Mortal Temptations

by Allyson James

  “He isn’t human.” Patricia’s headache began to recede, but the muscles in the back of her neck still pulsed.

  “No,” Ajeed agreed. “Your friends, they are demigods, half god, half mortal. I am like them, only nothing about me is mortal.”

  Before meeting Nico and Andreas, Patricia would have assumed the man was crazy, but now she was not so sure. “A god, then. Which god?”

  “There are so many,” he smiled. “Gods, gods everywhere. It’s likely you wouldn’t have heard of me.”

  “Try me,” Rebecca said, hands on hips. “I’ve studied most of the ancient Egyptian religious texts.”

  “Very well, then you can call me Bes if you want. But I prefer Mr. Ajeed. I like having a human name.”

  Rebecca looked him up and down. “Bes was a dwarf god. You’re pretty tall.”

  “Ah, but human forms can be so deceiving.” Ajeed cocked his head toward the entrance, looking for all the world like a harmless, friendly Egyptian man. “I believe your friends have arrived.”

  He turned as Nico strode from the stone stairs into the tomb. Andreas came behind him in his leopard form. Patricia wondered why they had taken so long, but maybe they’d had to look for a private spot where Andreas could change into his leopard shape.

  But then, Mr. Ajeed—Bes—had claimed that they were no longer in Giza. Frowning, she marched out past Nico, taking the stairs up. Nico turned and followed, and she heard Rebecca clattering behind them.

  Patricia emerged in a shallow room that looked out over a place of bright emptiness, a land she’d never seen before.

  17

  WHERE are we?”

  Patricia felt Nico behind her, his tall, strong body protectively at her back. The shallow, square-cut cave opened out to a steep, rocky cliff. Below them empty desert rolled away under a blue sky to the gray green smudge of cultivation around the Nile. Dry air burned through her lungs.

  Rebecca stopped beside them. “I’d swear this is Amarna, a cliff tomb on the north side. But that’s like two hundred miles south of Cairo.”

  “Mr. Ajeed claims to be a god,” Patricia said, staring at the stark beauty of the landscape. “Why couldn’t we follow him into the Great Pyramid in Giza and emerge a couple hundred miles south?”

  “I never would have believed it before I met you people,” Rebecca muttered. She shook her head, turned around, and marched back down into the tomb.

  Nico slid his arm around Patricia’s waist. “I’m not sure what’s going on, but I’m happy I haven’t lost you.”

  “I wouldn’t have left you behind.”

  He didn’t answer. His arms tightened around her waist, and she turned around and kissed him.

  Their mouths took each other’s in slow warmth, with only a taste of the incredible hunger of the sex they’d been having. Right now she was just a woman loving a man.

  Nico smoothed her hair back from her face and touched his forehead to hers. “Patricia.”

  His dark eyes held so much sadness. She kissed him again, trying to wipe away the loneliness that made her heart ache. He’d spent so many years alone, and she wanted to assure him that he never would again.

  “We should go see what this is all about,” she whispered.

  Nico nodded, still holding her. She would have loved to stay there forever, the two of them against the barren and beautiful landscape, the sun warming them as they held each other.

  Nico took her hand and led her back down the passage.

  At the bottom, Mr. Ajeed stood smiling at Rebecca, while the leopard Andreas sat protectively in front of her.

  “So, now we know where we are?” Ajeed asked, still affable.

  “I was right; it’s Amarna,” Rebecca said stiffly. “I’ll gloss over how we got here, because I have the feeling I don’t really want to know. But why?”

  “I will show you.”

  Ajeed started to go around her, but Andreas rose, hackles up, teeth drawn in a snarl.

  “Let him, Andreas,” Patricia said. “I want to see why we’ve been tricked here.”

  Andreas subsided, still pressing tight to Rebecca, his blue eyes ice-cold.

  Ajeed led them through a small doorway built of precisely chiseled thick blocks and down another passage. It, too, was lit by a string of generator lights, which made Patricia wonder about the power source. If this was an undiscovered tomb, who had put in a generator?

