Dark Sins and Desert Sands

by Stephanie Draven

  And Ray was losing her.

  The dark god of Egypt rose from the steaming wreckage of the truck that had plowed into him. Shouts came from all directions as his security team tried to figure out who to shoot at. The Scorpion King slid off the hood, his mind black with fury. The war god’s suit was a ruin. Shredded rags. So much the better. Seth tore off his shirt, and the remainder of his pants, revealing himself as in battles of old. Thunder announced his towering rage, and he knew that storm clouds would roll in soon after.

  That’s when he saw her. Isabel. She was here, close enough to crush, and the possibilities of how he’d vanquish her danced before his eyes. He forgot the minotaur; he forgot the sphinx. He stalked the young goddess until a wall of jungle plants rose up in front of him, blocking his path.

  “Xochiquetzel!” Seth shouted, easily withering her plants away. But no sooner had he done so than another wall of greenery rose up before him, this time surrounding them both.

  “I come with a proposal,” she said.

  “No more trades,” Seth growled. “No more deals. No more pacts or bargains. Nothing as civilized as that ever again. I’ll honor none of them. You could’ve gone your foolish way, but you’ve stepped back into the quicksand of my world now and you’ll all be sorry for it.”

  “But it’s my realm you’re trespassing in,” Isabel said, her hair damp from the rain that leaked through her wilderness roof. “You may have dominion over the industry of war, but I have dominion over pregnant mothers. I wouldn’t have let Layla go back to you if I’d known she was with child.”

  “She’s mine,” Seth said, heedless of the petulance that he heard in his own voice. “The sphinx is mine!”

  “You don’t even want her,” the sex goddess said, coming so near to him that the dampness evaporated from her skin. “I’m your match. Not her.”

  “Is that so?” Seth asked as he summoned the storm to blow her jungle canopy to dust. Rain turned to scorching wind. His rage was hot, so hot that her vines withered and burst into flames. The fire engulfed her. Her clothes charred and fell away from her body. He smelled the burning magic in the air and heard her shriek. Yet, even writhing in pain, the young goddess was strong. He reached for her smoldering form, but she broke free and ran for the building as terrified mortals scattered.

  His employees were just ants now. He paid no attention to any of them. Not his workers, not his minions, not anyone. He’d trod them underfoot without another thought. His quarry was Isabel and he’d need to focus all his power to capture her. He chased her into the building, up the stairs and into the atrium where a massive tree burst from the floor, shooting up into the skylight and sending glass crashing down to litter his path. It annoyed him that she was causing such damage to the Scorpion Group building, but he had her trapped now. She must have known it, because her ivy grew so swiftly over the walls and windows that it soon blocked out all light, forcing Seth to hunt her in the darkness.

  “You should have never toyed with me, Isabel. Don’t you know what I do to other gods? Haven’t you heard of my battles?” She didn’t answer, but he heard the young goddess panting. He liked that. Let her be afraid of him and of the dark. “Are you trembling, Isabel? You should be. I caught another nature god once. His name was Osiris. I drowned him in the Nile, then cut him to pieces.”

  “That was in Egypt,” Isabel said when he was close enough to see the faint illumination of her eyes. She was shrouded in nothing but leaves, peering between vines like a jaguar. “I don’t think you’ll be able to conquer me here.”

  He lunged for her, but just as he grasped hold of her, two vines dropped from the ceiling and caught him by the arms. The force of it threw him to the ground where leaves grew thick over his body. He gave a mocking laugh at her pitiful attempts to restrain him. It was only a matter of summoning enough power to break these bonds.

  And yet…he couldn’t.

  This wasn’t possible, Seth thought, his own breath coming out in ragged gasps. Of all the old gods, the war gods were the strongest. Everyone knew that.

  “You’re farther from home than I am,” the young Aztec goddess explained, her silhouette all curves. “My powers are stronger here than yours.”

  “War is stronger than peace,” Seth said, pulling frantically on his bindings. “Hate is stronger than love.”

  “Maybe,” Isabel said, kneeling over him. “But creation is as strong as destruction.”

