Killing Time

by Elisa Paige

  Great. Just great.

  Forcing my libidinous brain to focus, I began the long-overdue reconnaissance of the suite. A quick check of two doors off the living room proved them to be bedrooms, each with a gloriously appointed king-size bed covered by mountains of pillows and a fluffy comforter. Both rooms had a private bathroom, in addition to the one Koda was…I firmly steered my mind back to the task at hand.

  Returning to the living room, I paced past the long wall with its huge windows, scowling at the total lack of security. Inviting they may be, but they were a weak point in the room’s defenses. Pulling open the French doors, I stalked out into the garden and made it ten feet before freezing at the sheer loveliness assailing my senses.

  Although we were in the heart of Dallas, the city’s sounds seemed far away. Situated in the middle of the Turtle Creek area, The Mansion was surrounded by blocks of heavy woods, broad parks and jogging trails. Our rooftop terrace on the boutique hotel’s third floor was nestled in the tops of the mature oaks and magnolias. It felt like being in an aerie, aloft in a green and vibrant world.

  A full moon hung just overhead, filling the night sky with its silvery mass and casting its ethereal light across the lush private terrace. Enormous urns were everywhere, overflowing with gorgeous flowering plants, towering trees and thick greenery. The sweet perfume of hibiscus, gardenia and magnolia blossoms soothed my senses as the musical sound of falling water led me to a small fountain in the garden’s center. Sitting on the tiled rim, still warm from the sun, I couldn’t resist dipping my fingers in the cool water and watching the drops fall like jewels back into the fountain’s rippling surface. It felt like I’d stumbled into a hidden, magical oasis and a deep peace stole over me. The tension in my muscles eased and I inhaled, letting the flowers’ fragrance and the balmy night air fill my lungs.

  A smile stole across my lips at this one, small part of my heritage that pleased me—the narcotic-like effect nature had on fae.

  Movement brought my head up languidly as Koda came to stand by my side. Unable to resist, I let my gaze traverse his beautiful form. Even though we were in night-dark shadows, I could see him easily. Could see his silky, damp hair and knew from its enticing waves that he’d merely finger-combed the long strands back from his face. Could see his untucked chambray shirt stretched across the breadth of his powerful shoulders. See how his faded jeans encased his lean thighs and see that he was barefoot. It seemed impossible to me that even his damn feet looked good and I sighed with impatience at my inexplicably attentive libido.

  Cheeks flaming, I wrenched my eyes away and wondered just how good his night-vision was. When his dark gaze traveled across my face and his eyes glinted—with amusement or with irritation, I couldn’t tell—I had my humiliating answer.

  Koda’s hands fisted at his sides and he growled something to himself. Moving a few feet away, he leaned his elbows on the waist-high stone wall encircling the patio. I could only guess my blatantly checking him out made him want the distance between us.

  Without looking at me, he said, “Teach me some of your words.”

  I startled. “You want to learn Fae?”

  He shrugged one shoulder and leaned his hip against the wall. “A few phrases might be useful.”

  I thought about this, hesitating. Then I got it and smiled bitterly. “Ahh. Know the enemy.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest and a muscle leapt in his jaw, but he didn’t respond.

  Curiously stung, I said in a soft voice, “That’s how you see me.”

  A tense moment passed before he swung his head toward me, but I couldn’t identify the emotion in his shadowy eyes. “Sephti, your kind—”

  “Yeah, I know. We carry the stench of fae.” Pinching the bridge of my nose, I struggled against a rising tide of caustic fury. “Among many other loathsome characteristics, thanks to the bastards’ appalling decision to call bitterns into hellish being.”

  Koda’s face went pale as he studied me. “You hate your existence so much?”

  “You’ve no idea,” I hissed, fighting off the rage and despair.

  “Sephti,” he whispered. “All life is sacred, no matter how it came to be.”

  I made myself breathe slowly, forcing air in and out of my lungs as I wrestled for calm. “You believe that?”

  “I do.” His voice rang with certainty.

  I was so damn weary of my unending internal battle. “I envy you then.”

