by Anna Leonard
“Wanna play rough, do you?” he asked, recovering quickly. His eyes were as hotly focused as ever, even as the muscles in his face were loose and soft, and she couldn’t resist kissing the tip of his nose, watching with delight as his eyes almost crossed, trying to follow her.
“Want you,” she told him. “In me. Now.” She grinned, fierce to match his stare. “We can play…later.”
Later. There would be a later. He took that promise and ran with it, fastening his mouth to hers in a deep sweet kiss, even as his hands brought her down onto his cock, sliding into her wet folds like coming home, like some impossible perfect fit. She wasn’t warm, she was hot, and tight, and a little voice in his head warned him that they weren’t using protection even as she shifted on him and he groaned into her mouth.
They fought for the lead, first one and then the other setting the pace. Sweat glistened and thoughts fled, until Lily arched her back and lifted her face, tears streaming.
“Lily?”
“Don’t…keep going, keep…”
Her fingers gripped his shoulders, and she tucked her chin forward, hair falling around her face as she looked down into his eyes. It was almost a challenge, that wet stare, and he met it, keeping eye contact even as his own orgasm built.
She blinked first, her eyes closing, that odd shadow closing half a second before her outer lid, but then she was falling into a silky black spiral, totally caught up in her own sensations. She collapsed in his arms for a second time that night, his fingers tightening on her arms as he pulled out, reaching his own apex against the pale, sleek skin of her thigh. She swore, and he laughed, and followed her over into exhaustion.
He woke up, immediately aware he wasn’t at home, or in the usual scratchy-sheeted hotel room. These sheets were soft, almost silky, as was the body snuggled next to him. They had made their way to the bed at some point during the evening, holding hands and stumbling against things in the dark.
He ran his finger along the lines of one creamy-skinned shoulder, listening to the sound of her breathing. Lily kept the thermostat in her condo higher than he was used to. Post-sex sweat always seemed, well, sweatier than when he worked out in the gym. Probably because you didn’t usually end up cuddled with your workout partner.
The thought made Patrick snort with horrified laughter—his usual workout partner, Cal, was not exactly cuddling material, being six foot three and three feet wide, all of it muscle. Attractive to some, he supposed, but…
Yes, he definitely preferred them pocket-size and curvy. Call him old-fashioned.
His Venus rolled over to face the sound, opened one eye, then the other.
“Mornin’?” It sounded as though she was begging for a negative answer.
“Not quite yet,” he reassured her. “But I should…”
“Yeah.”
The dialogue sounded awkward. But he couldn’t quite stop smiling, and Lily raised herself up so that she rested on one elbow, her dark curls falling over one bare shoulder like some not-quite soft-core-movie poster. Her skin was flushed across her chest and neck, and there was a dark purple hickey forming just below her jawline.
He didn’t remember doing that, but the evidence was, well, evident.
“I have to go. Boss wants a status report, and I have to check the overnights, and…”
He didn’t want to go anywhere. He wanted to stay, and not just because he was worried about that freak finding her. He wanted to stay in that bed, the sheets smelling of them, and feel her legs tangled in his, her hair tickling under his nose. He wanted to be able to roll over and have her in his arms, ready and warm and willing. Or even just sleeping: anticipation, when you knew what was waiting for you, was sugar-sweet.
She blinked lazily, and he was reminded again of the strangeness of the night before. But she seemed to have forgotten it somehow. Or dispensed with it as not important. Either way, he hesitated to bring it up again. Not here. Not now. Stress. She was under a lot of stress. Bad dreams and dizziness—she hadn’t had dinner last night, either.
“I’ll be fine. And I won’t be offended by your early-morning departure. Go.”
“I’ll call you.” He was still worried. That was a surprise, and an unwelcome one. Worry was personal. He couldn’t afford that personal twitch, couldn’t be distracted by it. Not now. Not yet. He hadn’t thought about that when he had daydreamed his seduction of the delectable, desirable Lily. Idiot.
“Mmm.” She smiled at him and he lost track of his thoughts again. “You’d better. You need coffee?”
“I’ll get some on my way. Go back to sleep.”
He kissed her on the tip of her nose, and she scrunched it under his touch, then sank down into the blankets and sighed, sliding back into sleep even as he picked up his clothes and headed for the bathroom. He should have already been focusing on the case, on what might be waiting for him, but all he could do was keep thinking that Lily Malkin was…
Was more than he had been expecting. Far, far more.
Chapter 10
Dale Mortman, agent in charge of the D.C. CID and various other governmental initials, was a very patient man. But even patience could reach an end, and his voice at the other end of the standard-issue police department phone carried that warning. “You realize what you’re asking?”
Patrick crossed his legs more comfortably under the desk, stretched out in his borrowed chair and rolled his eyes to the heavens as though to ask for patience. “I’m not twelve. Yes, I know what I’m asking. Look, right now this is a mild curiosity that could become a localized media circus. Fine, not our problem, locals can handle it, yeah, I know. But his words are…worrying me.”
The cat woman. She knows. The recording Petrosian had gotten of the phone call replayed in his head on a seemingly endless loop.
