Boundless

by Annie Dean

  Boundless

  Annie Dean, Bonnie Dee, Dionne Galace

  Published 2007

  ISBN 978-1-59578-374-5

  Published by Liquid Silver Books, imprint of Atlantic Bridge Publishing, 10509 Sedgegrass Dr, Indianapolis, Indiana 46235. Copyright © 2007, Annie Dean, Bonnie Dee, Dionne Galace. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  Liquid Silver Books

  http://LSbooks.com

  Email:

  raven@LSbooks.com

  Editor

  Chrissie Henderson

  Cover Artist

  April Martinez

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogues in this book are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental.

  Seven Days

  Annie Dean

  Dedication

  As always, for Andres.

  Day One

  Teresa knelt in prayer.

  While other girls daydreamed over boy bands and what they would wear to the prom, Teresa meditated and volunteered at the city hospice. Now she hovered on the precipice of her sweetest dream. In one week’s time, she would take holy vows and join the Sisters of Peace, no longer a novice, but a bride of God.

  This time of day, this chapel was quiet. Candles burned on the altar where she knelt, throwing long shadows. The monastery lay an hour from Vancouver, and they lived quietly, leading chants and prayers, tending the lambs and llamas. Eight of the sisters were quite old and wise and Teresa felt honored to have been chosen to train here.

  Tonight she needed to make dinner for the others. Finishing her prayers, she straightened and found a man standing shadowed in the nave. She paused. They received visitors rarely. Though neighbors were welcome to attend services, very few did. Thus, the sisters led services for each other and for God’s glory.

  Teresa didn’t know why, but the stranger made her uneasy, as if he carried portents of change. Nevertheless, she tried to smile, moving forward in her plain gray robe. It wouldn’t do to turn someone away in need of aid.

  “Hello, may I help you?”

  He stepped into the light and she nearly gasped. Such beauty should be sinful, and it likely was. She doubted he meant anything good by coming here, and then immediately chided herself for such suspicion.

  Still, she’d never seen a man who looked as he did: fine, chiseled features, eyes of summer sky, and hair that shone with the dull gold of ancient coins. Not that Teresa possessed much real knowledge of men. She hadn’t seen her father or her brother since she’d left to study at St. Mary’s and she’d applied to the Sisters of Peace after graduation.

  The stranger still didn’t speak, so she tried again. “I’m sorry, are you lost?”

  “No,” he murmured in a voice sweet and dark as bitter chocolate. “But you soon shall be, I think.”

  His impossibly blue gaze roamed over her in a manner that made Teresa draw back. Her voice came out shaky. “You have no business here. Go. I’ll call one of the other sisters if you don’t.”

  In a languid, graceful gesture, he leaned his shoulder against the ornate stonework that lined the arch leading into the nave. Candles guttered when he smiled, and a chill ran over her skin. Her lungs wouldn’t work right, and Teresa’s sense of personal threat escalated out of proportion to the danger.

  “By all means, do so.” He sounded amused.

  Teresa narrowed her eyes. If he thought he could intimidate her—

  “Reverend Mother!”

  Her shout brought the nun hurrying from her studies in the library. Teresa folded her arms, satisfied that the old woman would soon sort matters out. God help this man for wasting the Mother Superior’s time.

  The other woman peered around the chapel and then focused on Teresa with a frown. “What is it, child? I thought we had burglars by your tone.”

  The golden man’s smile widened. His expression said, I told you so.

  You don’t see him?

  Teresa managed not to voice the question. The Sisters of Peace didn’t welcome instability in their members, and a novice who suffered from visions and visitations would disrupt their quiet lives. The time when a woman could claim to hear the angels had well and truly passed. Now they would medicate her and call her crazy. Sister Margaret could send her back to Pennsylvania.

  She thought fast. “I thought I heard something in the vestry, but I must have been mistaken.”

