Chapter 45

Talia stuck her head into her brother’s room. Cheap curtains blocked out most of the morning light, leaving just enough for her to see him quite clearly, lying on his bed. He had only come home from work an hour ago and he was already laid out. Lazy git. He usually didn’t sleep until late afternoon.

Well, he wasn’t actually asleep. Too many years of sharing an apartment with him told her that his breathing was off. Also, his heartbeat was way too fast.

Not for her, though.

What a bloody idiot. Honestly. He was just as bad as that pretty little thing he was always scolding for running away from her problems. Pot calling the kettle black, indeed. Any other time and she would have filed it away in her head with amusement, just another checkmark on her private list of why those two were embarrassingly cute together.

This time though… This time it was backfiring all to hell and it was all she could do to keep her mouth shut. She had been good, by the heavens! She had resolutely not interfered and not stuck her foot in it and had, with the exception of a small wager with West, stayed the bloody hell out of it. It would figure, of course, if the one time she finally managed to keep her mouth shut and mind her own damned business it would turn out that she really should have stepped in and …‘helped things along’. That’s what she called it. Ryan called it ‘sticking her damned nose into other people’s personal business’.

Always eloquent, that one.

Well, forget it. She would be damned if she just stood around and waited for him to stop being such a bloody idiot and get off his a*s for once.

Not that she had anything against that little boy of Leda’s. Nice enough, she supposed. Certainly pretty enough as armcandy, and perfect for use as a jar-opener or spare pillow. She was simply of the opinion that her brother was, in addition to being retarded for her (although he’d never admit it, as stubborn as he was), quite the good guy and in need of a girl.

Hell, if she could get him a girl, maybe then he’d stick around. Or at least stay in civilization, rather than gallivanting off to heaven knew where to save the exotic pygmies from death and destruction.

Not that the nice exotic pygmies didn’t deserve to be saved. Obviously.

First things first, though.

She needed to get his a*s out of bed and back over to Leda’s house.

Not that she hadn’t tried, for the last three weeks. Two weeks he’d “fallen asleep” after work and was miraculously nowhere to be found when she came back to the apartment a few hours later. Promises not to order pizza for an entire week didn’t work. Nor did the threat of stealing all of his clothes and replacing everything in pink. Her attempt to make cookies, as an enticement, had backfired completely. The place had smelled like burnt eggs for days, and she was still finding splatters of dried dough in the unlikeliest of places. Time for drastic measures.

She stepped lightly into his room, making no sound as a matter of pride. She was a scout, after all. She was useless if not completely silent. At the last step she crouched down and bounded onto his stomach, landing heavily on her knees. She was rewarded with a surprised grunt of pain. She could be pointy when she wanted to be.

He opened his eyes with great reluctance and scowled at her.

“What?” he asked resentfully.

“You’re getting up, and—”

“I’m sleeping.”

“And putting on some shoes,” she continued on as if he hadn’t said anything at all, “And getting in the car, and going to Leda’s house.”

“No. I’m not.”

“Yes you are,” she said matter-of-factly.

“I’m really not.”

“Because,” she explained, “I’m going to sit on your chest, with my knees embedded quite nicely in your ribs, until you get up.”

He reached out a hand and swatted her off, sending her tumbling to the ground with a squeak. She jumped back on. Made sure to really nail a few bones this time, and he had to swallow another pained grunt.

“Sorry, not going to work,” she said. “As long as you’re on that bed I’m going to keep sitting on you. I mean it.”

He growled at her but did not try to knock her off again. He might heal, but first he’d hurt.

There was a standoff for a few minutes. After the initial shock of her jumping on him he could handle the weight without a thought. Now it was just a contest to see what happened first: either he would get annoyed, or she would get bored. Usually, in situations like these, she would get bored. But she was determined not to this time. Sure, he’d hate her for it now, but one of these days he’d be thanking her and who would be the smart one then? Her, that’s who. Ryan was just a smarta*s.

Finally he swatted at her again, halfheartedly. It was enough to knock her over. She sighed, shook her head at the silly boy, and jumped on him again, hard. He yelped and rolled off the bed, pushing her as he went. Talia landed easily on the floor and grinned up at him in triumph.

“What the hell is with this obsession of yours?” he demanded as he grudgingly found his shoes and pulled them on.

“I could ask you the same thing,” she answered, sticking her tongue out at him. He just glared.

Damn it, it was more fun when he didn’t get the joke.

Oh well.

Just to make sure, she followed him around his bedroom and the rest of the apartment as he picked up the pieces of everything he’d need to take with him. Followed him so closely, in fact, that she bumped into him once or twice when he stopped abruptly to pick something up.

These things happened.

The important thing was, he was getting ready and would soon be back at Leda’s house. She was already working out her excuse to leave early and leave the two of them all by their lonesomes. If she managed to strand him there, all the better. She would make sure to at least come back in time to get him to work. Maybe. Hell, he could use a day off.

