“What do you think you’re doing?” she shouted as she stepped into the bedroom.
“Bed,” he said. He was still smirking. “We sleep.” He turned his head on the pillows but didn’t open his eyes. “You said bed.”
She’d brought this on herself. She realized this even as she fought off the panic reaction. She’d suggested bed to him, and his filthy male subconscious had responded in a typical libidinous way.
“Men,” Char muttered. And now she was going to have to lug this lummox back to the living room couch. “Like I have time for this.”
Unfortunately, sunrise caught up with her just as she reached the bed. She was hit with a flash of amazement that worrying about the fool man had actually screwed up the excellent sense of time that was standard issue along with her fangs and claws. A rare wave of dizziness hit her, and she fell forward, just barely able to catch herself and settle onto the unoccupied side of the bed before the dizziness turned to a wave of enveloping darkness. She couldn’t keep her eyes from closing or her muscles from going slack. All she could do now, no matter who shared her bed, was go to sleep.
That was a daymare, right? A ludicrous, farcical daymare. Had to be. Char would have breathed a sigh of relief if she had any control of her body at the moment. Her mind was the only part of her that was free during the daylight, though her awareness was limited, and perception was weird when she was in the waking dream state at all. Most days she spent in sweet, sleeping darkness, and her dreams were real ones.
And the daymare about Haven in her bed was a doozy.
Must have been what roused her. Just as well. She needed to get her mental act together and try dream walking again today. The combination of telepathy and astral projection and elements that were unique to the strigoi was wearing yet, but if she was going to find the sorcerer and demon holding Daniel, then she needed to make the effort. Besides, practice made perfect and all that.
The first thing to do was make herself remember what she’d done last night, separate what had really happened from the weird daymare about her and Haven and Santini at the abandoned hideout and the magical trap and bringing Haven home and checking out with him sleeping in her—
Bed.
Oh, good lord.
She had, hadn’t she? Brought him home. Where was he now? How long had she been out? Was he awake? Had he noticed her lowered body temperature? That she was still as death and that her pulse was slowed to the point of being undetectable? It wasn’t like she was dead or anything, but she understood how her daylight condition might appear a little odd to, say, a stake-wielding vampire killer. The older a vampire was, the more the narcolepsy resembled a deep, sound sleep. Well, she wasn’t all that old in vampire terms, and what she looked was dead. She would most likely be dead if he noticed. Unpleasant images of being staked, beheaded, and burned flashed through Char’s mind. Haven was the thorough type.
It took a great deal of concentration—it took a hellish amount of concentration—but Char went looking for the man lying in bed beside her.
Please let him still be lying beside her.
She floated, hovered, searched without sight or hearing. She became aware of the heat of familiar blood, scent of warm skin, the scrape of the rough edges of a mind in turmoil, blunted, thoughts disassociated but still rasping on her awareness. Haven. She’d found him.
Having found him, she touched him.
He was sleeping.
Char’s awareness resonated with relief, but she couldn’t relax, couldn’t do anything but will him to remain blissfully, deservedly, deep, deep asleep.
This ploy lasted for about three hours, until he grunted, shifted, muttered, “Gotta take a leak” and heaved himself up out of the bed.
Char couldn’t have moved if she’d tried, but even if she could have, she might have curled up on her side, frozen with the mortification of sharing a bed with a strange man.
“Sound sleeper, aren’t you?” he said when he slipped in beside her.
Had he just slapped her butt? Yes, he had; she was certain of it. And he chuckled in her ear, as well. He was lying on his side, long body stretched out close to hers, spoon fashion. She was aware of his warmth all along her back and against her thighs. Sweet, mortal warmth. Jimmy always said that one of the best parts of having a companion was to be in that hovering state, body in a trance, mind weirdly aware, and to know in a half-dozen almost impossible-to-define ways that your lover was there, warm and waiting beside you. That it made a strigoi feel protective and protecting at once, safe, but with a hint of unpredictability, because complete control was gone and only trust remained.
