“The Guild panicked,” Dag continued. “The threat of the Darkness had risen, and with no Guardians to battle the Seven, it appeared all hope of life was lost. They began to prepare for the worst. But then something happened they had not planned on. A woman appeared before them, a woman of power whose magic rivaled that of any of the Wardens but who had been turned away from a position in the Guild. She refused to believe that the Guardians would permanently desert mankind, and so she knelt before the statue form of a Guardian and she prayed that he would wake and stand against the Darkness.
“The woman called to him, and to the astonishment of the Wardens, the Guardian heard her call and answered. He woke and seized the woman, claiming her as his mate. He vowed she had been destined for him, and that for her sake and the sake of her people, he would again take up the struggle against the Seven.”
Uh-oh. Suddenly Kylie forgot all about Wild Kingdom and started to feel a lot more eHarmony. Did he think this was Girl Scout camp? Because this was turning into the scariest story Kylie had ever heard.
“One by one, women of power appeared, and one by one each Guardian found his destined mate. Each fought for her sake to banish the Darkness once more from the world, and when the threat had passed, each one demanded that the Guild release him from his duty so that he could spend the rest of his existence with his chosen mate.
“From that time forward, my kind has whispered, but only a handful of additional Guardians have ever been said to have found their true mates. It has become a kind of legend among us, a fairy tale each of us has heard and yet none of us truly believed. Until now.”
Kylie really wanted to blame the steam for the way her head was spinning and her heart had suddenly decided to sprint a hundred meters in 0.7 seconds. Oh, if only she could. “I—you—but what—”
Oy.
She took a deep breath and tried again. “Are you trying to tell me that you think I am some kind of sent-from-heaven perfect girlfriend, and we’re going to live happily ever after together for the rest of eternity?”
Dag scowled down at her. “You do not believe me.”
“Right now, I don’t believe I’m not lying in a bed at Mass General in a drug-induced coma, so don’t take it personally.” Desperate for clothing and a little bit of personal space, Kylie finally succeeded in pulling out of Dag’s embrace and shutting off the water. Hurrying from the enormous shower enclosure, she wrapped herself in a short, fuzzy bathrobe (okay, on her, it wasn’t really that short) and bundled her hair into a towel with shaking hands. She wished it was from cold.
She also wished her farkakta hormones weren’t pouting about the lack of shower sex. As if there weren’t one or two things in this world just a teeny bit more important than orgasms. And no, she was not asking for a vote.
Dag followed her into her bedroom, hiking a towel of his own around his hips. “Why do you doubt what is between us?” he demanded, looking distractingly hot in the plush gray towel with droplets of warm water beading his skin. “Do not tell me that you felt nothing when we joined, because I will call you a liar if you make the attempt.”
“Of course I felt something,” she snapped. “I’m not dead. But hot sex is a long way from predestined mates, so don’t look at me like I’m the jerk because your train left without me.”
He blinked at her, dark lashes spiky with moisture, and she saw his frustration in the way his skin wanted to bleed from tan to gray. “Once again you try to confuse me with your speech. I thought we had gotten past such juvenile tactics.”
“Juvenile? Just who do you think—” Kylie cut herself off and bit back what she had intended to say. “No, you know what? I am done having this discussion. I said we should wait, and that’s what I’m going to do. We both need a little bit of time to step back and figure out where we stand. And don’t tell me that you don’t,” she said, raising a hand to ward off his protest. “No. I don’t care if you think you’re fine just the way you are, because I need some time to think, and I’m darned well going to take it.”
She stomped over to her closet and gave him her back as she flung open the door. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to ask you to go get yourself dressed and meet me downstairs with the others, where we will behave like civilized Jews, gentiles, and Guardians, order Chinese food, and do what we all came here to do.”
Behind her, she could almost feel him vibrating with frustration, but when she finally gave in to the urge to peek, he had disappeared through the door to the second floor. When she heard that telltale step squeak, she threw herself back onto her bed and took a deep breath.
