by Sandy James
“As if it’ll be that easy. You know, if you were anybody else, I’d tell you to just have sex with the man and get him out of your system.”
“Yeah, well...maybe that’s exactly what I’ll do.”
“Oh, puhleeze. Who exactly do you think you’re talking to?”
Gina shrugged to feign indifference. Her warming cheeks probably betrayed her true feelings.
“I’m your sister, Gina. I know how long you’ve protected your virginity. Twenty-six very long years. When you finally sleep with a guy, it’ll be because you love him.”
Why was it always so easy for Sarita to see right through her? “Amazons don’t fall in love. It’s against the rules. Remember?”
Sarita’s sardonic chuckle filled the cabin. “Tell that to Rebecca and Megan.”
“But they fell in love with Sentinels, not some civilian. Artair and Johann are a part of this world. A guy like Zach can’t be.” The words were the closest Gina could push herself to admit aloud that she had feelings for Zach Hanson.
“Miracles happen every day.”
“To other people.”
Sarita sighed. “Look, I don’t want to argue. I’m glad you’re back. I’m going to go tell the Guardian you’re here and that you’re fine—as if she probably hasn’t figured that out for herself.”
“Thanks, sis. Give Rebecca my love.”
“You feel it in your heart, and she already knows. Why don’t you come over to her house a little later? We’re going to open a bottle of wine and have some quality Amazon bonding time.”
“Fine. I’ll be over in a while.”
She didn’t watch Sarita leave, so when Dolan’s voice suddenly popped up beside her, Gina let out a squeak. The changeling must have slipped in when Sarita slipped out. The bugger scared her hair straight.
“I’m sorry, mistress. I did not mean to frighten you.” He held out a jar of one of his homemade remedies and had a towel draped over his arm. “Mr. Hanson should have this salve applied to his burn three times a day until it heals.”
Burn. She’d forgotten about the burn left behind by the shocker SOG. Where had he been hit? Picking up his hand, Gina checked the day-old injury. It had already begun to heal. She checked his other hand. No mark.
“His neck.”
Leaning over Zach, she checked the back of his neck. Just a small burn. She opened the jar and started to dip her fingers inside when the smell hit her full force.
“Geesh, Dolan. What did you put in this stuff? Rotten eggs and horse manure?”
“I beg your pardon, mistress, but the recipe is an ancient secret. I know the aroma is far from pleasant.” He wrinkled his own nose. “But his burn will heal quickly should you put this poultice on it. If you’d like me to try another cure...”
“It’s okay. Bad as it smells, I’m not sure I really want to know exactly what’s in it anyway. Besides, I trust your cures.” Bracing herself against the odor, she dipped two fingers in the medicine and tried to ignore the cold, slimy feel of it.
Pulling Zach’s shoulder to roll him more on his stomach than his side, Gina dabbed the poultice on his burn. Afraid to push hard or to smear it around too much, she ensured the whole injury was covered. She rubbed some over his injured palm for good measure.
“Do these need bandages?” she asked.
Dolan shook his head. “When it dries, it will form a protective barrier and draw out his pain. Your man should sleep soundly now.”
Her man?
As if.
Gina set the jar on the small bedside table, took the towel Dolan offered and wiped her fingers clean. At least the smell seemed to lessen with the medicine.
“Thank you,” she said as she passed him back the towel.
“You are most welcome.” He bowed and scurried out of the cabin.
She turned off the lamp on the nightstand, ready to head to her own cabin for some much needed sleep. Turning back to check Zach one last time, she was surprised to find his striking eyes staring back at her.
“Who was that?” he asked, his voice groggy.
“You’re awake.”
“Yeah, but... God, I’m tired. What time is it?”
“It’s late. Get some more sleep. We can talk in the morning.”
He scrunched up his nose. “Please tell me that smell’s not coming from me.”
The tense muscles in her neck and shoulder relaxed. If he felt well enough to complain about the smell, he was going to be fine. “’Fraid so.”