  He felt the heat of her as she straddled his hips and it filled him with frustrated need. She leaned forward, her hair in his face. Her eyes were a chaotic storm that called to him like a siren’s song. “Forget about the sphinx and the minotaur,” Isabel said, her lips brushing against his like a whisper. “Let them go and I’ll let you go.”

  Seth thrashed again, enraged that he should be under a woman’s power. When his second wife had tried to chain him, he’d hated her for it. Now Isabel was reminding him of those epic battles, those glorious days when he’d been at his prime. When the power had flowed through him, and he was a potent force. And in spite of everything, she was making him feel that way now. Potent. “You can’t hold me here forever, Isabel. You’ll lose your strength, day by day.”

  “Yes,” she admitted. “But by the time I’m drained, I’ll have swallowed up your Scorpion Group compound in the earth, and think how the other immortals will laugh at you.”

  Pride. It already stung and she was picking at the wound. Still, it was hard to pay attention to anything but the insistent throb between his legs. She was throbbing too, shifting her weight subtly back and forth, to drive his lust. The wide expanse of her hips glistened bare and tantalizing below her belly button. Her hands splayed across his chest and electricity seemed to tingle in every line of her hands. “Oh, Seth, if you’d won your bargain with me—if you’d taken me as a lover—you’d have been the envy of other immortals.”

  “Why would they envy me?” he said. “You’re just a whore. Anyone could have you for a price.”

  “Then why don’t you pay me? I have a price. I’ve told you what it is. Leave the sphinx and the minotaur free to live their lives.”

  The scent of her, the warmth of her skin, the sheer power of her being drove him mad. He’d pay any price to thrust inside her, but when it was over, what if he wanted her to stay? “Why should you go to all this trouble on behalf of two mortals? You realize if Layla has her child, that’s what she’ll become. Just another worthless mortal, no use to you either.”

  “I didn’t come for Layla,” Isabel said, the tender skin of her inner thighs clinging to his hips. If she shifted only an inch, he could be inside her. “I came for you.”

  Hearing that did something to him; he searched her eyes for the lie, but found none. “Should that flatter me?”

  “Ay, Papi,” she said with a little tinkling laugh. “I knew the first moment I laid eyes upon you. You’re a match for me. You’re not the only one with pride, you see. I’m a young goddess. I yearned to taste the lips of a god older and more fearsome than any in the new world. Mortal men all fall at my feet, but you’re the Scorpion King, and almost immune to my charms.”

  “Almost,” Seth said wryly, because he couldn’t hide his body’s response to her.

  “I think we were always looking for each other,” she said.

  He didn’t want to admit it, but he knew it was true.

  “Even if there weren’t any sphinx or any minotaur,” she continued, “you’d have found me, wouldn’t you have?”

  “Yes,” Seth said. It was more than agreement, and they both knew it. It was an acceptance of terms. All of them. Spoken and unspoken. She moved over him, lowering herself onto the solid length of his erection. He closed his eyes and groaned as Isabel shamelessly undulated over him, her lips parted in obvious pleasure. She didn’t move in the way he would’ve anticipated. Her skin wasn’t the color he most favored, and her breasts were more ample than he would’ve desired. And yet, these unexpected things about her—womanly qualities outside
of his control—ensorcelled him.

  She seemed to know it. She loosened his restraints, and he snapped them, turning Isabel onto her back. She didn’t fight him, but wrapped herself around him like a python. She gave herself to him even though she wasn’t something of his creation. She owed him nothing, and yet, she was here with him. It was a mystery that might take centuries to unravel, but they both had time….

  Chapter 21

  Opened up, surprise!

  Bitten gently, coquettish lies.

  Gently together, beckoning.

  Together hard, time for reckoning.

  Ray’s lips were on hers when he felt Layla take the first ragged breath on her own. She was coming back to him. Ray couldn’t be sure if it was the gulps of air he forced into her lungs, or the fact that Seth seemed to have forgotten about his diabolical punishment the moment he saw Isabel. Whatever had happened, color rushed to Layla’s face and her body became flesh again. She transformed before his eyes. First stone, then tawny lion hide, then the smooth skin of the woman he’d made love to. The woman he loved. The woman he’d nearly lost. “Ray?” Layla gasped, her eyelashes fluttering against the rainstorm. Her teeth chattered against the cold.

