face him with all of her body, lying on her side as she watched him breathe deeply. He looked so hard asleep, as if exhaustion rode him into it instead of him having gone willingly into it.
She reached out with the softest touch she could manage, touching his whisker-roughened jaw and chin, fascinated by how several days’ growth still could not detract from that boylike ingenuousness. She smiled, though, when she came to his lips, their decadent fullness far too sinful for the image of innocence to hold true.
“Julian,” she whispered softly.
And like magic his eyes flew open, the confusion of sleep shed instantly as he sucked in a breath and held it for several beats. Then he was reaching to grasp her shoulder, squeezing tightly.
“What did you say?” he demanded.
“Nothing,” she replied. “I just called your name.”
“My name? You know my name?”
“Of course I know your name,” she said, truly perplexed when he suddenly scooped her up against his powerful body and squeezed the breath out of her in a powerful hug. “Why wouldn’t I know the name of the man who has plagued my every waking minute for days?” She laughed at him.
“Asia,” he breathed, unrelenting as he crushed her to him. “You’re here. You’re all here!”
“Yes. You brought me here, remember? Where the hell else am I going to go?” Then she paused for a beat, trying to think. “How did I end up in bed with you?”
Julian pulled back a little, easing his clutch on her and trying not to feel the pang of doubt that suddenly wormed through him. “What do you remember?” he asked her. “What is the last thing you remember?”
“Um.” She gave it some thought. “I remember you telling me to go take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut.”
Julian laughed. It was a sound of pure relief and she could swear those were tears in his eyes. He reached to kiss her lips tightly again and again and she could do little more than accept the strange turn in his behavior. Then, with her face held between both of his powerful hands, he looked deep into her eyes, the green of his dark with emotion.
“I love you, Asia,” he said on a fast hot breath. “By saying that, I fully expect to freak you out and make you behave as friendly toward me as a hissing snake, but I have to say it. I love you. Everything about you. I love how hard and stubborn you are. I love your relentlessness and dogged determination to see justice served. You constantly think I want you to change, and maybe I have given you that impression from time to time, but I don’t want you to. I don’t want anything to change. All I want, all I have ever wanted, is the hope of a chance. Just a small hope of a chance that someday you will search your heart and find me in it. That is all I want. Can you give that to me? Just that small hope?”
Every emotion in the book chased through her as he made his declaration, starting with outright fear and ending with utter bemusement. In the end, she went with the last thing she was feeling.
“Why would you want anything to do with me?” she asked him frankly. “All I do is vex you until you clearly want to strangle me. What makes you think I am even capable of the emotions you’re talking about?”
“Kenya,” he answered promptly. “If not for her I might doubt you, but you love your sister even beyond good judgment, so I know very well that you are capable. More than capable. I know that if I am ever so lucky as to earn what I am seeking from you, you will be just as determined to keep me and to hold me as you have been when you have fought your way free of me. It is a day I long for. One I am willing to wait for and work for, whatever it takes. Perhaps if you see I am not about to go anywhere, maybe then you will come around and begin to trust me with your heart. The same way you entrust it to Kenya.”
Stunned, Asia stared into his darkened eyes, realizing just how determined he was. It was radiating out of every inch of his body. But the frightening thing, the truly scary thing, was that she considered his offer. She knew almost everything about him, about the parts of him that should really matter, and she asked herself what it would take, if not him, to win over her jaded little heart. What more could he possibly do? What more outside of honor, loyalty, truth, and determination would do for her? What more, outside of the overwhelming passion they shared, would anyone be able to do to convince her to take a chance on what she had never considered before?
“I see the fear in your eyes,” he said, proving just how well he could read her, just how well he had come to know her. Every bitter, judgmental part of her. All of the good and powerful she could offer and all of the stubborn and bad.
“It scares me that you know me so
well,” she confessed on a soft, rushing breath. “Everything about you has always scared the hell out of me. You were so much easier to cope with when I thought you were a serial killer who had taken my sister’s life. I knew what to do with you then. I knew just how I was going to handle you.” She paused for a breath, but she never once looked away from his frank eyes. She hoped he could see she was being just as candid. “You know,” she said, “I’m never going to really need you. You understand that, right? I mean, I’m not the needy sort. I don’t need rescuing and I don’t need handholding or any of that weak girly crap.”
“I already told you, I don’t want any of the weak girly crap. I want you just as you are. All of your strength and all of your indefatigable spirit. I need you, not the other way around. And I am perfectly willing to accept that.”
“You say that now,” she said softly, finally breaking eye contact with him and looking down. It showed him she was afraid of much more than what she was telling him. “But maybe years down the road you won’t be able to tolerate it. You were pretty pissed before, willing to just give it all up.”
“I was angry and frustrated. I said things out of hurt, Asia. And I’m going to do it again. I’m going to find a lot of things frustrating about you, and I am certain the reverse will be true as well. But I’m not going to give it all up. It was bullshit. It was stupid. I almost lost you, Asia, and it nearly killed me to realize it. I’m never going to put myself in that position again.”
“Lost me?” He had her full attention. “I don’t understand.”
“You mean you don’t remember. I’ll explain that to you in a minute. What I want to do right now is make sure you won’t shut me out. That we have hope.”