Текст книги "Fury of the Demon"
Автор книги: Diana Rowland
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Текущая страница: 16 (всего у книги 35 страниц)
Chapter 22
Mzatal stood on the sweet spot in the grass, hands behind his back and eyes closed in a familiar stance of focused concentration. He opened his eyes as I approached. “Zharkat. I am ready to begin.”
“Tell me what I need to do.”
He took my hand, drew me to him. Carefully and patiently, he explained the process and showed me the needed sigils for the diagram, and for the rest of the afternoon we prepared the unassuming patch of grass. For the first hour we did little else but clear residue and stabilize the power of the confluence, like pressure washing grease-encrusted drainage pipes. After that came the foundation anchors sunk deep, and meticulously woven flows. Then dozens upon dozens of rings of sigils, with every link checked and double-checked. Jekki kept us amply supplied with food and tunjen, and after more than four hours of work—and a quick potty break for me—we felt ourselves ready to begin the ritual itself.
Thunder rumbled in the distance as we returned to the confluence, and I glanced up at the sky. Clouds hid the sun, and little gusts of wind whipped high branches. As I lowered my gaze, I caught sight of Jill at the kitchen window, watching with avid curiosity though I doubted she could see any of the sigils. We probably looked rather weird as we walked around in seemingly random circles in my back yard.
Jill grinned and waved at me, but then pointed toward Mzatal and made a point of fanning herself. I grinned right back at her, ridiculously pleased that she’d made it over to see my mega-hot boyfriend. Wait ’til she sees him up close, I thought, chuckling low as I returned my attention to my work.
While I checked the sigils around the perimeter, Mzatal walked spirals, a slight frown on his face. Paul emerged from the house, tablet in hand, looked out to us then down at the tablet. Mzatal’s frown deepened, and he stopped, eyes on the ground.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I am unable to locate the virtual center.” Frustration rolled from him like a slow tumble of boulders. “All is shifting, and I need the precise alignment.”
“One step back and one to the right,” Paul said, eyes glued to the tablet as he crossed the grass toward us and stopped about ten feet away.
Mzatal lifted his head, regarded Paul, and then to my mild surprise took one step back and one to the right.
“Too much,” Paul said with a shake of his head, face fixed in concentration. “Left again a little.”
Mzatal moved as instructed, went still, and drew a deep breath. “Yes.”
“Yes!” Paul exclaimed. He looked up with an exuberant grin, then his mouth dropped open as if he’d just realized what he’d done.
“Well done, Paul,” Mzatal said. Paul flushed, to my amusement.
Mzatal took my hand again. “What was that all about?” I asked quietly.
A faint smile touched his lips. “He has an affinity for the flows,” he told me. “In this world, he touches them through his devices, and it gives him unconventional access to information. Even in the demon realm he feels the flows.” Rare delight lit his eyes. “He is innocent, and it is simply natural to him, a part of who he is. I find him fascinating.”
I smiled. “You like him quite a bit.”
“I do,” he replied without hesitation. “He is . . . comfortable.”
Thunder rumbled in the distance, and gusts of wind whooshed through the tops of the pines. “Time to get this show on the road,” I said with a glance up at the cloudy sky. Hopefully this wouldn’t take too long.
Together, we danced the first seven rings of the shikvihr; Mzatal traced floating sigils that I enhanced and amplified as I followed. When those seven rings were set, I remained in the center of the diagram as Mzatal finished the remaining four. That was a first for me, and with every ring I felt the increase in potency like a vibration inside of my bones.
Once the entire shikvihr was complete, he moved to the center with me. He ignited it in a burst of potency that made my head spin—in a good way—and left me feeling energized, as though fresh from a nap and a brisk walk all at the same time. Together we walked the perimeter and assessed for any anomalies in the sigils. The wind picked up, gusts stronger and more persistent, and carrying the scent of rain.
I took note of the dark, agitated clouds. “We need to finish soon, lover. A thunderstorm is headed this way.”
