Author's Note: So, I've reached 300 reviews which is pretty freakin awesome! I never thought that would happen. The feedback has always been much appreciated, and I hope it continues. Anyway, there's some more smut in this chapter, just to let you know ahead of time (I mean, this is a story about a succubus so, that'll happen lol). I hope you all have a great weekend, and thank you so much for reading!
Bo
My stomach was growling with a vengeance. The past few days everything had been so crazy that remembering to eat had become a task. We made our way downstairs and towards the obnoxiously loud music, finding Kenzi and Tamsin in the kitchen. The table top was loaded with several bottles of liquor and various mixers, as well as shot glasses.
"Bo-Bo!" Kenzi exclaimed when we walked in, raising her cup in salute. Tamsin, who was standing at the table making some sort of cocktail, looked up and gave a lopsided smile.
"You guys are drunk? Already? It's like ten in the morning. And what's with the music?" I asked loudly.
"Not drunk. Tipsy," Kenzi corrected before taking a large gulp of her drink. "It's like vacation!"
"Well, could you turn it down? Just a little?"
Tamsin nodded and grabbed a remote off the counter. She hit what I assumed was the volume button only once before she threw the remote back down and went to stand next to a snickering Kenzi by the sink. I looked to Lauren. She just raised her eyebrows and shrugged.
Shaking my head, I walked over to the cabinet, grabbing two mugs. At least they had made coffee. I took the pot and filled each cup, "I'm guessing you two didn't pick up any milk while you were out last night, right?"
Tamsin tilted her head, "Must've slipped our minds."
I rolled my eyes and handed one of the mugs to Lauren. Once I drank this, I might have enough energy to put up with the snarky blonde. I eagerly started drinking the coffee but it took a few seconds before I registered that the burn on my tongue and throat wasn't caused by the heat. Spitting some back into the cup, I choked out, "You spiked the coffee? Who does that?!" Kenzi and Tamsin burst out laughing as Lauren coughed since she had also drank some of the coffee, unaware of its content. "Are you okay?"
"I just need some water," she said.
"Hey, Tamsin," I heard Kenzi say as I went to grab another cup. "Do we serve water here?"
I turned around just in time to see Tamsin slam on the faucet, full power, before Kenzi yanked the hose from the sink, took aim, and sprayed the water directly into Lauren's face while they both chanted, "Hell, no, H2O!" for several seconds.
My hand went up to cover my mouth as I stared at my now drenched girlfriend, unsure of what was about to go down. I knew that Kenzi and Lauren didn't really get along, and Kenzi's immaturity was a big factor in that.
Lauren wiped her face, calmly. "Bo?"
"Yea?"
"Duck," she ordered before raising her hand, and I complied without a second thought. She immediately had control over Kenzi's arms and in a split second, the hose was pointed towards Tamsin, catching the woman off guard. She jumped when the water hit her, then darted to the other side of the kitchen and I took the opportunity to move behind Lauren.
Then a wide-eyed Kenzi turned the hose on herself. "Uncle! Uncle!" she sputtered out. Lauren took her time lowering her hand as I tried not to laugh. "Oh, it is on, now," Kenzi said, her make-up running down her face, and turned the hose towards us.
I grabbed Lauren's hand and pulled her out of the kitchen. Kenzi abandoned the hose and chased after us, Tamsin behind her. We ran up the stairs and into our room, slamming the door and locking it right as the other women approached. They banged on the door for a minute, shouting about how they'd get their revenge, as we leaned against it and laughed.
"I think we should wait a while before we go back out there," I said.
Lauren nodded, "Yes, we definitely should."
I couldn't help but laugh again, replaying Kenzi's shocked expression in my mind. "I can't believe you did that." I moved in front of Lauren, "Kenzi was right, though."
"What do you mean?"
Reaching up and brushing her damp hair out of her face, I said, "This is like a vacation for us… I know that there's a lot we need to deal with but we don't know everything yet and all this guessing and… this… this…"
"Speculation?"
"Yea, that… It's kind of pointless right now, don't you think?" I didn't let her answer, putting a finger over her lips when she opened her mouth. "I'm just saying that with everything that's going on, maybe it would be good to take a day off… and just be together… because I have a feeling that we might not get another chance for a while. What do you say?"
She stared back at me for a few seconds before pulling my hand away and nodding. "Okay. But we have to figure out how to get out of this room because I'd very much like it if I could take a shower and eat something."
"I think I can arrange a truce. On one condition…"
"What's that?"
"I get to take that shower with you."
She smiled, "Well, I thought that was a given."
####
"Do you always carry a knife somewhere on your person?" Lauren asked as I strapped a sheath to my thigh.
I shrugged, "It's good to be prepared. Why? Does it bother you?"