  Koda drew a sharp breath and came to sit beside me, our shoulders almost touching. It seemed he would speak but thought better of it and we sat in companionable silence for a little while.

  “What’s your word for flower?” he asked, his deep voice blending with the night in a way that sent shivers across my skin.

  Wrapping my arms around myself, I cleared my throat and worked to speak levelly. “Siafnir.”

  He whispered the word to himself. Tilting his head back, he looked at the stars overhead. “Night sky?”

  My tone was biting. “How do such words help in dealing with your enemy?”

  Koda didn’t look away from his contemplation of the moon. “They don’t, but that is not why I asked.”

  “No?”

  “No.”

  I couldn’t help it. “So…why?”

  He shot me a triumphant look, like he’d been waiting for the question. “Seek first to understand.”

  “What is that, Confucius?” I huffed.

  “St. Francis. It’s from the Bible.”

  “You’re quoting the Bible. To a bittern.” I barked a laugh. “According to our masters, we don’t possess a soul.”

  “According to your former masters, my people have no right to the air we breathe.” He shrugged, unaffected. “So why would anyone believe the itiq?”

  I went still. “Are you saying…” I was curiously conscious of the air passing in and out of my lungs. “You can’t mean what I think you’re saying. Not after having witnessed a bittern frenzy.”

  “That’s what has you white as a sheet and shaking?”

  I glared at him, unspeaking.

  The lines of his face gentled. “Haven’t you wondered why our fight ended? Why I bore no more injuries than the few you saw?” He gave me a sidelong glance. “You’re a formidable fighter, Sephti. And smart. But you didn’t wonder?”

  Cheeks flushing, I squirmed under his gaze. No way was I going to admit my humiliating assumption that he was more skilled.

  He lifted a brow at my obstinate silence. “The reason the fight and your frenzy ended is because you stopped it.”

  My breath caught in my throat. “That’s not possible. The frenzy had me.”

  “It is the truth. You reacted emphatically to aggression, but when I backed off, you instantly disengaged.” He considered me from the corner of his eye. “Would someone driven by animalistic impulses do that? I don’t believe so.”

  “But the frenzies—”

  He shrugged again. “So you’re DNA challenged. Doesn’t mean it governs you.”

  I had to laugh. “DNA challenged?”

  Koda just smiled.

  Wonderingly, I thought about what he’d said. “You think…do you think I have a soul?”

  He bent his head to meet my gaze. “I look in your eyes and see your soul shining out. I touch your skin and feel your soul’s fire. Yes, Sephti, of course you have a soul. How could you think otherwise?”

  My heart thudding in my chest, I felt a grin stretch my lips. I wasn’t sure if he was right, but it felt so damn good to hear it.

  “Would you do me a favor, though?” he asked, rubbing his eyes.

  I nodded, breathless at the joy he’d awakened.

  “Would you drop the camouflage when we’re in private? Every time I look at you, it’s like I can’t focus.”

  “You can see it?” I asked, startled.

  “It’s like there’s a filmy gauze over you.”

  “Because of your bindings?” It was strange knowing someone could see through t
he glamour.

  “No. Because of what I am.”

  Feeling unaccountably shy, I admitted, “I was keeping up the camouflage because I thought if I looked like a Round Ear, it would make you more comfortable.”

  He quirked a brow. “Round Ear?”

  “It’s what bitterns call humans. Knowing how you feel about fae, I figured—”

  “As you’ve told me repeatedly, you are not fae.”

  “As you’ve told me repeatedly, you don’t believe me.”

  Koda gave me a look I couldn’t decipher, but he didn’t respond.

  Staring off into the night, I debated furiously with myself before letting my camouflage fall. It was strange, but I felt exposed before him in a way I’d never experienced.

  Koda’s warm gaze roved across my features. “Much better.”

  My hand strayed to my hair, pulling it down over my pointed ears. Desperate to change the subject, I returned to our earlier discussion. “Midnight sky is h-lai giit.”

  His eyes darkened as he looked at me. A spark of humor glinted in their depths, along with unexpected gentleness. I covered my surprise by correcting his pronunciation as he repeated the words a few times and he surprised me even more by accepting the corrections with patient good humor.

