Firefighter Unicorn (Fire & Rescue Shifters Book 6) Read online

  Ivy smirked at the mental image of Hugh being grilled by the Phoenix while three sheets to the wind. “Can’t have gone too badly, since he hired you.”

  “Well, I told him what I could do, and why. Which I would never have done while sober, so I can thank two bottles of vodka for my job.” His flippant tone turned more serious. “In any event, Ash gave me back a purpose. And the first thing the next morning I went out and got the vines, to make sure I never forgot it again. To help me stay focused.”

  Ivy touched one of the dry, dead leaves on his right pectoral. “Stay focused on what?”

  He was silent for a moment. Then he took her hand, drawing it across his chest so that her forefinger rested on one of the budding leaves on the other side.

  “John Doe,” he said. “Sword through the heart.”

  Ivy drew in a sharp breath, but he was already was moving on. Following the curl of the vine, he guided her fingertip to a triple spray of leaves springing from a single stem.

  “Griff. Three times. I hope he’s bored with endangering himself, because I’m running out of skin there.” Another leaf. “This was a woman in a traffic incident. Never knew her name, but she would have bled out before the ambulance arrived. Anyway. You get the picture.”

  She lifted her head to stare at him, speechless. He avoided her eyes, looking down at his left arm as if it belonged to someone else.

  “A leaf per life. Terribly melodramatic, I know.” His tone was light, but there was a forced edged to his self-mockery. “But once I’d started, it seemed churlish to stop. Would be rude to decide that someone wasn’t worth recording, after all.”

  She flattened her hand over his bicep. Her fingers covered at least a dozen leaves just there. And the curling vines covered his shoulder, down his arm, round over his back…

  “This part’s empty,” she said, following the vines down to his elbow.

  “Just waiting to be filled in.” He shrugged. “I wanted the unfinished design to be there, staring at me accusingly, if I was ever tempted to stop.”

  “Stop getting tattoos?”

  “Stop healing,” he said softly. “Give up my unicorn. Like I said, the tattoos help keep me focused.”

  Her eyes went from the half-filled vines on his left arm to the nearly empty ones on his right. Only a handful of dry, curled leaves clung there…

  “Hugh.” She touched one of the autumn leaves, and he flinched. “If the growing leaves are people you’ve saved, what are these?”

  He was silent for a long, long moment.

  “The people I didn’t,” he said at last. “And I pray to God that side is finished.”

  He kept score on his skin. Lives saved versus lives lost, measuring his worth by the slow creep of ink down his arms.

  She’d thought his tattoos beautiful, until she’d learned their meaning.

  She sat up, spreading both of her gloved hands across his shoulders. Her hands were too small to blot out more than a small fraction of the design. She wished that she could scrub the black marks off his skin, take away the terrible guilt and pressure he carried with him wherever he went.

  “You’re more than just what you can do, Hugh,” she said fiercely. “You don’t have to keep score. I wish you wouldn’t.”

  He smiled a little, sadly. “I’m not, and I do. But thank you for the sentiment.”

  Oh, how she wanted to show him how much she treasured him. To hold him close and wordlessly tell him over and over that he was loved for himself, not for his talent. She longed to caress every inch of his unblemished skin, until he knew bone-deep that his value wasn’t just marked in black ink.

  As if sensing her thoughts, he drew her back down again, tucked her head under his chin. She stretched her arms, hugging him tight. She closed her eyes, feeling the warmth of his bare skin against her cheek, the rapid beat of his heart in her ear.

  “I told you about my tattoos because I want you to understand why I can’t mate you, no matter how much I want it,” he murmured.

  “You think I’d want you to give up your unicorn?” she said, taken aback that he could even have thought such a thing. “I’d never ask that!”

  “Ivy, being a unicorn means shifting in secrecy and endless headaches. God, if that was all it meant, I’d make love to you here and now, and bless you for finally ridding me of the wretched beast. But that’s not all it means. I could give up the unicorn, but I can’t turn my back on the people who need me. The people who will need me in future.”

  She ran her thumb over his left shoulder. So many lives owed to his powers. So many more that could be saved.