  “This place can be a bit spooky at night,” Sister Margaret allowed. “Possibly a dove’s gotten into the eaves again. I’ll have Mr. Jessup look tomorrow morning.”

  “Thank you, Sister. I’m sorry I disrupted your studies.”

  The nun waved a hand in dismissal. “No trouble. I needed to stretch my legs anyway. Shouldn’t you be in the kitchen, though?”

  “Of course. I was just finishing up my evening prayers.”

  “Ah. Make something light? That beef log Sister Agnes foisted upon us last night shall weigh on me ‘til Michaelmas.” Margaret’s gray eyes twinkled.

  Since they’d just begun marking the days of April off the calendar, she smiled. “I’ll bear that in mind. Perhaps a nice chicken and rice dish with a touch of lemon?”

  “Lovely. I’ll see you at supper then.” With that, Sister Margaret passed from the chapel into the corridor that led back to the library, where she researched her pet project, a brilliant book called The Lives of Saints.

  “Satisfied, Teresa?” As he spoke her name, he proved his imaginary status. She didn’t know anyone like him. He pushed away from the wall and sauntered toward her.

  Her heart thumped wildly. Maybe she did need medication. “You’re not real, and I need to cook dinner. I don’t have time for hallucinations.”

  His soft voice carried as she turned her back on him. “I’ll let you run for now, but you can’t hide. Neither of us can.”

  While she cooked, she expected the stranger to appear again and taunt her some more. She usually enjoyed preparing a meal in the big, old-fashioned kitchen, but tonight she felt jumpy. The sisters enjoyed her lemon chicken casserole, but then, they always did. It digested easily, an important point when most of the nuns were well advanced in years.

  After dinner, she wiped down the antique wood countertops and the old ceramic sink. It needed to be scrubbed daily with baking soda or stains soaked in. Everything about the monastery spoke to Teresa and made her feel at ease. Sometimes she thought she should have been born in the nineteenth century. Certainly this farmhouse, built in the 1700s and donated to the sisters in 1844, felt like home in a way the squat prefab house in Pittsburgh never did.

  By the time she’d finished the dishes, she’d convinced herself she’d imagined the whole thing. A man nobody else could see? Ridiculous. Nobody had ever mentioned pre-Bride-of-God jitters, but Teresa supposed it wasn’t that much different than traditional pre-wedding nerves. God never forgot to put the toilet seat down or threw his socks on the floor, so there was even less reason to be anxious.

  With a sigh she hung up her dishtowel and turned off the lights. Tonight she would spoil herself by reading a few chapters of her favorite author’s latest novel before bed. Maybe the other sisters wouldn’t approve of her delight in a series called Murder Inc., but she ate the books up.

  First thing, she clicked the lamp on as the small window did nothing to dispel the shadows. Tonight, Teresa didn’t want to think about shadows or doubt. Her cel
l didn’t possess much personality, plain white walls, a crucifix hung over the single bed and a bedside table, but her dorm room at St. Mary’s hadn’t looked much different. Even when she could, she never hung posters, so moving to the monastery had altered her life very little. She enjoyed these peaceful hours after dinner, liked feeling she’d earned her relaxation by virtue of a good day’s work.

  She changed quickly from her novice robe to a demure white nightgown and made sure not to look too long at her naked body. After rummaging beneath the bed for her stash of murder mysteries, she curled up like a child, ready to sink into the adventures of fearless P.I. Maxine “Max” Donnelly, who could kick a man’s behind faster than Teresa could weed the cabbages. Sometimes she wondered what it would be like to live as such a woman, tough and capable, breaking heads in a man’s world.

  But she’d only turned a few pages before she heard, “Do you think Sister Margaret would approve of your choice in reading material?”

  He couldn’t be in her room. The door hadn’t opened; the window remained closed and locked. Impossible. Teresa covered her eyes and counted to ten.

  When she peeked through her fingers, she saw him perched at the foot of her bed. “You … what are you?”

  Screaming for help hadn’t done any good, so she might as well talk to him. See what she could learn from such a pretty delusion.

