He was too restless to sit. He prowled the room, finally stopping behind his desk and propping a shoulder against the book shelves. “You weren’t interested in helping before.”
Her chin tilted fractionally higher. “You didn’t ask me.”
“I assumed we were on the same side.”
“No. You assumed I was a slave you could suborn, that I would act against my presumed master simply because he commanded me and not because he was evil. You thought you could use me.”
The leather arms of the chair dented under the pressure of her fingers.
The tension in her voice and body told Darek he had to control his own emotions. He and Laila were combustible together. They needed to step back, talk, rebuild…no, find common ground.
“No one else believes the sorcerer exists,” he said. “There is no scent of sorcery in the land. No trace of his presence.”
“So how do you know he exists?”
He listened for a note of doubt and found only interest. Her willingness to believe him relaxed some of his tension. He walked around the desk and leaned back against it. Only a few steps, a low table and the memory of distrust and disaster separated them.
He folded his arms. “I smelled the stink of sorcery in slaves.”
“There is a trade in slaves in the twenty first century?”
“A lucrative trade. From Africa, from South East Asia. Poverty, desperation. As long as people exist, they’ll exploit each other. Just as others will fight to free everyone. I have contacts among the various security forces who work in the Middle East. I was with them when they found and freed a container of Pakistani men and women in the Black Sea port of Lahijan. The sorcery was like a fog of cold sulfur when we opened the container.”
Laila leaned forward. “How were the people bespelled?”
“They weren’t.” His tight smile lacked humor. “There were no marks of sorcery. There was no proof. Do you know what it felt like? As if the sorcerer had licked the people. Just tasted them and moved on. He didn’t take anything. He didn’t change anything. He just tasted them.”
“How bizarre. But if the sorcerer did ‘taste’ the people, he must have had contact with them at some point. Did you trace back where they came from?”
“Every step,” he said grimly.
“And you found nothing.” She studied him a moment. “How long ago was this?”
“Eight months.”
“Have there been any other hints of a sorcerer?”
He looked away from her. The painting on the far wall was by Camille Pissarro. A summer countryside shimmered with heat and ripening wheat. He concentrated on it, imagining the sound of cicadas, the smell of dust.
“Six months ago I’d only sensed sorcery in one place. Lahijan. It troubled me, but it wasn’t my major problem. Idiots were playing with unstable nuclear technology and the earth was rumbling. That was down south. I’m a dragon. The land is my first priority. My responsibility.”
“But if you were the only one to sense the sorcerer, to believe in the threat…”
He nodded. “I had a duty there, too. I can’t be in two places at once, but my eyes can. I placed my left eye in Lahijan to watch for sorcery. I flew to the southern mountains.”
She stared at the patch over his left eye socket. “You’re keeping watch.”
“Hardly.” He laughed, harsh and sharp. “The sorcerer stole my left eye.”
She jumped up and approached him impulsively. “You lost your eye? But how could the sorcerer get close enough to steal it without you knowing?”
“Oh, he did better than that. He stole my eye without leaving any trace of his presence. The few people I confided in believe my eye was simply stolen by someone who stumbled over it and mistook it for a sapphire.”
Away from his body, his eye would be as hard as a stone and as brilliant. Blue fire lurked in the depths of his remaining eye.
Laila touched his arm. “If a common thief stole your eye, you’d sense its presence now. Wherever it is.”
He didn’t know if by her touch she meant to offer reassurance or belief in his story. What he felt was a searing sense of need. He resented the linen shirt that covered his skin. He wanted her hands on him, caressing and building the connection between them.
He covered her hand with his free one. “People don’t want to believe in a sorcerer.”
“To believe in evil means a decision. Either fight it or acquiesce and become part of it.” She breathed lightly. The stillness of her body revealed her awareness of his touch. “I swore to never again allow a sorcerer power over people. Solomon cursed my brothers and sisters and me to centuries of slavery and abuse. Never again. That’s why I’m here.”
