by Jayne Castle
She gasped and pulled her mouth away from his.
“Wait,” she managed breathlessly. “Hold on a minute. I think things are getting a little out of control here.”
He groaned. “Celinda—”
“We should both cool down a bit,” she said, taking several deep breaths. “I mean, this isn’t even a real date, is it? More like a business dinner.”
He came back to his senses with a disorienting jolt.
What the hell was he doing? He’d only met her this afternoon, and he’d been about to take her up against a grimy wall. He’d never taken a woman against a wall in his life. He caught her face between his hands and rested his forehead against hers.
“Don’t know how it is in your line,” he said, “but I gotta tell you my business dinners don’t usually end like this.”
She gave him a tremulous smile. “Neither do mine.”
He opened his mouth to apologize. The sound of footsteps stopped him cold. There were plenty of other people out on the streets of the Old Quarter enjoying the warm summer night, but until now he and Celinda had been alone in the tiny lane. He listened closely.
“What’s wrong?” Celinda whispered, going very still.
“Probably nothing.” He spoke directly into her ear.
“Oh, jeez. First date I’ve been on in four months, and I’m going to get mugged, right?”
Very gently he put his hand over her mouth to silence her. He turned her slightly so that he could watch the mouth of the lane from the cover of the shadowed vestibule.
A figure stood silhouetted against the brighter lights of the main thoroughfare behind him. He was tall and spindly, a scarecrow of a man. The outline of a loose-fitting wind-breaker was visible. He had a cap pulled down low over his eyes.
The figure hesitated a few seconds longer, as though seeking his quarry. After a while he moved warily forward, heading toward the Phantom.
Davis put his mouth close to Celinda’s ear again.
“Stay here.”
He made it an order, not a suggestion. He could tell that she didn’t like it, but he was pretty sure she was too smart to sabotage him at this critical juncture by making a scene.
He released her and moved quietly out of the doorway.
The figure in the cap had reached the Phantom. He leaned down to peer through the window into the darkened interior.
“Looking for something?” Davis asked behind him.
The scarecrow froze for an instant. Then he jerked upright and whirled around. Davis got a brief glimpse of haggard, death’s head features, and then the lane exploded in a raging inferno of green ghost light.
Not one but two wild, acid-colored balls of alien psi energy flared and pulsed on other either side of him, trapping him.
Doppelganger light, Davis thought. There weren’t many hunters who could generate a dopp, especially outside the tunnels. He had some immunity—he was descended from a long line of hunters, and almost all ghost hunters could sustain a brush with ghost light—but no one, hunter or not, could survive a close encounter with this much raw energy.
Chapter 7
CELINDA WATCHED THE EVENTS IN THE LANE FROM THE doorway, horrified. Some of her brother’s friends were ghost hunters. She had seen them generate small UDEMs on occasion but nothing of this size and certainly not two at a time. In the blazing green energy given off by the twin ghosts she could see Davis pinned against the brick wall.
She had always heard that the only thing that could stop a ghost was another ghost. Davis had told her that he came from a hunter family. Why wasn’t he fighting back with a ghost of his own? Then she remembered something else he had told her: “I turned out a little different.”
Maybe he couldn’t generate a ghost. If that was the case, he was in mortal danger. She knew enough about ghost-hunting to be aware that the person who generated a UDEM had to concentrate hard to keep it going. The only thing she could think of to do was to try to distract the man in the cap.
She rushed out of the vestibule, heading toward the fiery spectacle. But before she had gone more than a few steps, the twin ghosts suddenly began to spin chaotically. In the next second they winked out of sight.
The man in the cap appeared to panic. He ran back toward her. Davis pounded after him.
A car engine roared nearby. A split second later, a dark vehicle shot out of an alley, nearly running her down. She scrambled back barely in time. The very high heel of her evening sandal twisted out from under her. She went down, landing hard on her rear.
The car slammed to a halt less than two feet away from where she sat on the ground. The window on the driver’s side was down. She could just make out a dark profile. Instinctively, she opened her senses. She was close enough to pick up the highly agitated psi energy patterns emitted by the man behind the wheel.
She heard the door on the passenger side open. The man in the cap tumbled headfirst into the front seat. The driver floored the accelerator, aiming straight for Davis.
As Celinda watched, Davis leaped out of the way with only inches to spare.
The vehicle turned down another alley and disappeared, tires shrieking.
Chapter 8
HIGH HEELS CLATTERED ON THE PAVEMENT.
“Davis. Davis, are you all right?”
He turned to see Celinda hurrying toward him. How did women run in high heels? One of the great mysteries of nature.
“I’m okay.”
That was a flat-out lie. She had nearly been run down before his eyes, the bastards had gotten away, and he had generated enough silver light to melt amber, which meant that he was headed for the usual burn and crash. He was not okay with any of that. But given that the situation could have been a hell of a lot worse, he figured he was entitled to a little prevarication.
“Thank heavens.” She halted in front of him, surveying him anxiously. “I was terrified that you’d been singed, at the very least. I’ve never seen so much ghost light. It looked like a scene out of a horror movie.”