"No. I'll just have to keep that in mind so things don't get messy next time I decide to rip off your clothes."
I laughed before pulling her in for a kiss. "Don't worry, I'll draw you a map."
"Much appreciated."
"Hey, Bo?" Kenzi called to me through the door, interrupting our attempt to stop touching each other long enough to actually get dressed. Though, I wasn't putting much effort into the task anyway.
"Yea?"
"Hale wants to know if you got in touch with Dyson," Kenzi said.
I quickly grabbed my shirt and pulled it on before opening the door. "You called Hale?"
"No, he called me." She raised her phone up in front of my face. "Do you wanna talk to him?"
I pushed the phone away and whispered, hoping he wouldn't hear me, "Why did you answer? We're supposed to be off the grid!"
"I didn't know I wasn't allowed to talk to him!"
Giving her an exasperated look, I snatched the phone from her. "Hale, hey. What's going on?"
"Is everything okay?" he asked.
"Yea. Everything's fine. Why'd you call?"
"Dyson's still MIA. Did you reach him at all yesterday?"
"No, I didn't. Sorry. Is that it?" I was certain that he and Trick were aware of what happened yesterday at the Light compound and Dyson's disappearance was the least of my worries.
"Uh, yea. I guess it is. You sure you're alright?"
"Yes. Yes, we're good. Everything okay there?"
"As far as I know. We're just a little worried about Dyson, that's all."
"Are you at the Dal?" I turned and looked at Lauren who was staring at me intently, obviously trying to figure out what was going on.
"Yea. I'm here with Trick. I'm about to head over to the compound and see if I can find any more stuff in the archives. Just wish I could get ahold of Dyson 'cause I'm not even close to halfway through-"
"I'll let you know if I hear from him, okay? I've gotta go. I'll call you."
"Okay," he answered hesitantly. "I'll talk to you later then."
Once he hung up, I handed the phone back to Kenzi.
"What did he say?" Lauren asked me.
"He just wanted to know if I talked to Dyson. I don't think they know what happened."
"That's not possible. The Ash would've sent someone to at least check the Dal. And Hale is an officer of the Light," she said, shaking her head. "There's a chance they may have traced the call."
"Hale wouldn't do that," Kenzi said firmly. "And neither would Trick. He's been protecting Bo since day one."
Lauren seemed to think about this for a minute while Kenzi and I waited. "You might be right, but if that's true, then there are only two other possibilities that would make sense," Lauren said. "The first would be that, for whatever reason, the Ash doesn't want them involved, which is highly unlikely."
"Okay. What's the other one then?" I asked.
"Castor wiped their memories while they were unconscious, like he did to me."
"Bravo, Doc." We all turned to see Tamsin who had materialized in the doorway at some point during the conversation, "He was right about you. You catch on quick."
"Wait… What?" I stared at the blonde, dumbfounded. "Who was right?"
"Castor," she answered in a nonchalant tone. "Our mutual friend."
In less than a second, I had her pinned against the hallway wall, knife at her throat. "What the hell are you?"
"Bo!" I heard Lauren call behind me.
"You know," Tamsin said calmly, "that's a very rude-"
"A rude question to ask, yea, I get it," I told her. "I'm not really into Fae etiquette."
She raised her eyebrows, "Clearly." I pressed the knife harder into her neck. At this point, I knew that adding even the smallest amount of pressure would cause the sharp blade to pierce her skin. She raised her chin, "Anna had a thing for knives, too," she said.
"Um, I would answer her if I were you," Kenzi said.
Tamsin rolled her eyes. "I'm a Valkyrie. And I am also trying to protect you, so it'd be great if you chilled the fuck out and lowered the knife before I change my mind."
"Bo," Lauren repeated after a few seconds. I took a deep breath, releasing the other woman, and stepped back.
"What's a Valkyrie?" Kenzi asked.
Tamsin rubbed her hand over her throat and glared at me, before turning to Kenzi. "Not really important right now."
Not knowing how exactly I knew, I realized that Rachel had also been a Valkyrie. The thing about being inside someone else's head is that when you see anything that is familiar to that person, images, memories and emotions flash through their head and suddenly that thing is familiar to you, too. And at that moment, the image of Anna and Rachel flashed through my head and I saw Rachel's face, hideous and skull-like, as the three men who surrounded them fell to the ground, unconscious. I gasped, snapping out of it and shaking my head.
"Are you alright?" Lauren asked, having been the only one to notice my reaction.
"I-I'm fine," I told her and then looked to Tamsin. "So, you are Rachel?"
"I was Rachel. Many lifetimes ago. Just like you were Anna and Zoie and Kes," she explained, pointing to each of us in turn. "My curse is that I actually remember my previous lives."