Mzatal laughed. “It is indeed.” He gave my hand a squeeze. “Glorious, is it not?”
Lightning flashed nearby, followed by a deep rumble of thunder. “Yeah, glorious,” I said doubtfully. “Glorious to watch from the safety of a nice dry house.”
“No, beloved,” he said as he walked us back to the center of the diagram. “I am calling the storm.”
I stopped dead in my tracks. “The fuck?”
Mzatal gave me a sideways look, and a smile crept over his face. “I am calling the lightning. We will use it to activate the nexus.”
I felt my eyes stretch wide open. “ Lightning?” I’d lived in Louisiana all my life and had a healthy respect for dangerous weather.
“Yes.” An undercurrent of excitement rippled through his voice. “I work in great harmony with lightning.”
Reluctantly, I moved to the center with him. “You do know that human bodies are kind of allergic to big jolts of electricity, right?”
“It will be an experience you will not forget, zharkat.”
“For the remaining ten seconds of my life, you mean,” I muttered, already sweating at the thought.
Mzatal turned to face me and laid his hands on my shoulders, expression serious. “Beloved, I will not allow harm to come to you,” he assured me. “But I do not wish to bring you distress. The activation will be stronger with you here with me, but I will not mandate it.”
The truth of it showed in his eyes. I exhaled softly, leaned in and kissed him. “I’ll stay, but you’d best remember that if you fry me, I won’t be much fun in the sack afterward.”
Mzatal returned the kiss, trailed his fingers along my cheek and smiled. “Then I will most assuredly notfry you.”
He moved behind me and dropped his left arm over my shoulder and across my chest, pulled me back against him. With this close connection, I felthim call the storm, felt the increasing charge in the air. He inhaled deeply, as if bringing in all of the energy from the diagram around us.
“Focus on the full pattern,” he murmured. “See all of its parts as a single unit.” He raised his free arm high above his head. “When the strike comes, send it to every aspect.”
I swallowed. “Sure. Got it. I’m an old hand at this.” Wind whipped around us and rushed through the nearby woods, as if we were the calm center of the storm. Movement caught my eye, and I looked up to see Jill and Bryce emerge from the house to watch us from the sensible shelter of the covered porch. Paul knelt in the grass halfway between the perimeter of the diagram and the house, rapt focus on us as he clutched his tablet to his chest.
“Paul!” Bryce called out. “Get under cover!”
Paul didn’t move or even acknowledge him. Bryce scowled, said something I couldn’t hear and pointed for Jill to stay against the wall of the house. He leapt off the porch and hurried toward Paul, staying low as leaves and large drops of rain lashed through the air. “Paul! Jesus, kid. You need to get out of here!”
Paul startled as Bryce put a hand on his shoulder. “What?” He jerked his eyes up to Bryce. “No. I’m okay.”
Bryce shielded his face with his forearm. “Yeah?” he shouted over the wind. “You’re giving mea heart attack.”
Paul’s face filled with sudden worry, then he scrambled to his feet and returned to the porch with a deeply relieved Bryce right behind him.
With one hand still held high, Mzatal tightened his arm around me. “ Now, zharkat.”
Lightning leaped to his hand, and a CRACKof thunder ripped the air. Power slammed through me, like a ten-foot-high wall of water crashing down, but without it crushing me or bowling me over. Even though I’d never been struck by lightning, I knew without a doubt this wasn’t at all the same. Every particle of every atom in my body screamed in joyous furor, utterly painless yet with an intensity that threatened to overwhelm.
Almost as an afterthought, I remembered to shunt the power out to the pattern, filling every aspect and sigil and loop as it ignited in a glorious rush. I felt Mzatal’s approving acknowledgement of completion as he released the strike.
Eyes wide, I breathed in shaky gasps. It felt like a roller coaster ride, the kind where you scream you want off while it’s happening, then can’t wait to do it again as soon as it’s over. “Hot fucking damn,” I managed, though I knew I had a crazy grin on my face. Every cell in my body seemed to vibrate on the verge between uncomfortableand ecstatic pleasure.
