Etched in Bone (Maker's Song #4)

by Adrian Phoenix

“Come back, Baptiste,” she said, opening her eyes and brushing the backs of her fingers against his burning cheek. “You’re in New Orleans, at Club Hell. You’ve just returned from feeding. It’s almost dawn and time for Sleep.”

  Dante shuddered, drew in a sharp breath.

  “I’m here, waiting for you,” Heather promised.

  Dante lifted his head and stared at the wall between his hands. Blinked.

  “Dante, here. I’m here.”

  “Catin,” he whispered, voice rough.

  He looked at her then, from across his muscle-corded shoulder. Red slashed the thin rings of dark brown encircling his pupils, the furious color fading as she watched. Blood trickled dark from his nose. Slicked his lips.

  “Me too.” He turned to face her, his hands sliding away from the wall. “J’su ici.”

  Feeling rubber-kneed with relief, Heather stepped in and hugged him hard. His strong arms wrapped around her and he rested his cheek against her hair. She didn’t know if she was holding him up or if he was holding her up.

  A little of both, I bet. We’re both done in.

  Dante burned against her, his hard, lean body hot as sunbaked desert sand. Sweat popped up on her forehead, dampened the hair beside her face. She breathed in his November frost and burning leaves fragrance, filled her lungs with his scent. Pulling free of their embrace, she grabbed his hand and led him to the queen-sized bed.

  “Lie down,” she said, releasing his hand to give his bare chest a gentle shove.

  Dante shook his head. “Nope. Not yet. I just spoke to someone who knows where the motherfuckers who torched the house are holed up. He also knows they’re supposed to meet Mauvais at midnight on Lake Pontchartrain. Guess the fucker has a yacht too.”

  “Is this someone you trust?” Heather asked.

  “Trust? No. He and his household did the pinky-swear kiss-kiss BFF thing with fucking Mauvais, even though he doesn’t like the fi’ de garce. But . . . Vincent is—” Dante paused, then raked a hand through his hair, a muscle jumping in his jaw. After a moment, he continued, voice husky. “Was a friend of Simone’s, and I know he actually cares . . . cared . . . about her. But since nightkind politics often trumps friendship, he might just be playing me, setting a goddamned trap. I need to discuss it with Trey, see how he feels.”

  “I hate to break it to you, but Trey’s already Sleeping, thanks to De Noir, and you’re in no shape to do anything except lie down on the bed. But if you’d rather fall down, that’s up to you.” Without waiting for his reply, Heather turned around and went to the attached bathroom and wet a wash cloth with cold water.

  When she returned, she didn’t know whether to feel pleased or worried to see Dante sitting on the edge of the bed, his forearms against his knees, a bottle of absinthe dangling from his black-nailed hand. She settled on both—pleased and worried—with extra helpings of worried.

  “Empty,” he mourned. He set the bottle on the hardwood floor between his boots.

  “Then lie down,” Heather urged softly. “I don’t know how you’re still on your feet. Fighting nightkind and Fallen, breaking into other worlds. Aren’t you even sleepy?”

  Dante straightened, and pushed his hair back from his face. A smile flickered across his lips. “Tired, sure, catin, but not sleepy. Not until Sleep comes. Nightkind don’t take naps.”

  “That’s sad. I love a good nap.”

  “Maybe I’ll get to watch you having one some night, see what I’m missing.”

  Heather plopped down beside him on the blood-red comforter. Smooth velvet greeted her hand as it brushed against the comforter. The faint scent of sandalwood wafted up from the velvet.

  Mmm. Feels warm and comfy and completely snoozalicious.

  “I can think of other things I’d rather have you watching me do,” she murmured, wiping at his blood-smeared face with the washcloth.

  “Kick ass? Take names? Mix a mean margarita?”

  “How about I kick your gorgeous ass?”

  “Promises, promises,” Dante laughed, his voice husky and low and warm, but Heather heard strain underneath. Plucking the washcloth from her fingers, he finished scrubbing his face clean of blood.

  For the moment, anyway, Heather mused. His nose was still bleeding. And more blood loss couldn’t be good.

  “Did you . . . feed enough?” she asked, wondering what she would do to keep him inside and safe if he said no. The thought of him taking blood from her out of hunger left her cold. But if he needed it . . . Her hands clenched into fists on her lap.