“Nothing personal.” He echoed the first words she’d said in his bedroom.
“Exactly. We’re allies brought together by the threat of sorcery. Once we’ve defeated the sorcerer, we need never see each other again.”
The soft tremble of her breath denied the words. Despite the hurt he’d inflicted with his suspicions and accusations on the mountaintop, there was a bond between them. Loneliness? Power? Kismet?
He bent his head and touched her lips.
Chapter Five
Darek’s mouth was a breath from hers when Laila vanished. She reappeared on the far side of the study and wrapped her arms around her body. She shook with a volatile mix of desire and fear.
“God. I didn’t mean to frighten you.” He gripped the edge of the desk. The wood creaked.
“I’m not afraid…of you.”
He frowned. “Then why?” A gesture indicated her panicked retreat.
“I said from the beginning, this isn’t a personal visit.” She braced for the blast of his anger because she’d been the one to break her own rule.
It was his pain that had compelled her to reach out, to touch him. She knew about loneliness. It was what evil did: it isolated you, and in your loneliness you were seduced to despair.
Except Darek was too strong to fall apart. He was a guardian, a fighter. What he needed from her was help to find the sorcerer. She could do that.
“I have old manuscripts on magic. I made a study of sorcery after Solomon cursed us djinn. I pulled them out last night. I’ll need to study them again, looking for ways a sorcerer or his magic might be found. His wards—if nothing else—ought to leave a mark on the world.”
“Bring the manuscripts here,” Darek said. “No, I don’t want to take them from you. Pursuing a sorcerer, you need a safe retreat.”
“I have rooms.”
“And I have been reinforcing the wards here for centuries. The sorcerer cannot enter my home, not even if he kills me.”
Laila blinked. “Wards?”
He smiled. “They didn’t touch you, did they, fire rose? You are welcome in my home.”
“I won’t sleep with you.” She blushed at her panicked response.
“I got the message when you vanished rather than kiss me. I won’t hurt you and I won’t push you. Stay in my home and be safe.”
“I have my own safe rooms.”
There was a heartbeat of silence.
“Please.”
She looked away, as uncomfortable as Darek with his raw plea.
He cleared his throat. “If the sorcerer hurt you, I’d be cursed with guilt. I involved you in this fight.”
The less personal plea gave her an excuse to accept. She nodded.
“Thank you.” He straightened from the desk. “There is a guest room on the floor below this one.”
Chapter Six
The business card was already dog-eared in Ty’s hand. He flicked it with a finger. As many times as he tried to ignore the happenings of yesterday, the card remained proof, tangible evidence, that he’d freed a djinni.
Just her name, Laila, and a phone number.
She’d been beautiful, her long black hair lifting and swirling in the wind, her light purple eyes luminescent with emotion, her figure…enough to convince him he had been
dreaming. Those curves. He flicked the business card again, then stowed it in a pocket.
He hadn’t bothered to set up camp again last night. Walking at night down the rock-strewn mountain wasn’t fun. He’d managed twenty minutes, maybe half a mile from his original dragon-devastated—his mind boggled—campsite, and then, set out his new bedroll and turned in. Sleep had been hard to come by.
Laila had flicked her fingers and they were in Times Square, New York, the noise and confusion unmistakable. Another flick of her fingers and he’d been flying solo from the remote mountain top to a luxurious albeit stuffy and windowless room. Lamps had glimmered on well-polished antique furniture and expensive rugs had muffled his booted feet as he roamed and explored. Books were arranged by subject and author on ceiling-high shelves, and stacked in a business-like fashion on a large oak desk. He’d only just sat in the desk’s chair when whoosh he was back on the mountain—to find his camp burned out.