  Purposely exaggerating the first syllable, he said, “Sounds like I’m choking on a chicken bone.”

  Despite myself, I smiled. “Yeah, it does.” I lifted my sock-covered feet onto the fountain’s wall and wrapped my arms around my knees. “The closest word for ‘friend’ is étawis.”

  “So that would be my name if I were bittern?” he asked, sounding amused.

  I rested my chin on my arms. “No. The word does not apply to us.”

  Koda opened his mouth to say something when there was a knock at the suite’s outer door. I shot to my feet, drawing both daggers smoothly and shading on the same breath.

  Chapter Six

  “It’s all right, Sephti,” Koda said. His hands framed my shoulders as he ignored the proximity of my blades to his belly, making my heart thud painfully at his lack of caution. “I called room service when I got out of the shower.”

  Sheathing the daggers, I solidified my form. “Room service?”

  He headed back into the suite. “Dinner. Food.”

  Working to calm myself took some effort, since adrenaline was flooding my system, and with it, the ever-present threat of a frenzy. Dimly, I heard Koda talking with another male, but didn’t bother focusing to make out their words. Breathing the garden’s floral perfume deep into my lungs, I extended my awareness in search of the serenity I’d experienced earlier. Slowly, it crept into my senses, easing the adrenaline shakes and soothing the rage’s sharp edges. Rolling my shoulders to release the tension, I’d just gotten myself centered when I heard the sound of the outer door closing.

  Warm, mouth-watering scents overrode the flowers’ fragrance and I hustled into the suite’s dining area to find Koda inspecting an astonishing number of covered dishes.

  He looked at my face and did a double take. “I noticed the soot when we were outside but didn’t realize how much there was.” I flushed at what else he’d noticed and his eyes danced with laughter. “Unless you’re planning on leading a war party tonight, you might want to shower before we eat. The food will stay warm if you don’t take too long.”

  Beating a hasty retreat to the bathroom, I closed the door and leaned on it as I surveyed the gleaming marble and brass. Remembering Koda’s description of endless hot water and sweet shampoo that hotels like this were supposed to have, I went to the shower, but couldn’t find a faucet—just a panel and a digital screen. Perplexed, I started pushing buttons and almost jumped out of my skin when water exploded from four showerheads, all at once.

  Grinning hugely—I’d come to love gadgets in my brief time among humans—I experimented and quickly figured out how the controls worked. At least, I thought I did. I parbroiled my hand when I stuck it under the water’s flow. Sucking on my burned fingers, I pushed some more buttons with my other hand, and through careful trial and error, set the digital display to read “103”—hot enough to sting in a hurts-so-good kinda way.

  Shucking my filthy clothes on the floor, I stepped into the blissful torrent of water cascading from the showerheads. I’d never imagined such hedonistic luxury and tilted my head back, basking in the sensory indulgence. Four jets pounded my skin, the hot water soothing away the aches and pains and nasty grime of weeks of hard travel, sleeping in cheap motels and hand-to-hand fighting. A wide grin stretched my lips as I marveled at how very different my current circumstances were from, well, pretty much everything I’d ever experienced. Exhilaration in this unexpected indulgence shivered through me. The experience was so…so…uncomplicated, wholly delightful and startlingly…feminine.

  Seeing the little bottles lined up on a built-in shelf, I opened their tops until I found the shampoo. Almost swooning from its sweet fragrance, I dumped the whole thing on my head, relishing the thick bubbles I kneaded through my hair. As the shower rinsed me off, I identified and used the conditioner, relishing its scent and laughing aloud. I knew I was being a goof, but in that moment didn’t care.

  There was a knock at the door and Koda said something, but with my head under the pounding water, I couldn’t make out his words. I was pretty much finished anyway, so I turned off the shower and rubbed my eyes clear, realizing only then that I’d left my towel on the other side of the bathroom. Squeezing the water from my hair before stepping onto the floor, I looked up to see Koda stick his head around the door.

