Warriors of Poseidon 04 - Atlantis Unmasked

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    “You think I‟ve got you,” he said slowly. “I like the sound of that.”
     
    Sam, Michelle, and the dozen trainees lined up in rows on either side of the target area, loudly calling out their favorites and bets for the challenge.
     
    Grace smiled and shook her head at them. “Hey, a little more respect here. Loser‟s buying you yahoos dinner.”
     
    She raised her elegant wooden bow and fitted the arrow exactly where she wanted it in a graceful motion that was second nature to her, the bow a natural extension of her arm. Her breasts rose with the motion, straining against the fabric of her shirt, and his mouth went dry again, but this time for an entirely different reason.
     
    He bowed toward the trainees and then to Grace. “After you, my lady.”
     
    She leaned toward him a little, opening those lush lips, and he instinctively bent closer to hear. “There‟s something you should know about me, Alexios. I choose my targets very carefully, and I never, ever miss when I aim,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper. “And now I‟m aiming at you.”
     
    With that she whirled to face the target, pulled back her bowstring, and let the arrow fly.
    True to her word, the point struck dead center in the bull‟s-eye of the large straw target that stood twenty yards directly opposite her.
     
    A cheer went up from their audience, and the man who‟d had the effrontery to touch her earlier whistled. “Yeah, Grace! That‟ll show him.”
     
    Alexios bared his teeth in a fierce approximation of a smile and lifted one of his daggers over his shoulder, judged the distance to the target next to Grace‟s, and then threw it with exacting precision. The dagger struck right in the heart of the red circle.
     
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    Another cheer went up, and he heard Michelle‟s British voice rising above the others, “Twenty pounds on Grace!”
     
    “Let‟s make it more interesting, shall we?” Grace said, another arrow already in her hand. “Five more each, and we‟ll shoot simultaneously. Whoever has the best array at the finish will be declared the winner.”
     
    Words didn‟t seem like enough. He threw back his head and laughed, sheer joy rising through his limbs, bubbling in his veins, and clearing out the cobwebs in his soul. She had courage as well as the grace that bore her name—a fitting match to a warrior, in every way possible. “As you like, my lady. Be warned, though. I plan to eat a very large dinner. I hope your pockets are full of cash.”
     
    With that, he took aim and threw dagger after dagger into the heart of his target. The challenge wasn‟t the target; it was to keep from being distracted by the way his entire being strained toward Grace.
     
    But he‟d trained for centuries to succeed in spite of any distraction, no matter how intense. He threw the daggers, one by one, and his aim was true with each. After he‟d released all six of his daggers, he smiled with satisfaction at the way they clustered so tightly in the bull‟s-eye. Nothing with a thickness greater than the tip of his smallest finger would have been able to fit between any of them.
     
    He‟d won. She‟d buy dinner, and then he would have her for dessert.
     
    He turned toward her, the satisfaction of victory fighting with the tiniest sliver of regret that she would be disappointed. But nothing remotely like disappointment showed on her face. Instead, bright triumph glittered in her gaze and smile.
     
    He shot a glance at her target. Five arrows stood in a circle in the center of her own bull‟s-eye, their feathered fletching still quivering with the force of impact.
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    “Five?” he said, frowning. “But—”
     
    “I have one more.” She fitted her sixth and final arrow to her bow, then, staring directly at Alexios the whole time and never once turning her gaze to the target, she let the arrow fly. The thunk of arrow on target was followed by a brief hush and then the sound of a dozen sharply drawn breaths.
     
    Still staring at Alexios, a smile twitching at the edges of her lips, Grace slung her bow over her shoulder again. A resounding cheer made it impossible for him to hear what she was saying, though her lips were moving.
     
    He had to know. He spun around to see her target, but it was unchanged. Five arrows stood tightly together, the work of an expert archer. Puzzled, he glanced