And again. This time he flipped her onto her hands and knees. She was mewling into the bed and shoving her ass back to him as he took her from behind. He wrapped his arms around her, his wise and wicked woman, and slammed her into the headboard. She braced herself as best she could and reached up behind her head to clutch at him, and he wrapped an arm around her neck, and this time she was the one who groaned it through clenched teeth. “You’ve gone and done it now—you’re so mine, Rune Ainissesthai—Rune—Rune, oh God—”
Three times, the witching number.
“That spell’s already been cast,” he said into her hair. And he gave himself to her, spilling everything he had into his mate.
She could not let go of him. He propped himself against the headboard and pulled her into his arms, and she went willingly. She rested her head on his shoulder and only realized she was clenched on his arm when she caught sight of her hand out of the corner of her eye and saw that her knuckles were white. She forced her fingers to loosen and saw that she had left a red imprint on his tanned skin. If he had been one of the more fragile of the Elder Races, she might have broken his arm.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, stroking his bicep.
“Don’t ever be sorry,” he said. He kissed her forehead. “Bite me, mark me, claim me in any way you wish.”
That was when she realized he held her just as tightly too. He rested his face in her hair, and his chest rumbled. It had a low, deep, rough cadence that vibrated against her cheek. She ran her palm across the broad muscled expanse wonderingly. “Are you purring at me?”
“I might be,” Rune said. His deep voice was rougher, and lazy with intimacy. “Unless you’ve done something wrong. Then I’m growling at you again.”
She tightened her lips to try to keep the laughter in, but it spilled out anyway. “Just because I’m laughing doesn’t make it okay,” she warned.
“The purring?” He threaded his fingers through her short hair.
“No, the growling. I will not be chastised by you growling at me every time you think I might have done something wrong.”
“Then I will definitely be purring from now on even when I’m growling.” He captured her hand before she had the chance to smack him, and he brought her fingers up to his mouth to press a kiss on her knuckles.
She refused to laugh again. She clenched her jaw against it until the impulse eased. Then she cleared her throat. “About what just happened.”
“What about it?” He sounded calm, his purring steady and quiet. It was remarkably soothing.
She looked out the French doors at the wrought-iron balcony they would most likely be too busy to enjoy. The sun had almost set, and the red and gold streaks across the sky were starting to fade. Dr. Telemar would be arriving at SFO soon.
“It was—more than I expected.” As old as she was and as much as she had seen, she found herself unexpectedly at a loss for words.
“You mean when we mated.”
That was what they had done. They were mating. He was mating with her. She had taken him into her body as she had taken him into her soul, and he had wrung her inside out. Everything ached, pleasantly, although that would fade soon enough as she healed with Vampyric speed. “I didn’t know it would be so intense,” she said softly. “How could you trust me like that?”
He was silent for so long, at first she thought he wasn’t going to answer her. Then he stirred and said, “It just happened. The more I learned about you, the more I cared, and the more I trusted you. Your research, your dog, the way you looked at me and said you took responsibility for how we might change things. You think I don’t know you said that to make things easier for me, when I might have been the only one to remember what happened? Then this last time when I went back, I looked at you and panicked at the thought of losing you. I know I told you too much, but I couldn’t stop myself. And so you knew all this time that I would come to you some day, and you said nothing, did nothing.”
She buried her face in him. “I had a lot of time to think,” she whispered. “I thought about time looping back on itself, and about how you said you were from the future and how every time you came back, you changed things in the past. You said it was incredibly dangerous, and I believed you. When I finally met you again and realized who you were, I thought about getting in touch and telling you what had happened. Then I realized that if I did, I might change you too so that you never came back in time to see me. And I didn’t want to risk losing those memories, so I waited to see what would happen at Adriyel River, and beyond.”
He pushed her onto her back and came on top of her, covering her with his body while he held her tight, pressing his lean cheek against hers. “You thought it through and held steady,” he said. “You closed the time loop we created. You held your ground when I don’t know of anyone else who would have. Then after all of that, you tried to send me away this afternoon, and it was so goddamn loving and extravagantly stupid, how could I not want to mate with you? Of course I trust you. I knew if you laid claim to me, you would hold on no matter what.”
“No matter what.” She swallowed hard, gripping him as tightly as he held her. They were wrapped around each other, torso to torso, skin to skin, Power entwined with Power, so that she was not sure where one ended and the other began. “I think I can see what my life must have been like before you went back, and everything feels truer now.”
He nuzzled her neck. “All the pieces interlock. The thought keeps running through my head that it’s like a keystroke password to an unbreakable code. It opens a vault door to a strange new country, and even though it is strange and new, it is all still familiar. All the colors are brighter and more fierce, the song notes more piercing.”
She kissed his temple and ran her fingers through his hair. The weight of his body sent his purr vibrating through her chest, and she felt a sudden rush of adoration for him so intense it made her feel drunk, insane. “It’s a more beautiful, deadlier world because there’s so much more to lose,” she said. “Rune, you can’t go back anymore. We have to protect what we have.”
