“I am so sorry to call you, Dela, but there is a man here in my home. He says he is supposed to watch out for me. He will not explain why, and he will not leave. When I threatened to call the police, he said to call you.”
Dela sighed. Hari watched her face as he tried unsuccessfully to unbutton his shirt. Scowling, he finally pulled it over his head, popping several buttons in the process.
Oh, well. I have to buy him new clothes anyway.
Dela found herself staring at Hari’s body, and shook her head to clear the libidinous cobwebs. “Adam, I did ask someone to check on you. I’ve been receiving some … threats, and I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“Threats?” He sounded appalled. “What kinds of threats?”
“Don’t worry about it. Is that man nearby? Let me talk to him.”
There was a moment of silence, and then someone who had an even sweeter voice than Adam coughed lightly into the phone. “This is Eddie, ma’am. Roland sent me.”
Must be new. She hadn’t met Eddie yet.
“I guessed that. Why, however, are you scaring Adam? I was hoping for something more discreet.”
“Ma’am, Roland told me this is a high-priority job, and that the safety of you, your friends, and your establishment create a non-negotiable situation in which I, and my colleagues, are allowed full authority over certain aspects of your personal security.”
It was a long sentence, spoken very quickly, and so obviously rehearsed that Dela had to smile. “Tell me what Roland really said. Word for word.”
A moment of silence. “Ma’am, I don’t think that would be appropriate.”
“Humor me.”
“Ma’am.”
“Eddie.”
Eddie took a deep breath, clearly torn between following the implicit order in her voice, and a very good upbringing involving Words You Never Say in Front of Women.
“Ma’am, Roland said, and I quote: ‘I don’t care what you beeping have to do to keep her and her peeps beeping safe, but if it means acting like the Good Lord Jesus parting the beeping Red Sea, then you will part that beeping sea, or else a certain region of your lower anatomy will be mine on a beeping stick.’”
“Delilah?” Hari appeared from the bathroom, a towel flung over his shoulder. He was clearly concerned by the strange choking sounds she was making, as well as the deep crimson of her scrunched-up face. “Delilah, are you all right?”
She nodded weakly, but that one small movement made her dissolve into a helpless fit of giggles. Hari began to smile—clueless, but taken in by her mirth.
“Ma’am?” Eddie said. He sounded like he was grinning.
“Thank you,” she finally gasped. “I think I understand your situation a little better now.”
“Actually,” he said, “I would never have approached Adam, except we found evidence that someone has been tampering with the locks of your home. There was no sign of actual entry—probably because your security system was designed by Blue—but we thought it might be safer if one of us stayed on the inside at all times.”
Dela ground her teeth. “Eddie, can you do me a favor? After this conversation, I want you to purchase a plane ticket to Hawaii in Adam’s name. Book the hotels, all that. Roland’s expense account, of course. Tell Adam that if he refuses to go on vacation, he’s fired.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Dela liked the fact that Eddie didn’t argue with her. “Does Roland have any idea who’s doing this?”
“Ma’am, if he does, he hasn’t informed us.”
Typical. She gave Eddie a few more instructions, mostly along the lines of “don’t kill anyone unless you have to,” and hung up the phone with a sigh.
Hari watched her with a somewhat bemused expression on his face.
“What?” She stretched out on the bed. Her head hurt.
“You are very fierce,” he said, approaching gracefully, some mysterious intent in his eyes. He tugged off her shoes and socks, fingers tracing the fine bones of her ankles. Dela’s breath caught. Hari clasped her hand and pulled her from the bed, guiding her toward the bathroom. “You remind me of my people.”
Hari sat her down on the toilet, and then bent over the tub, fussing with the water until it rose, steaming, into the quiet air. Dela felt very small. It was like seeing the GQ version of a human King Kong crammed inside a teeny gift box. He filled the entire bathroom, not just with muscle and bone, but with the ever-expanding vibrancy of his presence. Hari was so much bigger than his body, but his energy was profoundly comforting—not intimidating in the slightest.