"Wait! Hold up," Kenzi cut in. "I'm reincarnated? Why didn't anyone tell me? Was I Fae?"
"It's complicated," Lauren answered. "We were going to tell you. At some point…"
"Well, who was I?" she asked. "Was I a stripper, too?"
"No. Kes was Zoie's best friend. She worked in the palace kitchens," Tamsin said.
Kenzi raised an eyebrow and looked at Lauren, "Seriously? Best friends?"
"Yes. That was your glamorous past life. Are you happy, now? Can we move on?" Tamsin answered in an annoyed tone.
"I think I would've preferred being a stripper," she muttered.
"Kenzi!" I chided her even though I knew Lauren wouldn't really take offense to the comment.
"What? I was kidding," she said before looking away. "Well, sort of."
I shook my head and turned back to Tamsin, "You can tell us what happened?"
"No. The whole point of this is that you two are the only ones who can use the Hyeshukan to see what really happened. If I told you what I know, you wouldn't want to go back, and that's not an option."
"The hya-what?"
"The blood stone."
Lauren stepped forward to stand next to me but kept her eyes on Tamsin. "Zoie did kill her, didn't she?"
"I think you've seen enough by now to know that Zoie would never hurt Anna," Tamsin replied. "I wasn't supposed to let on about who I am, but I couldn't have you two taking off because you thought you were being tracked. The only thing I can tell you is that Castor took care of the Ash and the others. I made sure the guards you attacked were taken care of and tied up all the loose ends."
"How could you have done that? You were with Kenzi when it happened and you brought us here," I said.
"I've been alive for a long time. I know people," she explained cryptically and I knew it was pointless to ask her to explain.
"Well, if everything is taken care of, then we can go back."
Tamsin shook her head, "No, you can't. Not with the bounty still on her head," she nodded towards Lauren. "Right now, you're safe here."
"I'm thinking we should move this party down to the kitchen. I'm starting to lose my buzz," Kenzi suggested.
"I second that," Tamsin said before they both headed for the stairs. I went to follow them but was stopped by Lauren's hand on my shoulder.
I turned to look at her, immediately sensing something wasn't right. "What is it?"
"Maybe we should just leave it there… for now. She's not going to tell us anything we don't already know," she said. "We'll take the day for ourselves like we planned and… we can deal with this tomorrow, after we go back again."
I knew Tamsin wasn't going to be cooperative about answering our questions. What was odd, though, was that it was Lauren asking for a break. Why didn't she, of all people, want to know everything she could about the whole situation? It definitely wasn't like her to actually want to step back from something important like this. But as I stared back into her eyes, I recognized the fear. It didn't take much thought to realize what had caused it. Tamsin hadn't given a straight answer to her question, much like Castor hadn't.
I nodded and tried to keep my tone light, "Yea, I don't see why not. I mean, they're drunk anyway. And it's not like we have to worry about the Ash now."
She gave me a small smile before bringing her hands to either side of my face and meeting my lips with her own in a soft lingering kiss that soon became more heated. When we finally broke apart, she gently ran her thumb over my lips and whispered, "You know I love you, right?"
I was a little thrown by the sadness behind her words, but I didn't let on. "I know."
####
We spent the day with Kenzi and Tamsin as they drank and we finally got to eat- grilled cheese had seriously never tasted so good. After a few hours of just hanging out and not bringing up our past lives, except for some of Kenzi's questions about her own, Lauren and I decided to drive my car up to the lake a little less than a mile away to watch the sunset.
Lauren seemed to have somewhat relaxed during the day, but I knew that what was to come still plagued her mind. We sat on the hood of my car, leaning back and watching as the light faded from the sky and patches of stars slowly revealed themselves. We talked about random things and I guided the conversation, making sure not to touch on any serious subjects. It was nice to be out here, in the middle of nowhere. It was almost like we were the only ones who existed and the outside world didn't matter. I wanted to savor this feeling as long as I could. I wanted to burn it into my memory so I had something to hold onto through the rough times ahead that were closing in on us.
We built a fire, which was easier than I thought it would be since Lauren was apparently very skilled at it, not to mention that with her new ability, we didn't have to worry about how to light it. Once she reclaimed her seat on the edge of the car, I moved to stand between her legs and placed a soft kiss on her neck before looking into her eyes, where the firelight reflected back at me.