  “Temptation,” he said, and his voice summoned gooseflesh on her skin.

  “I don’t understand.” She wanted to touch him, discover whether he felt as solid as he looked, but she feared he would take that as encouragement.

  “Poor baby.” His tone held a certain fatal kindness. “Your God likes to gamble now and again, as you doubtless remember from the Book of Job. I felt sorry for the poor bastard, if you want the truth. It’s never fun to be a pawn caught between two Powers.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” But she thought she knew, and it meant she should be locked up somewhere.

  “You’re the new chessboard,” he said softly. “God calls you a pure soul, but my master claims there’s no such thing. So I’m here to test the truth of the matter.”

  “You think I would forsake my faith for a pretty face?” She infused all the scorn she felt into the words. “I have devoted my life to God.”

  “But you haven’t spent seven days and seven nights with him,” he countered smoothly. “As you shall with me. Prayer will offer you no respite, girl. I mean to win.”

  Her throat felt dry as old parchment. “Win? What do you get if I fall?”

  He shifted, leaning forward so she could see the blue fire of his eyes. “My freedom. Every millennia or so, my master teases me with the possibility.”

  “My soul for yours,” she said as she realized it. “You intend me to take your place in Hell. Why have you told me this? It only fortifies my resolve.”

  “Because,” he whispered, leaning close, and the movement carried the scent of nutmeg and cloves. “You will not be able to resist regardless, and that makes my victory sweeter. Some of my kind enjoy the pain generated by brutality, but I prefer the anguished pleasure of desperate surrender.”

  “You must content yourself with memories then. I will offer nothing new.”

  She could ignore him for seven days she told herself, and opened her book anew. Teresa wasn’t entirely sure she believed, but she didn’t want to entertain the thought that she might be crazy either. Why would I be important enough for this?

  Then again, why was Job?

  He let her read for a few moments before he whispered, “You’re a pretty thing. Skin like ivory and eyes of darkest night. You’re wasted in a convent.”

  “It’s a monastery.” She broke her vow to take no notice of him.

  “Forgive me. I’m not acquainted with the modern distinctions, apparently.”

  Despite herself Teresa saw the absurdity of explaining religious shadings to a demon. For one such he must be. And if she accepted it, she could not go back. “Who are you?” She doubted it would reveal its name, but one never knew. Not that she could perform a ritual for banishing a demon.

  “My true name would boil the blood in your veins,” he told her gently. “And you would not be able to pronounce it in any case. You can call me Dev.”

  Teresa raised her brows. “Are you kidding?”

  On the wall behind him the lamp threw his shadow, where it coiled like a dragon. He followed her gaze and gave his wicked smile again. “You see more than most. I enjoyed a few centuries on work furlough here. Legend has it wrong, though. I brought St. George to my lair by ravaging the countryside in Libya, true, but there was no princess, nor did I devour all the maidens aside from the King of Egypt’s daughter.” Dev shook his head and sighed. “In those days they sacrificed one virgin a year to placate me, so how does that add up to my eating up all the women but one? Even given the lower population at the time, basic math disproves it.”

  She just knew she shouldn’t ask. Couldn’t resist. “What really happened?”

  “The fools got the sacrifice wrong too.” His face darkened as he drew his knees up to his chest. “I’m not that sort of dragon, though I’ve burned my share of barns. I eat women and enjoy it, but not that way. I wouldn’t have minded virgins chained up for my pleasure but I wish they hadn’t knifed them first. I prefer them live and writhing, like hearing their screams melt into moans and sighs. The Mesopotamian priestesses knew what they were doing in that regard.”

  “Oh.” His words summoned images she hadn’t known she could visualize.