“They’re called doppelgangers. Twin ghosts. Not many hunters can generate them, especially such big ones and aboveground at that. The guy is good.”
“Are you sure you’re all right?”
“Yes,” he said through set teeth. “What about you?”
“I’m fine.” She brushed at her shapely rear with one hand. “But this dress is ruined.”
She was safe. He was suddenly, overwhelmingly pissed. “What the hell did you think you were doing? That son of a bitch nearly flattened you. I told you to stay in the doorway.”
She blinked, startled at his tone, and then angled her chin, clearly annoyed. “From where I was standing, it looked like you needed some help. I thought maybe I could distract the hunter. I’ve always heard that the ghosts break up if the person generating them loses focus.”
“Next time you do what I tell you, understood?”
There was a beat of silence.
She cleared her throat very delicately. “Does this sort of thing happen a lot when you go out on a date?”
“You know, a question like that is a real conversation stopper. Come on, I’ll take you home.”
“You’re angry.”
He started walking back toward the car. “You scared the hell out of me back there when you came flying out of the doorway and nearly got clobbered by that guy’s getaway driver.”
“Do you think that man in the cap wanted to mug us or steal your car?”
“Doubt if there are many garden-variety muggers or car thieves around who can pull that kind of heat. Any thug that strong should be running a whole damn criminal empire.”
“Davis? What’s wrong? You’re not just mad at me because I didn’t stay put. There’s something else going on here. Are you sure you aren’t hurt? And what happened to those two ghosts, anyway? I didn’t see you generate any counter-ghosts. Did the guy just get scared and run off?”
“No.” He reached the car and gripped the door handle on the passenger side very ti
ghtly. He debated how much to tell her and then decided to go with a sanitized version of the truth. “I told you I’m from a family of hunters.”
“Yes, I know.” She searched his face. “But you said you turned out different.”
“I did. But I’m still a hunter. Sort of.”
She stared at him. “Are you telling me that those ghosts disappeared because you de-rezzed them?”
“Yes.”
“With what? I didn’t see any ghost light.”
“I work ghost energy from a different end of the spectrum. It’s almost invisible to the naked eye. They call it silver light.”
“I didn’t know that ghost energy could be generated from more than one point on the spectrum.”
“It’s a rare talent, and the Guilds tend to keep it quiet.”
“Why?”
“Tradition, mostly,” he said, deliberately vague. He was not up to any more explanations. He studied the interior of the Phantom. “Looks like Max and Araminta are gone.”
“What?” Distracted, Celinda whirled around and peered into the shadowy front seat of the vehicle. “Oh my gosh, they are gone. What happened to them?”
“Must have squeezed out through the window I cracked for them.”
“Maybe they got scared when they saw the twin ghosts and ran off.” She straightened and looked anxiously toward the nearest dark alley.
“Araminta?” she called.
There was no response.
“Have you got a flashlight?” she said to Davis.
He glanced at the midnight-dark mouth of the alley. The faint acid-green glow of the Dead City wall did not even begin to penetrate its ominous depths.
“Sure, but we’re not going to use it to go into that alley. I’ve had enough excitement for one night. Get in the car, Celinda.”
“But if Max and Araminta were badly frightened, they might not come out on their own.”
“Don’t know about Araminta, but I can tell you that Max wouldn’t have run away just because of a couple of ghosts. Not if he knew I was in the vicinity. My guess is they took off for reasons of their own while we were at dinner, long before cap guy showed up.”
He took her arm and gently but firmly stuffed her into the passenger seat. She slid reluctantly into the car. He got a fine, fleeting glimpse of a nicely rounded thigh. As an added bonus, the tear in the violet dress revealed a sliver of lacy black panties. Everything inside him tightened another notch. It wasn’t like he hadn’t already been thoroughly aroused before the confrontation in the lane. The burn was hitting him hard.
She looked up from the seat, brows scrunched together a little. “But why would they go off like that?” Alarm widened her eyes. “Good grief, do you think that Max lured Araminta away because he has designs on her? Maybe he’s out there somewhere right now seducing her.”
It dawned on him that from this vantage point he had an excellent view into the inviting shadows of the front of her dress. He sighed. Wrong time and definitely the wrong place. Just his luck.
“They’re dust bunnies, Celinda, not a pair of star-crossed lovers. They’ll come back when they’re ready.”
“If that bunny of yours takes advantage of Araminta, I am going to hold you personally responsible.”
He said nothing, just looked at her.
She winced. “Sorry. That does sound sort of dumb, doesn’t it? I mean, it’s not like either of us knows how dust bunnies think, let alone what their mating habits are like.”
“Can’t be much worse than mine,” Davis muttered.
“What did you say?”
He pretended he hadn’t heard the question and closed the door very deliberately.
When he got in beside her and rezzed the engine, she turned in the seat, studying him with a concerned expression.
“You look sort of strange,” she said.
“Thanks for the compliment.”