Mzatal lowered his hand, radiating strength and power as he dropped his head beside mine and nuzzled my neck. “Do you wish to remain for more, zharkat?” he asked, voice rich and intense. “The diagram is complete, but I am not.”
I gave an unsteady laugh. “I can take it if you can.” I leaned back into him, not wanting the moment to end. In my peripheral vision I saw Bryce shield Jill protectively on the porch, while Paul stared at us in utter awe.
Rain lashed around us, and the trees groaned under the onslaught of the wind, though we remained untouched in our arcane creation. Mzatal straightened, lifted his right hand again. “This one is for pleasure.”
The second strike was as heart-stoppingly kickass awesome as the first—even more so as Mzatal held the power, reveled in it, and shared it with me, with no need to shunt it to the diagram. Our connection expanded and crystallized in near orgasmic ecstasy, and in those extraordinary seconds, I saw through his eyes, felt what he felt, knew what he knew. When he released the lightning, the intimate hyper-awareness went with it, but the entire experience still left me breathless, amazed, and feeling somehow morethan myself.
Mzatal, vibrant and alive, turned me and gathered me close. “Well done, zharkat,” he murmured.
“That was wild,” I said with a soft laugh. “And a little terrifying.”
“It is exhilarating,” he agreed. “And another means to enhance potency.”
I smiled up at him, certain I was glowing. “Did it work? Do we have a mini-nexus now?” I felt plenty of power around us, but I had no idea if it was from the lightning strikes, was generated by the diagram, or simply radiated from us.
“We do. It is perfect.”
I grinned. “A bouncing baby nexus.”
For a brief instant he tried to hold back the laugh, then gave up and let it out—a glorious rich sound. “Yes,” he finally said, eyes still swimming with mirth. “And we its proud parents.”
He cradled the back of my head in one hand, slid the other to the small of my back, pulled me close for a deep and smoldering kiss. I slid my arms around his neck and returned it eagerly. I clearly felt his enhanced potency, and I had some neat ideas for how to celebrate the addition of a mini-nexus to our magic family.
But not right here in full view of spectators. I broke the kiss and seized his hand. “Pond,” I gasped, and then we were off at a run down the trail. I let him lead since I figured he could see better in the rainy gloom, and running smack into a pine would probably cool my ardor a teensy bit.
Lightning still lit the clouds as we emerged into the clearing, reflected in the pond like earth and sky joined in perfect synchrony. Dozens of sigils glowed around his little pavilion, adding their own color and sparkle to the surface of the water and casting soft light on the surroundings. Literally a magical setting, I thought as he drew me close again for another searing kiss. I moaned against his mouth as my hands worked the buttons on his shirt. Or tried to.
I pulled back with a curse of frustration. “Shitballs goddammit!” I snarled as the wet fabric defeated my attempts. “Are these stapled together?” Great. Magical setting overwhelmed by a ridiculously mundane issue.
He laughed, took my hand, and focused, and a heartbeat later power wrapped around us to pull the rainwater from our clothes and hair and vaporize it with a hiss.
“Show off,” I teased, then made short work of divesting him of the now-dry shirt. The rest of his clothing quickly followed along with my own, and then he scooped me up in his arms, strode to the pavilion, and tumbled me to the mattress.
Laughing, I took hold of his braid and delighted in his groan as I tugged him to me with it. The groan shifted to a growl of desire as he lowered his head to my breast and claimed a nipple. I let out a gasping cry as I arched up to his mouth, wrapped my arms around him, and savored the perfection of his body against mine.
He shifted lower, and I dropped my head back, grip tightening on his head and hair as he wrung incoherent noises from me. Hands and mouth and everything that was him, so familiar to me now yet still as exhilarating as our first time. I eagerly succumbed to it all, cried out and clenched and felt his satisfaction and delight mingle with my pleasure.
