have to look at them. “I’m fine now… let me go to her.”
“Her? You’re keeping him away from Envy?” Michael inquired while taking a seat on the bucket.
Warren looked at Michael and held up one finger… then pointed it at Devon with a mischievous smile. “You can’t go see Envy right now… it’s the middle of the night and she’s probably in bed snuggled up to her Teddy Bear.”
When Devon grabbed his head and started screaming in a tired voice, Michael slowly tipped the bottle up and took a long drink. It was a Trevor pun… he understood that much, but why the theatrics?
Michael felt his healing powers surface and sat the bottle back on the floor… he could feel Devon's pain and didn’t like it. He started toward the cage with every intention of fixing Devon but Warren’s words stopped him.
“He’s alright… leave him be,” Warren nodded when Michael turned to look at him curiously. “Kane has him under a compulsion spell.”
“Kane did this?” Michael asked rubbing his temple. “Isn’t this why you called saying you needed my help?”
Warren shook his head, “Nope, I need something else.”
By the time Warren finished telling him everything, Devon had quieted down to soft groans. “Where have you been for the last couple days not to have already known about this?” Warren asked. “And in case you didn’t know… your cell phone is going straight to voicemail.”
“We’ll talk about that later,” Michael brushed his own problems to the side and once again approached the cage. From the amount of pain coming off Devon, he’d have to say Kat was right in which brother needed his help. And right now… helping Warren meant talking some sense into Devon.
Squatting down beside the cage, Michael gripped the bars and tried the opposite thing that Warren had been trying. “Devon, look at me.”
“I don’t think so,” Devon said quietly. “The last time I looked at one of your kind… this happened.”
“Fine, just listen closely,” Michael said calmly. “I know you… have watched you since the day you were born. You’re hot headed and very passionate about everything you do, but above all you’re honorable. Believe it or not… I understand perfectly. You’ve found your soul mate and you love her with all of that hotheaded passion. It’s because of that passion that Envy fell in love with you. You know that… right?”
Devon remained silent as he listened to Michael's gentle voice then finally gave a slight nod. “She loves both of us though. I’ve known it all along. And now… there’s a baby.”
Michael closed his eyes as a vision of Aurora swam through his mind followed by the image of the demon that claimed to have possession of her. Blinking away his own disturbing thoughts, he refocused on the jaguar.
“I see… in your eyes Trevor is winning. So then… what will you do? Give her back to Trevor?” Michael asked point blank.
“No… but I don’t know how to beat him,” Devon gave voice to his biggest fear.
The caged jaguar made a pained face and Michael knew it wasn’t from a migraine… but a pain far deeper than that. “I’m not sure what you need to do but Kane gave you a huge hint when he put you and Trevor under the compulsion spell. The quickest way for you to lose Envy is to hurt the man she loves… and that goes for the both of you. It’s not about a competition anymore.”
“Then what do I do?” Devon finally looked at him.
“That’s the easy part… you love her exactly like you did before you found out she was pregnant. That is the man that took her away from Trevor in the first place,” Michael said as he snapped the lock on the cage. “Trevor has nothing to do with the way Envy loves you.”
When Devon didn’t make a move to come out of the cage, Michael looked back at Warren and then glanced up the stairs pointedly. The two of them moved away from the cage and back up into the bar area.
Warren stayed quiet until they reached the bar. There were many reasons why he loved Michael and the fact that the vampire had just gotten through to Devon where no one else had didn’t surprise him in the least.
“That’s why I called you. I know I was being cruel to him, but at first I thought it would work. Make him immune… you know,” Warren shrugged.
Michael shook his head and walked behind the bar to grab another bottle of Heat. “You torturing Devon before I got here was probably why he was exhausted enough to finally listen to reason. Don’t get me wrong… he’ll still have his fair share of migraines from random thoughts before it’s all said and done, but even without Kane’s compulsion, I don’t think he would have followed through with any of those thoughts. He loves Envy too much to risk her hating him.”
“Too bad Trevor caught on to that theory first. It made the bear shifter kind of look like the good guy… or at least it didn’t help Devon save face.” Warren pointed out still holding the bottle of Heat he’d brought up from the dance pit.
“About that,” Michael made a face knowing there was no such thing as a bear shifter. He rubbed his hand over his eyes remembering the bar was probably bugged by PIT and not a good place to be telling secrets. “I think it’s safe to leave Devon alone for a while. Let’s say we take a drive.”
Warren pulled two sets of keys out of his pocket, tossing one to Michael. “I bought a couple things this morning that you might find enticing,” Warren hinted with an intriguing smirk.
Michael followed him into the private garage attached to the extended building and smiled when he saw the sleek black motorcycles parked beside Warren's jaguar.
“You do know what I like,” Michael said and approached the vehicles.
“Where to?” Warren asked.
Michael started to say his house, but changed his mind associating the place with the loneliness he’d felt earlier. “Let’s go to Love Bites. At least I know that place isn’t bugged by PIT.”
“Must be important if you want to keep it from them,” Warren said.
Michael nodded and took up his helmet, “Trust me… it’s very important.”
“Race you,” Warren taunted as he put his helmet on.
Michael smirked, “Yeah right, you’ll be eating my dust.”
Chapter 5
A loud sound woke Aurora. She sat upright forgetting where she was for a moment. The sound abruptly silenced and she slid from the blankets to investigate. She crawled across the rooftop to the huge sanctuary sign and stood up behind the red lettering.
Peeking around the edge of one of the letters, she saw two men parking a pair of two wheeled machines close to the doors. She’d seen humans riding these contraptions around the city and they traveled very fast. It made her question how they kept from killing themselves on them. Humans were fragile creatures and it was usually the brave ones that figured that out first.
She tilted her head to the side curious when she heard male laughter and
