Rivals (Book 2 of The Warden series) Read online

  He looked up at her and his smile spread. It enhanced his features, which could otherwise have been described as plain. He placed a bookmark in his book and folded it shut. “No.” He stood and approached her, removing his tinted spectacles.

  His eyes were black.

  Not the type of black that people used to describe the very darkest of brown eyes. They were black like the pupil had taken up the whole eye, leaving no room for the iris. He must have noticed her gawking at him, because he slipped his glasses back on.

  He stopped at her bedside table and poured her a glass of water. “I’m a friend of Ethan’s,” he said with a thick Irish accent.

  Cori took the glass and drank from it. She kept glancing at him as she drank. She had questions for him, but she had been forgetting to hydrate and the water was too refreshing to interrupt prematurely. “Ethan?” she verified when her thirst was quenched.

  “Yes.” He took the glass from her and filled it again.

  “Is he here?” Cori glanced around the room just in case Ethan had discovered a magic cloak of invisibility and had yet to reveal himself. It wasn’t entirely out of the range of possibilities, but he didn’t appear.

  “No.” He handed her the water and sat down beside her on the mattress without invitation. “I’m Daniel.” He put out his hand for her to shake.

  “I’m Cori.” She shook his hand. His grip was firm, a little too tight. His hands felt rough, rough like Danato’s. “Why are you here? Is Ethan okay?” she asked, suddenly remembering Danato’s statistics on the longevity of hunters.

  “Ethan’s fine. He sent me to check on you.” Daniel must have seen the question on her face, because he grinned and continued his explanation. “He heard about the jailbreak.”

  “Attempted jailbreak,” she clarified proudly and took another sip of her water.

  “Ahh.” He looked away from her still holding his grin. He cleared his throat and seemed to get control of whatever amusement he was finding in the discussion. “He heard you were hurt… badly.”

  Cori shrugged. “Cracked ribs, internal bleeding, and a hole in my skull, but I don’t know if badly describes it best.” She left out the dying twice part.

  “Just a bit banged up, then?” He pretended to fist her shoulder, but neglected to make any contact.

  “Just a bit. Why didn’t he come himself? Too busy?”

  “He wanted to. I wouldn’t let him.”

  Cori felt her mouth gape. Daniel didn’t say anything. He held her gaze as evenly as she did his. “I am in bed recovering from the worst injuries I have received in my life, and you decided that my best friend shouldn’t come to see me?”

  “When he heard about the incident, he was beside himself with worry. I’ve never seen a man so impatient. He knew it would be days, maybe weeks, before he could hear how you were doing and he couldn’t stand it. If it weren’t for me and Heaton, he would have been here this morning kneeling by your bedside.”

  Cori felt the rage she was containing bubble over. “What right did you have to stop him?” She leaned forward and cringed in pain. He gently pushed her back. “Get your hands off me,” she seethed, containing her volume again.

  “Easy girl, I’m not here to make an enemy out of you. I’m here to protect my friend. He’s a good friend and a good partner.”

  She wasn’t sure Ethan needed protection from her, but she bit back her ire enough to find out why this man thought he did. “You work with him?”

  “Yes, me and another fella. He’s been a welcome addition to our team. He’s doing well in his new job. He’s caught more bounty in his first three months than I usually catch in six.”

  “He’s a hard worker,” she agreed. “He’s enjoying himself, I hope.”

  “The job’s hard, but he doesn’t seem to mind it.”

  “What about outside of the job? Obviously he’s making new friends.” Cori motioned to Daniel. “I suppose it’s a bit of a boy’s club in your line of work.” She danced around the question; she didn’t want to outright ask. Has he found someone else?

  “Oh, yes, work, pub, sleep, work, pub.” Daniel laughed. “That lad does not hold his liquor well. You’d think he’d never had a drink in his life.”

  Cori nodded, wondering if Belus had ever snuck a drink with Ethan. “We don’t get much alcohol under the warden’s care.”