Mzatal lifted his head as I fought to catch my breath, his gaze filled with stunning joy and passion. “Zharkat,” he murmured, then shifted forward.
“Not so fast,” I said with a throaty laugh as I once again seized his braid, wrapped it around my hand. “My turn.” Seizing control, I used the grip on his braid, shifted my weight and hooked a leg around his to reverse our positions. Mirthful delight danced in his eyes as he went to his back and I knelt astride him. We both knew he could have resisted easily, but where would be the fun in that? Yet the smile he turned on me was anything but indulgent. I claimed his mouth and tasted my own pleasure on his lips. A groan ripped from his throat, and the hands that rose to grip my hips shuddered with his own unslaked need.
I nipped and kissed along the sculptured landscape of his torso, toyed with sensitized nipples as he clenched his fists and throbbed against me. My fingers skimmed down his sides with a trail of goosebumps to mark their passage. Moving further down, I stroked and slid my flesh and mouth against him, loving upon him and giving back all he’d given me and more, until the clearing echoed with his own cries of need and pleasure and release.
His eyes met mine as our connection reverberated with all we were to each other, foreach other. Shifting forward again, I indulged in a long and slow kiss until heat once again clutched at my belly, and he throbbed hard and urgent between us. As I moaned into the kiss, he slid a hand to my backside and brought the other up to tangle in my hair to hold me close. He rolled me to my back, and I went unresisting, opened to him and wrapped my legs around his hips as he slid inside me. My hands dug into his shoulders as he drove deeper, quickened the pace. Without words I urged him on, merged our desire and ecstasy.
With a strangled cry he plunged into me as I bucked against him, gripped him close, and greedily took all he had to offer. His eyes shone with wild need, and as we crested together, I dragged his head down, covered his mouth with mine, and joined my scream of release with his.
Chapter 23
I stroked his chest while I pillowed my head on his shoulder. “Do you do that lightning thing often?”
“Perhaps thrice a year,” he replied. “Though I called it only two days past after returning home because of the severe depletion.”
“You don’t feel at all depleted now,” I said, pressing close. “We should work on that some more.”
His hand slid to my ass, and he chuckled low. “Ah, you will indeed deplete me, again and again.”
I laughed. “Before any more depletion, I need to get something to eat,” I told him. “Plus, my friend Jill is here. Y’all should meet.”
“Yes, it is time to know Jill Faciane,” he agreed.
We found our scattered clothing, quickly dressed, and returned to the house. Jill and Jekki sat at the kitchen table, heads bent together and apparently deep in conversation. She looked up as we entered, sly smile on her face in an I-know-what-you’ve-been-up-to expression, but then her eyes widened in obvious Wow, Holy Shit!appreciation as she took in the sight of Mzatal up close.
Yeah, my boyfriend was pretty impressive. Especially as radiantly vibrant and super-charged as he was right now.
“Hey, Jill,” I said with a smile. “This is Mzatal. Mzatal, this is Jill.”
She managed to scrounge together some composure, stood and offered Mzatal a hand, though she was clearly trying hard not to stare. “It’s nice to meet you.”
Mzatal took her hand in both of his. “Jill Faciane,” he said with a small smile. “It is a pleasure to finally meet.”
Jill’s mouth dropped open, and I knew she felt the tingling vibration from super-charged Mzatal along with a good dose of his natural mojo.
She abruptly jerked and let out a small Oof!“Sorry,” she said with a shaky laugh as she put her other hand on her belly. “She’s a bit wiggly right now.”
Mzatal’s eyes dropped to Jill’s belly, and an odd expression came over his face, fascinated and perplexed at the same time. He tilted his head slightly, kept hold of her hand, and placed his other hand on her belly. His expression grew even odder, as if struggling to remember a phrase or saying that was on the tip of his tongue.