Right now, she didn’t quite understand what was going through his mind, but she trusted him enough not to question it.
And you aren’t a girl who trusts many people.
“This was not the day you expected,” said Hari gently, perched on the edge of the tub. He looked deep into her eyes, his gaze slightly hypnotic, and ran an elegant finger along her chin. Her body thrilled at his touch. “You need to rest, Delilah. Forget everything but yourself. Do not think of today or tomorrow. Think only of the water, warming your body.”
The sound of his voice was soothing; her eyelids drooped. She felt safe in the glow of his presence, utterly at ease. The day’s events slipped from her mind, and all she cared about was that Hari was with her. She was not alone, and for the first time in a long while, that was a good thing.
Maybe she had not known him long—maybe there was a lifetime of stories left untold, tempers fit to fire—but she knew enough. In her heart, in her head. Hari was the best man she had ever met. Frightening, wonderful. She did not want to contemplate heartbreak, or danger to life and limb. In that moment, the future did not matter. Stupid, maybe—but she did not care.
Hari pressed his lips against her forehead, brushed her mouth in a kiss. “Bathe,” he whispered. “Rest. Think of nothing but that. I will check on you in a while.”
He left her, and after a moment of quiet contemplation, Dela stripped and sank into the hot water. She did rest, Hari heavy in her thoughts, and when she eventually slept, she dreamed of Hari, too.
And the dream became a nightmare.
While Dela bathed, Hari made himself a bed on the floor in front of the room’s main door. He arranged his sword beside the spare blanket, his knives near the pillow (a pillow, a blanket! Luxury!). Everything within easy reach.
She might let you sleep in her bed.
The memory of Dela’s body pressed flush against his own was enough to drive him wild, but he knew if lay beside her, more than kisses would follow, and it would be too much too soon. For both of them.
Besides, her bed was far from the door. Anyone who wished Dela harm would have only this entrance to come through, and Hari would be waiting.
He was not quite sure when taking care of Dela had become more important to him than staying out of the box, but the day had been strange, and events—both inside and outside his heart—were moving too quickly to follow. It was enough he wanted to keep her safe—desperately so. Dela stirred him to feelings of tenderness he had not known he was capable of expressing. All those years of brutal torment … and still, he cared. The idea stunned him.
He remembered her slender body pressed against him; her voice, soft—her lips, silken and sweet. The overwhelming emotion stirred by her compassion, her words. Everything Hari knew of pleasuring women had been learned through degradation and slavery. He had never wanted to be with his summoners or their friends, but he had learned to please them in all the varied ways they wished. Learned because he had been ordered.
His embarrassment was still piercing—jeers echoing hollowly in his ears as he knelt between a woman’s thighs, sliding into a dismal, sickening heat that was empty pleasure, a worthless effort requiring nothing but endurance. Endurance against degradation.
Not so with Dela. For the first time in his life, he desired. He wanted her, and it did not matter how or why. Her pleasure was paramount, her comfort and safety of supreme importance. And it was his heart, not just his bo
dy, wanting these things.
I am frightened. I do not know what to do. It is too much too soon.
Too much too soon. Just like the Magi.
The warmth Dela stirred in his mind disappeared. Hari recalled turning, turning, and suddenly the old nightmare was upon him, made flesh—I promise you anything if you will not harm her or the child—again and again—a life for a life—and his skull, so full of memory and rage, felt pushed through the head of a needle.
A vision—golden eyes set in a smiling face, long strong limbs dappled with sunlight. An elegant hand, curved around a swelling belly.
I am with child, Hari. The father is a traveler from the mountains. I will be his mate.
And where is he now, Suri? I have not seen this man.
Laughter. He will steal me away, and you will see him after the child is born. You know that is the way of it. But I will tell you a secret—he has returned to the mountain to prepare us a home.
