Bring Me A Dream: Reveler Series 5 (13 page)

The apartment’s mess swallowed their clothes, as Scrape sand did broken dreams. His arms were holding naked beauty, and he didn’t care if she burned him alive. He hoped she did. If any nightmare were to take him, he wanted it to be this one.

Again, he bent to pick her up, but she said, “Screw that,” and pushed him back on Paula’s sofa. In a slide of skin, Mirren was on him, kneeling over him, taut thighs straddling his lap. She hesitated for a second and he ground his teeth. Held on to her ass for sanity.

“If we don’t work out,” she said, “please don’t hurt me.”

As she was one of the most dangerous women in the world, he was pretty sure she meant her heart.

He pulled her close, near giddy over the nearness of her breasts to his mouth. She’d been so worried about her kid, she hadn’t been working their equation at all. “I’m not afraid of you,” he said. “And
you
have nothing to fear from me, either.”

She sighed, smiling. “Okay. Good.” And then her skin flushed. She rocked her hips just so, and then he slid into heat so tight and wet that he had an epiphany. She might have dreamwater-dark eyes like the nightmares of the Scrape, but she was not one of them. She was a
good dream
. She’d been one all along.

***

Mirren was changing her mind about a lot of things. She’d thought she had to always be in control. To be watchful for deceptions. She’d been used before. But at the moment, she could barely regulate her breath, much less care what was happening around her. Earthquakes. Apocalypse. Vincent Blackman. He could be the boss all he wanted, just as long as he didn’t stop doing
that
.

He’d managed to get them both to a bed, though the trip to the room was foggy, and he now had her facing the headboard, her hands braced on the wall above it as he drove into her from behind. Sweat dripped over both their bodies, but the scent was rich and thick, not unlike the dreamwaters. One of his hands held hers in place, effectively trapping her in the cage of his body. His other hand, his only weakness, had a firm hold on her left breast. Every single nerve in her body, from her fingertips to her toes, was singing.

If she’d had any secrets or insecurities, he’d ruthlessly ripped them away in his greedy exploration, and every time she thought it was too much, too fast, too deep, he lit her like a star inside and she could only cry out and senselessly hold on to him.

When he settled her on top of him again, she glimpsed the darkness in his green eyes. As she was shaking with need and yet too loose to manage, his Darkside-stained hands rocked her hips for a deep, slow ride. Her gaze locked with his, and she let out a hysterical giggle. Vincent wasn’t going insane; the man knew exactly what he was doing to her.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Vince’s arms were empty a millisecond into the first electronic warble of the phone. Mirren stood naked by the stack of plastic crates where he’d left it within arm’s reach. The sun was just high enough to make her skin glow and highlight the curves of her breasts and hips. Absolutely gorgeous. He hadn’t felt this content in years. He wanted more.

“Hello?” she said.

He figured they’d stay a couple of days at Paula’s to prepare, and then sink Darkside every night to search for signs of her father, plan a trap, and take care of him once and for all. Vince was pretty sure that most of the trouble with the nightmares sneaking into the waking world would resolve—or at least not get worse—once Didier Lambert was gone.

Mirren’s expression went white, unhappy, and she held out the phone to him. “She doesn’t want to speak to me.”

Jordan would just have to deal. He put the call on speaker. “Jordan?”

“Hello, Vince.” She sounded
delighted
to speak to him.

He felt the same way. “Let’s just make this quick and painless. Are you bringing David here, or would you like us to pick him up from you somewhere?”

“Lambert escaped.”

The temperature in the room dropped a couple of degrees. He sat up in the bed.

“When?” Vince asked at the same time Mirren asked, “Is David all right?”

Jordan sighed. “David’s totally fine. He’s at the park right now with Rook. They’ll be back any minute, so you can talk to him. And I’ll tell you both what I just told Steve about an immediate drop-off, and I don’t want any argument from you, either: we’re at least ten hours away and without a vehicle. It’s not safe to use public transport with Lambert on the loose.”

Mirren’s expression was a cross of worry and deep thought. “You can’t keep my son from me.”

“The point was to get him out of your father’s reach,” Jordan said. “That’s what we were doing. When there’s no immediate danger, we’ll connect and I’ll hand him over.”

Vincent looked at Mirren while he asked the next question. “You’re not angry that Mirren thought Maze City was her very own playground?”

“I have her son,” Jordan said. “
Obviously
, she’s not going to do anything to piss me off. Not to mention, I have no doubt that the Maisie-Steve combo can defend Maze City against her.”

Mirren lifted a brow at Vince, silently disputing Jordan’s claim.

Oh?
he mouthed at her. Apparently, she could unravel the maze.

She preened and gave him a smile. Then she waved for him to continue.

“I’m willing to go after Lambert immediately,” Vince said. This could be his chance. “Just point me in the right direction.”

“
We’ll
go after my father,” Mirren corrected.

“So sorry, guys,” Jordan put in. “Steve claimed Lambert. One of our supporters put herself at tremendous risk and was exposed while you two
weren’t
looking into the Sandman. We had to move fast to follow Lambert.”

“I could
help
Steve find him,” Vince said, going for a bygones kind of attitude. “Strength in numbers.”

“You’d just fight each other, not Lambert. If you want to help, you can do what you both originally agreed to do, minus the sightseeing.”

Sometimes he liked Jordan. Other times, he did not. “Fine,” he told her. “We’ll do it. We’ll find the Sandman.”

“Are you going to try your One Group contacts since you killed Agatha Fleight? We definitely don’t have the resources right now to identify another contact.”

Jordan didn’t seem to be blaming them, but just in case, he said, “She shot
herself.
”

“Well,” Mirren added. “I kinda pointed the gun at her head.”