“There’s no reason for me to go back now,” he murmured. He kissed her collarbone. “I think I can hold my own and not get caught up in the episodes when they happen. We’ve warned your younger self to take care, and I also think we’ve learned everything we can. The most important thing now is to guard you and keep you safe when you’re caught in them, while we figure out how to get them to stop.”
“You sound so optimistic,” she said.
“Are you still the glass-half-empty kind of girl?” he said. “You know, the more things change, the more they really do stay the same.”
She shook her head and exhaled a silent laugh. She loved how he could make her laugh.
The more things change. A sudden wave of fear had her clutching him tighter again. She had embraced the changes that had happened to her long ago, but what if something else changed in the world because of what they had done? She would never know, but Rune would. He said he remembered everything. What if they had done something wrong and had somehow destroyed something that should have existed? What if she had decided to do something she shouldn’t have, something that she hadn’t done originally?
She felt again that sense of hurtling forward, faster and faster, in time. She wanted to turn her racing brain off, to close her eyes and rest against Rune’s strong body in a true sleep. Then something else occurred to her.
“I just realized, right after I talked on the phone I went into the fade. I haven’t had the chance to tell you,” she said. “I’m pretty sure Julian’s turned against me. I can take him if we’re one-on-one, but as King he commands the support of the whole Nightkind demesne. We need to tread carefully.”
Rune came up on his elbow to look down at her. His gaze was sharp, his lean features focused. The fine lines at the corners of his mouth deepened. “Dragos left me a message to call him as soon as I could,” he said. “Of course I haven’t had time yet. I wonder if he was call
ing about the same thing. I need to call him back to find out what’s going on.”
“We have a hell of a lot to untangle,” Carling said. “Just set aside the whole dying problem for a moment. Nobody’s going to be happy when they find out what’s just happened between us. Not the Nightkind demesne, not the Wyr, and certainly not the Elder tribunal.”
They were both silent for a moment as they absorbed the enormity of the challenges in front of them.
Then Rune kissed her cheek. He blew a little in her ear, and she cringed away from how it tickled. “It’s always something.”
SEVENTEEN
The hotel phone rang, and Rune rolled over to answer it. Full night had fallen, and he switched on the bedside lamp as he did, flooding the room in soft light. Carling could clearly hear the feminine voice on the other end. “Rune, I just arrived at the hotel and I’ve checked into the room you booked for me.”
“Excellent, Seremela,” he said. “Please come up to the suite as soon as you are able.” He raised his eyebrows at Carling, who nodded in agreement.
“I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
As he twisted at the waist to hang up the phone, Carling ran her fingers along the line of his bare torso, from shoulder to hip. He turned back to her, his features creased in a smile. “Claiming each other is one thing,” she said. “Figuring out how to do ‘together’ is an entirely different thing.”
“We’ve come out of the gate strong,” Rune said. He came over her, bracing himself on one elbow by her head as he leaned down to kiss her. “We’ve learned to trust each other, like each other and enjoy each other’s company. We just have to keep relying on each other as we fight to find a cure for you. Learning about the rest, making life decisions about what comes next, all that can wait.”
Carling stared up at him, aching as she thought of everything he was giving up for her. She said slowly, “If we really find a cure that works, then I may become human again. If that happens, I’ll die so soon, in just another fifty years or so.” After the enormous amount of time she had lived through, fifty years seemed like an eye blink.
“Those fifty years would be worth everything to me,” he whispered back. His smiling eyes never wavered. They were clear and steady, right down to the bottom of his soul.
He really meant it, she saw. He really was mating with her, committing to her. He didn’t hold back, or qualify or try to dissemble. He would live as she lived, and die as she died. Panic struck her all over again, deeper and harder than before, not for her sake but for his.
She had qualified things and dissembled. Fight to live, he had said to her, and even as she did so, she still prepared to die, still settled her affairs and said her good-byes, still braced herself for the end.
Holy gods, not anymore. She had to fight to live with everything she had inside, because this was no longer just about her. It was about them both. She gripped his wrist hard. “We don’t have any time to lose.”
“Then we best get cracking,” he said.
He rolled off the bed and to his feet in one smooth, lithe motion. She sat more slowly, watching as he picked up the clothes from the floor. His hair was tousled more than ever, his nude muscled body bearing bite and scratch marks that were fading even as she watched. The embers of passion flared in her body as she stared at his neck. As he leaned over to lay her jeans, shirt and lingerie on the bed beside her, she reached up to finger the bite mark.
She felt his breath leave him. He gave her a glittering look under lowered eyelids. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his penis stiffen. He said roughly, “Behave.”
“Do you really want me to?” she asked gently.
His expression turned scorching. “Seremela’s going to be here in just over five minutes.”
She tilted her face up to his as she took hold of his erection. She rubbed her thumb over the broad head of his cock. He bared his teeth. He looked savage and magnificent, barely held in check and completely inhuman. Gods, how she loved this man. She whispered, “We’ll just have to remember where we left off then.”
“Bloody hell, woman,” he gritted. He grabbed hold of her wrist but didn’t pull her hand away. A muscle in his bicep started jumping, he was holding himself so tightly.
