Atlantis Rising

like it's family reunion week,' he called out.

He held out his hand to Conlan. 'Jack Shepherd. I help out.'

Quinn walked out of a small door behind Jack, arguing with somebody on the telephone. 'No, it's now or never. I need that stuff tonight. Or by morning at the latest.'

She held her hand over the receiver, nodded to Riley, looked at Jack. 'Dawn?'

He nodded, body radiating a fierce tension. 'Dawn. If your friends agree that it's better to hit the bloodsuckers at daylight?'

Conlan inhaled deeply, subtly called power. The elements sang to him, but the earth's song was the most piercing. He looked at Jack. 'And how about you? Is it better for you and the other shape-shifters to hit at dawn, too?'

Chapter 34

While Ven and the Seven made nice with Quinn's strike force, Conlan, Riley, and Quinn and her buddy the alpha werewolf sat around a scarred metal table on chipped and battered wooden chairs.

Quinn looked at Conlan. 'He's not.'

'He's not what?'

'He's not a werewolf, if that's what you were thinking. He's… Jack, is it okay if I tell them?'

Jack shot a hard, measuring stare at Conlan. Oh, yeah. The man was definitely a warrior, no matter what kind of animal he turned into under the moon's pull.

'Fine. I guess knowing about Atlantis is about as tit for tat as we can get on this op,' he said.

Quinn smiled briefly. 'He's a weretiger. Not indigenous to North America. But when the vamps—'

'When the bloodsuckers destroyed my entire streak—my family group—I decided they were going to die. And the best way to take them down was to come to the source,' Jack said, voice bleak.

Riley sent an affirmation through the bond. The man was telling the truth. That was good enough for Conlan. 'We need to recover the Trident. Its power in the hands of Barrabas or—gods help us—Anubisa could well signal the beginning of the next Cataclysm.'

Quinn nodded. 'They have your people, too. Daniel told us he's planning a coup, and we—'

'Daniel?' Riley interrupted. 'Who is he, and why do we trust him?'

'Good question,' Jack growled. 'He's one of Barrabas's top generals, and I don't trust him. Ask your crazy sister what the hell she's thinking.'

A dark, swirling shadow swept through the room, driving an icy wind before it. Before he'd even materialized, Quinn stood up, hands outstretched. 'Alaric.'

He swept down, took her hands, and pushed her back and away from the shape-shifter.

Jack obviously didn't care for that at all. He was on his feet, gun in hand, in the blink of an eye. Conlan had nearly forgotten how fast shape-shifters could move.

From the look of it, maybe weretigers were the fastest of the bunch.

'Step away from the lady, magic boy,' he growled, in a low, rumbling roar.

Next to him, Riley shivered at the jungle sound resonating through the small room. Conlan jumped up, flashed across the table to face Jack. 'Calm down, he's with us.'

'I don't care who he is, he needs to keep his hands off my partner, or he's going to be fertilizer.' Jack's eyes glowed an eerie yellow-green shade and the pupils lengthened to slits.

Quinn's voice came from behind Conlan. 'Jack, stop it. This is Alaric, and he healed me from that gunshot wound. He has… civility issues.'

Heat and light shot through the room, and Conlan didn't have to turn around to know who was generating it. 'Alaric! A little control, if you please. We've got a lot to deal with, here.'

Alaric's voice was rusty, strained. 'A word, if you would, my lady. I need—I need—' He broke off, breathing harshly.

Riley started to go to Quinn, but Conlan stopped her with a hand on her arm. This was something Quinn and Alaric had to figure out before they could all work as a team to storm the Primus. Riley glared at him, then felt his emotions and signaled that she understood. Nodded and sat back down.

Quinn finally spoke, her voice unbearably weary. 'Yes. We need to talk. Especially since that's all we will ever do with each other. Come with me. The rest of you, please just wait. Get to know each other.'

She laughed. 'Eat a cookie.'

As Quinn and Alaric left the room, Conlan achieved a moment of clarity. The realization that Quinn had trapped Alaric in her empathic net as surely as Riley had done to Conlan.

But certain sea creatures founder and drown in nets.

And Alaric was looking like one of them.

Then they were gone, leaving him alone with a creature that everything in his heritage told him he should destroy.

Riley watched them leave, then heaved out a sigh. She leaned forward, elbows on the table, and smiled at Jack. 'So. Tell us about being a tiger. Where are you from?'

Alaric faced Quinn on the roof of the building. Fighting desperately for self-control. For calm.

For the courage not to fall on his knees in front of this human female and beg for her touch.

How Poseidon must be laughing at his high priest now.

She watched him, wariness in every line of her body. 'You're the most powerful with the magic, aren't you? I can feel it singing in your veins, thrumming underneath my skin. What did you do to me when you healed me? And thank you for that, by the way.'

He stalked her, paced in an ever-diminishing circle around her position. Knowing he should stop.

Unable to do so.

'I did nothing unusual, although current events suggest that Riley may have aided in your healing,' he said roughly. 'What was unusual was what you did to me.'

She wasn't even beautiful. He'd always thought he'd fall someday, into grand and gloriously unrequited love with an amazing beauty. A goddess among women.

Among Atlantean women.

Yet this scruffy human—this rebel—wasn't anything like what he'd imagined. She was so thin as to look starved, all huge eyes with black circles under them over hollow cheeks. Her short hair looked like she'd cut it with that knife she kept in her pocket. Her clothes were no better than what he'd seen on beggars on the streets.

He wanted her so badly it was an actual physical pain squeezing his balls.

'I don't know what you think you see, but I'm not like my sister,' she said, voice and emotions filled with sorrow. The heat and colors of her emotions swirled around him, tortured him. Wine red, dusky gray, and the blue of the sea at twilight danced into him, through him, piercing him with poignancy.

Bringing tears to his eyes.

He fought them back. Fought against the silken net she so effortlessly wove around his heart. Around his soul.

The woman who could tame a sea monster.

And he, the monster.

'You're nothing like your sister,' he agreed. 'And yet you're exactly like her. Foolishly idealistic, the both of you. She saves crack babies, and you save the world.'

Feint, attack. 'Did you know that Riley gave up her life for two of our warriors?'

She paled even beyond the marble whiteness that was her skin. Her perfect skin.

The skin he wanted to taste.

'What?' she gasped. 'But, wait. You said 'gave up her life.' She was pretty clearly alive in that room.'

'Yes. Poseidon plays with semantics as easily as he plays with destinies and lives. He took her for his own.'

She scowled. Took a step closer to him. 'What the hell does that mean? Is some ancient pervert of a