Silent, I watched the curious exchange. Surely Mzatal had encountered a pregnant woman before? Jill remained motionless and didn’t say a word about the somewhat rude business of touching her belly without permission, though I saw it in the slightly wary-but-baffled look in her eyes. Beneath their hands the baby kicked some more, to judge by Jill’s occasional winces. I sensed him extend, mentally touch the baby.
Rare, naked curiosity lit Mzatal’s face. His lips parted as he leaned closer, feeling the movement of the baby, and connecting on the non-physical level. He abruptly sucked in a gasping breath and straightened, face contorted in pain as he jerked his hands to his head and took a staggering step backward. I seized his arm to steady him.
“Mzatal!? What’s wrong?” I demanded, worry flaring as I sensed his excruciating pain. He let out a low groan and took another step back. I shot a look at Jill as she backed away in confusion. “You okay?” I asked. She blinked and nodded, and I immediately shifted my full worry and attention to Mzatal.
I snaked an arm around his waist. “Outside,” I said as I worked to maneuver him in that direction. “You do better outside. C’mon, Boss.”
He didn’t resist, but it took all of my effort to keep him steady. He nearly stumbled down the back steps, but grabbed onto the post in time to shift the fall into a heavy sit onto the steps.
Jekki ran up beside me, chittering in distress. Keeping a hand on Mzatal’s arm, I shifted to crouch before him. “Mzatal? Boss? How can I help you? What do you need?”
Mzatal kept his eyes squeezed closed in a rictus of agony. “Ilana,” he managed to choke out.
Shit. Couldn’t ask for something simple, like Percocet. “She’s not here,” I said. “I can try to summon her.” Could one of the demahnk even besummoned? I turned to the faas. “Jekki, is Zack here?”
“Dahn dahn dahn.” His tail twisted in worry.
Yeah, that would have been too easy. “Can you get tunjen for Mzatal, please?”
The faas darted off, and I returned my attention to the lord. “Boss, talk to me,” I urged. “What’s going on?”
His breath hissed between his teeth, and a sheen of sweat covered his face. He gave a sudden cry that sounded more like frustration than pain. A shudder wracked his body, and a heartbeat later the rictus of agony faded from his expression. He opened his eyes, wiped an unsteady hand over his face.
“I do not know,” he said, voice thready. Jekki ran up with the glass of tunjen and gently pressed it into his hand. Mzatal murmured a low thanks and sipped, color slowly returning to his face.
“It started when you connected with the baby. Was something wrong with her?”
He started to say No—I feltit—but then the pain spiked through him again, as if caused by the mere thoughtof extending to touch the baby. He drew a breath and remained quiet, and the tension in his face diminished.
My worry for his immediate well-being began to ease a bit now that he didn’t look as if his head was going to explode, though I had plenty of concern beyond that. “Has this ever happened before?”
He drank more tunjen, then set the glass aside and reached for my hand. “Yes, many times,” he said, fingers tightening on mine. “Not for almost a year though.”
I moved to sit beside him on the step. “What triggered these other times?”
He took a long breath and released it. “No single trigger that I have found,” he said. “It has happened when working deep in the plexus. Once when simply talking with Helori. Many times with . . . nightmares.”
I brought his hand up to kiss his fingers. “I’ll try to summon Ilana,” I told him. “Maybe she can help.”
But he shook his head. “The demahnk rarely answer a summons,” he said. “I am unsettled, but the pain has receded. Do not worry, beloved.”
“Yeah, like that’sgoing to happen,” I said with a roll of my eyes, then kissed him gently. Rarely answer.Did that mean they could resist at will? “You should go lie down.”
“Yes, it would be wise,” he agreed. “Yaghir tahn.”
“No need for apology, love.” I gave him a warm smile.
He finished the glass of tunjen, then stood, swaying slightly. “I will be by the pond.”
I rose with him and slipped an arm around his waist. “How about I walk you there.”
His arm encircled me as we started for the path. “I much prefer it that way.”
We made it to his pavilion without incident. I got him onto the bed and made sure Jekki would monitor him. It was clear that Mzatal remained very unsettled, even if the pain had gone.