She had no idea what she was going to do. The word “confused” didn’t even begin to describe her current mental state. She’d felt off-kilter since the first moment Dag lifted her off the ground, and it had nothing to do with being flown over the rooftops of Boston and deposited in a church belfry. No, the huge gargoyle’s effect on her had nothing to do with gravity and everything to do with chemistry.
Yes, fine, she could admit it. They had something between them, something Kylie had never felt the likes of in her entire twenty-three (almost twenty-four) years. Oh, she had been in lust before, had even thought she was in love a time or two, but nothing compared to the feelings Dag stirred in her heart, her stomach, and in a host of other places she swore not to think about just now.
Maybe that was half her problem. Whatever Dag made her feel, she couldn’t find the right thing to call it, not in English or Yiddish. And she suspected that if she spoke another language, she wouldn’t find it in that vocabulary, either. All she knew was that the man drove her crazy in more ways than she wanted to count. That didn’t mean she believed in the “destined mates” story; it just meant she didn’t know what to believe.
And, yes, Kylie Kramer was a big enough person (barely) to admit that was the worst of it. For her whole life, Kylie had always known exactly where she stood, even when she didn’t like the view. Now? Well, now, she wasn’t even sure she had feet.
Closing her eyes and sticking her tongue out at the ceiling, Kylie gave in to her basest impulses and blew a long loud raspberry at the world. It even helped, at least a little.
Okay, she thought. She would give herself two more minutes to kvetch, and then she would haul her tokhes out of bed, put on some clothes, and go order pot stickers. With enough meat, dough, and dumpling sauce, anything in this world became possible.
Even facing a witch, two gargoyles, and Seven Demons from hell.
At least she wouldn’t have to do it on an empty stomach.
Chapter Eleven
Wen ikh ess, ch’ob ikh alles un dread.
When I’m eating, everyone can go to hell.
Kylie got her pot stickers. And her chicken mai fun, her beef with asparagus, and her vegetable spring roll. Actually, between her and the rest of their little group, the restaurant threw in free crab Rangoon, free hot and sour soup, and free almond cookies. Everything lay spread out on her giant coffee table like a three-day feast. The entire staff would probably be talking about the four people who ate like thirty, but whatever. Kylie never thought clearly on an empty stomach.
The food also served as a source of distraction, although by the time she had trooped downstairs either everyone had developed a conscience, or Dag had told them where to shove the knowing glances. Everyone seemed to be on their best behavior.
Dag finished relating the story of yesterday’s security installation and the hexed workman who had attacked Kylie. Fortunately, he left out the mea culpas and kept things short, so she didn’t feel tempted to shove her chopstick into his ear. Much.
“I’d say that answers the question of whether or not this Ott guy let Ky’s name slip before they killed him,” Wynn said with a wince. “They had to have been watching the house and waiting for an opportunity to have managed something like that. Definitely not a random-target thing.”
“Yeah, I think we’ve pretty much come to that conclusion all on our own.”
“
The question is how much they believe she knows,” Knox said, turning to Kylie. He and Dag had elected to sit on the sofa (“like adults,” he had said) while she and Wynn sat tailor fashion on the floor of the living room. “That they will wish you dead is a certainty, but their level of determination to see it done sooner will depend on how many of their secrets they believe you possess.”
“I’m not sure how we figure that out. Obviously, they know that I had contact with Dennis Ott, or whatever his name was when he was mixed up with the Order. But they didn’t find the drive in his pocket, or I’m assuming they would have taken it, so they don’t know that we’ve read his journal or seen that video.”
“Speaking of, any word from your AV guy yet?” Wynn asked.
“Vic?” Kylie shook her head. “No, but it should be any day. He’s squeezing me in as a favor, but I know he’ll get to it as soon as possible. He likes me.”
Dag growled at that, and Kylie ignored him. Well, she rolled her eyes, then she ignored him.