I took in the sight of her, mesmerized by the way the light danced over her skin, casting shadows across her face as the white glow of her aura haloed her body. She looked like a goddess that I gladly worshipped, starting with her lips and slowly making my way down her jawline and neck. My hands slipped under her shirt, sliding over the warm skin and cupping her breasts through her bra as her breath hitched. I continued to distract her with my lips, knowing that she might protest to me going any further while we were out in the open like this. Thanks to Tamsin, though, I had already confirmed that this was private land and her closest neighbors were over three miles away, but I hadn't known how to tell Lauren this without revealing my intentions. So while she was focused on the sensation of my mouth on her neck, I sneakily undid the button of her jeans before curling my fingers into the waistband and then pulling them down, along with her underwear, as I sank to my knees.
"What are you- oh!" she cried out as I didn't waste any time, running my tongue quickly across her already wet center. "Bo, we can't…" she whispered after regaining some of her composure.
"It's okay, trust me," I pulled away long enough to murmur and, before she could respond, gave another firm lick over her clit, feeling the little nub under my tongue. The moment I felt it, I let my tongue flutter, knowing that no woman I'd ever met could pull away from something that felt that good. Whatever Lauren had been about to say was lost in a choked gasp as she nearly slid off the edge of the car. I couldn't help the small smile of triumph. I chanced a look up at her now, seeing her chest heaving with anxious breaths as she stared back at me, conveying her surrender through the slightest nod.
Raising her thighs to rest on my shoulders for support, I immediately lost myself in the sweet, silky velvet beneath my tongue, the heat of the opening into her body, and the way she trembled as I eagerly explored her soft folds, finding several sensitive spots to tease; learning, as I saw what made her moan, what made her gasp, and what drew soft, breathy cries from her lips. I knew that I could do this for hours, but she was fast approaching the edge, judging by the way the muscles of her stomach jumped just beneath the skin and her hands rhythmically gripped the edge of the car, her knuckles white.
I started gently stroking my tongue in and out of her, letting it swirl against her opening each time I pushed deep inside, almost moaning at the flavor of her; her scent filling my head and my mind. I teasingly moved my tongue up over her clit, fastening my lips around the nub and sucking it into my mouth before roughly pressing my tongue against it.
With a loud gasp, her hips jerked as her body stiffened slightly. "Oh, God, Bo," she exhaled shakily into the night air. I knew I had her right on the edge of coming undone. Biting her bottom lip, her eyes drifted shut while my tongue softly began to circle again, her hips pushing against me and her warm thighs trembling on my shoulders. I accelerated the motion achingly slow, trying to keep her there as long as possible before sucking her back into my mouth and letting my tongue flutter over her clit once more.
Her back arched, lips parting soundlessly. Her muscles locked for several seconds before she relaxed, her harsh breathing and moans filling the air again. I continued to lick her, drawing out her orgasm until she couldn't take anymore and then kissed my way up her body, my tongue darting out to taste the sweat that lightly coated her skin as her trembling subsided.
Lauren finally opened her eyes again when I kissed her chin. "Hey. You okay?" I asked.
She let out a breathless laugh, "Yea... I just… I need a minute…"
I smiled, seeing that the confliction that had resided in her eyes all day had gone, at least for the moment.
####
Lauren
Though I had dreaded falling asleep, when we got back to the cabin a few hours later we were both so exhausted that it wasn't long before I opened my eyes to the concrete room, despite my effort to stay awake as long as I could. I immediately stood up, hearing Bo's voice.
"How long do you mean?" she asked Castor who was standing at the other side of the room.
"Enough time for at least two memories. We need to speed this up. After tonight, you two will be closer to finding out what happened than any attempt in the past. It wouldn't be wise to risk something happening before we've finished," he said and then looked over at me. "Is that alright?"
My eyes moved from his face to Bo's. I could see the worry clear on her face. I swallowed, my stomach in knots, and nodded, "Yes. It's… it's fine."
He walked closer to me, "You have to understand," he said softly, "we're doing this to prevent history from repeating itself, as well as stop a great evil which still remains in this world." He placed a hand on my shoulder before leaning in and continuing in barely a whisper, "You must be strong. Face the past so that you can save her, now."
I felt my eyes begin to burn as I stared back into his. There it was. His words had confirmed my fear and it took a few seconds to find my voice. "Okay. I understand." He gave a solemn nod before stepping back and holding the stone out to me. I took it from his palm with a shaking hand as I felt Bo come to stand beside me.
She took the hand that wasn't holding the stone and squeezed. When I looked up at her, she gave me a small smile, her eyes glistening. I knew I would do anything for her. Anything to keep her safe.
She gently raised a hand and cupped the side of my face. "You know I love you, right?"
The corner of my mouth twitched up and I almost smiled, hearing her repeat my earlier words. I closed my eyes and Bo's thumb quickly brushed away the tear that escaped. I took a deep breath to regain control of myself and then turned my head to place a kiss on her palm before taking her wrist. I looked at her as I guided her hand over the stone and whispered, "I know," as the white light enveloped us.
