by Ann Gimpel
Zoe shuddered. Compassion cut a path through her, but it wasn’t what Daide needed. She could tell him nine different ways that stealing food when he was a child wasn’t his fault. He had to believe it. Belief would spring from self-acceptance, a path each man had to walk on his own.
A blast of magic pushed the door open, and Karin strode through, arms full of bags. The pungent smell of herbs tickled Zoe’s nose as Karin started to stack things on the small desk. A rapid-fire pitch and yaw altered her plans, and she moved everything to one of two bunks set at right angles to one another.
“What can I do?” Zoe asked, thinking she’d cast a tarot spread or add complementary magic.
“Nothing.” Karin strung the bags’ handles over a hook. “The two of you need to clear out of here. Help Ketha with the ward. Go work on supper. Get to know our new crew members.” She made shooing motions. “Sooner you get moving, the sooner Daide and I can get to work.”
Daide sank to a sit on the end of the empty bunk, a resigned set to his shoulders. When Zoe looked closer, though, a ray of hope flickered in the backs of his dark eyes.
“You good with this, amigo?” Recco asked.
Karin’s copper gaze shot darts at him, but he wasn’t paying any attention to her.
Daide nodded. “You don’t have to watch over me.” A flash of the old Daide surfaced, and he added, “Not that I don’t appreciate the attention after all the effort I poured into you over—”
“I get the drift. We’re out of here.” Recco laughed and held the door for Zoe.
She turned to him once the door was closed, feet spread wide to compensate for the ship’s rocking motion. “I’m going to grab some clothes. Good thing this ship had plenty of them.”
He turned a smile her way. “I’ll dress too. Is there a short version to describe what Karin’s doing?”
“Yeah. She’s making Daide whole, so evil things can’t sneak past his boundaries. He made decent progress on his own before she arrived, though.”
“I don’t understand.” He grabbed the railing running along every corridor to stabilize himself.
“This isn’t rational. When parts of who you are cause you shame, it creates weak places in your psyche. Normally, they aren’t problematic, but we don’t live in normal times. The Cataclysm activated evil. Think of it as omnipresent, always knocking about the edges, looking for a way in.”
“Which would be why the dragon picked on Daide?”
“Aye, exactly.”
“And why once it was gone, something else saw opportunity and dove into the breach.”
Zoe nodded, pleased he understood. “The magical world has rules too. Exactly like the Vampire world or the one you lived in before the Cataclysm. ’Tis a matter of acknowledging and respecting them.” She inhaled, nostrils flaring. “Even though I was born a Shifter, I spent most of my life living in a non-magical world. I’m not as quick as I should be when it comes to recognizing these types of things.”
“Do you mean we should have dug deeper after the sea dragon episode?”
“’Tis precisely what I mean.”
Karin dragged the cabin door open. “Take the conversation elsewhere. Now.” Before Zoe could apologize, Karin slammed it in her face.
She gestured to Recco and walked to the end of the corridor. “Sorry about Karin. She’s always had a shorter fuse than mine, which says a great deal.”
“No need to apologize.” He wrapped his arms around her, breath warm against her forehead. “Let’s continue this conversation once we’re dressed.”
Recco’s nearness was enticing, and breath caught in her throat. He still smelled like his wolf, fresh and wild; the combination sang to her blood. She threaded her fingers through his thick, unevenly cut hair and tilted her mouth up.
Recco closed his lips over hers in a slow, lazy, exploratory kiss. He nibbled her lips, and she bit back, sliding her tongue inside his mouth. He sparred with it and licked his way over to her earlobe taking it into his mouth. Heat spooled in her belly, and her nipples hardened where they pressed against his chest. He rubbed his palms over her tight shoulder muscles, kneading away tension, and she melted into his embrace.
His hair felt like silk where she tugged it through her fingers. Stubble from his beard left trails of sensation wherever he moved his mouth. Her heart thudded against her ribs. Breath clotted, narrowing her throat. She hadn’t made love with anyone since leaving Ireland, a self-imposed penance for the insatiability that landed her in hot water with her three lovers.