What did Lily know? Did she even know that she knew? Or was it all part of this guy—the Night Serpent’s—game, or psychosis, or whatever?
That was Patrick’s job: to find out. It was what he was good at. All he had to do was step back and look at the pieces. And not think about how one of those pieces was probably just waking up right now, heading into the shower, standing under a stream of hot water, lathering up her breasts….
Yeah, definitely not thinking about that.
“We are not unaffected by the thought of a threat to a civilian….”
Patrick took another sip of his coffee and made a face. He should have accepted Lily’s offer—this stuff was worse than swill. At least in the good old days you could count on one cop per shift knowing how to make a decent pot. Now, with the “pod” machines, it was all mechanized, and—in his opinion—crap.
“Save me the canned PR bullshit,” he told his boss. “Just tell me I’m a good boy and to get on with my job.”
Dale had a sigh you could hear from one end of the Beltway to the other, and no hesitation about letting loose with it.
“If you think you have a handle on this guy…Run with it. Whatever you need by way of support, CID will do their best to supply. Just try not to need anything expensive that I’ll have to explain at a budget meeting, okay? And I need you back here by next Tuesday.”
“Got it. Thanks.”
It wasn’t a home run—he’d wanted to get Lily some protection, above and beyond the little that the local cops could provide, but without an actual threat from a certified serial killer, he’d known better than to even ask. His personal involvement might be clouding his judgment, but it wasn’t making him an idiot.
At least now he knew that his requests for information would get priority, without having to go the favor-for-a-friend route. Or getting Lily involved any further.
The bustle around him parted for a moment, and the smell of stale smoke and old coffee swirled down to him. Petrosian, scratchy-voiced, like a guy who had been chain-smoking all shift.
“You hear what they’re calling him?”
Patrick wondered where Petrosian smoked, since the entire precinct was now officially and legally sm
oke free, all the way out to the parking lot. “The Night Serpent. Yeah.” The morning news had picked up the story, lacking anything more bloodthirsty coming in overnight. He had heard a squib on the cab’s radio, on his way. Inevitable, considering the guy’s comments. More evocative than “sick bastard,” he supposed. Sold more papers, got better ratings.
“It mean anything?” Petrosian pulled a chair from behind the other desk and sat down in it. “Give you a clue into his alleged mind?”
“Maybe.” His brain went into “sift and filter” mode. “Serpents and cats are, historically and allegorically, enemies. They’re also, however, both aligned with the devil in Christian mythology. Our unsub is killing cats in a ritualistic manner, and then displaying them in a circle, nose to tail. Similar to that of a snake, in both Celtic and Norse mythologies. I’ve got a search running to see if there’s been anything entered into the system similar in the past twenty years.” Lily hadn’t found anything, but his search engine had access to more data. “Based on the witness’s description, this guy’s not old enough to have done anything noteworthy before then, or if he did, it would be under juvie seal.”
“In other words, you got shit.”
“I have…a couple of theories. None of which get us anywhere. That the tox report?”
Petrosian handed it to him. “Yeah. Same as the others—clean as a cat’s innards can be. This guy is doing it all by hand. You ever get around to asking Lily about your idea, that he’s another cat-whisperer type?”
The question was casual, but the glance sent along with it wasn’t. Patrick suddenly felt like he was fourteen years old and caught trying to feel up Judy Clare after gym class. He shook his head. “No. She was still pretty shook up…. You think you could talk her into going to see a doctor?” He carefully didn’t specify what sort of doctor; he honestly wasn’t sure. She was exhibiting signs that in another person he would consider warnings of a breakdown, if not an actual psychotic break. And yet, having looked into her eyes, felt her in his arms—even against all evidence, he didn’t believe that she was crazy.
He didn’t know what to believe.
Petrosian slouched farther into his chair. “I’m not her daddy, Patrick. She’s a grown woman, she does what she wants.” And with whom was loudly unspoken.
The personal undercurrents thus navigated to their satisfaction, both men relaxed slightly and returned to the case.
He had not slept well since he saw the woman. That golden glow inside her haunted him, distracted him. And finally, finally, he understood the message that had been sent, in her appearance. A gift from Herself; one of her Handmaidens, yes, but innocent in this world. Born fresh, clean. Ready for him to write his message on.
He was smart. Had always been smart. Smarter than his teachers ever knew. Smart like…like the serpent coiled in the grass. The Night Serpent, they were calling him now. He liked that, yes. The serpent was wise. Don’t show yourself. Don’t waste energy attacking everything that moves. Let others flush out your target, and then strike once, effectively.
His knife to the beasts’ throats; like a cobra’s strike: swift and certain.
It was not cruelty, it was not bloodlust; it was not any of those things the reporters were claiming on television. It was need.
That last time he had felt it; as the blood dripped into the circle, he had felt the earth shift, the gates begin to open. He was almost there, the time was almost right, the cats were almost right…but something essential wasn’t present. She wasn’t appeased. Wasn’t satisfied by his offerings, his sacrifice.