Well, Jimmy was gone, Haven was no one’s companion, she was totally out of control, and it was three or four hours yet before the sun released her from the paralysis of daylight. And Haven wasn’t exactly asleep. She worked through her terror to realize that much. He wasn’t awake, exactly, but hovering in between, halfway in both worlds, as she was, but in the less restrictive, mortal fashion. Dozing. That’s right, that’s what it was called. She’d all but forgotten the mortal terms for sleep. He was as aware of her on some level as she was of him. Her senses were tuned to thought and emotion, his were tactile.
His hand was on her thigh. And moving higher. She didn’t think he was aware of it, but nonetheless, the man was taking the opportunity to feel her up. Was that an erection that had worked its way between them?
She wasn’t sure whether she was mortified or amused. She knew that if she were able to, she’d push the hand away, shift her hips, say something sarcastic, and maybe smile a little to herself at his unconscious interest. After all, just because she was a vampire, she wasn’t dead, and having a man touch her was rather pleasant under certain circumstances. She didn’t have room right now in her emotional spectrum for any reaction other than a survival response.
Any moment now Haven was going to wake up and notice he was aroused. He wouldn’t do anything about it other than be relieved that she was asleep and didn’t know that he couldn’t control his body. But he’d be awake. He’d rest beside her for a while, maybe staring at the ceiling with his hands tucked behind his head, his subconscious would take notes. He’d take a closer look. Good-bye Char the Enforcer.
Rookie Enforcer.
Not a rookie strigoi, though, are you, girl? Or rookie female of any branch of the species? She would have smiled smugly if she could smile at all at memories of what she’d gotten up to in a similar bed in this very bedroom not too many years before. And she’d been a baby strigoi herself once, as sexually insatiable as young Daniel. She’d hunted, mortal and strigoi. She ought to be ashamed of herself if she couldn’t distract an already-aroused male for a couple of hours. All it should take was a lot of suggestion and a little imagination.
Char chuckled, in a virtual way, and got to work.
Chapter 16
“YOU DON’T HAVE to look so smug.”
Haven smirked, leaned back against the headboard, and put his hand over his heart. “You did the seducing, sweetheart.”
Pleased to be alive, Char supposed that letting him revel in his prowess wasn’t too much of a price to pay. His chest was bare and fuzzy. Scarred in places, as well. Then there was the tattoo, a sharp, angular black design that stretched from his shoulder all the way down his left arm. The overall effect of his appearance was barbaric, to say the least. He looked every inch the ex-con, and there were a great many square inches of him visible all the way up from where the sheet barely covered his hips.
“Nice place,” he said, looking around the bedroom while she looked at him. “Thought you said you’re based in Portland.”
“Not my place,” Char told him. “Belongs to an old boyfriend. He’s out of town. I’ve still got a key.”
“Old boyfriend, eh?” He finally looked at her. “You don’t seem like the old-boyfriend type. You seem like a keeper type.”
Haven’s assessing expression made Char wonder what he’d heard in her oh-so-neutral voice when she ment
ioned Jimmy Bluecorn. What was with him, anyway? Haven didn’t seem like the getting personal type. He seemed like the sex-as-recreation, leave-the-money-on-the-table-on-the-way-out type. Talking about Jimmy wasn’t easy, especially not to another man—one who was under the misapprehension that they’d spent the afternoon having sex.
“He was special,” she admitted. “We’re still friends—from a distance.”
“Generous of him to let you crash.”
Jimmy’s condo was, technically, what Haven would call a lair. There was no use giving up a place if you weren’t using it; you might need a secure place to sleep someday—or a good friend might need it. Keys got passed around, connections got made, all with a minimum of fuss and communication. You didn’t let just anyone crash, not in a place you’d called home. Or maybe Haven would think of it as a tomb with a view?
“What are you smiling about?” Haven asked.
“Nothing.” She ran her hands through her hair and checked the clock. “I need a shower.”
“Yeah,” he agreed, sliding out of bed. “I’ll join you.”