  Ajeed led them down a ramp and down again. The air was cooler here than outdoors, the sun a long way outside these giant blocks of stone. It was also not stale, which meant there was another source of air, some shafts far above, perhaps.

  When they reached what must be the very base of the tomb,. Ajeed stopped. They stood in a burial chamber, a stone sarcophagus prominent in the middle of the room.

  The walls and ceiling were covered with more paintings, the colors vivid white, green, red, black, orange. The human figures were the expected half-turned surreal forms. The animals were more lifelike: birds in flight, wild cats hunting among reeds, the curved prow of a boat on a lake, looking remarkably like the feluccas that sailed the Nile now.

  Rebecca stared around in great delight. “An untouched Amarna tomb? No way.”

  Ajeed flashed his smile. “It is. It was put into my care, I a lesser god, so honored by this task. I have protected it all this time, kept away robbers old and new. The lord, he rests in peace, enjoying his afterlife.”

  Patricia glanced at the sarcophagus, suddenly imagining the mummified body that must lie inside it. She stepped back into the curve of Nico’s arm. This place was indeed peaceful, the psychic vibrations soothing and almost still. No one had been into this room since the grave tenders had sealed it up more than three thousand years ago.

  Rebecca frowned at Ajeed. “The entire city of Amarna was built by Akhenaten to worship one god, the Aten,” she said. “Other gods weren’t welcome, in a big way, so why should you have been asked to guard this tomb?”

  Ajeed looked modest. “The lord who lies here, he secretly disagreed with the pharaoh. But one couldn’t say that, oh, no. He remembered Amun and Osiris and the old gods, and asked me personally to look after him.”

  “Hmm.” Rebecca looked around again, the gleam of the true historian entering her eye. The past was alive to her, Patricia realized, more alive than shopping in London boutiques or going to clubs with a gorgeous man. Her eye saw more than Patricia’s could, even with her psychic vision.

  Nico turned to look at the wall behind them and went still. “Andreas.”

  Andreas padded to him. He stretched his leopard limbs, then he elongated into his human form and stood up, naked and casual.

  Rebecca joined them, her gaze lingering on Andreas before she looked at the wall. Patricia looked, too, and realized what she was seeing.

  “The inscription,” she gasped.

  “All of it.” Rebecca nearly jumped up and down in excitement. “There’s the bit I translated,” she said, pointing to a patch near the ceiling. “There’s so much of it. No wonder it didn’t make much sense; whoever copied it out on the ostracons only used part of it. This is terrific.” She spun in a little circle, prettier than Patricia had ever see her. “I’ve just made my career. I’m the first one to ever see this; I’ll be the first one to translate it. I’ll have journal articles out the butt, interviews, job offers. Woo!”

  She danced around until Andreas caught her, his grin wide. “Take it easy, sweetheart. Don’t pass out from happiness.”

  Rebecca flung her arms around his neck. “I don’t care.” She kissed him on the mouth, then smiled at Ajeed. “Thank you, Mr. Ajeed, or Bes, or whatever you want to be called. You’ve made me the happiest girl on the planet.”

  PATRICIA had not said much about the discovery, but Nico didn’t have time to ask her why until later. The upper rooms of the tomb provided dry accommodations out of the heat and wind, and Ajeed had furnished them with cots and camp chairs, and plenty of food and water. He’d also somehow transported all their b
ags from the hotel.

  Nico stood in the entrance, looking out from the cliff face to the empty valley below. No one stirred there, not tourists nor archaeologists.

  “He was prepared for us, wasn’t he?” Patricia stood next to him, fanning herself in the heat, a bottle of water in her hand. “There’s enough stuff here for us to stay for weeks. But if anyone saw him setting up, or sees us now, this won’t be an undiscovered tomb for long.”

  “I think he did something,” Nico mused. “Suspended time or drew a curtain across this area or something. There’s nothing out there.”

