Visions of Skyfire

Chapter 9

Kellyn reclined in the oversized tub and idly stroked her fingertips through the mountain of bubbles covering the surface of the water. She’d had a rough month, she acknowledged. Hardly surprising that she needed a little pampering.

A frown curved her mouth as she remembered the bitter conclusion to her last encounter with Shea Jameson and the Eternal Torin. It had ended with Shea throwing a teleportation spell, sending Kellyn to the back end of beyond in the blink of an eye. Infuriated, frustrated, she’d awoken in a muddy field in Ireland, surrounded by cows who looked even more startled than she had felt.

Still feeling the sting of failure, Kellyn reached over to pick up her glass of champagne. She took a long sip, letting the icy bubbles soothe her tattered spirit.

“Doesn’t matter,” she assured herself, smiling at the way the light glinted off the crystal flute. “All I have to do is turn one of the Awakening witches. Just one. Then their plan will fall apart and I win.”

Sliding down deeper into the water, she rested her head against the cool porcelain and looked out the window at the skyline of Washington, D.C. She could have been in New Mexico right now, tromping through some hideous desert to deal with Teresa Santiago. But really, a bubble bath in civilization sounded so much better to her battered temper.

“Besides,” she whispered, “if he needs help with her, he can come and get me.”

When her phone rang, she considered not answering it. After all, hadn’t she earned a little relaxation? But the insistent, shrill tone wouldn’t be ignored and Kellyn sat up to snatch the phone off the shelf beside the tub. “What is it?”

“We missed her in the desert.”

Fury shot through her. “You mean you let those idiot human teams kill her?”

“No,” the voice on the other end of the line assured her quickly. “They missed her, too. The Eternal showed up and flashed her out.”

“Eternals,” she muttered, tossing the rest of her champagne down her throat as if it were medicinal. The immortal warriors had been a pain in the ass of every would-be bad guy for centuries. “I thought you said you could deal with him.”

“I can,” her caller said. “But the point was to not give ourselves away, remember?”

“As this is my plan, do you really feel it necessary to remind me of its intricacies?” Attractive or not, this particular male had begun to annoy Kellyn. She probably shouldn’t have agreed to work with him on this after all. But with his special gifts, he had proven just too tempting to ignore.

“No more than you should feel it necessary to remind me what the goal is.”

The ice in his tone let Kellyn know he was no happier about this situation than she was. Well, then, fine. She would give him a chance to fix it. “Where’s the witch now?”

“We don’t know,” he admitted. “An MP was attacked, though. Apparently he was hit by lightning.”

Kellyn smiled to herself. A powerful witch, this one.

“And there are a lot of dark zones in Sedona,” the man was saying. “My guess is the Eternal swept her into one. He was shot up pretty bad, so he’s going to need some healing time.”

“Then find her while he’s weakened.”

“That’s the plan,” he told her and hung up.

He hung up.

On her.

Kellyn stared at the phone in disbelief. No one dismissed her. No one. Her fingers closed around the phone until the plastic shattered and shards of it dug into her palm. Then she threw the mess at the wall and watched as pieces fell to the floor like black rain.

Furious both at having her relaxation time interrupted and at the clear disrespect, she poured more champagne and quaffed it. Turning her glare on the window again, she stared at the outside world and promised herself that once this damn Awakening was finished there would be some payback.

Her bathwater had cooled by the time she stepped out of the tub, leaving all thoughts of relaxation behind.