Awk. I have to tell him. First. Before anything else happens.
Zoe ripped her mouth from his. “Sure and we have to talk.”
His dark eyes had deepened to midnight; banked fires flared to life in their depths. This man held passion. Every detail from the way he clung to her, to his hungry gaze, screamed once they made love, he’d stake a claim to her. One that would last forever.
Part of it was the Shifter bond. They mated for life. No exceptions. No excuses. Recco’s intensity predated both Vampirism and becoming a Shifter. Why had he never married? Any woman would welcome a man like him, one who’d put her above everything else in his life. Who’d worship and cherish any woman he labeled as his.
“I’m listening.” He dipped his hands to the curve of her ass, settling them there.
She cut her gaze to her cabin door. “Inside, where ’tis a wee bit more private.”
“Is it only talking ye have in mind?” He mimicked her brogue.
Zoe chuckled and sent a jot of magic to open the door, walking through. Once she was inside, she perched on the edge of the berth she didn’t sleep in. It was littered with books and papers, all of which had shifted into untidy piles. Too late, she recalled Juan’s exhortation to batten down their living spaces.
“Aye. Talking for now.” She tucked her robe more tightly around herself, body still humming from his touch and kisses.
He sat catty-corner from her and placed a hand on her thigh. “What is it that can’t wait?”
She glanced upward, organizing her thoughts. There wasn’t any way to put a positive spin on her indulgence. Besides, he didn’t need the gritty details, merely the gist of things. She tucked a pillow behind her back and leaned against the wall.
“Shifters marry other Shifters for obvious reasons. Unless we wish to live a lie in our intimate lives, we can’t disclose what we are. Humans, most of them anyway, wouldn’t understand. There aren’t many choices of mates, so most of us remained unattached.”
Zoe exhaled raggedly. So far so good. Recco regarded her, an interested expression on his face. “Although we don’t marry,” she went on, “we still enjoy, erm, carnal pursuits.”
He broke into a grin. “What an old-fashioned term.” He squeezed her thigh. “Zoe, if this is a long-winded lead-in to you explaining why you’re not a virgin, I don’t care. I wouldn’t expect you to be, and I’m certainly not.”
Heat rose to her face. “Nay, I fear ’tis worse. I didn’t set out to have several lovers, but it happened. All of them were married, which was my hedge against them becoming overly intrigued by me.” She licked dry lips. “One of their wives found out and hired a detective. He uncovered not only her husband but the other two as well.”
“Other than the poor sod whose wife likely told him to hit the bricks, I’m not seeing the problem, or why you felt the need to confess. It’s certainly not something I’d hold against you.” He made a noise midway between a laugh and a snort. “I do admit to being jealous, though. I’d love to have three women warm my bed.”
“’Tisn’t as if ’twas at the same time. Those men may have been into cheating. Beyond infidelity, they were a stodgy lot.” Zoe smothered a laugh, and wondered why she’d worried about letting her secret out.
He winked broadly. “Too bad. Ménage is far more interesting than—”
Understanding he was teasing her, she lunged at him and mock punched his upper arm.
He pulled her across his lap, hanging on tight
, and she wriggled to get closer. “Why’d you want me to know?” he persisted.
“Och, Belfast isn’t as modern as all that. I lived in fear the tabloids would get hold of the story and ruin me. ’Twas when I decided I should leave for a span of time and how I ended up gracing the University of Wyoming’s archaeology department.”
“Would the university in Ireland truly have sacked you?”
“Och, aye, and in a heartbeat. They’d have seen me as a bad influence on Ireland’s best and brightest.”
Recco cradled her head against his chest. “They’d have lost a damn fine professor.”
Pleasure at the compliment kindled a warm glow in her midsection that had nothing to do with the fires igniting from his closeness. The ship lurched from side to side, suggesting they were in for a stretch of rough water, probably days of it.