“What happened?”
“You got hit from behind.”
“Another shock?”
“Yeah. A small burn, but you seem okay now. Just tired. The odor’s from the medicine I put on your burn.”
“It smells like dog shit, but my neck feels better already.” He flexed the fingers of his injured hand. “So does my palm.” A yawn made his mouth open wide enough she could see his molars.
Even his teeth were perfect.
Damn, she had it bad. “Go back to sleep.”
His gaze wandered the cabin then returned to her. “Where are we? Summer camp?” Then he yawned again.
“Later. We’ll talk later. Now, you need your rest.” She reluctantly turned to leave Zach’s new home, figuring the best thing she could do was try to keep some distance between them. Maybe if she wasn’t watching him all the time as she had in San Francisco, the attraction would ebb.
Liar.
“Gina?”
She glanced back over her shoulder. “Hmm?”
“Stay. Please stay.”
She shouldn’t. She should just go. Things were too complicated as it was. Her heart was already way too tangled up in this whole mess.
“Please, Gina?” Zach patted the quilt.
Had she ever moved so quickly? She was at his bedside fast enough, she wondered for a minute if she’d jumped there. He’d be asleep in a few minutes. Then she could go.
She squealed in surprise when he grabbed her hand and tugged her down on the bed. His arms were around her before she could get comfortable.
“There’s not enough room.” Her complaint was more a product of how uncomfortable she was in his embrace than because the twin mattress was too small.
Zach scooted over, tugging her with him until they were nose to nose. “Better?”
Gina nodded. Kicking off one shoe then the other, she pushed them off the bed. She rubbed the top of his feet with her sock-covered toes.
He smiled in response before yawning a third time.
“Sleep, Zach. You need your rest to get well.”
His eyes were already closed, and it didn’t take long for him to be dead to the world again. She found his slow, even breathing a relief. And damned relaxing too.
Closing her eyes, she promised herself she’d only stay a few minutes. Just until he was deeply asleep. She couldn’t have him wandering around on his own. No, she’d only stay until she knew he wouldn’t be wandering around.
Then she joined him in the embrace of Morpheus.
* * *
Sekhmet hated killing any of her “pets.” Their worship gave her strength and brought her power—power her father had first nurtured then tried to destroy. Other than their adoration, her followers could give her only one other thing that would help her cause. Their life’s blood. But she had to be selective, feeding only when necessary so she wouldn’t frighten her followers.
After so many centuries of isolation, year after year—decade after decade—of planning what she would do when she was free of her prison, her time had finally arrived. Her father—the great god Ra—had betrayed her, trapping her in a marble tomb. He’d buried her deep in the desert sands to prevent her from doing what she’d been created to do. To destroy this pathetic world.
Four Sons of Gaia knelt before her, cowering on the floor—as they should—in failure.
“A woman?” she asked, keeping her voice as calm as possible. They would see her anger soon enough. “You let him escape with a woman? There were fou
r of you. You could not handle a mere woman?”
Furtive glances between them told her there was more to the story than they’d shared. Much more if their hesitation was any indication. Sekhmet growled, the sound of the lion resting inside her coming back to life. One day soon, she would return to the existence she’d once known, to again be the Destructor.
And this world would cower at her feet before she brought it to an end. Even her father would bow to her.
“Oh, powerful one. We saw—” The man swallowed the rest of his words when her gaze caught his.
She narrowed her eyes, letting him see her displeasure.
He quickly looked back at the tile floor he knelt upon.
Sekhmet rose from her new throne. Not made of gold as her throne had been when she’d ruled from Memphis. No, this throne was of carved dark wood. She had learned to enjoy running her fingers over the smooth lines as she planned and plotted, but it wasn’t the same. One day soon she would sit upon a throne of gold again.
A throne of wood.
How far she had fallen.
