by Holley Trent
Strong arms wrapped around her and gently lowered her to the bed. He kissed down her neck, visited her breasts with his tongue for a while, then dragged his tongue lower, lower, and stopped at the elastic of her shorts. He hooked his fingers in and eased them down in one swoop along with her panties, which weren’t anything special to start with. If she’d known she’d be entertaining company, she would have packed a few pairs of underwear that hadn’t come out of a five-for-eight-dollars pack.
His tongue was back, now laving her most erogenous spot with a skill a virgin shouldn’t have had. Or perhaps virgins were more thorough when it came to things that weren’t quite sex?
She didn’t have any plans to research that.
“You belong on a pedestal, Ariel. The tallest one they make.”
She panted as he spread her further and dipped his fingers into her eager sex. “Flattery will get you everywhere, Hitch.”
He paused, and rolled those sea blue eyes up to hers. “My name is John. John Marshall Tate. Can you remember that?”
Remember it? Why wouldn’t she? She let her face show her confusion.
“Because that’s the name I want to hear you calling out. Got that, Ariel?”
Oh.
Chapter Eight
He wanted to take it back. Every single bit of it. The part where she’d ripped open a glow-in-the-dark condom and rolled it onto his aching erection. The part where he’d wrapped her legs around his waist and bent in low to kiss her.
The part where he’d breached her tight sex and eased in so deliriously slow.
He wanted to take it all back and do it again, because he was almost done.
It didn’t take Ariel much. She’d already called out his name twice, and his full name once, each time clamping harder around him and making him grunt like a raging bull. He tried to hold on because it felt so good, and her being pressed beneath him, holding him so tight seemed so right — like they had been sculpted for each other.
Admittedly, there was the small problem of having to hold back a second floodgate. One that would darken her soul and doom her to an eternity of … how had Gulielmus put it? Ennui. Ennui and eternal bunny cuddling. She deserved better than that, but right then, she was there and so warm and receptive to him, to every single touch of his skin to hers, he couldn’t do the right thing. Couldn’t let her go.
He was getting near and wanted her eyes focused on his, so he slid his fingers under her neck and tilted her head up, grazing his left palm against her skin as she opened her eyes.
It was like some trigger, and when he let go, so did that other thing, and it threatened to coil out of him and snake through — to feed him, while starving her. He pulled back and let her head fall onto the pillow, clenching his hands into fists and staring at her with horror.
No!
He eased off her legs and moved further away, nearly to the edge of the bed. Away from her. Out of her reach.
Ariel sat up, slowly, her face a confused mask as she pulled the covers up over her naked torso. It was obvious she didn’t know what to say. He’d yanked his body away from hers as if he’d realized what he was doing with her was so distasteful, but it wasn’t that, and he couldn’t tell her.
“Ariel, I — ”
She shook her head and wouldn’t meet his gaze. “Don’t.” There was an emerald ring on her right hand she twirled again and again as she chewed her lip. “You don’t have to explain.”
With a hiss, he eased the condom off and slipped over the bed’s edge. “You don’t understand, Ariel. I — ”
“No. Please don’t. It’s easier if you don’t try to explain. I get it. Really, I do.”
She couldn’t, so whatever it was she thought she understood was not only wrong, but scared him a bit. What had this woman experienced that would render her so cynical about intimacy?
He padded to the bathroom, tossed the condom, and washed his hands, paying special attention to his left palm. It itched as if some irritant had gotten under his skin and wanted to burn its way out. He rubbed the palm against a hand towel, chafing it again and again until it became some sort of mania. Maybe he could make it stop. Make it go away. But, no, the more he rubbed, the deeper it seemed to imbed, although he knew that had to be psychosomatic — only in his head.
He shut off the water and growled, pounding his fists on the countertop.
“Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.”
Was this really the only way he could have gotten away from the compound? To accept his demon father’s solicitation and doom himself to an eternity of this? Lifetime after lifetime of being able to look and love but not touch?
Couldn’t be. There had to be a way to reverse it all, even if it meant he’d go back to living in a hovel until he could make other plans. Do things the right way this time. He’d get some schooling — a driver’s license. Become a productive member of society. Earn his own way. Have those kids he wanted, and actually be there to father them.
Yeah. Charles had said the mark on his palm drew the demon part of him to the surface. So, John simply needed to find a way to suppress it once again. There had to be a way, because for him, this was no way to live. He’d turn into a cynical barfly just like Charles.
When John returned to the bedroom, he found Ariel had dressed in black running tights and donned that marathon t-shirt once more. This time, however, she’d paired it with a bra. She was lacing up her sneakers when he sat on the bed’s edge. Her actions were jerky, angry even, as she pulled the laces and tied them into vicious knots. It was a wonder they didn’t snap from the force.
He’d done that to her. Hurt her feelings. And he didn’t know how to fix it.
“I’m going to go run,” she said curtly while storming past, the scent of her perfume and their sex still potent on her skin.
“Down in the gym? Maybe I’ll come with you.”
