Cody pushed away the blankets and crawled down to the bottom of the bed because he knew what the lump was. It was Kitten. Kitten was here!
Cody picked up Kitten and brought her back up to the top of the bed. He put her very carefully down on the pillow next to him, close to the window so she could see that they were in a new place too. Kitten didn’t wake up, but that was okay. Cody was happy. Happy she was here.
He put his head down on the pillow next to her and petted her soft fur with his fingertips. Everything was going to be okay now. Everything was going to be good.
Then Cody felt a strange tingle grow in his stomach, like bees had gotten under his skin, right where the Snake man had cut him.
But it wasn’t bees. Someone was looking for him. Looking with the magic coins. Looking with the bones and blood and bad magic.
Snake man.
Hold still, the older, smarter part of him said. Don’t do anything. Cody. Don’t move.
Cody pulled the covers over his head, hiding Kitten under the blankets too. He held still. He held his breath. He wanted the tears to stop falling down his face, but they fell anyway. The older, smarter part of him was gone, so far away, and Cody felt all alone again. But he held still just like the older, smarter part of him had told him to.
The buzzing got stronger, and spread under his skin. The bees were angry. They buzzed all the way up to his throat because the Snake man told them to. They buzzed around her heart because the Snake man told them to. They wanted to buzz inside his head, but the older, smarter part of him had done something so they couldn’t get in.
Cody held still. He tried not to scream, but a tiny, scared sound came out of him.
The Snake man looked and looked. The bees buzzed and buzzed.
It felt like it took a long time. A really long time before the bees flew back down away from his head. Away from his throat. Away from his heart.
Finally the bees stopped being mad. They all went back inside his scar and didn’t buzz around anymore and didn’t move around anymore.
The Snake man stopped looking.
Cody was alone again.
He was glad the bees were gone. He was glad the Snake man was gone too. But he was afraid they would come back. Come back and hurt him.
It’s okay, the older, smarter part of him said. He sounded far away and tired. Go to sleep. We’re safe for now.
Cody didn’t feel safe, but he did feel tired. He made an opening in the blanket so Kitten could breathe cool air better. Then he went to sleep.
Chapter Ten
Someone was staring at me. I could feel it even before I opened my eyes. I breathed in, trying to orient myself by the smells around me. I got a noseful of flower, soap, and dog.
Nola’s place. The house was quiet, and no light came through my eyelids. It was night. Everyone else sounded asleep too.
So who was staring at me?
I opened my eyes just enough to see. Darkness and nothing else.
No, someone was watching me. I glanced at the doorway, and in the uncertain light from a night-light by the hallway floorboards, I could see the dark shape of Zayvion sitting on the couch.
Staring at me. He looked like he’d been awake for a while. Alert. Wary. I wondered if I’d missed something.
‘‘Are you okay?’’ he asked in a hushed voice.
A fleeting memory of a nightmare, bones and pain and blood, slipped from my thoughts. The sides of my cheeks were wet. I’d been crying.
‘‘I’m fine,’’ I said. Except I was alone. Except I wanted someone to hold me, wanted someone to comfort me, even if for only one night. The memory of the kiss in the car made me ache for the taste of him. It would just be one night. One night before I had to pick up my real life and deal with it again. I wondered if he’d say yes.
I sat. ‘‘Zayvion?’’ I whispered.
Light licked amber across the muscles of his arms, bare chest, stomach, and thighs as he stood and silently made his way across the living room. He paused at the doorway, wearing nothing but a pair of boxers. Shadows moved across his face, hiding his lips, but I could see his eyes, burning bright.
‘‘Yes?’’
‘‘Would you hold me?’’ I asked.
‘‘Just hold you?’’
I answered him by pulling off my T-shirt. He grunted like I’d just hit him in the stomach. I sat there, half-naked, cold. I wanted his warmth, wanted the safety of his arms around me.
‘‘More than that,’’ I said.
He still stood in the doorway, dark, motionless, and silent, except for the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed more quickly.
After a long pause, I realized I had made a mistake. He was going to say no. Maybe the kiss in the car and the kiss outside the deli had all been one-sided—had all been me assuming there was an attraction between us that was not there.
‘‘I’m sorry,’’ I said reaching for the T-shirt next to me. ‘‘I thought you wanted—’’
‘‘No,’’ he said, cutting me off. ‘‘I do want.’’
Those words seemed to decide something for him. He finally moved. He let go of the doorjamb he’d been holding onto and snapped his fingers. Jupe lifted his big head and thumped his tail on the hardwood floor.
