West of Want (Hearts of the Anemoi) by Laura Kaye Page A

getting hurt.
    “Thank you, Boreas. I’m glad you summoned me here.”
    The god chuckled. “Don’t stay away so long next time.”
    “I’ll try.” Zeph closed his eyes and focused, saw his compass rose in his mind’s eye. Just as he dematerialized, Boreas offered a last parting thought:
    “Sometimes what you want is what you need, Zephyros. Don’t forget it.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN
    Boreas’s words filled Zephyros with resolve. He had no idea what, if anything, might happen with Ella, but he wanted the chance to find out. He wanted to know if that peaceful aura would continue to affect him, if the kind look in her eyes could bloom into true affection, if the passion in her kisses would be lasting or fleeting.
    She dominated his thoughts. Excited his body. Eased that dull ache filling his chest just left of center. He felt drawn to her in a way he didn’t fully understand, but damn it, how he wanted to.
    But he couldn’t explore any of that while Eurus played his games.
    Zeph concentrated and allowed his mind to travel in search of his brother’s unique energy signature. As polar opposites, their energies were connected. Yin and yang. Life and death. West and East. So he found Eurus, easily. Within blocks of Ella’s house. Thunder rumbled around him as he flowed through the air in pursuit.
    Corporeality returned in a blaze of light, his seething rage crackling around him.
    “Ah, brother. I’ve been expecting you,” Eurus said. In the gloom of twilight, he lay prone on the dock in the middle of the marina where Ella’s boat had been taken that first day. Ankles crossed. Fingers making lazy designs in the air as if he were conducting a symphony. Cold wind whipped up around them, turning the calm waters of the inlet choppy, jostling the sailboats in their slips.
    His brother’s calm, casual repose was more disturbing than if Zeph had found him petulant and ranting. Because it meant he was planning. “What the fuck are you playing at, Eurus?”
    He sprung to his feet and tugged the lapels of his leather coat. “You see? I offer civility, and what do I get in return?”
    Zeph squared off and braced, ready for anything. “You don’t have a civil bone in your body.”
    Eurus pinched the bridge of his nose, shifting the wraparounds up the smallest bit. Though not enough, Zeph was relieved to see, to reveal his dead black irises. “If what you say is true, brother, whose fault exactly would that be?”
    “Not. Mine.” It was a fruitless conversation, but it was their little dance, and Zeph’s own special corner of hell.
    “Of course not yours. Not perfect Zephyros. Not the god of life and renewal. Gods forbid.”
    Zeph ignored the barb. Perfection was the last thing he believed of himself. Eurus was jealous of a figment of his imagination. “What do you want?” he finally bit out, hoping to defuse the other man, to delay the confrontation long brewing between them.
    Eurus whipped off his glasses and drilled his disturbing, blank gaze into Zeph’s very soul. “Leave the woman alone.”
    Rage filled Zeph’s chest with white-hot pressure. “Why the fuck do you even care? It’s nothing to you—”
    “Ah!” He chuckled and held out his hands. “You see, that’s where you’re wrong. It is something to me. Because it’s something to you.” He jabbed his long, elegant finger in the air.
    Warm wind whipped around him and rain pattered down in heavy drops, alleviating the smallest amount of the volcanic build-up within Zeph’s human manifestation. Prudence dictated he maintain a façade of calm. The more he revealed his interest in Ella, the more Eurus would latch on to the idea of her. “You know what? I’m not doing this with you anymore. You’ve built up this list of imagined offenses and there’s no reasoning with you.” He slashed his hand in the air. “Be gone.”
    Eurus’s body stumbled back, like an invisible hand shoved at his chest. He went elemental as his body flew off the edge of the