  Giving him a bright smile, I said, “Sorry, I didn’t hear you.” As I crossed the room, it seemed he’d been rendered speechless. When I bent over to towel-dry my hair upside-down, he made a strange choking sound. Lifting the towel out of the way, I glanced at him guiltily. “You were right about the hot water. And the shampoo,” I added, trying to figure out his odd expression. “Sorry I wasn’t faster. Has the food gone cold already?”

  His jaw was rigid. “You are naked.”

  I glanced down at myself and then back at him. “I just took a shower.”

  Color tinged his cheeks and he snapped with sudden anger, “Do you think I’m some kind of eunuch?”

  Since I had no idea what a eunuch was, I bought some time by standing upright and finger-combing my hair back from my face. “You’re the one who came in the bathroom, Koda. If you don’t like the view…” Trailing off, I tipped my chin at the door.

  His nostrils flared and he lowered his head in an almost predatorial way. When he spoke, his voice had a lot of growl in it. “I’ve no complaints about the view as long as you have no complaints about being viewed.”

  I snorted. “I lived in a bittern stable. Twenty-five people, one small room, zero privacy.”

  Koda’s hot-eyed gaze traveled across my body. “I have no trouble imagining your effect on the males.” His power flared, filling the bathroom and dancing across my skin with tantalizing heat.

  Astonished, my pulse leaping, I looked more closely at him. And he looked right back.

  Dark flames kindled to life in his eyes, a sudden flare of lust lighting their stygian depths. My body clenched in instant response and I trembled at both its strength and at the knowledge that Koda wasn’t nearly as distant as I’d thought. As he’d led me to think.

  And yet…and yet, a reserve still existed within him, betrayed by the fists held rigid at his sides, the tension in his square jaw, the tiny tic beneath his right eye.

  Habitual caution kept me back from him, the room’s width between us nowhere near enough for my sanity as my rampant hormones howled at me to take him. Like magnets, we attracted and repelled, the air between us crackling with energy.

  In a faint voice, I finally managed to respond. “Because of my rank, males didn’t express such things. They didn’t even look at me without my permission.”

  “I can’t take my eyes off you.” Koda lifted a challenging brow. “Should I be worried?�
��

  I debated answering him, but his eyebrow cranked higher at my extended silence. Hoping to deflect the sensual tension, I gave a short laugh. “Fae geneticists have a lot in common with horny teenage boys. If they’d made our boobs any bigger, it would be damn near impossible to draw a bow or swing a sword. Embarrassing, too.” In a weak attempt at self-deprecation, I put my hands on my slim waist and struck a comical chest out, pin-up girl pose.

  Koda inhaled sharply and his fists went white-knuckled.

  Startled by his emphatic reaction and by the growing heat doing a slow, hot burn low in my belly, I picked up the discarded towel and held it against my chest. Ignoring his wry chuckle at my sudden modesty, I cast a disgusted look at my grungy clothes on the floor. The idea of putting them back on was vastly unappealing, but I was having difficulty breathing under Koda’s carnal appraisal. I needed something covering my body. Something between my increasingly needy flesh and his hungry eyes.

  When he spoke, breaking the loaded silence, I jumped. “Do bitterns believe in ritualistic scarring?” His voice had a rough, erotic edge to it.

  His words were far more effective than any plunge into icy water.

  Cringing inwardly, I wished the towel was larger. Wished it could hide the countless silvery scars covering my body. Unable to think of a response that wouldn’t lead to an appalling discussion, I shook my head and looked away. I didn’t want to see Koda’s expression when it morphed into pity. Something that would happen if he learned how the marks had been made.

  Crossing the room, he bent to pull a robe out from under the counter. In a soft tone, he said, “Here. You can put this on. The hotel supplies them.”

  I took the knee-length terry cover-up he handed me, doing my best not to react to the warmth of his skin as our fingertips briefly touched. When I closed the robe over my body, he sighed—a sound I wasn’t sure he even knew he’d made. Despite my discomfort, I smiled behind a curtain of hair.

  Hesitantly, I told him, “I have the impression that nudity bothers some humans. Does it bother you?” Keeping my gaze focused on the belt at my waist as I tied it, I could practically feel his scowl.