  “I understand,” she said, meaning it with her whole breaking heart. “But Hugh, I don’t know if I’m strong enough for this.”

  He laughed a little, his warm breath stirring her hair. “Have you seen yourself, woman? All the crap the world throws at you, and you stride through it all like a damn queen. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met. Why do you think I trusted you tonight, when I didn’t trust myself to stop?”

  She took a deep breath, bracing herself to reveal her deepest, darkest secret. “Hugh, I touched Hope once.”

  He stilled underneath her. “I’m not following.”

  “Our mother was always so careful not to leave us alone. Mom thought I was jealous, she was scared I wanted to hurt the baby…but I didn’t. I just wanted to hug my sister. Just once. And one night when I was ten and Hope was two, Mom forgot to lock my door. So I snuck into Hope’s room, and I put my bare hands through the bars of her cot, and I touched her.”

  His hand came up to gently stroke her tense back. “That’s understandable. You were a child, Ivy. You didn’t know-“

  “I did, Hugh. Mom told me over and over every single day how dangerous it was, how I mustn’t ever go near the baby. I did it anyway. Hope spent eight weeks in intensive care, and when she came out she couldn’t use her legs anymore. She’d been a late developer, but she’d been pulling up, she’d been starting to toddle…and I destroyed all that. She's never walked because of me, Hugh. Because I had one moment of weakness.”

  “Oh, God,” he muttered, his tone bitter with self-loathing. “Ivy, I’m so sorry. I never meant—it’s not fair for me to put such pressure on you. I promise, I won’t put you in that position again.”

  She was not going to cry. He’d called her the strong one. She was going to be strong for him now, no matter how badly her heart was hurting.

  She forced out the words she had to say. “So you still want me to leave?”

  “No!” His hands tightened convulsively on her back. “God no. I never wanted you to leave, Ivy. In case you hadn’t worked it out by now, your mate can be a damn idiot sometimes. I was scared to tell you my secret, so I pushed you away instead.”

  “Well, you can’t,” she said. “I can’t go, Hugh, not when you’re in danger from Gaze. No matter how hard it’s going to be, I need to be here to protect you.”

  His chest muscles stiffened underneath her. “I can take care of myself. A unicorn is fifteen hundred pounds of muscle behind a five-foot spear, not a sparkly pony.”

  “All right, Stabby McStabface, don’t get your horn in a twist,” Ivy poked him in the side. “I’m talking about me, not you. I may be just a wyvern, but I’m still a dragon at heart. I can’t leave my treasure unguarded. I’d lose my mind.”

  “I’m your treasure?” His voice was softer than she’d ever heard.

  “You’re my mate,” she said, simply. “You’ll always be my mate. No matter what.”

  Neither of them said anything for a while, holding each other in silence.

  “I think it was easier,” Hugh said at last, “when you thought I despised you, and I hoped that you hated me.”

  Ivy couldn’t disagree.

  Chapter 12

  Hope knew the second she rolled through the door that her plan had worked.

  I am the greatest sister in the world, she thought smugly, and waited for Ivy and Hugh to tell her their good ne
ws.

  To her surprise, however, the happy announcement didn’t come. For some reason, Hugh and her sister seemed hell-bent on pretending that they weren’t now mated.

  They still maintained a constant, careful distance, sidling round each other as though terrified they might spontaneously combust if they so much as bumped shoulders. They exchanged only the minimum of words, their voices polite and strained like two strangers stuck in an elevator together.

  But though they were still determinedly keeping their hands to themselves, their eyes were all over each other. Hope could have toasted marshmallows in their heated gazes. They were basically walking heart emojis.

  Hope guessed that Ivy’s pride was holding her back from admitting what had clearly happened. After all, Ivy owed all of her newfound happiness to Hope’s awesome matchmaking skills. Now she’d have to finally accept that her little sister was actually smarter than her when it came to some things.

  Hope would, she’d already decided, not make a big thing of it. She would accept Ivy’s grudging apology gracefully, like the mature adult she was. She wouldn’t rub her sister’s nose in it.

