Hunted By Firelight by Krista Street

Chapter 4

~ AVERY ~

“This won’t take long. Please lie down.” Farrah, the woman in the long robe with a no-nonsense attitude, gestured toward the bed closest to the wall.

I lay on it, the soft comforter sliding against my back. Even though I didn’t have to undress for her to apply the probes, Bryce still turned to face the window until she was done.

When finished, I breathed a little easier that attaching the probes had been painless and quick, even though the lingering magic from him still shimmered in the air.

Magic hummed around me when the probes activated, yet my attention still focused on the feel of Major Jamison. I couldn’t see his magic, but I’d felt when it’d hit me right before he left, the powerful wave like an ocean tsunami. It hadn’t bothered me, but I’d felt it so strongly. The man was powerful.

That fluttering started in my stomach again when I remembered his stormy eyes as he’d stalked out of the room.

“This will only take a minute,” Farrah said, pulling my attention back to her.

She picked up some kind of handheld scanner. One thing I was quickly coming to learn about these people was that they relied heavily on technology. Most of them carried those weird tablet things. Farrah was no different. She positioned her device directly over me, all of her attention on it.

“Here we go.”

She tapped a button, and a colorful display of lasers erupted from the machine. Like the probes, I didn’t feel anything other than a vibration of magic as the lasers bathed me in their light.

Once finished, she tapped a button on her machine and its quiet whirring noise vanished. She gave me a brief smile. “All done.”

Before I could reply, she was removing the probes from my skin, peeling them off like Band-Aids.

“That was fast,” I managed.

She flashed me a smile. “Told you it wouldn’t take long.”

“So what does the report say?” Charlotte asked, looking over Farrah’s shoulder.

Charlotte’s jumpsuit glimmered when she placed her hands on her hips. I had no idea what material it was made of, but it appeared thick and moved like a second skin.

“The report is calculating now.” Farrah’s focus remained on the device.

Curiosity got the better of me, so I swung my legs over the bed to stand and join them. Bryce and Danielle did, too, and all five of us hovered over the machine like we were peering into an aquarium full of exotic fish.

Numbers began to appear. Then graphs.

Farrah’s eyebrows shot to her hairline.

I cocked my head. “Is something wrong?”

She cleared her throat. “Um, no, it’s just . . . surprising.” She waited until all of the data populated, her eyes growing wider with each new calculation.

“Well?” I said.

She worked a swallow, then tapped the screen. It went blank. “Do you mind if I run the scan again?”

“Seriously?” Charlotte’s eyebrows shot up. “Is this one inaccurate?”

“Not necessarily.” Farrah waved toward the bed. “If you don’t mind, Avery, I want to ensure the second set of data matches the first one.”

I did as she asked and waited quietly for the second scan to finish. When complete, we all crowded around the device for a second time.

“Well?” Charlotte placed her hands on her hips. “Is the data the same?”

Farrah took a deep breath, fascination filling her eyes. “Indeed it is. I’ve never seen anything like it.” She sat on the bed, patting for me to join her.

As soon as I sat, she proceeded to show me all of the graphs, miniature scans, and lines. Her voice grew more animated with every second that passed.

“Your power is truly off the charts. I’ve never seen any supernatural on earth with power this strong. I would love to run these scans again at headquarters—if Major Jamison decides to bring you to earth—to get a better understanding of what it all means.”

“So when you say you’ve never seen any supernaturals on earth with power like this, does that mean you’ve seen power like that in other realms?” Charlotte asked. “AKA, here?”

Farrah shook her head. “No, sorry, I didn’t mean that literally. What I meant was, I’ve never assessed any supernatural anywhere with power this strong.”

The power she spoke of still hummed through my veins. It felt as though rivers of lightning zapped around inside me. As strange as that was, it didn’t hurt.

“Is it bad that I’m like this?”

Farrah smiled. “Not at all. Just surprising. And the scans show your power isn’t unstable, so that’s good news.” She cocked her head. “You truly are a little mystery, but I’d much rather have you like this than how you were a few days ago.”

“How was I then?”

Her smile faltered. “Not good. You were very weak.”

“That’s why you died, remember?” Charlotte’s wry comment stopped the tension pooling inside me.

“I need to tell General McCloy about this.” Farrah began to pack up her equipment. “Since you’re stable, there’s no need for me to stay here.”

“General McCloy?” I said. “Who’s he?”

“The head of the Supernatural Forces,” Bryce replied before Farrah or Charlotte could. “He’s Charlotte’s boss’s boss. Isn’t that right?”

“That’s the one!” Charlotte grinned.