He rested a hand on the faas’s head, his eyes on me. “Thank you, zharkat.”
“I’ll be back to check on you,” I told him. I leaned over to kiss him. “I love you.”
Mzatal laid his other hand against my cheek, the simple gesture like a caress of my essence. “I love you,” he replied, then took a deep breath and closed his eyes.
I stayed a few more minutes to watch over him, then gave Jekki’s head a scratch and returned to the house.
Jill sat at the kitchen table distractedly flipping through an old Forensic Timesmagazine. She snapped her gaze to me as I came in. “What the hell was that all about?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “And I don’t think Mzatal does either.” I slumped into a chair. “I felt him connect with the baby and then felt him wracked with blinding pain. No clue whythough,” I saw the worry in her eyes, and I hurried to reassure her, “but I honestly don’t believe it was because something might be wrong with you or the bean.”
“Okay. Good.” She let out a breath and relaxed. “I want you to know, your boyfriend is seriously hot and seriously freaky.”
“Yeah,” I said, then grinned. “I think I like the freaky.”
She snorted, laughed. “You have pine needles in your hair from whatever freakythings you two were doing in the woods.” I opened my mouth to respond, and she jerked a hand up. “Do nottell me what they were.” She paused, appeared to consider. “Not right now, at least.”
“I’ll save the sordid details for the next girls’ night out.”
“Make notes so you don’t forget anything.”
I laughed and headed off to my room.
* * *
A quick shower and a change of clothing did a lot to restore my overall equilibrium. As I came into the living room, Bryce glanced up and paused the game he played, leaving a purple and green alien frozen in mid-splatter on the screen.
I flopped onto an empty space on the couch. “Is this day over yet?”
“Still a few hours until midnight,” Bryce said as he set the controller aside. “A little lightning wear you out?”
“What, that?” I gave an exaggerated snort. “Pshaw. I have lightning strike through me allthe time. Old hat!” I twisted my face into a comically freaked out expression.
“I’m not going to lie,” Bryce said with a shake of his head. “That was unbelievable.”
“Mzatal says it will help him remain here longer.” I mentally crossed fingers for that. Even three or four days at a stretch would be nice. With Idris on Earth, there wasn’t much Mzatal could do from the demon realm.
Bryce nodded. “He said as much back at his place.” He let out a low whistle. “He worked with the lightning there, too—while standing on the balcony rail about a billion feet above the rocks. I’ve neverseen anything like it.”
I eyed him. “He was standing on the railing of the balcony?”
“Yep, barefooted and shirtless and calling in a storm,” he said. “On the railing.”
“I’ll kill him,” I said with a sweet smile.
Bryce’s face abruptly twisted into the expression of a man who suddenly realized he’d told his buddy’s girlfriend that said buddy had been at the strip club all night. “Uh, he didn’t fall or anything,” Bryce fumbled out as he struggled to retract his earlier statement. “I mean, he seemed to be in complete control of what he was doing.”
I snorted. “I’m sure he knew what he was doing.” Then again, it wasn’t as if I could call Mzatal on it. He’d simply give me an implacable lookand tell me he was always in control. Dating a demigod sure carried its own set of unique issues. “I’m glad I wasn’t there to see it, though.”
“I’m glad I was,” Bryce said. “I’d only talked to him once, briefly, before witnessing the lightning-on-the-railing thing. I’m not likely to forget it.” He shrugged. “And today’s was impressive too, but something about there being nothing but sky beyond him, and the whole different world thing, it was beyond surreal.”
Jill came into the room with a large bowl of something weird and gloppy half-resting on her belly. “Jekki made pickle peanut butter pretzels for me,” she announced. “Anyone want some?”
“Oh, wow, gee, Jill.” I made an exaggerated wince. “Y’know, I justhad that for lunch, so I guess I’ll have to pass.” I shuddered.
“I’m not even going to pretend I want any,” Bryce said, giving Jill the warmest smile I’d ever seen on the man. He nodded toward the bowl in her grasp. “That looks and sounds disgusting.”