  “The first few times we went out to the pub, he would just complain nonstop about this girl he knew back here.”

  “Complain?” she asked.

  “Oh, yeah, pain in the arse she was. One of those girls that likes you, but pretends she doesn’t.” Cori nodded, playing along with his passive aggressive game. “Apparently she’s got issues. Baggage, you know? Like being hard to get wasn’t enough, she’s got trust issues, and intimacy issues.”

  “Intimacy issues?” She furrowed her brow. “Isn’t that usually a man’s issue?”

  “Oh, sure, but when men aren’t intimate it means we’re men; when women aren’t intimate, it means they’re hiding something.”

  “He said all this to you?” she asked.

  “Not verbatim and not all at once. This is over many a Guinness. So, as near as we can tell, the girl likes him, but just won’t bring herself to admit it because she thinks he isn’t good enough for her.”

  “That’s not…” She stopped herself from distracting her storyteller. Even if this game was leaving her personal life exposed, she wanted to know what Ethan had been saying about her to his new friends. “Ethan is a good man.”

  “Right, I know, but that was the theory. We’re thinking Ethan’s dodged a huge bullet. Like massive cannonball and chain, you know? But then something changed.”

  “What changed?” She tried to ask it casually, but his pause left her sounding anxious.

  “So, the first few weeks the guy complains and bitches. The next few he’s just quiet, kind of calm, like he’s finally gotten the floozy out of his teeth, you know. Then he starts talking about her again.

  “Now, my friend and I are groaning in our heads. ‘Not this again.’ But we be buds, so we listen. Not the same rant though. He starts talking about how docile she is, when you catch her off her game. He says she’s the type of girl that has just enough book smarts to get her into trouble, and more than enough instincts to get her out of it.

  “So, I was finally sick of hearing about the girl’s blasted personality. I said, ‘What’s she look like?’ Well, that was a mistake. He said, ‘She’s nothing special.’”

  Her piqued interest fell with her face. She felt instantly sick. “Really?” she asked before lowering herself into her bed. She didn’t want to hear any more.

  “As you might imagine, there was an uproar at the table. Why was this gobshite getting numb-brain over some girl that wasn’t all that?

  “He calms us down and he explains. He said that a woman views herself only two ways. She’s either something special, that is, she’s gorgeous and hot, or she’s nothing special, which means she isn’t that gorgeous and she isn’t that hot. He said the best kind of woman to have is the “nothing special” kind. Care to take a guess why?” He looked for a response from her.

  “Because no man will try to steal her,” she answered acerbically.

  He laughed. “That’s good. I like that. No, he said the something special girl already knows she’s special. She doesn’t need anything but to stay special, which as any man knows is a hard target to hit. With a nothing special girl, all you have to do is remind her that she’s beautiful, remind her that she’s hot. She’ll never believe it, so you’ll always be needed.”

  “So, Ethan wants an ugly girl, so she can need him to bolster her self-esteem?”

  “No.” Daniel shook his head. “He said he wants the pretty girl in the back row. He wants the girl that is going to appreciate him as much as he appreciates her.”

  She shifted uncomfortably in her bed. She no longer wanted to know what Ethan said about her in private. “So he’s just pining then. What f
or? Clearly he isn’t coming back for her.”

  A glimmer of amusement flickered in Daniel’s eyes. He seemed to know she was just playing along to get information. “I wouldn’t say pining. He’s been out on a few dates.” Cori looked up at him. She had no energy left to hide her jealousy. “That is what you wanted, isn’t it?” he asked, ending the game of pretense. “You wanted him to get drunk and get laid.”

  Cori felt the full impact of her words, coming back at her. She wiped away any hint of shame on her face. “I see why you came back instead of him.” He tipped his head at her interpretation. “I’m the man-eater, and you’ve come to bid me to stay away from your friend so I don’t hurt him more than I already have.” He smiled. She must have gotten it right. “I want whatever is best for Ethan. If I’m not good enough for him, then he can make that decision on his own. He doesn’t need to send his lackey to threaten me, mob style.”