“Are you going to faint or something?”
“Or something,” he said deliberately. “But not for a while yet.”
“Maybe I should drive.”
He gripped the wheel very tightly and pulled away from the curb. “I’m still capable of driving.”
She did not appear entirely reassured, but she turned to look at the alley one more time.
“What about Max and Araminta?”
“They know their way home. The Quarter isn’t all that big. Your apartment is only about a half mile from here. My condo is just as close in the opposite direction.”
She did not respond to that, but she shifted back around in her seat and clipped her seat belt. He had the uneasy feeling that she was doing a lot of thinking. That probably meant trouble ahead.
He made himself concentrate on his driving, working his way back to Celinda’s neighborhood via the maze of narrow streets and lanes that laced the Quarter.
“About this business of you being a sort of hunter,” Celinda asked in a suspiciously unconcerned tone of voice.
It had been too much to hope that she would let his earlier explanation go, he thought.
“It’s not a business for me.” He stopped for a light. “Oakes Security is my business. I’m not a Guild man.”
“But you can de-rez ghosts.”
“Yes. But as I told you, the ability to work silver light isn’t the usual kind of talent. That’s one of the reasons I never joined the Guild.”
“But you are a type of dissonance-energy para-resonator,” she pressed, cautious but determined.
“Yes.”
She cleared her throat again. “Can I assume that you’re now in that phase they call afterburn?”
The conversation was deteriorating rapidly. It was like watching a slow-motion train wreck.
“That’s one term for it,” he said.
“It’s an adrenaline and testosterone thing, right?”
“I’m not a teenager, Celinda. I can handle my hormones.”
“I’ve heard about the postburn syndrome,” she continued in the same polite, too-neutral tone. “A big testosterone rush.”
“Seems like just about everybody has heard about the syndrome.”
“Yes, well, I hate to break this to you, but women talk.”
Right, and he could pretty much guess what women said about hunters who were in the grip of an afterburn. The rumors were true, and they contributed heavily to some of the long-standing negative social attitudes toward the Guild.
There was no getting around the fact that there was nothing like pulling a little ghost light to slam a man into a state of full-blown sexual arousal. The bigger the ghost, the stronger the physical response. Which explained why mothers warned their daughters to stay clear of hunters and why the bars and taverns in the Old Quarter that catered to Guild men were popular with adventurous women, coeds looking for excitement, and bachelorette parties.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to jump on top of you,” he said.
“You can’t blame a lady for wondering.”
Startled, he gave her a quick, searching look. In the amber glow of the dash lights he could see that the corner of her mouth was curved upward, maybe twitching just a bit.
“A word of advice.” The light changed. He snapped the sensitive twin mag shift into gear. “This is not a good time to tease me.”
“Got it.”
“You’re not scared?” he asked.
“Of you? No. You’re in full control.”
He contemplated that briefly. “How do you know I’m in control?”
She raised one shoulder in a tiny shrug. “I just know it.”
“You sound very sure of yourself.”
“I am.”
He wanted to ask her what made her so damned certain that he wasn’t going to pounce, but he decided it would probably be a good idea to stop talking about anything even remotely related to sex.
“I melted amber dealing with that dopp,” he said quietly. “Do you know what that means?”
“That after the rush, you’re going to have to s
leep for a few hours?”
“Right. I need to get you home and then get back to my place before I crash.”
“I understand.”
He turned a corner and drove along another cramped street. Only three more blocks. He could do this.
It seemed like an eternity before he eased the Phantom into an empty parking space at the curb in front of Celinda’s apartment. He de-rezzed the engine, unfastened the seat belt, and opened his door.
“Never mind,” Celinda said quickly. “You don’t have to walk me upstairs. I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll see you to your door.”
“The clock is ticking on your afterburn. You’ll need the time to drive back to your place.”
He set his back teeth together. “I said I’ll see you to your door.”
She sighed. “Okay, be that way.”
“What way?”
“Stubborn, hardheaded, and difficult.”
“Hey, give me some credit. I’m good at all those things.”
“I guess it’s true what they say. Everyone has a talent.”
She was out of the car by the time he got around to her side of the vehicle. He took her arm.
He realized his mistake immediately. He never should have touched her. The physical contact had an effect similar to sending power through tuned amber, except in this instance it wasn’t just his psi energy alone that was suddenly very, very focused. It felt like every cell in his body was riveted by the woman beside him, clamoring to get closer, to get inside her.
He was drunk on her unique scent, a mix of herbal shampoo and the essence of pure Celinda. He didn’t want to merely touch her; he wanted to stroke every part of her from her toes to her ears. He wanted to drag her down onto the pavement and claim her in the most elemental way.
The force of his response caught him off guard. He was not in a standard postburn. He knew that condition, knew how to handle it. This was different. He didn’t just want to get laid; he wanted Celinda. No other woman would do tonight. If he couldn’t have her, he didn’t want anyone else.
You’re in deep trouble. Just get her upstairs and get the hell out of here before you do something that will really screw things up.
