Page 76 of Vengeance of the Gods

Bridger pulled himself up slowly, too relaxed compared to her sister. He casually wiped his hands against his pants, holes indicating he’d been stabbed a few times.

“Breaking the curse wasn’t part of the deal, Commander,” Marlena purred, watching the cold warrior shift back into place after his interrupted kiss. “But it’s good to see you’re taking kissing Vega very seriously.”

Bridger rolled up his sleeves, returning to the commander of Tolevarre.

27

Time slowed.

Vega felt like she was watching Bridger’s sleeves roll in slow motion, every flex of his hand and bulge of his forearm catching her eye.

“Do you trust me?” Bridger’s voice asked… but it wasn’t Bridger asking out loud, because he was standing five feet away looking like he was morphing back into the man she’d promised to kill.

Into the man with a secret.

Into the man with a deal.

His words caressed her brain like a feather. Like a whisper across her lips, she could feel his thoughts.

It was a feeling she’d felt a few times before but never had the whisper been so clear.

“In order for us to get home, she had to break her curse.” He ran a hand through his hair, mussing it in just the right way, a small strand falling out of place and curling across his forehead.

“Trust me,” Bridger said again, this time making eye contact with her when his words tickled her mind again.

She saw it in his eyes this time, the scrunch of his eyebrows and the way he bit the inside of his lip. But the moment was gone, his arms crossing over his chest.

Closing himself off.

So much power sizzled in her body, so much more than she’d ever felt, but she couldn't concentrate on it, couldn’t allow herself to feel the shiver of something new.

Something she’d been willing to trade her life for.

The portal had felt like a dream, and she almost told herself it was until…

A flutter of something inside her mind threatened to catch her attention, but it got lost, because Bridger took up too much space as he stepped away from Vega, settling in beside Marlena. “Vega, I promise⁠—”

Her sister smirked, dragging her eyes up Vega’s body, unknowingly interrupting Bridger. “You can break your curse, but you can’t figure out how to break your connection to a man who’s so desperate to rid himself of you that he’d⁠—”

“Tone down the dramatics.” Bridger sighed.

Vega stared at the side of his head, waiting for him to look at her. Gods, I’d been so stupid.

“I wasn’t going to be able to stop the curse from breaking. She’d already set it in motion the moment she landed back on Earth with her memories.” He picked a broken leaf off the collar of his shirt. The nonchalance of his demeanor felt like a slow, cold knife to the back. “But that didn’t mean the trip had to be a total waste. I thought I could take advantage to get information we might be able to use.” Bridger stole a glance at Marlena. “I have so many ideas.”

His gaze finally found Vega’s. Her heart was at war with her brain, which was at war with her body.

The reality of what Bridger was saying hit Vega like a freight train, and when the first laugh bubbled from her throat, it took her by surprise. The laughing didn’t slow, it only grew as she began to pity her poor self.

“No way,” Vega mused, finally able to get her fit of giggles under control. “You really got me.”

It can't be true. It can’t be. Her own voice pleaded. That was my Bridger. He was my Bridger…

Marlena snickered behind closed lips. “You should know better than to let your heart get in the way during a war you should be using your brain for.”

Vega wiggled her fingers. The vibration of the air simply existing around her was almost overwhelming. The flap of Khort’s wing beats disrupted the flow of wind enough to alert Vega of his approach.

Bridger sensed him too. She could see it in the way his head ticked to the side.