Her anger swelled as it always did when she thought of the betrayal of her father, how the great god Ra had tricked her. That anger forced Sekhmet to her feet.
From the table at her side, she grabbed a gold goblet embedded with rubies and emeralds. Moving silently like the great cat she was, Sekhmet stood among the Sons of Gaia kneeling and trembling before her throne. She chose the shapeshifter, the one who had led this band of brothers she’d sent on such a simple errand.
Bring me the human and his toy, she’d told them.
They returned with neither.
She calmly placed the goblet on the floor.
The goddess nudged the shapeshifter with her sandaled foot. “Look at me,” she ordered.
His hesitation honed her anger to a sharp edge. In one swift motion, she placed her hands on his skull, lifted and twisted. The snap of his neck echoed through the room. Seizing his hair, she bared his throat. Her fangs grew rapidly as the lion in her hungered for a feeding. Tearing at the muscles and veins of his neck, she opened a large wound. Taking her cup from the floor, she held it against the dead worshiper’s throat so some of his life-giving blood drained into the vessel. Then she released his hair as he slumped to the floor.
A purr rose from her throat. The three remaining brothers stared at her as she licked the warm blood from her teeth and lips, savoring it like a fine wine. She needed the strength that came from it, but she’d learned her lesson well, only drinking blood she gathered herself. Her father had captured her before by drugging the blood the Destructor was to drink, punishing her for doing the job she’d been designed to complete.
My own father! And for what? To spare the wretched refuse of humanity?
The all-powerful Ra—how she despised him. He’d breathed life into her, fashioned her for one purpose and no other. Then he’d changed his mind. She couldn’t help being what she was created to be—the Destructor. Everything inside Sekhmet propelled her, drove her to fulfill her role. Yet her father denied her. After he’d drugged her, Ra had imprisoned her in a pit so deeply buried it had taken infinite patience and gut-wrenching power to dig her way back out.
But she had. She’d done it. She’d bested her father, and she would soon place herself back on a golden throne. She would finish the job she’d begun so very long ago. She would destroy this world and create a new one. A better one.
One she alone would rule.
“Tell me about the woman.” Sekhmet walked back to her throne and settled herself against the hard wood. She leaned back, draped one leg over the chair’s arm and sipped the nourishing blood as her fangs receded.
“Not a woman,” one replied, his voice tremulous. “A warrior. Moves faster than light. Attacks with the strength of Hercules. Punches with the might of—”
She stopped his words with an angry slash of her arm. “I did not ask of her merits. Is she magical?”
All three nodded, wisely keeping their eyes directed at the floor. She found it odd that one of them could not seem to refrain from letting his palm rest against his groin as if protecting himself from an attack. Foolish, foolish man. Were she to punish him in that way, his mere hand would be of no consequence. With no trouble at all, she could have his testicles mounted on the wall next to her wooden throne.
She nodded to the lifeless Son of Gaia who had morphed from the inventor’s image back into his true identity upon his death. “And now you shall tell me what he refused to reveal.”
Three men shifted their gazes from one to the other. She had grown tired of their hesitation. A low growl rose from her throat.
“The woman,” one said, dropping his gaze when her eyes caught his. “She wasn’t—she—she didn’t—c—come alone.”
“Of course not,” Sekhmet snapped. “She came with the inventor, the wise man.”
“N—no, your m—m—majesty,” the man stuttered. “There was another.”
“I would have his name,” she shouted, fearing only one person, one betrayer who could complicate matters greatly. But it couldn’t be him. Surely he was nothing but dust by now. He’d left weeks ago. He couldn’t possibly still survive, let alone work against her plans.
“Ri—Ri—Richard. She came with—with Richard.”
The goblet hit the wall with a loud crash, followed by a shower of loose jewels across the tile floor.
Chapter Ten
Zach was getting damned tired of waking up disoriented and in strange places.