“The sooner the better.” Knox set aside his water glass and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. “If Dag’s theory is correct, and the video actually shows us the identity of the Hierophant, we cannot have that information too soon.”
“Either way, it’s important,” Wynn said. “But our real task now is figuring out the details of this big strike the local sect has planned and when it’s going to happen. We can’t let them raise enough power to return Uhlthor to full strength, let alone give them a shot at freeing Shaab-Na as well.”
Kylie pushed away her plate and shook her head. “I’ve been over that drive with a fine-tooth comb. If Ott knew the details, he didn’t save them on there.”
“Which leaves us where?” Wynn asked.
“Nowhere very useful. Maybe you guys wasted your time coming all the way out here.”
Wynn scoffed. “Wasted what time? It’s a two-hour flight and, oh yeah, you’re my friend, so it’s such a hardship to see you.”
“There is no waste,” Knox assured her. “What the Order had planned here sounds bigger than what they attempted in any of the cities where we have faced them so far. It is only right that we should join forces and deal with this threat together.”
“We merely need to discover the nature of it,” Dag said. “Then together we shall defeat it.”
Kylie nodded. “Okay, okay. Enough with the rah-rahs. What do we actually do at this point? I mean, where do we start?”
Before anyone could make a suggestion, someone knocked at the front door. This time, Kylie even heard it. “Hold that thought,” she told them, pushing to her feet and hurrying to answer the summons. When she caught Dag following her, she felt an instant of irritation before logic kicked in. She didn’t know who was on the other side of the door, she wasn’t expecting any visitors, and she’d been attacked twice (three times, if you counted the drude) in the last week. Maybe having backup wasn’t such a bad idea.
Too short to reach the peephole, she brushed aside the gauzy curtain covering the sidelight before she opened the door. When she saw who was on the other side, she nearly plotzed.
Brushing aside Dag’s concern, she wrenched open the door. “Vic? What on earth are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in New York!”
The genius of digital video she and Wynn had just been discussing stood on her front steps shivering in the chilly night air and looking decidedly sheepish. “Yeah, well, I came up to give a seminar this weekend, so I thought I’d bring you your clip. I should have called first, but I wanted to surprise you. Did I come at a bad time?”
Victor Gill could have posed as the poster boy for Kylie’s People, the geeks and geniuses she had always befriended, dated, and slept with before her gargoylization. Standing on the short side of average at around five feet nine inches, he had a lean, lanky build, and the kind of casual, preoccupied appearance of someone who paid more attention to a computer screen than to clothes, hairstyles, or cultivating more than a passing acquaintance with sunlight. He wore dark-framed glasses over his exotic dark eyes, and the dusky skin tone of his Korean ancestry kept him from a kind of glow-in-the-dark pallor.
He hovered on the threshold and glanced behind her, eyeing Dag nervously.
“No. Oy, no, not at all. Come in.” She stepped back and waved her friend inside, nudging the Guardian back with a (mostly) gentle nudge (kick) to his shin. “Are you hungry? We ordered Chinese, and I think there’s enough to actually feed China. Let me get you a plate.”
Vic hung back near the front door while Dag glowered. “I don’t want to intrude. I mean, I really should have called first, but—”
“Don’t be silly. It’s so cool to see you.” Kylie marched over to her friend and linked her elbow with his to drag him toward the living room. “That big menace in the corner is Dag, by the way. Ignore him. He’s just grumpy because the restaurant didn’t send enough duck sauce.”
The grump in question protested his label with a snarl, because that was effective. Then he trailed after them, continuing to loom while Kylie introduced her friend to the group. Somehow, meeting Knox didn’t seem to make him any more comfortable.
“Come on. Sit.” Kylie urged him to a spot on the sofa opposite Knox and turned for the kitchen. “Just let me run and get you a plate. Be right back.”