“I don’t have anything nearly as interesting to trade in return.” Recco’s deep voice rumbled against her hair. “I had the odd lover. So did Daide. Never at the same time, or some of those relationships might have worked out better.”
“Why do you think so?”
He tilted his head so he could look at her. “After college and vet school and practicing together for a long time, Daide and I were close. Not in the way gay men are, but in every other way. We worked together, studied together, shopped together, took turns cooking and cleaning. I can’t speak for his women. The few of mine who gave me a reason before they stopped dating me said they couldn’t compete.”
Recco raked a hand through his hair and kept talking. “At first, I blamed Daide. He did give my female friends the cold shoulder, but I ignored his women and they left too. Once they got to know him, his need to micromanage everything drove them away. He always seemed content when it was only him and me. I wasn’t, but I also wasn’t willing to take an otherwise satisfying life and turn it upside down.”
“You never met the right woman.” Zoe sent a knowing look skittering between them.
“You’d be correct about that. I took a stand with Daide the night we returned from McMurdo. Told him in no uncertain terms if he tried to get between you and me, it wouldn’t be pretty.”
Delight churned through her. “You did that? For me? When we were nothing more than friends?”
He looked down, lashes grazing his cheeks, and nodded. “I had hopes for more than friends. Still do.”
Zoe threw her arms around him and held on. “It may be the sweetest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
The PA speaker jumped to life. “Things are rough up here,” Viktor said. “Other than Karin and Daide, everyone else to the bridge. Now. And I mean everyone. New. Old. Dress fully to travel around the ship, and that includes life preservers. Avoid the outer walkways.”
Zoe peered around Recco. All she could see out the porthole was impenetrable gray.
He let go of her and got to his feet, hanging onto the desk to remain upright. “Damn. Sounds serious.”
She stood too. “See you upstairs as soon as I can get there. Viktor’s last lecture still stings.”
Recco’s expression turned serious, his eyes pinched at their corners. “Yeah. For me too. Wonder what new monstrosity is out there?”
She crooked two fingers into the sign against evil. “Pray ’tis only unruly water.”
Recco lurched out of her cabin, and she pulled on clothes as fast as she could. Big waves could sink them. It was self-serving on her part, but she’d finally met a man she could love. She’d be damned if she’d let bad luck screw her out of a mate. There’d never been enough Shifter men to go around. Coupled with a low birthrate and their long lives, the problem had done nothing except grow worse over time.
She turned her attention inward. Her coyote was silent. “What do you think? She demanded.
“Get moving. Recco will make you a good mate, but it’s not why Viktor wants everyone front and center.”
Zoe buckled her life vest into place and bolted out the door. The ship bucked and heaved beneath her, and she hung onto railings to get up each set of stairs. Though she waited, biting back anxiety, the coyote was done talking with her.
She replayed the last few hours, searching for what she might have done to piss it off, but couldn’t come up with a thing. Maybe the episode with Daide’s coyote had upset it. The more she thought about it, the more she decided she was on the right track.
Zoe pushed into the bridge and dove into a chair before the boat’s motion, which was even more pronounced on the upper decks, tumbled her onto her ass.
Viktor stood next to the wheel, not hanging onto anything. He offered her a curt nod. She nodded back and scanned the room. Recco was already here; so were the newcomers and the group they’d picked up on Arctowski.
“The reason I convened this meeting,” Viktor said, “is we have decisions to make, and I can’t leave the helm. Not in seas this big. We’ve posted a duty roster—two-hour shifts to spell Juan and me—on the white board over the chart table. You’re all included.”
“The main question we have to answer now”—Juan took over—“is whether we continue on our current course, which is due north. Or if we double back and try to transit the Drake Passage. It’s a much smaller stretch in terms of distance. Notorious for rough water, though.”
Discussion ebbed and flowed around Zoe as she fanned magic beyond the bridge walls, hunting for something unnatural that might be driving the big seas. Ketha had overseen constructing a partial ward, but it didn’t extend to the water surrounding the ship. In truth, they didn’t have enough power among all of them to create a bulletproof shield encompassing anything as big as Arkady.