  Ray wrapped his massive arms around her, willing the heat from his body into hers. “I’m here,” Ray said, though he wasn’t exactly sure where here was anymore. Isabel’s plants had all but swallowed the Scorpion Group facility, transforming the grounds and parking lot into a veritable jungle. Even if Ray could’ve found the wreckage of the truck, he wasn’t sure he could have started its engine. Meanwhile, the storm overhead was ugly, the winds more savage by the minute.

  Layla took another shuddering gasp, her fingers clawing at the earth as she did so. He would’ve liked to let her take a few moments to recover, but there was no telling when Seth would be back for her, and Ray would die before he let Layla fall into Seth’s clutches again.

  Hefting her up into his arms, Ray started off on foot. Rain lashed at him as he navigated the maze of plants, some of which appeared to be orchids and banana trees. Layla murmured against his chest, “Is Jack…dead?”

  “I didn’t kill him,” Ray grunted. “I didn’t even hurt him. Not much, anyway.”

  “I’m so glad,” she sobbed against his chest, with what sounded like relief. “I love you.”

  “I know,” Ray said, though it helped to hear her say it. “I told you that over and over again. Do you believe me now?”

  “I believe you,” she whispered as he held her, using his body to shield her from the wind. “I believe in you….”

  It had made all the difference before, and it still did. The trees swayed overhead, but the wind was dying down and the road wasn’t far. A few more minutes and he found an underpass to shelter her from the rain. It was only then, in the shadows of the concrete that he finally said, “Layla, when you were turning into a stone sphinx, you said something about a baby.”

  That was when she told him, in hushed and reverent tones. It took him a few moments before he could work his mouth. “We’re having a kid? You and me?”

  She actually smiled. “Yes.”

  Some warm feeling started to bubble its way up inside him. “I’m going to be a…”

  “Father,” she whispered. “If you want to be.”

  But he remembered what she’d told him. “Not if it’s going to kill you!” He cursed himself for every selfish time he’d touched her. She’d told him that having a child would take away her immortality, but he hadn’t given birth control a thought.

  “Our baby isn’t going to kill me, Ray. I just won’t have the power to riddle anymore…and I won’t be deathless anymore.”

  He felt his mouth draw into a thin, grim line. “I’m sorry, Layla. I don’t know what else to say. I’m so damned sorry….”

  “Don’t you understand that you’ve given me the greatest gift?” she asked, pushing her rain-soaked hair out of her eyes. “It’s what I wanted. Seth could never give me a child. He convinced me that it was blasphemy, but this is my body and you gave it back to me.”

  Ray watched the pounding rain beat against the pavement of the empty road. “But I took forever from you.”

  “No,” Layla said, touching his cheek. “You gave me a different kind of immortality. We live on forever in the memories of our children, don’t we? You gave me the rest of my life and I want to spend it with you. The baby and I belong with you. If you want us.”

  If he wanted them? Was she crazy? “There’s nothing I’ve ever wanted more in my life, but I’m going to jail, Layla.” Even if Jack’s story broke on the front page of every newspaper in the country, Ray still had things to atone for. Besides, what the hell kind of father would he be? Sure, he was good with his nephews. He loved kids. But he was a monster.

  Layla seemed to read his thoughts. “You can’t use your powers anymore, Ray. Never again. Not even for my sake. If you’re going to be a father—”

  “I’ve got to be a normal man,” he finished. “A better man.” Down the road, he saw flashing lights of police cars, and decided it wasn’t too soon to start. He moved to get up, but she clutched his arm. “I’ve got to turn myself in, Layla.”

  “I know,” she said tearfully, pressing a kiss to his lips.

  It buoyed him. He stood up, even though the force of the wind pushed him back. As the sirens got closer, Ray lifted his hands in surrender and felt stronger than he ever had, as a man or a minotaur.