  Some pretty young thing lies bound and helpless while he presses his face between her thighs. She howls in terror at first, but as his beautiful mouth laps at her soft flesh, heat builds down there. The virgin sacrifice lifts her hips and undulates against his tongue, feeding him with her mounting excitement, nourishing him with her juices. Before the end, she begs him to mount her—

  Teresa prayed her expression didn’t reveal her thoughts. She couldn’t afford to show weakness, not when so much hung in the balance. “Go on, please.”

  For the moment, he just seemed to enjoy the opportunity to set the story straight. “Once George entered my lair, he most definitely did not slay me with his mighty sword.” His eyes shone with a roguish light. “In fact, I never saw his sword. I took the form of the maiden Sabra and tempted him for seven days and seven nights.”

  “But he resisted you.” Teresa would take strength in that. If St. George could slay this dragon with his steadfast faith, so could she.

  “So he did, and by doing so, he banished me from this plane. I suspect I would have had more luck if I’d chosen my current form. George was no lover of maidens.”

  “You’re saying St. George loved other men.” She didn’t know whether to be amused or aghast.

  “Career soldiers often do,” Dev said. “Why else choose a profession where there are so few women?”

  “It’s not like that now,” she informed him. “Women serve in all branches of the military these days.” On some level she knew she ought not to chat with him, but it might distract him. Then she asked a question that brought the conversation full circle. “You were a woman for St. George? That was all right for you?”

  Put that way, it sounded impossibly naïve, but what did she know of such things? Curiosity had always been her chief fault, and it wasn’t likely she’d ever have a demon on the foot of her bed again. When she wondered about something, she asked, which made for some awkward moments over the years.

  “Are you asking if I’m bisexual, Teresa?”

  Oh no. I didn’t mean to get personal. The room felt stifling hot, and she wished she didn’t have to wear the nightgown, but she never slept nude, let alone with company. Come to that, she’d never had a man in her room before.

  “I don’t know what I’m asking.”

  He took pity on her. “I enjoy pleasure in all its forms. Human arousal generates astonishing energy … I can be sated for ages, if it reaches a certain crescendo.”
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  Orgasm. He meant an orgasm. Like any modern woman, she knew about them. As a teenager, Teresa explored herself a little before deciding on cold showers as the best remedy for occasional urges she couldn’t quell. By and large she didn’t suffer from an excess of sexual drive because she channeled such impulses into her work.

  She pursued the matter on an intellectual basis, afraid he would demonstrate if she gave him half a chance. “So you possess no gender bias?”

  The smile he offered in response curled her toes. “My energy is predominantly male. More yang, if you’re familiar with the concept, but one does not exclude the other. Yin and yang are interdependent.” His voice became caressing and Teresa’s nipples hardened beneath her white gown. “One cannot exist without the other, like stars in the night sky. It all relates to balance.”

  Seven days of this? I’ll go nuts. Studying theology at St. Mary’s College had in no way prepared her for a beautiful devil who talked Chinese philosophy and made her think of sex with his every word. It took a moment to process his words.

  “So you’re more … yang, but you have enough yin to enjoy a man’s pleasure if you…” She sought the right word. “Manifest as a woman?” Perhaps such interest damned her, but she found him fascinating.

  Assuming he was really here. Assuming she wasn’t crazy. She didn’t want to be.

  Dev nodded, his head canted as he studied her in the lamplight. “Just so. I prefer women, so soft and smooth. They possess such a luscious scent. For instance, you smell of cucumber, aloe and ginseng, accented by the warmth of your skin. I love long hair like you wear braided so tightly. May I take it down, Teresa? I want to brush it for you.”

  Waist-length hair comprised her sole vanity, one that would be shorn to more a modest cut when she took her vows in a symbol of casting away worldly things. Under no circumstances could she permit him to touch her, however. With but a few words he instigated wildly heated thoughts.

  She shook her head. “I’m afraid not. I sleep in the braids or it’s impossible to manage in the morning.”

  He sighed a little. “I’m sent to work, and my preferences never matter. Why should you be any different?” Before her eyes, he faded, leaving only his voice. “I’ll see you tomorrow, pretty one.”