She pursued her brother all the way out to the car, tailing him until he got into the car and shut the door.

“I don’t know what you think you’re going to accomplish by kidnapping me,” he grumbled while they were driving.

“Don’t you, Zeus?”

“I’m not Zeus! S**t! Would you leave off?”

“Oh, Big Brother, you should know me better than that,” she told him sweetly.

“Heaven help us if Interpol ever got wind of you.”

“I just hate to see you so sulky, is all.”

“Like hell. You’re enjoying yourself far too much for this to be any kind of charity act.”

She gasped as if stricken. “I am shocked and appalled that you would think such thing of me. Shocked and appalled. I am doing this out of the goodness of my heart, just for you my dear brother.” She sniffed. “As if it’s impossible for me to enjoy doing good works.”

“Right,” he said dryly. “And explain how this is ‘doing good works’?”

“Easy! She’s pretty. You’re pretty. I’m simply trying to fill the world with pretty babies.”

“Okay, first: you’re never calling me ‘pretty’ again. Second: what makes you think I have any intention of… of babies?”

“Oh, please. Enough with the macho bullshit. I already know full well that you’re retarded for her.”

He opened his mouth.

“Ah!” she interrupted, holding up a finger. He glared.

“Fine. Yes. Are you happy? But in case you hadn’t noticed, she already has a boy of her own, and she’s made up her mind about that.”

Talia snorted and waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “Please. That didn’t stop the other Zeus.”

“I’m. Not. Zeus.”

She rolled her eyes. Time to try another tactic. “Fine, fine, fine. So, Not-Zeus, are you telling me you’re intimidated by a little boy?”

“No!”

“Sounds to me like you are.”

“I’m not intimidated!”

“Are you sure? ‘Cause… I got to say, it does sound like it.”

He snarled, loudly. Talia had to bite her lip to stop from giggling. “Tha’ boy is nothin’ but a spoiled little child who thinks th’ whole world revolves around what he wants! He does not deserve t’ git in arm’s reach o’ the lass, let alone…” he trailed off. He didn’t even want to think it.

Ooh, he was pissed. He always sounded like Dad when he got pissed.

“So-o,” Talia prompted. “What are you going to do about it?”

“Absolutely nothing.”

For the first time, she scowled. “What?”

“I said I’m going to do absolutely nothing. She made up her mind. End of story.”

“Hm, yeah, I don’t buy that.”

“You’ve met the boy.”

“Yeah, so?”

“So, that’s what she chose.”

Talia shook her head. “You really are an idiot. Look—you want her. Yes?”

“Yes,” he admitted grudgingly.

“So for heaven’s sakes,” she said, “Do something about it! S**t!”

 

 

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There were very few times when she really got mad at her brother. Oh, sure, he annoyed her all the time. And she annoyed him. That’s how those things worked. But really, truly angry? Now that was rare. For all his bluster and bullshit he really was a good guy and she could never get mad at anybody like that, brother or not. In fact, she couldn’t even remember the last time she had been mad at him.

Today, though, she had a mind to smack him upside the head and really mean it. He hung back at the edge of the porch while she knocked. She watched him from the corner of her eye. She had the keys to the car, yes, but it would not be out of the question for him to pull some silly stunt like walk the twenty or so miles back to the apartment, or wherever else he felt like disappearing off to. Sometimes it sucked to have such a self-sufficient brother.

Aria opened the door, all fresh and perky like she always was in the mornings. Pregnancy was certainly agreeing with her. She wasn’t quite showing yet—though she would be, soon—but she was glowy enough for an entire bloody family.

“Heya, girl!” Talia greeted her when she opened the door. “How’s stuff?”

“Not bad at all. Come on in!”

Talia looked over her shoulder. “You coming, Big Brother?”

He wrinkled his nose at her and followed reluctantly.

Oh, how she wished she could have the look on his face on film, when the girl walked out of the kitchen. She would treasure that forever. Little Leda stopped dead in her tracks when she saw him, with a look on her face that was absolutely priceless. The fact of the matter was that she’d been getting drearier and drearier every time Talia had shown up without her brother in tow and it was a hell of a relief to see her finally perk up a bit. She was just glad to be of service.

Ryan was still being entirely too standoffish, but Talia managed to get the two idiots downstairs with a minimum of fuss. That part was easy, in a way—put the two of them together, good old Mother Nature would take over and they’d barely have a choice. The trick, of course, was getting them to admit what the rest of the damned world had already figured out.

She got them started, running through those mock fights they were so fond of. While they were suitably distracted she disappeared up the stairs with a muttered excuse about fetching a glass of milk for her brother. Aria was up in the living room playing that pretty violin of hers. Talia settled onto the couch to listen.