She bent sideways to kiss the muscle in his arm. She felt like she was immersed in him, his aroused scent, his hot presence, and yet starving for him at the same time. She was so starving. She raked her teeth gently along the skin of the bunched muscle, and he made a muffled sound and went down hard on one knee on the floor beside the bed.
She put her arms around his neck and kissed him. He clutched her to him, kissing her back with every bit as much hunger as she had. “Mine,” she whispered against his lips.
“Mine,” he whispered back. He ran his lips compulsively down her neck to her breastbone, bending her back. His mind slid on a patch of black ice as he flashed on her incomparable, gorgeous body, those curves, the jut of her ripe nipples, those strong shapely legs as she had wound them around his hips—
A knock sounded at the suite door, and he yanked away from the siren’s call of Carling’s body with a growl as he snatched up his clothes. She fell back laughing on the bed, her eyes dancing with such wicked delight it nearly broke his head to walk away from her. “Later,” he snarled at her.
“Oh my gods, yes,” she breathed, stretching out her naked body. “Later, and again, and repeatedly, I hope.”
He gave her a white-hot glare and bolted from the bedroom. There was another knock at the door. He roared, “Just a fucking minute!”
From the hall outside the suite, a woman said in a startled voice, “I’m sorry, I do beg your pardon.”
Rune swore then called out, “No, Seremela, I’m sorry. Hold on, I’ll be with you in just a moment.”
Carling snatched a pillow, crammed her face into it and rolled around on the bed as she laughed and laughed.
When she heard Rune open the door, she grabbed her clothes and shoved off the bed, and walked into the bathroom for a quick wash before she dressed. She caught a glimpse of her short tousled hair and makeup-smeared face in the mirror and exploded with laughter again.
Here’s the spook house/ roller coaster mash-up again. Euphoria and glee, sprinkled with outright terror. She turned on the water faucet and splashed her face off. The water felt crisp, cold and good.
Rune raised his voice. “Carling, I’m going to start explaining things to Seremela, if you don’t mind. If you would rather, we can wait until you get in here.”
She called back, “Not at all. Please go ahead. I’ll be right there.”
She listened to the two of them talk as she finished dressing. She thought about digging out a caftan from her suitcases but she wanted to put on the exotic jeans and flared silk crepe T-shirt instead, although she chose to remain barefoot. She ran her hands through her choppy short hair then went out to the living room.
She found them sitting in the living area. Rune had dressed in his black clothes and had finger-combed his own hair. He looked burnished and vibrant, and so sexy she pulsed with the dark urgent desire to mark him again. The medusa had taken an armchair, and Rune sat at one end of the couch. He was leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, moodily spinning an iPhone in circles on the coffee table as he talked. Both he and Seremela stood as she entered the room.
Carling strode forward to offer her hand. The medusa watched her approach with a wide, curious gaze. Seremela said with a smile, “It’s an honor to meet you, Councillor.”
“Thank you for coming on such short notice, Doctor.”
“Please, call me Seremela. I was happy Rune called, and it will be my pleasure to do anything I can to help.”
Carling watched the medusa’s expression closely. “You may find a lot of what we have to say disturbing. We need your confidentiality on this.”
“Of course,” said Seremela.
Carling glanced at Rune, her eyebrows raised. He nodded. She turned her attention back to the doctor.
/> As a medusa, Seremela Telemar was Demonkind, although she lived in Chicago, well outside the Demonkind demesne in Houston. She was a pretty woman in late middle age. Carling guessed her to be around three hundred and eighty years old. Her head snakes had grown to the length of her thighs. When she reached old age, they would touch the floor. Her skin was a creamy pale green with a faint snakeskin pattern, and her slitted eyes had a nictating membrane that was open for the moment. Several of her head snakes tasted the air as they peered curiously around her waist and over her shoulder at Carling.
However, most of the medusa’s head snakes were more interested in Rune. Carling watched a couple of the snakes slide up his arm. Was she imagining things, or was it actually possible for a head snake to look adoring?
Neither Rune nor Seremela were paying attention to what the medusa’s snakes were doing. They were busy in conversation, talking to each other as they focused on her.
Carling cocked her head and pursed her lips.
Snakes.
She strode forward and snatched up the two head snakes, one in each hand. Rune watched her in mild surprise. Seremela jumped and blushed, and began to apologize profusely, “I’m so sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. You know they have a mind of their own and, well, they like Rune.”
Carling ignored her. She held up the two snakes and looked at them. They looked back at her, their tongues flickering. They did not appear alarmed or disturbed at her handling of them. A couple of other head snakes lifted to twine around her wrists. Seremela gave an embarrassed laugh. “It looks like they like you too.”
“Of course it is,” Carling said to the snakes.
“Of course what is?” Rune asked.
“You said it was important to go back to the beginning, and it was,” Carling said. “The serpent goddess wasn’t just an archaic, superstitious Egyptian folktale. She was a real creature named Python who actually existed. So the next logical step is that the serpent’s kiss really is a serpent’s kiss. Vampyrism became a blood-borne pathogen, and Vampyres are created in a blood-to-blood exchange. But it had to have started as venom.”