  Well, not much.

  For now, though, Hope played along. She obediently lay back on the couch and held still under Hugh’s tingly-tickly healing hands, and secretly laughed her head off over the way that Ivy was clearly checking out his butt whenever he bent over.

  Not that Hope could blame Ivy for that, she had to admit. Hugh was easy on the eyes, if you were into the whole angst-and-muscles thing. And dudes, of course. Ivy could have done a whole lot worse, when it came to a mate.

  He’d be good for Ivy, Hope decided. Whatever his inner animal might be, he was clearly no pushover. He could handle her sister. And maybe, in his magic hands, Ivy would finally chill out a little. Let Hope live her own life at last.

  So Hope held her tongue, even though it just about killed her to pretend that she hadn’t noticed the way they were drooling all over each other. She knew her sister well enough to know that it was better to let Ivy come clean in her own time, when she was ready.

  After all, she’d have to admit the truth soon. It wasn’t like any shifter could actually keep their hands off their fated mate for long. It was kind of hilariously tragic, watching the pair of them try.

  At least, it was funny at first.

  As the morning wore on and they still didn’t admit their secret, it started to get old.

  By the afternoon, it was downright irritating.

  When Hugh went off after lunch to take a nap—apparently healing wore him out, although Hope herself felt as refreshed as if she’d been floating in a hot tub all morning—she couldn’t hold her silence any longer.

  “Well?” she demanded of her sister, once they were finally alone.

  Ivy didn’t look round from washing up her tin plate and cutlery from lunch. “Well what?”

  “Are you going to tell me about Hugh or not?”

  Ivy’s fork and knife clattered against each other as she twitched. “I don’t know his animal. And don’t you dare bug him about it, either. It’s rude to pry.”

  The tense line of Ivy’s back, the too-quick answer to a question Hope hadn’t actually asked…Hope knew when her sister was lying.

  But why? she wondered. If Hugh had shown Ivy his shift form last night—and Hope would now have bet her busted wheelchair on that—what reason could she possibly have for lying about it? Especially to her own sister?

  She set the mystery aside for later consideration. “That wasn’t what I meant. Come on, Ivy. Tell me what’s up with you and Hugh. You know you have to eventually.”

  Ivy’s shoulders stiffened, but she didn’t turn around. She seemed focused on her task, dumping each cleaned item back into the Box o’ Death, as they called the red-banded plastic container where Ivy stored everything she’d handled with bare hands.

  “Ivy. Ivyyy.” When her sister still didn’t respond, Hope scaled her voice up to her most annoying whine. “Ivyyyyyy. You know I can keep this up all day. Ivyyyyyyyyyyy.”

  Steel clanged on steel as Ivy threw a fork into the Box o’ Death with a rather excessive amount of force. “I am so not discussing my private life with you.”

  “I knew it!” Hope cackled with delight. “You totally did it! You banged Hugh and now you’re mated!”

  Ivy wheeled on her, face red with embarrassment. “Will you shut up? He’s only upstairs, he'll hear you! And no, we did not and we are not and this is none of your business anyway!”

  Hope lifted her eyebrows at her sister. “Excuse me, but it definitely is my business. Or are you going to tell me that we’re still going to be moving out of Brighton once this is all over?”

  Ivy’s eyes slid away. She fiddled with the cuff of her glove.

  “Well…no,” she admitted. “I mean, we haven’t worked out all the details yet-“

  “Because you were too busy banging,” Hope interjected smugly.

  Ivy shot her a death glare. “Because it’s complicated. It’s…really complicated.”

  Something about the way Ivy’s voice fell on the last few words made Hope pause. She looked at her sister. Really looked at her.

  Ivy had been lit up like a neon sign when Hugh had been around, but now that secret glow had guttered out. There were dark smudged circles under her eyes, as if she hadn’t slept at all. Hope had assumed that Ivy had been up all night…but for reasons that should have left her satisfied and smug, not pale and drawn.

  “Ivy,” she said in concern, rolling a little closer. “What’s wrong?”