She was really good. Seriously. If she hadn’t turned hunter—not that there had ever been much of a chance of any other outcome—she could have easily been a famous violinist playing for some awesome orchestra somewhere, or whatever it was that bloody genius violinists did. Talia listened for quite a while, just enjoying the music and the chance to really relax for a little while. She wasn’t too worried about the kids downstairs. They had been plenty distracted by their retardation for each other when she’d gone upstairs, and at least one of them would have come upstairs to investigate if they ever realized she’d been missing for almost an hour now.

Maybe she’d get really lucky and Little Leda would take a nasty fall. Talia wondered, vaguely, if her brother realized exactly what he was doing every time he gave that girl a part of his blood. Probably not. He had been called unexpectedly, and he never bothered with the finer details of their kind either before or, hell, even after that. He generally preferred to pick things up as he needed to. Wing it, so to speak.

Ah well, they were halfway to together with or without Ryan’s little contributions.

After she had been upstairs for a couple of hours, Talia was getting curious to see how her plan was coming. She winked at Aria and slipped silently down the stairs. Not even a hunter could hear her when she really tried. She stuck her head around the corner, just enough to see. She smirked.

Not bad.

They were leaning against one of the walls, and they had worked up a mighty fine sweat, for sure, doing… whatever it was they’d been doing. Fighting, probably. They still had all their clothes on and neither was particularly glowing. Well, more than usual. Wait, no, Little Leda was brighter than usual. Talia could see a trace of her brother behind her eyes.

Not bad at all.

Talia grinned widely and slipped back upstairs.

Aria paused for a moment, theoretically changing the music in front of her. Bullshit. Aria never needed any bloody sheet music to play. Talia held a finger in front of her lips and shook her head. Aria glanced downwards and raised her eyebrows. Talia grinned again and shrugged promisingly. Aria nodded and went back to playing.

Talia grabbed a snack from the kitchen. She hadn’t decided yet whether she should strand her brother at the house. On the one hand, it was for his own good. On the other hand, he’d be more likely to ignore her in the future if he was too pissed at her for stranding him at Little Leda’s house. Of course, if she found some halfway legitimate excuse to run off without him he might be a little more agreeable. Or less disagreeable, as the case may and probably would be.

Now, what excuse could she use…?

She sat, pondering and enjoying the free violin concert, for at least another hour. The problem was, she had already used up most of her usual excuses back before this whole fiasco when she was plotting to very unfortunately miss the Saturday training sessions so that just her brother could be there. She didn’t like to use any one excuse any more than twice in one year, or else she would risk letting them go stale and then she’d be out a whole crapload of excuses for good instead of just having to put off using one or two for a while.

Her thoughts were interrupted by someone knocking at the door. Aria set down her violin and went to answer it, and Talia looked up in interest.

Oh, hell in a handbasket.

It was Leda’s little boytoy.

He said hello to Aria and said something about a lunch date with the girl, then asked where she was.

“Oh, she’s still training. She should be up in another minute or two,” Aria told him. “Talia, do you want to go tell her Nate’s here?”

Jackpot.

“Actually, you can just go on down,” Talia said. “Go see how much progress they’ve made. I’ve, er, got to use the bathroom.”

She disappeared around the corner and pressed her ear to the vent next to the stairs. The one that blew air up from the basement through a nice, echo-y metal tube. Sure, she could probably hear well enough without it. But she wanted front-row seats to this show. First was the muted scuffling of a mock fight overpowered by the sound of feet on stairs. Then the feet stopped, and there was dead silence for a moment or two. Then came the yelling. Talia had to bite her fist to stifle the giggles that threatened to burst from her throat. If at all possible, she wanted them mad. Leda’s boytoy got stupid when he got mad. Ryan just got scary. If he got scary enough, maybe the boy would back off and find somebody else to charm the socks off of.

Then more stomping of feet. First one set coming up the stairs, then another close after. She walked back around the corner, into the living room, in time to see the boy emerged followed closely by Leda, who looked like she’d been chasing him. They walked briskly out the door and to the boy’s car.

A few seconds later her brother showed his face, looking tousled and pissed.

“I guess you’ll be wanting that milk now,” Talia said. She moved towards the kitchen, bouncing theatrically on the balls of her feet. When she came back from the kitchen Ryan was staring out the window, looking at the spot where the boy’s car had been. She handed him the glass.

“So? What’s the deal?” she asked.

“That boy’s an idiot,” he said without turning around.

“Duly noted. And?”

“I’m forty years older than her.”

“You’re frozen at eighteen. Next.”

“I’m her trainer. Her teacher.”

“Nobody gives a flying frick. You done yet?”

He sighed, and looked down. “…Yeah. I’m done for all right.”

She grinned widely. “’Atta-boy.”

He gave her a disgruntled look. “This is going to backfire completely. I hope you know that.”

“Go get your Leda, Zeus.”