Zoe poured more magic into her seeking spell, but didn’t come up with a clear answer. Not sure what would come out of her mouth, she raised her hand. When Juan called her name, she said, “I don’t have hard evidence. My gut tells me dark things are out there.” She waved an arm toward the windows speckled with sea spray and went on. “If I’m correct, no matter where we sail, the weather will be perfectly rotten.”
Viktor caught Ketha’s eye. “If Zoe’s right, is there a counter spell to keep us floating?”
Ketha scrunched her forehead in concentration. “If there’s a way, we’ll damn well find it.” She lurched upright. “Come on, women. Meet me in the presentation room on Deck One.”
“What about Karin?” Aura asked.
“I’ll stop by and let her know where we’ll be,” Zoe said.
“I’ll tell her,” Recco said. “I planned to check on Daide when I left here, anyway.”
“Look at the roster before you leave,” Viktor reminded everyone. “Whoever doesn’t have bridge duty, get something simple going for supper.”
Zoe rose from her chair and wished she hadn’t. Racing for a railing, she caught hold of it. Magic would help, but she didn’t want to waste any. As she moved through the ship, she reached for her coyote.
“Are you all right?”
“Fine. Listen and listen well. I’ve been talking with Ketha’s wolf. There’s a spell in that book of hers—”
“Which spell?” Zoe interrupted. “The book is enormous.”
“You’ll know it when you find it.” The coyote shut up.
Zoe understood. Conversations between the animals were private. That her bondmate shared as much as it had reflected how precarious their situation was. “Why wouldn’t Ketha’s wolf point her in the same direction?”
“It’s not sure, and after everything else today, it doesn’t want to upset her.”
Maybe to avoid the temptation to say even more, her coyote left. The place it lived inside her felt hollow, empty. Zoe made a note to thank it later and hustled down the last flight of stairs into the bowels of the ship. The lower she’d gotten, the easier it was to walk.
“Oberon’s balls”—Tessa sidled up to her—“my people were a seafaring lot. You’d think I’d warm to this, but all I want is off the ship.”
“Don’t wish too hard.” Zoe angled a pointed glance her way a
nd pulled on the door to the cavernous presentation room where tourists had gawked at slideshows.
“No kidding.” Tessa pressed her mouth into a thin line and scuttled through the open door. “Off as in down the gangway to a dock, not off as in sinking to the bottom.”
Zoe patted her arm.
“Hurry,” Ketha called from the front of the room. “I ran an idea past my grimoire”—she tapped a fat, black book with an index finger—“and for once it agreed with me.”
Chapter Sixteen: Challenges and Cures
Recco walked as fast as he could back to Deck Three and the cabin where he’d left Daide and Karin. As long as he didn’t fight the ship’s motion and made a point of flowing with it, he had an easier time. It reminded him of martial arts training where he’d tapped into a subconscious wavelength, letting it guide his movements.
The door was still shut. He hesitated. Should he knock? If he did, would he undo any of Karin’s work? Recco marshaled his clumsy grasp of magic into an attempt at telepathy. Before he got any words out, the door swung open. Karin’s white hair had escaped its bun, and untidy strands framed her face. Her copper eyes glowed warmly.
“We’re almost done,” she informed him.
Recco didn’t want to pry, but he couldn’t stop himself from asking, “How is he?”
“Better than he was.”
The reply was so like Karin—dry and barbed—Recco grinned. “How soon can I talk with him?”
“Give us five more minutes,” Daide called from inside the room. The strained note had left his voice, and he almost sounded like himself.
“More like fifteen.” Karin scrunched her eyes into slits. “You stopped here for a reason. What?”
“The women are in the auditorium on the first deck working out a strategy. They want you to join them as soon as you can.”
“Already know about it.”
“How? Did someone else use telepathy?”
Karin grunted derisively. “When you’ve lived as long as I have, not much gets by you.” She cocked her head to the side as if she were listening to something. “It’s getting interesting down there. You and Daide might want to join them.”