  She joined him to look over the ruins of the kingdom of Akhenaten and his famous queen, Nefertiti. There was nothing left except a few faint ruins covered over by dust. A green smudge in the distance showed a line of cultivation and then the sparkling waters of the Nile.

  “I was advised that this area was dangerous to visit,” Patricia commented.

  “He’s protecting us.”

  “I have to wonder why. Bes wants Rebecca to translate that wall. Is he for or against Hera?”

  “Come here.”

  Patricia went to him as Nico stripped off his T-shirt. He unfolded his black wings, enjoying stretching them out. “You asked me once if these worked, if I could truly fly. Want to see?”

  Patricia’s eyes began to glow, the blue green light of the sea. “I’d love to.”

  Nico pulled Patricia to stand in front of him and wrapped his arms around her waist. She gasped. “You mean with me?”

  Instead of answering, Nico jumped off the cliff. Patricia shrieked once, and then Nico’s huge, feathery wings caught them in outstretched black glory.

  He glided on the hot wind from the valley floor, then pumped his wings to take them higher. He loved the feel of the wind in his feathers, the strength of his wings holding them easily aloft.

  After Patricia’s initial fright, she went very quiet. When he looked at her, Nico saw that she was grinning.

  “Like it?” he asked.

  “Like it?” She laughed. “Nico, I love you!”

  The words smote his heart. She’d said them before, when he’d first made love to her, and he still couldn’t be certain if they came from her heart or from the joy of the moment.

  He soared over the valley and to the barren stretch to the east, not wanting to chance being seen by farmers near the river, not sure how far Bes’s power stretched. He wheeled over the cliffs, again catching the updraft to glide across the valley and its ruins.

  The sun was sliding westward, streaking the sky with red as it hit the dust in the air. Twilight descended, quickly followed by dusk. The stars were silver pinpricks in the sky as Nico landed at the cliff-top entrance to the cave again.

  He turned Patricia in his arms and kissed her. She tasted like the wild joy of flying and the honey sweetness of herself. He wrapped his arms around her and lowered her to the clean-cut floor, letting his wings cushion her.

  “Let me pleasure you,” he whispered.

  “Now? Right here?”

  He swept his tongue through her mouth, feeling her respond like he’d taught her.

  “Right here.”

  Patricia’s pulse sped under his touch. “What if the others come looking for us?”

  “What if they do?”

  Her eyes burned bright. “That would be bad.”

  “You like it bad, Patricia.”

  “Do I?”

  “You’ve had it sweet, now let me show you rough.”

  She smiled, a glint in her eye. “You’ve tied me up before. And I remember a gag once.”

  “That was nice playing.” He bit her cheek. “I mean bad, Patricia. Do you trust me?”

  Her pheromones were pouring from her, her excitement increasing. “Yes.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  For answer, she licked him across the lips. His cock tingled and lifted. She certainly wanted to play.

  He could tell the difference in their kiss. Things had changed between them, no longer she being uncertain and he teaching her. She’d learned to give in to her naughty self, the one that loved two men in her bed, liked playing with the silk scarves around her wrists.

  Now she wanted more, the most he could give her. Their relationship would peak; after this, she’d start losing interest in him, and her affection would drift away, maybe even manifesting itself as disgust. She wouldn’t be able to believe she’d let him do what he did—if their lovemaking even lingered in her mind.

  “Strip,” he said.

  She started, then smiled again, glancing over her shoulder to see if anyone was on their way up the passage.

  Nico growled. “I mean now.” He ripped open her blouse from neck to waist. Her hands came up to stop him, but he let his god strength and magic manifest to have her clothes in shreds and her naked in seconds.

  “That isn’t fair—”

  “I don’t care about fair,” Nico said. He snatched her up in his arms, got himself to the edge of the cliff, and flew off into the night with her.

  PATRICIA had seen movies like this. The savage man dragged the woman off with him, and the others went wild with worry, but the woman discovered that beneath the beast lay a heart of gold. She’d already found Nico’s gentle heart, but she hadn’t experienced his savage strength.