Char didn’t make any objections, and she could tell by the tilt of Haven’s eyebrow and the slight smile he gave her that he expected a protest. Why did she always give the impression of being the fainting maiden type? ’Cause it was true most of the time? “Planning to check me for bite marks, Haven?”
“Should’ve checked already.” He ducked his head and scratched his stubbly chin. “I didn’t pay much attention this afternoon.”
“Neither did I.” She waved him toward the bathroom. “Come on. We can soap each other down.”
“When’d you get to be so sexy?” he asked when the hot water was rushing over them.
She squeezed shower gel into her hand and slapped his chest. “I’m off duty until I’ve had caffeine. I’m not being sexy,” she added as she spread white foam all over his chest. “This is efficient. I’ll be all business in half an hour.”
He followed her example and began to rub the slick pink shower gel over her front, paying close attention to make sure her breasts had enough soap. The scent of strawberry rose with the steam. His thoroughness produced a pleasant tingle and buzz of sensation. Char arched into his palms when he cupped her breasts.
Then she remembered that she was going to kill Haven, and she slid away to face the falling water instead. She wished now that she hadn’t deliberately tried to attract him last night or had to seduce him in his dreams today. Or that he’d unselfishly acted to take her out of harm’s way when the psychic bomb went off. He was a hero in his own badass way, and she was the villain of this piece. She hated using sex as a weapon, because it had a tendency to backfire and leave the person who used it as damaged as the target.
They fit together into the large shower stall, but it was a tight fit. Haven was a big guy. A big, hairy, hard-muscled guy with big, quick hands. He cupped her bottom with them and ran them down her thighs, and she found herself leaning back against him because real contact felt too damn good to deny for the sake of a little thing like ethics. The man’s touch felt so good it made her fangs tingle.
“Found any bite marks yet?” Char asked around faintly protruding teeth.
“Got to be thorough.” His fingers slipped between her legs as he spoke and began a soft, sweet stroking.
She bit her lower lip and tasted a drop of her own blood before it was washed away. She pressed her palms against the blue tiled front of the shower. A quick check of her fingertips assured her that her claws were safely sheathed. Of course, she was turned on, not hungry. She didn’t get hungry for mortals anymore. Yes she did—in the typical way a woman grew hungry for a man. She closed her eyes and let him touch her for a long time, absorbing the pleasure it gave him as much as responding to the stimulation he gave.
Eventually, she shifted against him, turned, and closed her hand around his erection. She rested her head on his shoulder, breathed in the warm scent of him, stroked him as he stroked her and made that be enough. After a time, the water that poured over them was cold as ice, and that served as good a signal as any to bring this joining to an end.
He wasn’t getting involved. He looked at Charlotte, who was very much not his type, and reminded himself that he didn’t get involved. They’d only been passing the time. Usually Haven never put thoughts of sex and involvement together. He approved of one, avoided the other. “I’m not likely to live long,” he said to the woman seated across the kitchen counter from him. He rubbed his freshly shaved chin.
She gave him an odd look but said, “I’m well aware of that, Mr. Haven,” as cool and calm as you please. “Do you want the last piece of toast?”
He could use some fresh clothes, but he was clean, and he felt pretty good. “Too bad the boyfriend didn’t leave any of his stuff behind.”
“He’s a lot smaller than you,” she said. She ate her toast, drank some tea, and then went on. “Here’s how you think it will be, one of the revenants you hunt will finally get its teeth into you. You’ll fight the infection, try to kill yourself before you lose your mind and change into one of the creatures. If you don’t manage to commit suicide, Baker and Santini have promised to do you, as you’ve promised to do them. If they don’t manage to kill you immediately, the hope is that they’ll hunt you down and get you before you get them.”
He nodded. “You have somebody to take you out when they get you?”
Charlotte ignored his question. “We’re talking about your survival strategy right now. The danger in Seattle isn’t from the blood-drinking monsters you’re used to dealing with. You know nothing about demons or sorcerers, and that might have gotten you killed last night.”