Now, with dawn sending fingers of pale gold through the trees at the edge of the clearing, and the birds stirring and chirping, a raven cawing, Ty investigated the new camping gear he’d acquired. His old gear had been functional, but its replacement was cutting edge. The smartphone was the latest version, but incredibly contained all his contacts and messages. Could dragons resuscitate melted SIM cards? Even the food was markedly improved. Ty unwrapped a breakfast bar and chewed thoughtfully.
Unless he blamed the new camping gear, his memory and Laila’s business card on an elaborate prank helped along by hallucinogenic, he had to face an unlikely truth: magic was real.
He shook his head, laughing as he stowed the empty breakfast bar wrapper in his backpack. His grandmother had always said magic was real, that it grew her garden with her. None of the family had believed her, but now, “Gran, I owe you an apology.” The words drifted away on the wind.
Ty paused, his head tilting to the side. The wind carried another sound, one not so welcome; one that silenced the birds and stilled the scurrying in the undergrowth behind him.
Whap-whap-whap. A helicopter.
Helicopters weren’t common, despite their practicality for covering distance in these remote mountains. Ty scooped up his bedroll and backpack, and dashed for the meagre shelter of the scrawny trees. The wild places of the world contained more than dangerous animals. The people could be lethal, and he’d attracted attention twice yesterday: once in saving the villagers, and then, when the dragon had burned out his campsite. If someone was watching the area, running smuggled goods, then they’d investigate. So would the Iranian military.
As a solitary American, even one with government approval and UN backing, discretion was the better part of valor.
The helicopter approached, hovered deafeningly, and landed elegantly in the clearing.
It definitely wasn’t military. It was a small, dragonfly machine painted the deep turquoise color that was superstitiously held to repel the “evil eye”, and it held a single occupant, the pilot. The whirring blades slowed and stopped. Silence returned to the mountain.
Ty stood near a pine tree, letting the shade of its dark trunk conceal him. He left his knife in the sheathe strapped to his leg. He could reach it easily enough, but introducing the threat of violence into a first encounter seldom ended well.
The helicopter’s door opened and a figure jumped out, wearing a black leather jacket over jeans, but the clothes couldn’t disguise that she was very definitely female. The woman walked a bit away from the helicopter and looked around.
As Ty saw her profile, recognition blasted through him. He’d walked out from the trees before a coherent thought formed. Djinn and dragons were more believable than Yasmeen Alfaer, here.
His movement must have caught her attention because she spun around completely to face him. For a moment they stared at one another, and then, she smiled that radiant, incredibly joyous smile that had first attracted him.
He stopped. Dropped his backpack and bedroll.
She closed the distance between them, walking with a model’s hip-gliding stride despite the rough terrain, so that she resembled a panther stalking towards him. “Hi, handsome.”
“Yasmeen.”
If anything, her smile widened. She halted just out of arm’s reach. She didn’t break the silence and he didn’t know how. Why was she here? How could she be here?
They had met in Istanbul, at a loud, music-thumping party filled with gorgeous people and powerful people networking. Ty’s UN boss had hauled him along with the advice, “Make contacts. You never know who you’ll need a favor from. Even better, who might one day owe you.”
Ty had made contact, all right. Full body contact. From the instant he set eyes on Yasmeen, they’d danced exclusively together. The music had pulsed through their veins and locked them into one unit, creating a mutual seduction that had been heightened by Yasmeen’s refusal to lose eye contact with him. They’d existed only in and for each other. A space out of time, bounded by the music and night time, and ending—
Ty shook his head. It had ended when a drunken UN buddy had thumped Ty on the back and congratulated him on snaring a “billionaire babe”.
Yasmeen had heard, even over the raucous party and heavy rhythm of the music. She’d tilted her head a bit, and dismissed the drunk and his words with a shrug and smile.
But Ty had stilled. He’d thought she was another worker, like himself. Now, he guessed her crystal earrings and necklace were actually diamonds and the little red dress an expensive creation. He’d already guessed that the high-heeled seduction shoes were expensive.
Yasmeen had raised herself on tiptoe, leaning up and into him, shouting into his ear. “What’s wrong?”