‘‘Out,’’ Zay said. He snapped again and pointed to the living room. Jupe yawned and dutifully walked out of the room, like he and Zay had been buddies for years instead of hours.
Nola had left Jupe here to guard me, to keep me from sleeping with Zay. Probably because she thought getting serious with a man I barely knew wasn’t a good idea. But Nola hadn’t had everything in her life go to hell. She hadn’t been chased, hurt, accused. She hadn’t gotten sick from watching a little boy almost die, hadn’t had her father lie through shared blood, hadn’t overdosed on magic to try to fix a stranger’s stab wound.
She hadn’t told her father for the last and final time that she hated him, then had him die on her before she could say she was sorry.
Zay quietly shut the door and padded across the room. He paused and stood in front of me.
Electricity trembled through me. I reached up and placed my palm against his chest, my hand a ghost of ivory against the darkness and heat of his skin. I drew my palm slowly down the tight muscles of his stomach and paused at his waistband.
‘‘I want you,’’ I whispered.
He leaned toward me and I leaned back, lifting the covers so he could come with me to this soft and sacred place. He waited as I tugged off my sweatpants and panties. I waited as he pulled off his boxers. In all the time since he had come into the room, and it felt like hours, days, he had not yet touched me, had not yet kissed me.
And I so desperately wanted him to.
Zayvion lay beneath the covers beside me and finally, finally, drew his hand up my hip, my ribs, and over the curve of my breast. I shuddered in pleasure. He brushed his thumb over my nipple, paused to circle it gently. I moaned and met his lips with my own.
Desire echoed through me and I trembled with need. I tangled my legs with his and leaned back, bringing Zay on top of me, the weight of his strong, wide body pressing me into the soft embrace of the bed. He lowered his head and gently bit the hollow of my neck. Electricity flickered through me, wicked and warm, pooling between my thighs.
I was hot, needful, hungry.
I dragged my nails up his wide, lean back. I pushed my fingers into the thick curls of his hair, savoring the texture of him, and coaxed his lips down to mine. He breathed gently against my cheek, then finally, finally, his lips cradled mine, soft, hot. His tongue slipped sweetly into my mouth, seeking, stoking my passion. With every stroke of his strong, masculine heat, need rose in me. High. Higher.
The scent of pine, of musk, the salty-sweet taste of him, wrapped me, filled me.
I wanted more. More of him. All of him. I wanted this to never end.
Heat and pleasure stretched me, filled me so full, too full.
More.
I arched up, pressed again
st him, wrapped around him. The sliding heat of fire licked through me, growing, spreading, pulsing, until all I could feel, all I could want was the aching hardness of him within me.
Yes.
Zay shuddered. Hot waves of pleasure broke and poured through me, tumbling me over the edge of desire and gently down, down to the soft, welcome warmth of his body against mine.
It has never felt like that before, I thought as he lay against me, sweating and heavy, my legs still tangled with his. It has never felt so right.
I might have drifted off to sleep, or maybe I just lost track of time. But I eventually noticed again the ticking of the clock in the living room, the smallness of the room around me, and Zayvion.
He rolled away, leaving a final kiss on the top of my breast before taking up half the bed by lying on his back. I shifted to my side and put my head on his shoulder and my arm across his chest, not ready to lose contact with him yet.
We didn’t say anything. Even though his breathing was soft and even, I knew he was awake because I could hear the flick of his eyelashes as he blinked.
And while I did not know why he was still awake, I knew what was keeping me up.
I couldn’t believe I’d just slept with him. Not that it wasn’t wonderful. Okay—fantastic. But now I didn’t know what to do. Nola was right. I had a long history of falling into bed with men before I knew them. And I did not really know Zayvion.
It would be crazy to fall for someone who was hired to stalk me—who maybe still was stalking me. After all, he had a remarkable knack of tracking me down when things went terribly wrong. He was a wild card in my suddenly too-wild life.
Other than stalking and maybe spying, I wasn’t sure he even had a job.
He might be following me and doing all these nice things because I was rich. Richer now that my dad was dead. If he got in good with me, he would never have to work again in his life.
Maybe he had this all planned and wanted to get me out here where I couldn’t defend myself with magic.
Okay, that was crazy. He’d told me he didn’t kill my dad, and I believed him.
Pull yourself together, I thought.
I wished I’d made the dog stay.
I wished I’d gone back to sleep.
‘‘Zay,’’ I said.
