Breathing Fire (Heretic Daughters #1)(73)

“It’s your imagination. I’ve always hated you this much,” she shot back, not denying the implication.

His smile was mean. “Not always…” This discussion was getting more and more interesting.

“Tie your balls in a knot, breeder.” She sneered at him.

His smile turned rueful. “That’s a new one.”

Sloan changed the subject back to the issue at hand. ”We need the slayer. I’m pulling rank on you, Cam. If Dom is unavailable, the decision falls to me. Give us the slayer.”

He glared at her, just a cussed mean glare, for at least a full minute. I shifted impatiently on my feet.

“You know I f**king hate it when you pull rank on me,” he said softly.

Sloan smiled at him, a goading kind of smile, but with the most bitter of twists. I thought that she must hate pulling rank on him as much as he hated having her do it, by that look. I didn’t understand it, but I still saw it clearly in her eyes. “Please, Cam, let’s take it to the arena. There’s nothing I’d love more. If you want my rank, we need to fight.”

Cam met that goading smile with a challenging look, his chin lifting. “Never going to happen, Sloan. Fucking never. Deal with it.”

“You still scared of me?” she goaded.

He smirked at little at that. The pair of them really did enjoy their nasty little confrontations. They shared a long, intense look, full of a lifetime’s worth of raw emotion and straight up animosity. “You know why I won’t do it. Hate it and fight it all you want, sugar, but we both know why I won’t fight you.”

“Just give me the slayer, you ass.”

Cam sighed. “He’s in no shape to help you.”

“Dragonsblood will restore him. And guess what we have.”

I wasn’t surprised that Cam didn’t spare me a glance. He was silent for awhile before finally saying, “I suppose it’s pointless to tell you not to do anything stupid.” He disappeared into the building without another word.

“Why does Cam think you’re a lesbian?” I asked Sloan as we waited, referring to one of the many insults Cam had thrown at her. I had been waiting ten minutes to ask her about it.

She rolled her eyes. “Because he’s an idiot.”

“Is there a reason you want him to keep thinking it?”

She shrugged. “Because it seems to piss him off, which has been my mission in life for more years than I care to count.”

“Fair enough.”

It was a good twenty minutes before Cam appeared again, carrying a sickly looking Christian.

“Is he unconscious?” I asked softly.

“I only wish. Little bastard keeps shooting off his mouth,” Cam growled.

“I’m not little. You’re just one huge mother-” Christian began, rather weakly.

“Shut your mouth, boy.”

Cam handed him off to me without sparing me a glance. His weight wasn’t a problem for me, but cradling a six foot plus man in my arms was awkward, to say the least.

Christian didn’t open his eyes as he said to me softly. “I’m sorry I tried to kill you, Jillian. I’m glad they put this thing on my wrist, even if it knocks me on my ass.”

“Don’t worry about it.” I told him gently. I was over it, honestly. “I’ve got a job for you to do, and you’re gonna like it.”

“Oh yeah?” His voice was half-interested. He held up his wrist, jangling a bracelet of bones at me. Druids and their geases… “It is a relief to me, like a weight off. They tell me it only applies to you and Lynn. You still owe me a lot of answers, Jillian, but when I’m thinking clearly I know I don’t want to kill you. But when I found out that you were…well, I couldn’t think at all. It was like a red haze went over me, like I had no control over what my body wanted to do.”

I listened as he spoke, staying silent. Caleb helped me put him in the backseat without a word. I moved into the backseat with Christian, and we all watched the show. Sloan and Cam couldn’t seem to help but put one on for the world whenever they got into each other’s vicinity.

Cam was gripping her arm tightly, and she was attempting to pull away, to no avail. “Get your hands off of me, you cave man,” she was yelling at him.

His response was to grab her other arm, leaning down until they were face to face, pushing closer until their foreheads literally bumped, and he was snarling at her in a whisper, all of his teeth showing.

“Can anyone hear what he’s saying?” I asked. I started rolling down my window. I wanted to grab some popcorn and watch this little reprieve. It was a nice temporary escape from the bigger problems at hand. The way they interacted had always been more fascinating to me than any movie. I had concocted a drama in my head where they were secretly in love, but couldn’t be together because they were both so stubborn and dominant. I was team Sloan, of course, but a part of me had always respected Cam for his staunch loyalty to Dom. And I couldn’t help but have a soft spot for someone who looked similar enough to Dom to be his brother.

I also couldn’t help but think how beautiful Sloan and Cam looked together, standing nose to nose, both tall, with straight black hair and blue eyes.

“Fuck you, Cam,” Sloan was shouting, a comical contrast to Cam’s fervent whispering. She was still pulling hard against him, but he was immovable. This went on for precious minutes while we watched.