“Why does he need to know?” Energy began to crackle around me. The power inside me sparkled, like shimmering lights just waiting to strike. I took a deep breath. The same feeling had happened before I’d unintentionally created the dome.

“He’s in charge of my assignment since he directed me here. I have to tell him.” Farrah collected another piece of machinery, carefully packing it.

“Hey.” Charlotte nudged me. “It’s nothing to be worried about. General McCloy has known everything regarding your little death and rebirth from the get-go. Just another normal day at the office.” She snickered, playfully bumping into me again.

Some of the sparking electrical synapses inside me lessened. As before, I couldn’t stop the smile that spread across my face. There was something about Charlotte that felt . . . safe. I didn’t know why, but I felt like I could trust her. And she’d truly been nothing but blunt and to-the-point since we’d met. I had a feeling if something was up, she would tell me.

And that was exactly what I needed right now.

I nudged Charlotte back. “Okay, well, then you better report to your boss’s boss, too, before you get fired.”

Charlotte laughed. “He can’t fire me. It’s my first week on the job. Well, actually . . .” She scratched her chin. “Come to think of it, that’s a great reason to fire me. I better not fuck this up.” But instead of looking worried, she just laughed again.

I joined her, a giggle bubbling out of me like a spring sprouting from a meadow.

And that was how Major Jamison found us when the door opened and he crossed the threshold.

As soon as he entered the room, all laughter died on my lips. The energy in me hummed wildly again, but then I inhaled.

Food.

He held two large trays filled with various dishes, drinks, and desserts.

Stalking to the small table by the wall, he set them down, then turned to face me with his hands on his hips.

My eyes widened, and I didn’t move.

His rigid jaw looked forged from steel, his green eyes a stormy torrent. Energy radiated from him in simmering waves, and the rounded muscles in his shoulders bunched when he placed his hands on his hips.

“It’s good to hear you laughing. Are you still hungry?” A veil descended over his eyes, all emotion cutting off. He stayed like that, watching me. Waiting.

My heart picked up again in a staccato beat. But before I could respond, my stomach growled loudly.

“I take it that’s a yes.” He picked up a plate off the tray and began dishing food onto it.

He piled it high with succulent meats, breads, cheeses, and vegetables. There was even a pot of what looked to be sweet fruit.

“Oh, she doesn’t like carrots!” my mother said from where she perched on the other bed.

Major Jamison’s hand stilled, his jaw clenching. The energy from him increased tenfold, and Bryce gave Danielle a look.

What? she mouthed. “She doesn’t,” she said under her breath.

But I was pretty sure Major Jamison heard her.

After scraping the carrots off, he finished dishing everything else on the large plate. I didn’t know what to make of him serving me, since I was completely capable of standing and portioning food onto the plate myself, but given the brewing storm in his features, I opted to stay on the bed.

Damn. The man just made me . . . Fuck, I didn’t even know what this feeling was in my stomach, but it suddenly felt as if I couldn’t eat a thing even though I was ravenous.

After the plate was heaped to the point of spilling over, Major Jamison brought it over.

He stared down at me, his face completely blank. “I gave you a little of everything.” He glanced at Danielle, then back at me. “Except for the carrots.”

I took the plate from him, one of his fingers brushing mine in the process. A hundred watts of electricity zinged up my arm, shocking my nerves and making me yank the plate away from him. Some kind of vegetable tumbled off onto the floor.

Before I could retrieve it, Major Jamison had picked it up and was striding toward the trash. He dumped it in the bin, then looked over his shoulder. “I’ll let you eat . . . in peace.”

In a blink, he was at the door and out the room, the door closing with a strong thud.

Silence fell. Everyone just stood there as the tornado that was Major Jamison had come and gone.

Charlotte was the first to break the quiet as the tantalizing aromas from the generous meal wafted up to greet me. I tentatively picked up my fork as she cocked her head. “You really don’t like carrots?”

I shrugged, a huff of a laugh raising my shoulders. “I don’t know. Maybe I should try one.”

And now that Major Jamison was gone, I had no problems doing so. My appetite returned, and I began inhaling the food.

However, when it came to the orange vegetable that my mother insisted I’d never cared for, I took one bite and wrinkled my nose.

She was right.

I didn’t like carrots.

∞     ∞     ∞

Major Jamison didn’t return for another hour. I managed to polish off most of the food in the time he was gone, everyone else digging in, too, since we were all hungry.

But while the food was delicious, I still found that it wasn’t enough to completely hold my attention.

I kept thinking about Major Jamison and the obvious agitation he was feeling. That and I felt a bit guilty that all of us had eaten but he hadn’t.

