Now he could appreciate Jeff’s laid-back nature.

Maybe it’s just a ploy of hers…

He paused at that thought. Maybe she was just doing this to drive him away. It was possible.

Very possible.

Oh yeah, he was on to her now. It made total sense.

Fine then. Two could play this game.

Getting into his car, he smiled. “En garde, ma petite.” They were about to go to war, and at the end of this, he was going to win.

3

Rafael wasn’t winning his war. He was losing it miserably and not even with style. No matter what he tried, Celena circumvented his best efforts. The woman was a machine, and after forty-eight hours of having her in his house, he’d had enough.

Sitting on his couch in the basement an hour after sunset – because, quite frankly, if he went upstairs, he might kill her – he called Ephani, who answered on the third ring.

“Come get your Squire,” he said without preamble.

Her tone was dry and snide. “Hi to you, too, Rafael. Nice to hear from you.”

“Cut the crap, Eph, and come get her before I kill her.”

“She’s making you crazy?” He could hear the humor in her voice.

“You think? How do you stand it night in and night out, and not lose your mind?”

“She’s a little obsessive, but – ”

“A little?” he asked incredulously. “The woman makes a serial stalker look like a Boy Scout.”

Ephani snorted. “She’s not that bad.”

“Oh yes, she is. Trust me. I almost lost my head to a Daimon the first night she was here.”

“How so?”

He clenched his teeth at the memory. “Picture this. There I am in the alleyway, sneaking up on a group of Daimons who have this college kid trapped between them. Just as I go to make my move to save the kid, the phone rings with Ms. I-have-no-purpose-save-to-make-you-crazy calling to tell me that according to the tracer she has on me it’s time for me to head home so that I won’t get caught out in daylight.”

Ephani was laughing so hard that he wanted to reach through the phone and choke her.

“It’s not funny.”

She kept laughing.

Rafael let out a disgusted sigh. “Did she reorganize your kitchen and fill it up with wheat germ and shit? I tried to explain the whole I’m-immortal-I-live-forever to her, but she doesn’t get it. She said that even immortals need to eat healthy foods.”

Still Ephani was laughing.

And still Rafael wanted to kill the Amazon as well as Celena. “This really isn’t funny, Eph.”

“Oh yeah, it is. Gah, Rafe. You’re such a man.”

“And I’m going to take that as a compliment.”

Clearing her throat, Ephani finally sobered. “There’s a few things you need to understand about Celena.”

“You mean something other than she’s nuts?”

Ephani tsked at him over the phone. “She’s not nuts.”

He glanced up to the ceiling. No doubt Celena was up there right now doing something extremely odd in order to protect him, the immortal warrior. “I think I’ll reserve my opinion.”

“Trust me, Blackbeard. She’s not nuts.”

“Then what is she?”

“Scared.” The word surprised him. Celena certainly didn’t act that way. “Have you tried to ask her anything about her family?”

“A couple of times, but she won’t talk about them.”

“That’s right and do you know why?”

“She’s nuts?” This time he said it with a little less enthusiasm.

“No… she’s scared.”

But that didn’t make sense to him. “Of what?”

“Of losing the people she loves, so she tries to keep up walls to protect herself. If she doesn’t talk about people, then they can’t be close to her. But it’s a crock. I know this because when her father died a year ago, it almost killed her. She still cries about him in the middle of the day when she thinks I’m sleeping.”

The news floored him. That was so opposite of the hard-nosed woman upstairs. There was nothing vulnerable about her, and honestly, he couldn’t imagine her crying about anything. “Celena?”

“Yes, Celena. And do you know why she’s so anal about her duties?”

“She’s nuts?” He was back to being convinced. Anyone who executed their duties to such an nth degree wasn’t normal.

“No,” Ephani said in an irritated tone. “Like Jeff, she’s from a Squire family. The Dark-Hunter she grew up with was killed eight years ago because he was cornered by a group of Daimons and executed. If that wasn’t bad enough, the first Dark-Hunter she was assigned to died because she couldn’t make it back before sunup. Celena tried to get to her in time, but there was no place for her to hide, so she turned into toast minutes before Celena got there. The Council warned me when they sent her over that she was a bit… traumatized by the event. Hell, if you think she’s bad now, you should have seen her when she first came to work for me.”