Oh, if only. If only his sister’s dreams had unfolded as she thought they would. If only the Magi had not captured her mate. If only Suri had not been lured in blood-rage by the sight of his skinned hide. If only …
But the Magi was alive. Here. Now. Impossible, inexplicable—but no illusion. Hari would never forget that scent: hot coals, iron, spice. He would never forget that sly voice, the wide white smile. No other man could imitate that knowing sneer.
Hari’s belly clenched with a rage so profound he found himself digging his nails into his palms to keep from growling. All the blood he had spilled, millennia worth, and none would taste as sweet as the Magi’s.
So he’d thought, in that first moment of seeing. So he’d intended.
Until Dela wrapped herself around his body. Until she kissed him—so ferocious, her heat and scent enveloping his blood-rage, soothing the killer. Insanity to come between a tiger and the kill, and Dela had done so without hesitation, trusting he would not harm her, that somehow he would hear her voice and listen.
And I did. Not because she commanded it, but because I wanted to listen. Two thousand years spent dreaming of revenge, and I stopped because she asked me to. Because she trusted me to trust her.
But the Magi still lived, the how of it inexplicable, and wanted Hari to help him. Hari had no illusions of freedom, release. The Magi wanted a slave. The slave he had created.
But for what purpose? Dela was right: The Magi had already worked his worst revenge. Why search out Hari after all this time? Two thousand years ago, the Magi had asked for a child—with Hari’s sister as the chosen mother. What he could possibly want now did not bear contemplating.
Oh, but it had been strange for Hari, hearing his mother tongue flow from the Magi’s lips. From anyone else, with any other words, he would have taken a moment to savor the sound of the ancient language. But no, the Magi had stolen even that.
A fine breeder, the Magi had said, referring to Dela, her slender body pressed against Hari’s side. If you do not take her, then perhaps I will. Make her skin shine with my seed, like I did your sister.
I will kill you first, Hari had snapped. I will feed you your balls.
Hari squeezed his eyes shut with the memory. He had no talent for subtlety. The Magi had read him too well, divining the depths of his feelings for Dela, and had manipulated him into confirming the emotions. If he had been more careful—pretended disdain, perhaps—the Magi might not have turned his powers on her. He would not have counted on Hari choosing Dela over revenge.
If the Magi takes hold of Dela, he will not just kill her. He will make her suffer first. The horror of that possibility staggered him. He would rather die than see Dela endure the same fate as his sister. The Magi might not want a child this time, but he was a man of deep, violent lusts. Hari could still see his sister’s eyes, broken with sorrow, her bleeding hands clutching her naked belly. The young woman, trying to protect her unborn child—and unable to, at the very last.
Delilah would make an excellent mother. The thought was unbidden, powerful. Hari buried the notion before his heart could burst from his chest. His life was too uncertain to think such things, his pain too great. His few words to Dela about his search for a mate had come far too close to some truth he was not yet willing to face. A dream long denied.
Hari felt Dela’s scream before he heard it, some instinct tuning his ears to the bathroom as water splashed under the sounds of her terrified cries. He did not feel himself move, but suddenly he was in the bathroom, watching helplessly as Dela rocked back and forth, arms clasped around her knees. He knelt, resting his large hand on her head, soothing back damp hair and drawing her into the dry warmth of his chest.
“Hari,” she whispered. “Something terrible is going to happen.”
“Tell me,” he said, the world listing sideways beneath him.
Dela shook her head, staring at the tiled wall. “I had a dream. A vision. The future comes to me that way sometimes, but this—this wasn’t specific. Just that you and I will be put into a very bad situation.” Dela looked at him then, and Hari suddenly became aware of her nudity. She hugged her legs closer to her chest.
“I am sorry,” he murmured, standing, his eyes averted.
“Hari,” she said, stopping him. “Thank you.”
He nodded and closed the door behind him. Creating a little distance from Dela’s presence helped clear his mind. He leaned against the wall, hands curled tight against his thighs.
Something terrible is going to happen. You and I will be put into a very bad situation.