  Dante lobbed the wadded-up cloth into the bathroom, hitting the sink with annoying ease, then he looked at her. His dark eyes held hers, his gaze open and direct. “I got enough,” he said quietly. “But even if I hadn’t, I’d never take blood from you outta hunger, Heather. No matter what.”

  Heather felt her cheeks heat up even as relief flooded through her. Had her freaking shields dropped again? A quick check revealed her steel walls still surrounded her mind. “Did you . . . hear me?” she asked, touching a finger to her temple.

  “Nah. I felt your apprehension through the bond. So I made a guess about what was bothering you.” His fingers whispered against her cheek, trailing heat. Amusement stretched his voice out into a warm drawl. “You’re blushing, chйrie.”

  “I’m used to my thoughts being private,” Heather muttered.

  A smile tilted Dante’s lips. “They’re still private. I didn’t hear anything. I just—” His words came to an abrupt halt. Squeezing his eyes shut, he rubbed his left temple with his fingers. More blood trickled from one nostril.

  Fear curled through her.

  “That’s it,” Heather said. “Lie down, Baptiste.” Crawling to the head of the bed, she untucked both pillows from beneath the comforter. Lying down and resting her head on one firm pillow, she patted the other. “Please,” she added in a low voice.

  Without a word, Dante joined her, rolling onto his side to face her. Heather scooted close to him and studied his pale, beautiful face. Exhaustion and grief shadowed his eyes, pain drew his features tight. He looked at her from beneath his long, dark lashes.

  “I’ve been thinking about our next move, after we tend to Mauvais and his motherfucking Molotov cocktail tossing buddies,” he said.

  “Well, there’s your problem right there,” Heather said. She trailed a finger along his jaw. “No more thinking. No more planning. Rest.”

  “Not yet, catin,” he said, his hand skimming over her leather-clad hip to the curve of her waist. “As long as my past is messing up my present, I’m beaucoup dangerous to you and anyone near me. I’ve gotta find a way to always stay here and now.”

  “You’ve done more than enough tonight. You need to rest. And you need to mourn. We can think about all this when we wake up. When our heads are clear.”

  “Don’t tell me what I need, you,” Dante murmured. He slid hot fingers underneath her tank top and across her belly, a teasing path traveling north. She shivered, her nipples stiffening in anticipation. “Already know what I need.”

  Heather’s finger trailed from Dante’s jaw, down along his throat to his collar, and curved through its steel ring. “You do, do you?”

  She tugged him in close and kissed him thoroughly. His soft and fevered lips tasted of alcohol and anise and amaretto—a heady brew.

  Dante deepened the kiss, parting her eager lips with his tongue. His hand cupped her breast through her bra. Slipped underneath. Her breathing quickened. Heat pooled low in her belly, flared between her legs.

  “Was that what you needed? How about this?” Heather asked breathlessly when the kiss ended. Her finger abandoned his collar so her hand could glide down to his chiseled chest. “Or do you have other things in mind?”

  “Thought I wasn’t supposed to be thinking.”

  Dante’s kisses moved from her lips to her throat, tracing a wet, molten path down to the top of her breasts. His fingers discovered her aching nipple, pinched.

  “That’s right,”
Heather gasped. “No thinking.”

  “A shame, cuz I’ve got all kinds of naughty things in mind for you.”

  Liquid fire rippled through Heather’s belly. “In that case, by all means, keep thinking, Baptiste,” she whispered. Licking the tips of her fingers, she brushed them over the stiff peaks of his nipples, swirled a wet design on his flesh.

  It was his turn to gasp.

  Heather smiled against the top of his head, his silken hair. “Two can play the naughty game,” she said, trailing her hand over his taut, flat abs—then down. She caressed and rubbed, her hands hungry for the feel of him. He was hard, his erection straining against his leather pants, and she happily felt him up through the supple leather.

  Dante groaned against her breast. “Ain’t I supposed to be resting?”

  “You complaining?”

  “Fuck, no.”

  “Then shut up, Baptiste.”

  Dante obliged her by pulling down the neckline of her tank top, thumbing aside the lace of her bra, and closing his hot, wet mouth over her nipple. Moaning softly, she arched her back, offering more of herself to his mouth.