But he had another chance. One more before the window closed, his third chance was up, and he was trapped in this hell for another lifetime. She had given him that; had shown him the cat woman, the one who glimmered with gold, who brought the beasts to hand. She was the key to the lock. She would be able to tell him what he had been doing wrong.
And now he knew where she was. All he had to do was collect her.
Lily woke at nine that morning, sat up in panic before remembering that she was off today, and then fell back onto the bed, only to be reminded by the not-unpleasant aches that she had not spent the night alone. Or sleeping.
Oh God. She had actually…they had actually…
Not that she regretted it, she thought. She just wished it had been under less…weird circumstances. The night before was sort of fuzzy, after they told her about the phone call, and her inclusion in it, but she remembered getting dizzy, and Jon’s arms around her, and…
And the memories that followed that made a flush rise up her cheeks. Aches in her thighs, oh yes. And also her shoulders, and her arms, and her stomach…
He was gone, long gone if the temperature of the pillow next to her was any indication. She had some memory of that as well, of waking and speaking and the faintest caress of his hand on her face before he left.
Getting out of bed, she ran through her normal routines before realizing, halfway through her shower, that she had nowhere to go and nothing to do today. She was supposed to work at the shelter this afternoon; they were gearing up for the year-end donation appeal, and she was supposed to do her share of envelope stuffing and stamping. But she had agreed to stay away from the shelter for a few days, she did remember that.
“I suppose I could get someone to bring over a box or two of letters,” she told herself. Even Special Agent Jon T. Patrick couldn’t object to that, and she’d love to see some overeager reporter try to stick a microphone in Ronnie’s face. They’d end up tasting it all the way down their throat, if the shelter director was feeling particularly cranky. Or she would use the opportunity to get some free media attention for the shelter. Either way, goodness.
Amused despite the situation, Lily got out of the shower, grabbed the thick black towel off the rack and dried herself off. Clad in a soft robe, she padded to the kitchen to make herself some coffee and see what was up with the world.
The talking heads were still doing their shtick, but if the bastard who was killing cats was still newsworthy, it had been featured before she tuned in.
She would give this house arrest two days. Then she was supposed to be back on shift at the bank, and she would, by God be there.
The phone rang, and she jumped, then, shaking her head at the sudden attack of nerves, crossed the room and picked up the receiver.
“Yes?”
“Heya.”
She suddenly felt like a teenager with her first crush, curling the phone cord around her fingers and leaning against the wall, the phone pressed to her ear.
“Hey yourself.”
“I figured you’d be up by now. You okay?”
“I’m…okay, yeah.”
What did you say to the man you’d met only days before? The man who had left your bed before dawn? The man you knew better than to get involved with, and still did?
“I’m not very good at this.” She had always been brutally honest. No reason to stop now.
“I think you underestimate yourself,” he said, and she flushed again.
“I mean…”
“I know what you mean. Don’t worry, Lily. I think you’re amazing, and brave, and a lot of other things I’m not going to say out loud with half a dozen cops sitting in the same room with me pretending that they’re not listening in.”
She was definitely blushing, now.
“I just wanted to check in, see…You okay?” he repeated.
She was puzzled—what did he think would be wrong?—when she remembered. Being cold. Not just dizzy, but dislocated. Hearing voices.
Mother, forgive me!
“Lily?”
“I’m here. I’m…okay.”
No, she wasn’t. She suddenly felt ill. Her stomach hurt, as if she’d been throwing up, and the muscles in her neck and shoulders hurt in a bad way, not the good of before, and her eyes were red and dry like they’d been sandblasted. Like she had the flu, or something.
“I’m okay,” she said again. “Jon, I’ve got to go. I’ll tal
k to you later, all right?”
She hung up the phone and made it to the bathroom just in time to dry heave into the toilet. She was shivering and weak kneed, but her head stayed clear, and her memories were her own.
Maybe she was coming down with the flu.
She called the shelter after that, planning to give some excuse, but none was needed. They had seen the news reports as well, and put two and two together and come up with five reasons why she should not come in that day, even before she announced her intention to take a few days off.
“Girl, that may be the most sensible thing I’ve ever heard you say, and you were born sensible,” Ronnie cackled over the phone. “Stay home. Stay out of sight. And if anyone comes here looking for you, we’ll sit on him until your gorgeous Fibbie comes to arrest him.”
“He’s not my Fibbie,” Lily protested, but could feel herself flushing again as she said it. Maybe not hers, exactly, but she had laid a claim…and so had he. She touched the bruise on her neck and was suddenly almost thankful for the excuse not to have to explain it to anyone. Although if it weren’t for this loon, she would never have met Jon, so there wouldn’t be anything to explain….
She hung up the phone and reached for the cleaning supplies. Anything to keep from thinking. Not about this Night Serpent and whatever he was planning, not about Agent Patrick and his disturbing ability to get inside all of her defenses, and absolutely not about the weird dreams and weirder dizziness she had been feeling.
Although she hadn’t had any dreams last night. And she felt fine this morning, until Jon’s call. No weirdness with her eyes, no dizziness, no strange smells or sounds…
So maybe all you needed was a good romp between the sheets? It was a lowering thought, but the medicine had been sweet, so she really couldn’t complain.