Hari heard Dela step out of the tub, his ears picking up her careful, measured breathing. Her control reasserted. He had seen her fear, though—naked horror etched on her face—and he felt himself sink deep into a place he had not been for almost two thousand years. Without his skin, he could not become tiger in flesh, but the tiger was still within, restlessly dreaming.
Hari surrounded his beast, stroking and whispering. Too much time had been spent on dreams.
It was time to wake.
Chapter Five
Visions of death haunted Dela for the rest of the night, a fatal caress upon her mind. Resting in the darkness, she had trouble closing her eyes. Hari’s anguished face filled her thoughts, and all she could hear was someone’s sigh of death. Soft, lethal.
But the future never turns out the way you think it will. What you see is a glimpse, the shadow of a possibility.
A truth Dela knew all too well. When she was twelve, she had dreamed a car would hit BoBo, the family dog. The following week, BoBo was struck while chasing a ball into the street. A glancing blow only—he suffered a broken leg, and went on to live another five years before succumbing to old age.
Still, BoBo had been a ripple point in Dela’s emotional life, which seemed to guide the frequency of her visions. Her grandmother was a card-carrying member of Oracles-R-Us, but Dela’s visions always had been limited to events that would bear deeply personal emotional consequences. And at the moment, deeply personal emotional consequences were what she was all about.
She listened to Hari’s quiet breathing, half the room away in front of the door. He had bade her good night with a deep kiss, then settled down in his makeshift bed on the floor. Seven feet of gorgeous magical man, guarding her. And a gentleman, no less.
The transformation in them both astounded her. Dela could not reflect on it long without feeling overwhelmed. So much had changed in this short day, not just in her life, but also—she suspected—in Hari’s.
Magic really exists. Curses, immortals, shape-shifters—she remembered the Magi, then—and cruelty. True disregard. Evil.
Evil and its opposite. Dela felt her cheeks warm as she thought about Hari, and their first meeting. And yet, between them, a subtle shifting of roles. Strangers to friends—and now, deeper waters, sweet and mysterious.
Dela missed Hari’s touch. She even contemplated bedding down beside him just to feel his body pressed against her own. Her need was outrageous and confusing, inexplicable, her feel
ings so far beyond the realm of anything she had previously experienced that she felt faintly ridiculous.
But thinking of Hari was far more pleasant than contemplating the person—or people—who apparently wanted her dead.
Dela stared at the ceiling, running through the past ten years of her life—every major argument or strange encounter—and came up with nothing important enough to kill over. Nothing worth her life. Nothing except the agency.
It was a risk they all lived with, that the government or military would discover their powers, that the media might catch wind of the agency’s true purpose and light the fire of scrutiny under their collective psychic asses. No one wanted to end up in a lab or on the cover of National Enquirer.
But Roland had been emphatic; Dirk & Steele was safe, its cover still intact. Which meant this was somehow her fault.
Dela blew out her breath, exasperated. True, she knew she had a talent for irritating people. She was too blunt, completely undiplomatic, with dislikes that were painfully obvious. But to hire an assassin?
“You cannot sleep.” Hari’s voice floated from the darkness.
“Did I wake you? I’m sorry.”
“I was not sleeping, either. You are still thinking of who might want you dead?”
“Yes. I’m not coming up with anything.”
“You know the answer, even if you are not aware of it. Give yourself time.”
“Ha. You’re implying I’ve actually done something deserving of murder.”
“That is unfair,” he said.
“Maybe,” she conceded. “But true.”
He was silent for a moment. “I find it difficult to believe you have enemies, Delilah. I have seen nothing in you to warrant such hate. But perhaps it is jealousy you are encountering. Men and women have been killed for less. Is there a … a lover in your past—or present—who would wish you harm?”
“No,” Dela said. “There have been some men, but not for a long time. They wouldn’t have any reason to hurt me, either. Our separations were amicable.” Amicable because Dela and her few boyfriends had always known the relationship was temporary. Dela never allowed herself more.
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