  A congressional inquiry had been opened into Ray’s torture and extraordinary rendition to Syria, but Layla held out little hope of justice being served on that account. And then, of course, there was Ray’s trial. She wished she could be inside the courtroom, but the government demanded secrecy on the grounds of national security.

  All she could do was wait. Outside the gate, Layla found a seat on a bench, heedless of the reporters that crowded in around her. Whether Ray emerged as a prisoner or a free man, she wanted her face to be the first he saw. He hadn’t wanted his family here. Didn’t want his parents or his nephews to be caught up in the media circus, so Carson and Missy waited with her, the two teenagers holding hands like it was the most innocent and natural thing in the world to do.

  “It’s going to be okay, Dr. Bahset,” Carson said with a shy shrug of his shoulders.

  “It’s sweet of you to try to reassure me,” Layla said. “Especially because none of this would be happening without you or your father’s newspaper.”

  “I guess I’ve got a better appreciation of what my dad does,” Carson said. “I’m feeling a lot steadier these days.”

  “I wish I could’ve done more to help you,” Layla said.

  “You did plenty. I’m still in therapy, but I’m getting better,” he said, smiling at the girl on his arm. Meanwhile, Missy shifted from foot to foot as if trying to make peace with the long white sundress that covered just about everything but her arms.

  The former call girl winked at him. “He just had to learn that nothing is perfect, everything is flawed. He just has to let himself see things how they really are.”

  Layla smiled at Missy. “I think you’ll make a good therapist one day.”

  Missy beamed at the praise. “What’s taking the judge so long anyway? ¡Ay, caramba!”

  If Layla weren’t so nervous, she’d have laughed at Missy’s spot-on imitation of Isabel. Since the day she was almost turned into a statue, Layla hadn’t seen the goddess. Then again, she hadn’t seen or heard from Seth either, and she hoped that would last for the rest of her mortal life. Maybe Seth would find some measure of happiness and the world would be better off for it.

  When the trial was over, Layla rose awkwardly from the bench, and squinted into the sun as Ray emerged, looking uncomfortable in his dress uniform. In spite of her very pregnant belly, she found the energy to run to meet him.

  Their eyes met and locked.

  The crowd rushed forward, reporters jostling them. “Specialist Stavrakis,” one called to him by rank. “Do you ha
ve anything to say about your sentence?”

  “Time served,” Ray said, his voice low and stunned and just for her.

  Layla had been preparing for this moment, practicing how she’d tell him that she’d wait for him, no matter how long it took. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll come see you every opportunity—”

  “Layla, I’m not going to be locked up,” Ray said, a slow smile crossing his lips. “They considered my time in the dungeon as time served.”

  She grasped his wrists and realized he wasn’t in manacles. “You’re not going to prison?”

  “No,” he said, as if just realizing it himself. “Jack’s going in for psychiatric evaluation, but I’m free, Layla.”

  “Free?” A burst of happiness made her tremble. Ray had given her this feeling, too, and the joy of it made her laugh. He laughed, too, sweeping her up, pregnant belly and all, into his arms.

  The reporters jostled them. “C’mon, Ray! Give us something for the news.”

  Ray’s eyes were for her, and only her. “So, Doc, what the hell are we gonna do now?”

  “Whatever we want,” Layla said.

  A thousand flashbulbs went off as she kissed him, and she didn’t care.

  There had been moments when Ray thought he’d never live to see this day. Never thought he’d ever hear the creak of the porch step under his boot. Now, here he was, slowly climbing the stairs of his childhood home. “Are you sure you don’t want to do this by yourself?” Layla asked, cradling their baby girl in the nook of her arm.

  Ray chuckled. “We got into this mess together, didn’t we?”

  The petunias were in bloom, petals unfolding in hanging pots by the railing, and the front door opened before Ray even had the chance to ring the bell. His nephews came shrieking toward him and both boys were up into his arms, leaping at him like overeager puppies. “Uncle Ray!”

  They smelled like milk and grass and he gloried in their wholeness and the way their big brown eyes lit up. They weren’t afraid of him and they wouldn’t have to grow up thinking that they lived in a country where people could simply be disappeared without consequence. That was something that he’d done for them; something for which he could be proud.