Had he not been staring into the face of an angel, he might have been furious. But how could he think of anything other than Gina when he woke to find her in his arms? Although he wondered how such a miracle had come about, he chose to brush his curiosity aside and enjoy having her so close.
She slept with her lips parted. Her mouth was softer, and the worry lines framing the corners of her eyes had vanished. Damn, she was one pretty woman, especially with her brown and blue hair sticking up in every direction.
One of her arms pillowed her head while the other draped over her hip. Her legs had tangled with his, their hips pressed against one another, close enough he’d woken up with an erection. Now, as his gaze caressed her beautiful face, he wanted her so badly he had to close his eyes to regain some control. All he could remember was their last kiss, replaying it in his mind and feeling his desire soar.
Stopping that kiss back at her apartment had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. He couldn’t let the overwhelming attraction to Gina distract him from whatever threat they were facing. There would be time after the danger passed for him to get to know her better and for them to participate in those wonderful rituals couples went through as they learned each other’s secrets, their likes and dislikes.
Sliding his hand up between their bodies, Zach closed his eyes and groaned when his knuckles brushed across the swell of her breast. Only a single thread of willpower kept him from covering that breast with his palm, feeling the shape of her.
He opened his eyes and stared at her as his fingertips traced the line of her chin, her jaw, her cheek. Then he rubbed his thumb across her pouty lower lip. An odd thought passed his mind that it had been swollen the last time he’d seen her.
Touching her was a luxury. She would never allow such intimacy when she was awake. He’d watched whenever Richard got too close. The reflexive stiffening of her body. The subtle movement to put some distance between them. The frown tugging the corner of her mouth when he invaded her personal space.
Yet she’d let Zach kiss her. When things could have gotten too heavy and he’d tried to ease away, she’d shocked the hell out of him by grabbing fistfuls of his shirt and pulling him right back into another hot kiss—another scorching-hot kiss. He must have been out of his mind not to scoop her up in his arms and carry her to the bedroom. She’d been willing. He’d been eager.
Perhaps those awkward years of rejection for being such a nerd still haunted him... No man wanted to put his hand
back in the fire that had burned him.
He wanted her. Desire washed over him in torrents of warmth and want and need. His hips instinctively rocked against her. Once, twice, mimicking the act he desperately craved.
Her hips replied in kind, drawing a groan from deep in his chest. It was no surprise that her chocolate eyes now stared back at him. Maybe one day soon he’d be lucky enough for her to wake him up in a similar manner.
Preferably naked.
“Good morning.” He glanced at the rays of sunlight streaming through the window. “At least I think it’s morning.”
Her fingers flew up between them to cover her mouth, knocking his hand out of the way.
“What’s wrong?”
She mumbled something behind her hand.
“Excuse me?”
“I’ve got morning breath.”
“Like I’d care.” Zach lifted his leg to cover her thigh. She could have been munching cloves of garlic and he would still want to kiss her.
Skeptical eyes watched him. “You don’t care?”
“No, Gina, I don’t care.” Just to show her he was sincere, he gently pulled her fingers away and pressed his lips to hers.
No morning breath—just soft lips and the sweet smell of strawberries. She pulled back before he could deepen the kiss, and he almost growled in frustration. If he hadn’t thought he was coming on too strong, he would have repeated her earlier actions and grabbed her shirt to bring her back. At least with his leg draped over her, she couldn’t escape too quickly or too far.
“We can’t keep doing this,” Gina said.
“Why not?”
“I’m not supposed to... I can’t be with...” With a shake of her head, she closed her eyes.
Zach put his fingers under her chin and lifted her face back to his. The question he needed to ask was on the tip of his tongue. Why couldn’t he just spit it out?
Because he was afraid of her answer. Jealousy had never once been a problem in his life, but now it seemed to be his weak spot, a way to bring him to his knees.
He swallowed his apprehension and decided to stop being a chicken shit. “Gina, is it because of Richard? I know what you said, but are you and Richard—”