  In silence he carried her through the desert night, her naked body against his for warmth. Something seemed to jar the entire world, then he landed in a strange place that was nothing like where they just were.

  She seemed to be on a balcony overlooking a lush, green world, perhaps an oasis in the desert. It was night, everything in hues of silver, black, and gray. The room behind her had a marble floor and cushions everywhere, no other furniture except two low tables heaped with food and drink.

  She started to open her psychic senses to discover where she was, but Nico clamped his hand on her arm. “No. Let it be.”

  “Why? Where am I?”

  “In a world of my making. Enjoy it for what it is.”

  She looked perplexed. “But where are we really?”

  For answer he seized her wrists and pushed her down into the cushions. He kissed her, his mouth masterful, and she stopped squirming.

  Nico was heavy on top of her, no longer playful and laughing. He was strong, pinning her wrists to the floor. Before she could ask what he intended to do here, he’d shoved her legs open and thrust himself inside.

  What he did to her—what she let him do to her—in that room amazed her. She never thought she’d like what he wanted, to surrender entirely to him and let him do as he pleased.

  He pumped into her until they both were ready to climax, then he withdrew, flipped her onto her hands and knees, and entered her from behind. They both came not long after that. Then he made her stay in that position while he worked lube into her ass and then slid inside there.

  Andreas had done this, but with him it had been tingling, experimental, daring fun. Nico meant business. He filled her and pinned her, his strength letting her know that he could do whatever he wanted, and she couldn’t stop him.

  But he never hurt her. As hard as he drove, as firmly as he held her down, it was nothing but pure pleasure.

  Afterward, he carried her to a bathroom like the one in their Cairo hotel and laid her in a huge fountain with warm water running from its spigots. He washed her and himself, then he made love to her against the tile.

  He tied her to one of the spigots and made her promise him all kinds of sexual favors to secure her release. Then he made her do them. They used the fruit and wine that loaded the two candlelit tables, he feeding her or eating from her as he liked.

  When she was exhausted from this play, he carried her to the balcony and let her rest, watching the wind in the trees and the moonlight on the lake there.

  Nico laid himself on top of her to warm her. “I never want you to forget me.”

  She gave him a sleepy smile. “How could I ever?”

  “You could. But I don’t want yo
u to, even if you hate me. I know I never will forget you.”

  “Because of the curse?”

  “Because of you.”

  The emptiness in his eyes hurt her. She knew she could never reassure him, and she also knew she didn’t really understand the curse of the goddess. Both he and Andreas had decided that whatever Rebecca or Patricia did couldn’t help them.

  “If you’re my slave,” she asked, “why can’t I order you around? You’ve been pretty masterful all night.”

  An interested light entered his eyes. “What would you do?”

  “Oh . . .” She let her imagination go and began to smile with where it went.

  He took her hand and wrapped her finger around his gold chain. “What would you do?” he repeated. “Command me.”

  Excitement shot through Patricia. What would she dare? But they were in a place of magic, a place that didn’t really exist, and maybe anything she did here wouldn’t be quite real. It was a fantasy, and Nico was letting her live it.

  “All right,” she whispered, then pushed him away. “Get your butt back in that fountain. Now.”

  Nico suppressed a smile as he rocked to his feet and sauntered back inside, his beautiful ass moving as he walked. Laughing at her, was he?

  Patricia stalked after him, and when she entered the chamber, she found a whip in her hand. She snapped it.

  It flew around and hit her own bare skin, stinging like crazy. Nico started for her, concerned, but Patricia waved him off, her face flaming.

  She practiced with the whip until she mastered it better, and Nico watched, unable to hide his grin.

  “You asked for it, buster,” she said.

  She cracked the whip again, loving that she had her own beautiful, naked, willing slave at her beck and call.

  “You’re not in the fountain,” she said. “Stand in it, against the wall.”

  Nico stepped into the fountain tub, putting his back against the blue-and-green-tiled wall. Water trickled from vents in the top, coating his body with a sheen of it.

  She wanted to stop and salivate, but she kept up her persona. “Hands above your head.”