He’d balanced her, two hands at her waist. “Nothing.”
But for him, the possibilities of the night had ended. He didn’t do casual, and he most definitely wasn’t a toy for some rich girl to play with and discard. He’d been in the moment, content to let tomorrow look after itself. Until he’d learned there’d be no tomorrow.
He’d smiled at her because she was beautiful and more. Special. And she hadn’t promised him anything, hadn’t lied. It was he who’d been blind. So he’d smiled and shouted back at her. “I’m having a Cinderella moment, and the clock just struck midnight.”
It had been well after midnight, but she caught his meaning. Her own smile died and for a second, something serious and regretful flashed across her face. Then she’d kissed him lightly on the mouth, soft as an angel, sweet and fleeting. “Hurry home, Cinders.”
She’d walked away, weaving through the crowd, and he’d watched her go. Felt something magical leave with her.
They’d met again a few weeks later, a chance meeting in a group of people who knew each other and whose flights crisscrossed at Dubai airport. He’d been in his work clothes, hiking gear that was comfortable and practical for travel as he forced his six foot plus self into cramped economy class. Yasmeen had been elegant in a figure-skimming cream dress, a red coat over it, and her amazing legs highlighted by yet another pair of stunning heels. She was first class all the way.
She’d sat next to him at the airport. “So, where are you off to?”
And he’d told her that he was finally about to start his project in the central Iranian mountains. He’d probably spoken too much about water management, but his tongue was on auto-pilot while he focused on her so close, the memory of dancing with her, how her scent was subtle, just teasing him, and most of all, that he wanted her.
She’d held out her hand at the end, as they all stood and separated to catch their flights. She’d held out her hand and when he clasped it, she’d drawn him down and into a hug. “I hope you find your dreams, Ty.”
And then, his dream had walked away.
“What are you doing, here?” Ty asked as the dust from the helicopter’s intrusion finally settled.
“Looking for you,” Yasmeen said calmly, as if appearing in the middle of nowhere was perfectly natural.
“Why?”
“Now, that’s a bit of a long story.” Her British accent was as attractive as ever, adding a touch of coolness to the warm timbre of her voice.
This wasn’t the party girl he remembered or the glossy socialite of Dubai. She sounded focused, but not nervous. Whatever her reasons for tracking him down, it wasn’t seduction.
“I brought hot coffee and flatbread fresh from the oven. I remember camping. Fresh bread was what I missed most—well, that and indoor plumbing.” The last words came over her shoulder as she returned to the helicopter. She reached in and pulled out a basket.
He took it from her and set it down by a bare rock in a patch of sunlight.
She sat without fuss and opened the basket, handing him two stainless steel cups and a thermos, before unwrapping a barbari bread.
The yeasty scent hit the mountain air, making Ty forget all about the breakfast bar he’d just eaten. He poured the coffee and swapped a cup for a generous piece of bread torn off the main loaf. The flatbread was amazingly good. Still warm. Even as he enjoyed it, he considered what that meant: Yasmeen hadn’t travelled far.
She cradled the cup between her hands and looked over the clearing, currently dominated by the blue helicopter, apparently in no hurry to break the silence between them. Finally, she sighed. “So much beauty and no one to see it. Or is it the absence of people that makes it beautiful?”
“That’s cynical.”
“Hmm.” She put the cup down and stayed leaning slightly forward, her hands on her knees. Her fingernails were unpolished but carefully shaped, her fingers pale against the indigo of her jeans. She’d braided her hair, and it snaked down her back, the lush silkiness confined and controlled.
She looked controlled.
Her gaze was steady and assessing when she turned to him.
His shoulders straightened military-square out of instinct. He’d had a captain in the army who’d used to examine his unit like that, eyes searching out weaknesses and strengths. The man had been a brilliant tactician, brave, intelligent…he’d died in Iraq.
Fire Rose Page 4