  Unbuckling his belt, Heather fumbled his zipper down and freed him from his leather confines. His breath caught rough in his throat when she stroked her hand along his hard, hot, satiny length.

  “So tell me, what else do you need?” Heather asked, her voice a husky whisper. “A little bit of this?” She stroked him again.

  Dante’s low growl, the sound vibrating against her nipple, was all the answer she needed. His hand blurred down to the front of her leather pants, then—with another low growl—he tore them open. The top snap tinged against the floor. She gasped as his fingers slipped beneath her now-wet panties.

  She moved her hips against his circling, dipping, and knowing touch and closed her eyes. Pleasure fluttered through her belly. Dante curled his tongue around her nipple, then his lips moved from her breast and reclaimed hers in a fierce and hungry kiss.

  His desire, his need for her raged like a gasoline-fueled bonfire through their bond, torching Heather, body and mind in an explosion of white napalm heat. Her breath rasped in her throat. Pleasure coiled and pulsed within her as his fingers worked their magic . . .

  A sudden narcotic tide washed over Heather, submerging her in a black and dreamy drowsiness, like a morphine drip. Then just as quickly, it ebbed from her mind, vanishing like a sneaker wave.

  Dante’s lips slid away from hers. His fingers stilled. His body relaxed.

  Heather opened her eyes. Gray light leaked into the room from around the edges of the curtains. Dante’s eyes were closed, his pale face calm and peaceful. Lost to Sleep.

  “Shit, shit, shit!”

  And in her hand? Still hard and hot and ready. So very ready.

  Heather groaned in frustration. It wouldn’t be right to jump Dante’s bones when he was out cold and unable to enjoy it. Wouldn’t be right to use him like a hard and fevered sex toy while he Slept.

  Tempting. But not even close to right.

  She wanted him to be with her. Inside of her. Kissing her. She wanted to look into his eyes as pleasure lit them from within and sparked blue fire in their depths.

  Sighing, Heather released him, then rearranged their clothing and respective body parts as best she could—torn clothing and heightened arousal considered.

  Curling up against Dante’s smoldering-coal warmth, she planted a kiss on his lips. “You’re gonna pay later, Baptiste,” she whispered, closing her eyes. “Over and over and over.”

  19

  PUMPKINS INTO COACHES

  ALEXANDRIA, VA

  SUNSHINE WAFFLES CAFЙ

  March 28

  ASWIRL OF WARM air flavored with the crisp smells of bacon, waffles, coffee, and cantaloupe washed over Teodoro Dнon as he pulled open the door to Sunshine Waffles and walked inside, leaving the chilly predawn morning behind him.

  A manila file folder in hand, Teodoro strolled down the cafй’s narrow aisle, smiling apologetically as waitresses balancing armloads of plates sidled past him. Forks scraped against plates. Spoons clinked against coffee mugs. Voices rolled and dipped, a gentle wave of hushed conversations—a quiet, comforting hum.

  Mortals, every one, their fast-paced hearts a trilling cascade of notes, like a two-handed cocktail run down a piano keyboard, in comparison to the slow, bass boom of his own heart.

  Teodoro tuned out the noise as he headed for the last booth on the right. The woman sitting there alone was busy reading a report or printout of some kind while eating, reading glasses perched on the end of her nose, a frown on her dark face. Silver glinted among the tight black curls that capped her skull. He would bet anything that the ratio of black to gray in her curls would soon reverse, given the recent events at HQ.

  An AWOL section chief, two runaway field agents with heads full of sensitive intel—correction, only one head jam-packed with intel since Teodoro had wiped the other’s memory during debrief—and a joint project with the FBI in sociopathology that had imploded in a violent and messy fashion.

  But none of that had anything on a little girl named Violet Miyako Sullivan. She’d taken a stray bullet to the head during the SB shootout in the Happy Beaver motel parking lot outside Damascus and had ended up cradled in Dante Baptiste’s arms. Then between one moment and the next, she’d been transformed by his glowing blue hands into another child entirely.

  The long-dead Chloe.

  True Blood magic, some of the SB brains claimed. Illusion. Mass hypnosis.

  Hoax, others declared. The child hadn’t changed—she’d been disguised, and Prejean had performed a very effective sleight of hand.