Jill returned the smile, chuckling softly as she lowered herself into the chair and rested the bowl atop the swell of her belly. “Says the man who likes spicy pickled cabbage.”
I looked at the two of them. They’d sure gotten to know each other quickly. The alarm panel in the kitchen buzzed, indicating that someone authorized was coming through the gate. Either Zack or Ryan, since all the other chicks were at home to roost. I stood and moved to the window. “Zack’s home,” I remarked to nobody in particular. Nobody who was paying any attention to me, at least. I watched as Zack pulled into his usual spot and got out of the car, face grim. He closed the car door, then leaned back against it and looked up at the sky, expression somber and with an odd longing I couldn’t quite parse.
“Yes, but there are other people who like and eat kimchee,” Bryce was saying with a laugh. “I doubt anyoneelse eats that concoction.”
Jill merely gave a serene smile. “Pregnant chicks all over the world would eat the hell out of this if they knew it existed.”
Zack pushed off the car and headed up the steps, expression all surfer-dude Zack and not somber at all by the time he reached the porch. I stepped away from the window as he opened the door and entered.
He gave Bryce a broad smile, everything in his posture indicating customary good mood and joviality. I almost doubted that I’d seen the earlier gloom. “Welcome back to the land of the living, Mr. Thatcher,” he said with a congenial air as Bryce hurried to stand.
“Bryce, this is Special Agent Zack Garner,” I said to help him out.
“It’s nice to meet you, sir,” Bryce said to Zack, extending a hand. “Can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done for Paul and me.”
Zack took his hand and shook it, and I noticed the faint flicker in Zack’s eyes as he did. Assessing Bryce, I knew. Apparently he passed the quick assessment since Zack continued by saying, “Sure you can. You can lose to me—badly—in a game of Alien Bloodbathlater.”
Bryce chuckled. “I’ll be sure to go out in an impressive blaze of glory.”
“Of course you will,” Zack said with a laugh. “I’m that good.”
Jill snorted and rolled her eyes, but when Zack moved to her and leaned down to give her a kiss, she melted into it, then lifted a hand to his face and gave him a lovely, warm smile. “Hey, babe,” she said. “How was your day?”
“Long. And not over yet.” He sighed and dropped to sit beside her. “Waiting for Ryan to get home at this point.”
I watched as her smile flickered, saw the thought plain upon her face: He’s bailing on me again.And since she had no understanding of why, how could it feel like anything but rejection? Yet on the heels of her disappointment, I saw a shimmer of relief. If Zack bailed on her, then that was one more night where she wouldn’t have to face the giant winged elephant in the room and ask him about his demon side.
“You’re off again as soon as he gets here?” she asked gamely.
“We’ll be working in the basement,” Zack told her. He took her hand and kissed her knuckles. “It will probably only be an hour or two, sweetie. You’ll still be here?”
Her shoulders lifted in a too casual shrug. “I don’t know. It’s getting late, and I have some stuff I need to do at my house.”
I rolled my eyes so hard it hurt. “For fuck’s sake.” I glanced at Bryce. “You’ll have to excuse me, but there’s something I need to take care of.” I strode over to where Zack and Jill sat on the couch, removed the bowl of pretzel things from Jill’s lap and set them aside, reached down and grabbed her hand, then Zack’s. “You two are coming with me right now,” I said with my expression and manner fiercely conveying, Do Not Even Think of Resisting Because OMG, You Two!
Jill looked suddenly terrified. “I have some things I need to do.” Zack didn’t resist, but he didn’t stand either.
“No you don’t.” My fierce look grew fiercer. “We’re doing this now.”
Zack sighed, stood. “I think she might be serious, sweetie.”
“Damn straight,” I said. I tugged Jill to her feet, waited for Zack to steady her, then hauled both of them into the guest room and kicked the door shut behind me.
I released their hands and pointed at the bed. “Sit.”