“Oh my God,” muttered Jordan.

But Vince patted Mirren’s hand. “Again, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.”

Jordan spoke to someone on her end of the call and then came back with, “So how are you going to do it? I need to tell everyone so they’ll get off my back.”

Vince thought the
how
was the most obvious part of the plan. It was far more dangerous than approaching Agatha Fleight, but it was simple. “The easy way. I’ve got a nightmare after me, just like Rook had one after him.”

It hadn’t shown up for a while, but that was probably because he’d been with Mirren since then.

“Shit, Vince. I didn’t know that,” Jordan said.

“Demon Steve must’ve left it out of his report. Fact is, I do.” He looked over at Mirren, who nodded her agreement, even though he had yet to utter the plan out loud. With her behind him, he continued. “Word among the Oneiros is that those who have attracted a nightmare have been specially chosen by the Sandman. I will allow myself the honor of being dragged by my nightmare into His illustrious presence. Done.”

What should have warranted an impressed acknowledgment of his bravery was undercut by Jordan saying, “I’m guessing Mirren would follow and save your ass?”

So much for heroic acts. “Yep,” he answered. “But then we want to join the search for Lambert.” If the Sandman didn’t turn out to be Lambert, that is. “And you will give us any and all information you have to that end.”

“And I want David back,” Mirren added.

“Agreed,” Jordan said. “I have to update everyone, but real quick, Mirren, do you want to say hi to David? Rook just walked in with him.”

Delight suffused Mirren’s face. Vince lay back while she made mama sounds into the phone. And the kid answered with a string of baby French that would take an expert linguist—or his mother—to decipher. But when the call ended, clearly all too soon for Mirren, she was tearfully happy.

Naked and happy, and now available.

She squeezed her eyes shut, and when she opened them, the tears were drying. A gleam had replaced them. “Just throwing this out there,” she said, “because it crossed my mind, and it’s better spoken, I think, than snaking around in my mind.”

Vince was curious. “Yes?”

“Well, with Steve off looking for my father, Maze City is largely unprotected.”

He grinned at her. “So it is.”

“Can you make me come one more time, so that I can better resist temptation?”

“Mirren, I’ll make you come anytime you want.” He pulled her back down onto the bed with him. His dreams before Rêves had never had the elaborate creativity and majesty that Maisie Lane would claim. “But if you need a dreamscape so badly, you’re welcome in mine, such as it is.”

***

Steve Coll entered Director Allison Bright’s office, or rather, a Rêve designed to
seem
like Bright’s waking world office. It was a big room, full of sunlight, with a large desk stained a reddish-brown color. Her plants were deep, vibrant green. The wall behind the desk displayed several tastefully framed photographs. A giant Chimera seal was emblazoned on the large circular carpet.

Felonies were being committed in this room, though. First, it was illegal to impose a shared dream on someone without his or her knowledge. Second, it was illegal to replicate an official building. And third, the kind of clearance necessary to make the details this accurate meant that someone had violated the dictates of his or her clearance.

Marshal Fawkes had warned them that something like this had happened to Bright in the past. It was the kind of mental manipulation that could break a person.

And there she sat at her desk, stony and stoic. Frozen in uncertainty.

“Am I dreaming?” she asked him.

“Yes,” he answered.

He’d risked entering the Agora to search her out. At the back of his mind, he could sense that Lambert had been here, too. His trail led that way. But first…

“I’m going to wake you,” he said gently. Free her from this illusion.

“You can’t,” she told him. “I can hold on. Waking me will only warn him that you’re coming.”

***

The gray-brown nightmare was a simulacrum of bone and flesh leaning out from the shadows at Vincent’s back, while he sat working at a conference room table. Mirren bit her knuckles as she watched it on the security screen.

Vincent had been right—she’d been keeping the nightmare away just by being near him. So he’d brought her to the New York SpiderSly offices. It was the weekend, so the building was largely deserted, and those few custodians, security guards, and workaholics remaining were asked to go home. The place was theirs.

The nightmare had appeared slowly, first a transparent waver of dark light, and then grew incrementally more solid, until at last it stood there silently peering at Vincent as if
he
were the interloper.

She wanted to warn Vincent, but she was a floor down and several hallways over in a security room. Lots of screens faced her, but the one she cared about featured the new man in her life.

Vincent lifted his head and blew a kiss toward the camera. She caught it and held it tight against her chest. Stupid. Sentimental.

She had to be separated from him, but she also had to know the exact moment he was taken so she could follow them Darkside, hopefully all the way to the Sandman.

The creature observed its prey. If Vincent looked to the right to jot down a note, the nightmare leaned right, as well. And if Vincent reached to type something on his laptop, it leaned forward slightly, as if Vincent unknowingly puppeted the nightmare in some very loose way.

The behavior supported Vincent’s idea that nightmares were products of revelers’ bad dreams. That they weren’t independent, evil monsters. As Mirren looked on, she began to wonder if the thing had always been lucid—or if it had
become
lucid when Vincent had shared his first dream. She’d never entertained these kinds of questions before, but now she felt it was critical that she did. Whatever their nature, witnessing a nightmare’s prowl made Mirren feel less defensive about herself. She wasn’t like this creature, not like it at all.

The nightmare stepped forward, its big head listing slightly to the side.

Vincent must’ve finally sensed its closeness, maybe in an itch at the back of his neck, because he wheeled around in his chair. Gripped the armrests.

He said something to it, though Mirren had no idea what.

The nightmare didn’t answer. Just mirrored Vincent’s lean a little. Adjusted its shoulders the way Vincent was adjusting his.