  “I think you underestimate how hard it was for him to leave you behind.”

  “I think you underestimate how hard it was for me to watch him leave,” she ground out the words. “I respect your bond of friendship with him, but don’t think for a second that your three months of beer guzzling overrides my connection to him. We came into this together. Every part of our new, weird, effed-up world is grounded in that bond. We are each other’s normal. Distance isn’t going to change that, and neither are you.”

  Daniel nodded. “I see.”

  “You should leave. If you would please, relay my condition to Ethan. He might be happy to know that I am not dead or dying. Unless you think it would be easier on him to think I am dead.” She couldn’t withhold the snappish remark.

  He shook his head. “No, he will be overjoyed to hear you are recovering well. I will tell him you are full of piss and vinegar, as usual.” He collected his book and headed to the door. “I’m sorry for upsetting you. I really did have Ethan’s interests in mind.”

  She nodded. “I meant what I said. If you’re Ethan’s friend than you won’t have an enemy in me.”

  “Is there anything else you would like me to tell him, any words of affection or goodwill?”

  She paused. “Yes, give him a list of my injuries: broken ribs, internal bleeding, and a hemorrhage in the brain. Tell him all that and then tell him none of it hurt as badly as him sending you here in his place.”

  33

  Cori spent another six days recovering before they let her leave the infirmary. Without work release though, she just wandered up and down the halls in a loose jogging outfit and shoes she may as well have stolen from an orthopedically challenged geriatric.

  Her back still hurt and her legs felt weak, but she was moving, and that was all that mattered to her. She rounded the corner and slipped into Danato’s office to see if he had anything she could do that wouldn’t conflict with the doctor’s orders.

  Belus sat at his desk signing paperwork. She had not seen him since the prison break. “Hey Belus. Is Danato around?” she asked as she slipped in the door.

  He nodded and gathered up his papers. “He’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  “Good.” Cori wobbled over to a chair and sat down with a controlled groan.

  Belus clutched his documents and headed to the door.

  “You don’t have to leave. I’ll just wait quietly if you need to work,” she offered.

  He looked back at her coldly. “I prefer to leave.” He slammed the door behind him. The glass rattled, threatening to break, but it endured the abusive slam, just as it had many times before.

  Cori stood again and followed him out the door. “Belus,” she called after him. She followed him through the tight hallway away from Danato’s office. She stopped short just inside the main foyer entrance when she felt a stitch snap under her bandages. She cursed.

  Off to her right, Belus was on his way down the hall leading to the gym and kitchen. “Belus!” she yelled after him. He finally stopped and looked back at her. She limped toward him holding her side just in case her insides tried to spill out. “Why are you…?” She looked into his scolding eyes. She forced herself to stand. “This is about the prison break.”

  Belus didn’t say anything. She had never seen anger on his face; disgust and disapproval, but not anger. He wore it easier than she would have expected.

  “You’re mad—”

  “Not mad. You saved us all,” he announced with civility on his tongue, but not in his eyes.

  She stopped her approach and knelt down on one knee to bring her to eye level with him. It actually brought her beneath him, but it was appropriate either way. “That doesn’t matter, though.” She could read the resentment in his eyes. “I didn’t follow your plan.”

  “Your plan worked.” His words were almost congratulatory, but his face showed nothing but controlled fury.

  “Yes, but…” Cori shook her head. “I didn’t have your back.” He didn’t say anything. He was a proud man. Too proud to acknowledge any hurt feelings. “I get that. I know you think I’m just too stubborn to follow orders. Everyone thinks that. That wasn’t what stopped me. I didn’t want to leave you. I hated doing that. I thought I was being weak, but that wasn’t it. I just felt… I knew it was a futile fight.”

  “Clearly it was. You made the right choice.”

  “Stop giving me kudos. I know what you’re thinking.”

  “Really? What am I thinking?” Belus asked, stepping closer to face her down with all his derision intact.