“No.” She picked up the single keycard and stuffed it down her collar into her bra. “Outside. I’d like to run alone.”
“It’s dark, Ariel. That’s not safe.”
She narrowed her eyes at him and sneered before letting the door swing closed behind her.
“Fuck.”
He cringed at hearing it from his own mouth, through his own lips, but there wasn’t a better word in the English language that encapsulated the absolute mess he was making. It was a word he’d been trained not to say as a child, but as an adult? He understood why it was so useful, so he said it again.
“Fuck.”
He paced. If he were smart, he would have followed her — kept tabs on her at least from a distance to ensure no harm came to her. Well, besides him. Now it was too late. He’d never catch up. Never know what direction she went in.
The pacing didn’t help, so he sat, tapping one foot to shuck off some of his excess energy. It tapped faster, and faster, and finally he gave that up, too, because all he was doing was making his calf ache.
“The phone,” he remembered. He hurried to the bedroom and patted his jeans pockets for the device Charles had given him. There had to be some way to get a hold of him, or even Gulielmus. Of course, Gulielmus would be his last resort.
It took him a while to figure out the menu hierarchy, but eventually he found Charles’ contacts list. John scrolled through which was mostly a useless endeavor because all of the names were either initials or abbreviations. There was a G which might have been Gulielmus, but didn’t Charles call him “Pop”? Wouldn’t he be listed under P? What was Hell’s area code, anyway?
He decided not to try it. Instead, he scrolled back up to C. Charles had said there was a brother named Claude. Maybe that was him.
He dialed and hoped whoever picked up didn’t chew him out for calling before dawn.
Two rings, then the clearing of a throat. “Salut, connard. Je m’attendais pas t’entendre avant
que la semaine s’est passé.”
John felt his face scrunch with his confusion. He didn’t catch a single damned word of that. “Uh, I’m sorry?”
“Pourquoi t’es si confus? Tu boit encore?”
Confused? Is that what he said? Yeah, that was about right. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand whatever it is you’re speaking.”
“Then you have the wrong number,” the man said in perfectly unaccented English.
“Well, wait. Maybe not. Is this Claude?”
“Who is this? Why do you have that phone?”
“It was given to me.”
“Voluntarily?”
“Yes. I didn’t know who else to call and I didn’t recognize any of the numbers in here.”
Silence.
“Hello?” John nudged.
“Who are you?”
“First, tell me, is this Claude?”
“It is.”
“Okay.” John blew out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding. “My name’s John. I’m the newest recruit in the Gulielmus army.”
“My sincerest apologies.”
Did no one like this gig?
“Yeah, I — ” He raked a hand through his hair and picked up the pacing again. “I have a problem.”
“We’re generally a pretty adaptable bunch. There isn’t much you can’t get yourself out of, short of decapitation.”
Good to know.
“It’s not that kind of problem. It’s an ethical one.”
“Ah. Ethics. That’s what sets us apart from the pure-bloods. Demons don’t share human ethics, whereas we’re conditioned to uphold them. Assuming we have any.”
“Do you?”
“Of course I do.”
“But you do … this?”
“I do it well.”
That wasn’t the response John had expected. He thought Claude would say he only sought out bad people or that he rarely partook at all. But to confess that he did it well?
Claude laughed, probably at the silence that’d spanned the two of them. “You must think I’m a terrible person.”
“The thought had crossed my mind.”
“Well, it’s true. Terrible person. Terrible cambion. Know why?”
“Why?”
“Guilt. I do my job, because it is what I was made for, but I have my days where I’d rather smite myself than touch another woman.”
“I don’t want to do this.”
“What’s wrong? Find some pretty girl who makes you want to be a better man?”
Was he that obvious? He didn’t respond.
“How long have you been out, little brother?”
“Two days.”
Claude barked with laughter. “Oh, you’re so fucked.”
Yep. He’d figured that out already.
“Look, Charles said you’d know what the symbol on my palm meant. Do you know how to get rid of it?”
“Yeah, I do know.”
“And yet you still have one?”
“I was born in eighteen hundred. A lot of shit has happened between then and now. Cities have boomed. Some have disappeared. Technology has improved exponentially. I like life. Being a witness. Besides, I’m too far gone. My mark is a part of me. I couldn’t go back if I wanted to. By the time I learned I could have, even then it was too late.”
“What about Charles?”
“Too late.”
“And me?”
“Non.”
“Will you help me?”
“If you want. But let me ask you this, little brother. This woman that’s shaken you to your core — she’s worth giving up near-immortality for? I can’t say for sure you’ll get to keep it.”
John drummed his fingertips against his thigh while he thought. “I think the afterlife has something better in store for me than cuddling bunnies.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Okay. Where are you right now? I can come to you after Papa does his monthly check-in on me — ”
“Wait, he checks you monthly?”
“I don’t need supervision. Besides, he avoids me because my mother was a witch. I got a little of that. Makes me dangerous.”