  Her sister turned away, bracing her hands on the edge of the sink as if it was the only thing keeping her upright. She stared out the window, but Hope was pretty sure she wasn’t seeing anything but visions of a certain hot paramedic.

  “It’s really complicated,” she said again, quietly. “I can’t say much more than that, Hope. I promised Hugh I wouldn’t tell his secrets to anyone. Not even you.”

  “But you are mated, right?”

  Ivy let out a long sigh. “We’re mates. But we’re not mated. That’s all I can—what’s she doing here?”

  “What?” Hope craned her neck, but her wheelchair was too low down for her to be able to see anything out the window other than sky. “Who?”

  “It’s one of Gaze’s thugs.” Ivy had ducked out of sight herself, as if taking cover from a sniper. “She’s across the street, staring at the house.”

  “How do you know she’s one of Gaze’s people?”

  “I recognize her from the party, and she was at the cafe with him yesterday, too. Actually, she asked after you. Tall black girl, cornrows, wears motorbike leathers?”

  Hope’s heart skipped a beat. “Betty?”

  Ivy raised an eyebrow at her. “You know her?”

  “Betty? Oh w-well, kind of, I guess,” Hope stammered. “I mean, yeah, I know her a bit. She goes to my school. We’re in some of the same classes. She’s my partner. In biology. At school, I mean.”

  Both of Ivy’s eyebrows had now risen. “You’re lab partners with a juvenile delinquent?”

  “Betty’s not a delinquent,” Hope said defensively. “She’s smart. Really, really smart. And funny and brave and loyal and—” She noticed that Ivy’s eyes had narrowed suspiciously, and hastily changed tack. “Um, and just a really good partner. Biology partner. At school. Like I said. Yep.”

  Was she babbling? Oh God, she was babbling.

  “We’re more casual acquaintances, really,” she finished lamely. She tried to stop there, but couldn’t help herself. “Uh, so, you said she asked about me?”

  “Yeah.” Ivy had gone back to peering suspiciously out the window.

  Hope waited, but Ivy didn’t say anything further. “Well?” she prompted. “What did she ask? How did she look? Did she seem angry, or worried, or, or—look, just tell me exactly what she said and how she said it, okay?“

  “If Hugh hadn’t vouched for your innocence, I would definitely be worrying about now,” Iv
y muttered.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” Ivy let out a long-suffering sigh. “Hope, about this crush—“

  “I don’t have a crush on Betty!” Hope yelped. “Who said anything about crushes? I just like her for her brain. Because she’s so smart. Did I mention she was smart?”

  “Yeah, you did. Several times.” Ivy rubbed the bridge of her nose as if she had a headache. “Hope, don’t you get it? She works for Gaze. No doubt he ordered her to cozy up to you in order to get to me. She was using you.”

  Hope flinched from the stark statement. It was exactly the fear that had been gnawing at her ever since the disastrous party. The worry that had kept her from responding to any of Betty’s increasingly frequent messages.

  “Betty wouldn’t do that,” she said, trying to convince herself. “I’m sure she’s not part of anything bad. She’s only knows Gaze because his charity runs her shifter orphanage.”

  Ivy rolled her eyes. “So she’s one of his little street minions. Wonderful. And now he has her spying on us.”

  Hope caught her breath as the truth dawned on her, chasing away her deepening clouds of misery. “No she isn’t! She can’t be working for Gaze!”

  “She is right there, Hope. I can see her.”

  “Exactly! If she was really spying on us, you wouldn’t! She’s a hellhound, she can do their invisibility thing. If she’s letting us see her, it’s because she wants us to know that she’s there.”

  Ivy stared at her, clearly having only heard one word of this explanation. “Your so-called lab partner is a what?”

  “Hellhounds aren’t all bad, you know,” Hope said defensively.

  “The clue is in the name! There’s a reason they aren’t called heavenhounds!”

  “Oh, like you can talk, wyvern? At least Betty doesn’t literally spit acid!”

  “What’s going on?” Hugh had appeared in the kitchen doorway. He rubbed his eyes, his hair sleep-tousled. “What’s all the yelling about?”