  But only Teodoro understood that Violet had been reshaped by a creawdwr caught up in the past and balanced on the edge of madness. A truth he planned to keep from the Shadow Branch’s fumbling grasp for as long as possible.

  Until it no longer mattered.

  Halting beside SOD Underwood’s booth, Teodoro said, “Good morning, ma’am. Interesting choice for a meeting. Looks like the land of comfort food. I didn’t even know this cafй was here.”

  Underwood’s fork full of scrambled eggs paused at her mouth, and irritation rippled across her face before she smoothed it into her usual cool and professional expression. She looked up from her report, light from the overheads bouncing from the lenses of her reading glasses.

  “I’m not surprised, Dнon,” she replied, setting her fork on her plate. Her gaze flicked down to the folder in his hand, then back to his face. “Trendy bistros, biscotti and lattes, and European cigarettes seem more your style. But those who beg for off-site meetings are in no position to be choosy.”

  Teodoro shook his head and allowed a self-deprecating smile to curl across his lips. “Right on all accounts, ma’am.”

  Underwood picked up her fork and tucked it back into the diminishing pile of scrambled eggs on her plate. Only thin swirls of maple syrup and crumbs remained of her waffles. “Take a seat. And let’s get to it. I need to get into the office early.”

  “Understood, ma’am.” Unbelting his short khaki trench coat, Teodoro slid onto the opposite seat, the vinyl squeaking beneath his charcoal gray trousers. He placed the folder on the table.

  Underwood looked at him from over the top of her reading glasses and waited.

  “First,” Teodoro said, “the Sullivan/Prejean event seems to be contained. The final agent involved in the shoot-out in Damascus was debriefed last night.”

  “It went smoothly, I trust?”

  Teodoro nodded. “It did. He didn’t resist, and the wipe wasn’t difficult.”

  “Then that’s everyone—motel manager, guests, field agents. Everyone who saw what Prejean did to that child.”

  “Violet Sullivan, ma’am, yes. Except Section Chief Gillespie.”

  Underwood’s expression iced over—deep winter. “I gave that bastard a second chance when no one else would and he goes AWOL at the first little bit of weirdness as a thank you. Never trust
a drunk.”

  In truth, Teodoro mused, Violet’s transformation had been the third or possibly fourth bit of weirdness SC Gillespie had run into since arriving in Damascus. Out of curiosity, he ticked through a quick mental count.

  Uno: a Stonehenge of fallen angels, white stone statues kissed with dancing blue sparks.

  Dos: a missing house—porch, foundation, every single nail, gone.

  Tres: a pit delving deep into the earth where the house had once stood; a pit ringed by the Fallen Stonehenge.

  Cuatro: and from within the pit/cave’s glistening depths? Something sang, Holy, holy, holy.

  So in all fairness, Violet’s transformation at Dante Baptiste’s hands had been the fifth bit of weirdness encountered by Gillespie before he’d bugged out for parts unknown.

  But Teodoro decided to keep those observations to himself. He doubted Underwood would appreciate his insight.

  “I wouldn’t be surprised if Gillespie was busy boozing his way across the country,” Underwood said, her voice so cold Teodoro half-expected her words to frost the lenses of her reading glasses. “When we find the deserting bastard, I think we’ll do more than just wipe his poor excuse of a memory.” She arched one are-we-clear? eyebrow.

  “Mбs claro que el agua,” Teodoro murmured. Then added at her questioning frown, “We’re clear, ma’am.”

  The eggs finished, Underwood rested her fork on her plate. Curiosity thawed her expression. “Were you born in Spain, Dнon, or just raised there?”

  “My mother was Spanish, but I was born in Egypt. We moved back to Spain when I was very young,” he replied. “However, I’ve lived in the States all of my adult life,” he added, the lie slipping without thought from his lips. Another act of transformation—falsehood into truth with endless retellings.

  Underwood opened her mouth to speak, then shut it again when the waitress, a slightly chubby woman in her mid-thirties, with a warm, gap-toothed smile, stopped beside their booth.

  Teodoro ordered a cup of black coffee and a fruit platter, hoping the coffee wouldn’t be scorched or the fruit less than fresh.

  After the waitress hurried away, tucking her order pad into a pocket of her apron, Underwood asked, “How is the girl and her mother?”