John grimaced. A cambion that had magic beyond the demonic? If he were Gulielmus, he’d probably be wary, too.
“Right now I’m somewhere in Arkansas, but I’m heading east. Assuming she doesn’t put me out.”
“You’re a cambion. Charm her. Where to in the east?”
“Somewhere in North Carolina. I think I heard her say her new job was in Wilmington. I don’t really know where that is.”
“Well, I’ll wait. I’m stalking campgrounds in the Smokies. Give me a call when you’re near and I’ll intercept you whenever you stop.”
John stopped pacing. There was an out! And he was going to get it, no matter what it required of him. Sweetening Ariel up enough for her to allow him in her car again, though, that was the issue of the moment and he didn’t want to use demon powers to do it.
“Claude, before you go — how do I get Gulielmus to back off?”
Claude barked again. “You got a cross, little brother?”
“Uh, no. I think Ariel — the woman — she has one.”
“Stay near her. That’s a start. Carry a bible in your pocket if you can. Any holy relic, really, if you can manage to touch one. They tend to repel demons because of the magic they hold.”
“Bible. Right.” He scanned the room and started pulling drawers open. Had to be a bible in there somewhere, and hotel bibles were made for stealing, weren’t they? “I’ll call you.”
“Until then.” He disconnected.
John set the phone on the dresser and suddenly had a thought. His mother told him when he was seven that she stopped wearing her cross because the leader thought they were relics of things they were greater than. He wondered now if that was the only reason she’d given it up.
Gulielmus.
Chapter Nine
After a long run that gave her a foot blister, aggravated her shin splits, and did nothing for her sullen mood, Ariel returned to the hotel and said a thank you prayer that the elevator she rode up in was empty. She didn’t want to make small talk or be told by some stranger that she was pretty and should smile. No. She wanted to punch something.
Or someone.
She knew she was wrong for feeling it, but John’s sudden aversion to her — to touching her — woke up not-so-old memories she thought she’d left behind in Los Angeles. That man had made her feel like she wasn’t much more than a convenient, nearby body, and usually had his pants back on before Ariel could clean herself up. Then at work the next morning, he’d be solicitous. Friendly. Until the next pitch meeting she was always excluded from.
She sighed and shoved away from the elevator wall as the bell dinged and doors slid open. Reaching into her sports bra for the keycard, she heard the honeymoon suite’s door click open, and she paused. She hadn’t decided if she wanted John to still be there when she got back.
Yes, she enjoyed his company on the road and with two days of driving ahead of her, she’d need his cheerful conversation during that last, grueling push. But, at the same time, she didn’t want him along for the ride if, to him, it was just a convenient means of transport. Maybe it was starry-eyed, fairy tale thinking to even consider it, but what a great story it would make if this road adventure turned into a romance?
People might think they were a little nuts, but there were worse ways for people to hook up. He could have been a prostitute, for instance.
John stepped into the hallway, being careful to hold the door open behind him. “Heard the elevator. Hoped it was you. You left your phone. I worried you got lost or … ”
“Dis
patched by an axe murderer? Alas, not this time.” She slipped past him, letting her sweaty side graze his clean t-shirt on the way in. He’d showered and shaved and … looked wonderful.
Damn him.
She heeled her running shoes off in front of the sofa and nudged her sweaty socks off using her big toes as hooks. “The breakfast here doesn’t start until seven. I don’t want to hang around that long. I’ll be out of here in half an hour, max.”
“Okay.” He’d stepped into the room and now leaned against the foyer wall with his arms crossed over his chest. “I’ve already packed up my stuff.”
“Great.” She stomped into the bathroom, already clawing her waistband to peel down the tight elastic of her running pants and froze in the entryway. The room was hot and steamy and the air scented with green tea or chamomile or some other herbal thing she couldn’t identify. The source of all that heat and that enthralling small was the sunken tub, filled nearly to its brim with water and foamy bubbles.
Half an hour wouldn’t do it.
“You filled that for me?” she asked lamely.
“Yeah,” John called back from the living room. “I overheard what you said to your gran. I figured this way you wouldn’t have to wait. I worried at one point, though, I’d have to drain it all and re-fill.”
“I think it’s still plenty hot. Thank you.”
“Yeah.”
Well, that was nice of him. She hated him a little bit for it. She’d started growing attached to her anger, and for him to come along and buff it off like some smudge on car paint … well, she felt a little silly.
Sweaty clothes off, she dipped one toe into the hot water, found it perfectly comfortable, and sank her tired body into the bubbles up to her neck.
“Ahh.”
It’d been ages since she’d had a bath. She never wanted to waste the time. There were always other things she could be doing. Even now she could be taking a five-minute shower and getting her things packed up so she could go. She’d thought a lot about the day’s route while pounding the pavement. She wouldn’t stop and dawdle at weird tourist traps. She wouldn’t swing into a gas station every two hours for coffee. It would just make her pee. Once her butt hit that driver’s seat, she was going four hours non-stop. No distractions.