If she was worse, then he was grateful he hadn’t met her then. But all that actually explained a great deal about her psychosis.

“And she must really like you to be so paranoid that she’s calling you all the time to make sure you get back home in time. She’s not that bad even with me.” Then she added under her breath, “Then again, I always follow her patrol plans and get back before she freaks.”

Rafael was quiet for a second as he considered Ephani’s words. “That puts a lot of perspective on her, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” he said with a sigh, “I won’t kill her tonight.”

“Please don’t. All in all, I’m rather fond of her, and I have to say I much prefer her to the one I’m dealing with right now. This one’s kind of lazy. She even balked at making my scrambled eggs with cheese and onions in them.”

Rafael laughed at that. “I guess it’s what you’re used to.”

“I guess. But send Celena home soon. I miss her.”

He shook his head. “By the way, thanks, Eph.”

“No prob. Just take care of my girl.”

“Will do.” Rafael hung up the phone and tucked it back in his pants pocket. His mind whirling with what he’d learned, he headed upstairs to find his “breakfast” waiting.

Grabbing a piece of bacon, he had to admit that this was the one thing he liked about having Celena around. Unlike Jeff, she was up all night with him and made sure that he had plenty of food prepared. She even packed him a snack bag to take with him. Of course it was full of wholesome foods that he poked at like an alien life-form, but it was a nice thought.

“Hi.”

He swallowed his bacon as she brought him a glass of orange juice. “Hi.”

After he took the glass, she lifted a notebook up from the table. “I’ve made notes on your patrolling patterns. I’ve noticed that you tend to stay here in Columbus around campus until about midnight and then you head over to Starkville. I was thinking that – ”

He took the pad from her hand and set it aside. “I like my pattern, Celena.”

“But it would be safer for you to patrol Starkville first and then head back this way.”

“And I was a pirate who laughed as he died and spat in the face of my killer. Safety’s not my concern.”

“It should be,” she insisted.

“Why?”

Her brow creased by worry, her face held a very faint hysterical note in it. “Because you could die and become a Shade, wandering the earth with no body and no soul, in constant pain and misery. Wanting food. Wanting someone to hear you. Wanting someone to just touch you and having no one able to see you. To – ”

He stopped her words by laying his fingers on her lips. Personally, he didn’t like the gruesome image she painted with her words. “It’s okay, Celena. I’m not going to die.”

But he could see the pain and fear in her eyes. “That’s why you should rethink your pattern.”

Moving his fingers from her soft lips, Rafael dipped his head down to capture her mouth only to have her retreat from him again.

He let out a tired breath. “Don’t you ever date?”

“Not anymore. To bring an outsider in could threaten the safety of Ephani. What if I were on a date and she needed me?”

“What if a meteorite fell through the house right now and flattened us both?”

She actually glanced up at the ceiling.

If it wasn’t so serious, he’d laugh. “Celena, you can’t go through your entire life worrying about what might happen.” He closed the distance between them. “Any more than you can go through life alone. Trust me on this one. It’s lonely as hell.”

“You live that way.”

“Not always. I do reach out to someone from time to time.”

Instead of comforting her, those words brought out her anger. “And I’m not your one-night stand. We both have duties to attend to. Oaths to uphold.”

“I would kiss you anyway, but I have a feeling that if I tried – ”

“I’d kick you in the nuts and tear your ear off.” There was no mistaking the sincerity of her angry tone.

“That would hurt.”

“That’s the idea.”

Rafael shook his head at her. She was saucy, and as she walked away from him he couldn’t help the heat that flooded his body. Everything about her appealed to him on a primal level.

Honestly, he was losing his mind being this close to something that tempted him while unable to touch it. No wonder the Council preferred to assign only Squires who were the opposite sex of what a Dark-Hunter lusted for.

I can’t take it. He needed some distance from her.

“I’m going to kill Daimons now.”

“But it’s early.”