He took a sip of coffee, then lit a cigarette. Charlotte frowned as the smoke curled up to fill the kitchen, which only amused him. “At least tobacco won’t get the chance to kill me,” he told her.
“It might be a contributing factor,” she said as she drummed her fingers on the countertop.
For a moment Charlotte McCairn looked very dangerous. It was kind of sexy. Then her big eyes widened and she began to cough. A choking fit took her, and her pale face went red. Haven figured the smoke bothered her, or toast crumbs must have caught in her throat. She grabbed a napkin and pushed away from the counter. She turned her back on him as she spit up into the napkin, but dropped it as she started coughing again. Haven heard a ping of something metal hitting the floor, but Charlotte scooped up whatever she’d dropped before he had the chance to look over the counter.
She straightened, took a deep breath. “This is your fault.”
She turned a glower on him as she tossed the napkin into a wastebasket under the sink. The venom in her eyes was almost enough to make him crush out his cigarette. Almost. Then she turned around with the coffeepot in her hand, poured him another cup, and sat back in the chair across from him. “Where were we?”
“Talking about dying.”
“Been there, done that. Let’s move on.”
“Demons,” he reminded her. “Sorcerers.” He finished the cigarette and put out the butt in a saucer she passed to him. “And what the hell happened last night?”
She nodded. “First, though, do you have any idea where Mr. Santini might have disappeared to? The spell we encountered left you too incoherent to be of much help, and he was simply gone.”
“He’ll be in touch,” Haven said after he thought for a moment. “He always is.” Santini wouldn’t have abandoned them unless he’d come across something that needed to be followed. He was a hell of a tracker, and he did things his own way. Haven thought about another smoke but intercepted Charlotte’s look as he reached for the pack resting beside his coffee cup and changed his mind. The young woman across from him was full of information he desperately wanted. They’d had sex, they’d had breakfast. It was time to talk.
Char was aware of Haven’s sudden surge of hunger with an intimate flash of recognition. Looking at him was like gazing into a flyspecked, warped mirror. They were a lot alik
e, she and Jebel Haven, only he’d come to the hunger for knowledge later than she had. She was a scholar, a researcher. He was . . . scum. Would probably be proud to acknowledge it. The scum scholar was also a man of action with barely any education, but he was smart, in a native cunning sort of way. He’d discovered a small piece of the hidden world beneath the ordinary, and it had lit more than a sacred fire to defend the world from monsters in him. One small peek behind the curtain had sparked a latent need to know. He was looking at her right now like he could eat her up, and she was rather flattered that his lust was for knowledge rather than another roll in the sack.
“Demons aren’t immortal,” she told him, beginning with what she needed him to know. “Long-lived, yes, but not immortal.”
“How do you kill ‘em?”
“I’ll get to that. They come in different shapes, sizes, and colors, all of them ugly. They run the gamut of horns, fangs, claws, scales, and leathery skins. Typical modus operandi is to hide out somewhere isolated, gather a group of mortal followers, and send the minions out to do their bidding. Control of the minions is usually achieved through the worship of some old god and/or the help of a practitioner of ritual magic. The demon helps to enhance and focus the mortal sorcerer’s natural talent. So you frequently get the demon/sorcerer pairing. In some cases, the demon attaches itself as a familiar to several generations of a family of magic users. There’s some evidence of mortal and demon matings and offspring, but the demon seed B-movie ‘having my monster baby who’ll grow up to rule the world’ scenario is not what we’re dealing with here.”
“Then why’d you bring it up?”
“Because once I get started on a subject, I have trouble shutting up.”
“Focus, Charlotte.” He did that head tilted look up through the long eyelashes disarming smile thing that was so appealing she almost forgot she was scheduled to kill him. Then he reached across the table and poured her a cup of tea from the blue Fiesta ware pot, waited for her to take a sip of orange and spicy Constant Comment, before prompting, “Go on. What’s Danny boy have to do with demon boy?”
Laws of the Blood 2: Partners Page 13