Vic jumped to his feet like someone had just goosed his ass. “No!” He seemed to hear the panic in his own shout and cleared his throat before repeating much more calmly, “No, really, Kylie. I—I can’t stay.” He pulled a hand out of his pocket and held out a small red thumb drive. “Here. I cleaned up your image and saved it on here. Although next time I see you, you’re going to explain how you came across such crappy footage of Richard Foye-Carver at some kind of a candlelit social.”
Kylie had reached out to take the drive, but when she heard his joking words, her fingertips went numb. “Richard Foye-Carver?” she repeated dully.
“Yeah, not exactly his usual photo op.” Vic eased toward the hallway, keeping wary eyes on both Dag and Knox. “So, um, give me a call this weekend if you’ve got time for, you know, coffee or something. I’m speaking Sunday morning, but otherwise I’m pretty open.”
In the corner, Kylie could see Dag’s glowering expression and hear the subtle rumble of his muffled growl, but frankly, everything had sort of faded into the background with Vic’s news. Her mind kept trying to wrap around it as she walked her friend to the door, but every time she thought she had it, the slippery nugget of information would slide away.
Pasting on a poor imitation of a smile, she waved to Vic as he jogged down the steps and out into the night. Then she closed the front door, reset the alarm with trembling fingers, and slowly made her way back into the living room.
Wynn was the first to voice her thoughts. “Did that kid seriously just say the video is of Richard Foye-Carver? You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Oh, if only, Kylie thought, sinking back to her seat and gazing down at the small device in her hand. This opened an entirely different can of worms than the one she had been prepared for.
Richard Foye-Carver was a name most of the developed world would have recognized if they heard it. The scion of a wealthy family, Carver grew up in the world of international business and high finance, evolving over the years from young playboy to wealthy-in-his-own-right tycoon, to renowned philanthropist and human rights activist. He appeared regularly in news reports from one third-world location or another, shedding light on the sad plights of the world’s poor and persecuted.
And Kylie was supposed to accuse him of leading a cult of demon worshippers who were attempting to bring about the end of the world.
She could hear her bubbeh’s voice. A mensch tracht und Gott lacht. Man plans, and God laughs.
But really, did He have to make everything quite such a comedy?
From the sofa, Knox scowled. “This name holds meaning for you.”
Wynn snorted. “Yeah, a little bit. The guy is a famous international figure, known as
being a champion of the little guy and an all-around pseudosaint.” She gave a brief potted biography of the man, ending with the thoughts that had already run through Kylie’s mind. “Not only would no one believe a word anyone spoke against the man, but getting near enough to stop him ourselves would be next to impossible. The man has his own private security team that’s probably better trained and certainly better equipped than the U.S. Army, and he never goes anywhere that the press doesn’t follow and film everything he does, darn near up to using the toilet.”
“It’s useless.” Kylie slapped the drive down onto the coffee table and glared at it. “Finding out his identity is essentially worthless to us. Yeah, we know who he is now, but we can’t do a darned thing with that information. We might as well not even have it.”
Dag stepped up behind her and crouched, his big body nearly surrounding her. “I do not agree with that,” he said, flicking the drive with one finger and making it spin. “You say it is impossible to get to this man, and I say there is no one who cannot be reached, especially when a Guardian is involved.”
“And I’m saying we couldn’t get to him if he were a normal human being without getting our heads blown off. That’s without even adding in the dangers that come from him being able to use black magic on top of everything else.”
He tilted his head a bare inch. “That does make things a bit trickier.”
Kylie opened her eyes wide and turned to Wynn. “Their heads really are made of rocks, aren’t they?”
“No.” Wynn defended her fiancé and his brother, laying her hand on Knox’s knees. “Well, maybe sometimes.”
The big Guardian frowned down at his witchy mate. “You doubt my ability to assassinate one member of the Order? When I have another of the brethren at my side? I take issue with this insult.”
Rocked by Love (Gargoyles Series) Page 16