  She fought back tears. She knew he wouldn’t offer her any more sympathy with them. “You’re thinking you could have respected me more for failing with you, than succeeding on my own.”

  His eyes flickered over hers. He nodded. “Something like that. I would have tried to fit the word ‘deserter’ in there somewhere.” Belus pushed past her, despite her fragile state.

  She grabbed the only clothing she could hold onto, which turned out to be his sleeve. He stopped short of dragging her on her belly. “Belus, I know you can hardly take me at my word, but I promise you, if I had felt right about the plan, I would have followed you into that room, even if that meant dying. I’m not a quitter, and I do have your back, just not when I know you’re wrong.”

  “Isn’t there a song about standing by your friends even though they’re wrong?” he said.

  “Yeah, a few, and they’re all bullshit. A good friend should be the first to tell you you’re wrong. A good friend should have the fortitude to accept the criticism.”

  Belus pulled his sleeve away from her gruffly. “You didn’t tell me I was wrong. You just abandoned me.” He walked away without looking back.

  Cori wanted to yell after him. She wanted to grovel and beg for forgiveness, but Belus wouldn’t respect her for that. He wasn’t like Danato, who balanced his love and respect for her with his devotion to his job. Belus expected her to earn her rights every single time. Including the right to call him friend.

  34

  Danato was surprised to see Cori come into his office. He rushed over to help her to a chair and shut the door behind her. “I thought you would be at home.”

  “I’ve been in bed for the last three weeks, I need something to do.”

  “Well, I sympathize, but I don’t know what you can do.” He sat down at his desk.

  “I thought you would have been desperate to have me back.”

  He smiled. “I am. As soon as you’re ready. Until then you can study for your written test.”

  “You got me back in the running?”

  “Yes, Mr. Godfrey was more than thrilled with your performance since you saved his butt. Not to mention I sent him a copy of your medical chart. I insisted that anyone capable of recovering the prison when they are that close to death deserves the right to complete the application process.” Danato hated the sound of the word ‘death’ in reference to her. He knew the job was a risk, and he knew that Cori was up for the challenge, but part of him wished he hadn’t let her apply.

  Cori took a deep breath. “J
ust doing my part, boss.” She said it jokingly, but he knew she was trying to be respectfully humble, like Ethan had always been with him.

  He had noticed a change in her temperament toward him in the past months. She had come to depend on Belus for her training and duty assignments. When she came to him, it was more for personal attention: conversation and advice. He knew it was partly because she missed Ethan, but he thought, or at least hoped, that she was starting to relax her defenses with him.

  “I wouldn’t have been able to do it without Cleos. I know you disapprove of him, but he was better to me than the morphine was.” Danato didn’t want to hear her praises for the prisoner. “Where did you end up moving him to anyway?”

  “What do you mean?” He knew exactly what she meant.

  “Have you built his dark room yet, or is he still in the basement?”

  Danato didn’t want to have this discussion this early in her healing. He didn’t want to have this discussion at all, but he had no choice. He knew she would never let it go, and he had no intention of lying to her, lest he break that tenuous trust she had in him. “He is still in the basement.”

  “When will the room be finished?”

  “It hasn’t been started, and it won’t be.” Cori’s cold glare left him wishing he had lied. “Aside from the obvious reasons not to,” he explained, “there is no money for it, and the board would never approve the funds.”

  “I don’t care about that. I made them a promise.”

  “A promise you could not back up.” Danato shook his head.

  “They saved us all,” Cori argued.

  “Yes, and they have been given as many incentives as we can provide without rewriting our rules to suit them.”

  “I’m sure that went over well with the lava monster.”

  “Actually,” Danato chimed in, hoping to cheer her up. “Rodan has been moved outside. The thought process was sound. The water woman got pretty much everything she wanted too. I’m leaving the hot chocolate issue to you.”

  Cori’s forehead crinkled in deep thought. “You’re saying everyone got what they wanted except Cleos.” She pursed her lips with determination. “Danato—”