‘‘Mmm?’’
‘‘I need to ask you something.’’
He shifted so he was on his side, facing me. ‘‘So do I. Let me start, okay?’’
‘‘No. Me first,’’ I said. ‘‘Are you here because you want the money I’m going to inherit?’’
He paused on an exhalation and stiffened. ‘‘You’re kidding, right?’’
‘‘No. I want to know if you want my money, or if you’re angling for a hand in the business—Beckstrom Enterprises.’’
He closed his eyes. When he opened them, all the warmth and laughter was gone. ‘‘Is that what you think? That I did this to manipulate you?’’ He was angry and probably had every reason to be.
‘‘Yes,’’ I said. ‘‘No. Maybe.’’ I groaned and flopped over on my back. I couldn’t think straight. I pressed my fingers over my eyes. ‘‘I don’t know,’’ I said through my palms. ‘‘It’s just happening so fast. I don’t know if I can handle this. Us. Whatever we are.’’ Hells, could I sound any more pitiful? ‘‘You don’t want the money, do you?’’
He didn’t say anything. I waited, but all I heard was his breathing, slightly elevated, like he was still angry. I finally pulled one hand away from my face and peeked over at him.
Predawn light fingered through the slats covering the window. It was pretty, I suppose. It lent enough light for me to watch Zayvion’s expression close down until none of the warmth and passion of a lover showed in his eyes. Until he was calm, controlled, closed. Zen.
‘‘I don’t want the money,’’ he said with such quiet and control it actually spooked me. ‘‘I don’t want control of the company. If this is going too fast, then I’ll give you some time to think about what I do want.’’
He reached over and brushed my bangs out of my eyes. His thumb glided across the mark of magic that curled at my temple, and I found myself longing for the coolness of his touch. Something deep in my bones responded to him, drew toward him whenever we touched.
‘‘What are you?’’ I whispered.
There was a knock at the door, then Nola’s voice. ‘‘If you two want to put some clothes on, I think you need to come out to the kitchen and see this.’’
I didn’t know she was awake, hadn’t heard the springs on her bed creak, hadn’t heard her walk down the noisy wood stairs. Hells. Someone could have walked in and killed me, for all the attention I was paying. Or maybe I’d been paying very close attention to the only person in the house I wanted to see.
Still, it was predawn. Nola had a hideous habit of getting up before the sun, so she’d probably heard all the moaning and groaning going on in here. This old farmhouse had very thin walls. How fabo was that?
I blushed, and was glad the light was low.
‘‘We’ll be out in a minute.’’ I pulled the top blanket around me and slid off the bed to gather the sweats and T-shirt.
Zayvion got out of bed, picked up his boxers, and put them on.
I managed to get my sweats on while contorting to hide my decency behind the blanket. Oh, screw it. It’s not like we hadn’t just been a whole lot of naked with each other a few minutes ago.
I dropped the blanket, turned the inside-out T-shirt inside-in again and tugged it on over my head.
Zay was watching me.
‘‘What?’’ I asked.
‘‘Do you want your father’s money?’’
I rubbed at my hair and knew it must be sticking out like a Christmas cactus. I was glad there weren’t any mirrors in the room, because I was sure I was a vision of lovely.
‘‘Listen,’’ I said while I rummaged for a robe in the closet. ‘‘I know I’ve had advantages in my life because of my father’s money, nice things and good education—especially the education. But when I failed at getting my degree in business magic and dropped out of college, he disowned me. I knew there would be no going back on that.’’
‘‘Why didn’t he hire private tutors?’’
‘‘What do you mean? To teach me magic?’’ I snagged a plain white robe off the hook, and shut the closet door. ‘‘No one teaches magic outside the universities. It’s too dangerous. If a student does something really stupid, you need a whole crew of people to set Siphons, bear Proxy, and do other kinds of mop-up.’’
I thought Zay was just testing to see if I had really gone to college. But he was watching me, his nostrils flared like he was trying to scent the truth of my words.
‘‘You never met other users?’’ he asked. ‘‘Teachers?’’
And I knew there was something riding on my answer, something important.
‘‘What if I had?’’ Okay, that was a bluff, but I was suddenly really interested in what had gotten Mr. Zen all worked up.
He shrugged one shoulder, but otherwise was still, waiting.
I was so not in the mood for a game of truth or dare. ‘‘I’ve never met with teachers outside of the universities. Well, maybe in a social setting, but not in a student-teacher sort of way. Okay? Why is that such a big deal?’’