“Do you know why, um, Major Jamison is so—” I didn’t know what the right word was as Charlotte licked her fingers after eating the last little cake that’d been coated in a sweet honey glaze.

She raised an eyebrow. “Pissy?”

I snorted. “I guess that’s the word.”

She rubbed her hands together, dispelling the crumbs from them. “That’s a good question. And if I didn’t know better, I’d say that he wants to claim you but can’t.”

“Huh?” I replied just as my parents’ heads whipped toward Charlotte.

Farrah had finished packing up and was getting ready to head back to earth, so she wasn’t paying much attention to us.

“He wants to claim her?” Bryce’s eyebrows rose.

Charlotte took a deep breath. “Shit. Not exactly the best conversation to have with your dad around.”

Danielle elbowed Bryce, then pulled him to his feet. “Come on, hun. Let’s go for a walk.”

“But, she just said that Avery’s commander—”

“I know what she said, but right now is probably not the best time to have us around, like Charlotte said. Let’s let the girls talk.”

Before Bryce could protest further, Danielle had him on his feet and out the door. Farrah looked up when they passed her.

“Everything okay?” the healing witch asked me and Charlotte.

“Just peachy.” Charlotte grinned, then lounged back on the bed, her bent elbows propping her up.

“In that case, I’ll be heading back.” Farrah heaved her bag onto her shoulder. “Avery, if anything changes or you begin to feel differently in any way, please tell Major Jamison so that I may return and assess you again.”

I managed a nod before she departed. When it was just me and Charlotte in the room, I crossed my legs underneath me and faced her.

“Okay, so what the heck are you talking about? Claiming me? What’s that?”

Charlotte fingered a lock of auburn hair behind her ear. “It’s a werewolf thing. Since I’m a female wolf, I’ve seen plenty of male wolves acting like Major Jamison throughout the years.” She shook her head, her lips tilting up. “Something tells me that you were keeping things from me during the past three months. Have you two hooked up?” But then she shook her head. “No, you wouldn’t remember. Dammit! What I wouldn’t give for all the juicy details that you probably kept from me.”

That roiling feeling began in my stomach again. “Hooked up? With Major Jamison?”

She shrugged. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you did. You were kinda all googly eyes for him when we were new recruits, but I didn’t think you’d ever act on it, so maybe you didn’t. But damn, I’m pretty sure what I just witnessed was a male wolf who wants to claim a female.”

I crossed my legs more tightly underneath me. “What makes you say that?”

“Well, for one, it explains why he showed up at our apartment three times before he left for an assignment the other week. Two, it explains why you two went alone to Bulgaria together, and why he’s being so moody when the man’s never been moody in all the time I’ve known him. And three, it explains why he’s been so protective of you ever since shit went down after our final tests. And let’s not forget that he just brought an entire restaurant of food on two trays for you to eat. Wolves who want to claim a woman will do anything for her, and considering the only thing you’ve let him do is feed you, well, he kinda went overboard.”

I swallowed the thick lump in my throat, my heart pattering wildly. “So you’re saying that he likes me?”

She laughed, her head tilting back. “That’s the understatement of the year.” She straightened, then tapped her chin. “I mean, I don’t know for sure that Major Jamison’s taken an interest in you, so I don’t want to make shit all awkward between you two by bringing this up, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s developed feelings for you.”

My chest heaved. “Feelings. For me. Okay.” I leaned forward and took a deep breath. I was breathing so fast now that it seriously felt like I was going to pass out.

Charlotte patted my back. “Hey, sorry. I didn’t mean to freak you out or anything.”

Electricity crackled inside me, a light hum skating across my skin.

“Ouch!” Charlotte whipped her hand back. A spark rose around me, close to where she’d been touching me.

“I’m sorry.” I made a sour face. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

“S’okay. Deep breaths, girl. We don’t want you going all electrical and burning this place down.”

I laughed, and some of the energy inside me calmed. I seriously loved how easygoing she was, not in the least bit fazed by the chaos inside me. Still, I closed my eyes and did as she suggested.

The electrical storm that’d been building inside me returned to quiet zapping.

“Shit, girl. This power in you is seriously wicked. I wonder if you could power a city.”

I groaned. “If my life wasn’t such a mess right now, I’d be game to find out.”

She gave me a sympathetic look. “Yeah, it’s kinda crazy right now, isn’t it? But no matter, I’ve been assigned to you until this is all sorted out, so I’ll keep you from burning any shit down.”

I laughed again, rolling onto my side as she joined me. But in the back of my mind, what she’d said still lingered.

Did Major Jamison seriously have feelings for me?