Fury of the Demon (Kara Gillian) (22 page)

His eyes met mine as our connection reverberated with all we were to each other,
for
each other. Shifting forward again, I indulged in a long and slow kiss until heat once again clutched at my belly, and he throbbed hard and urgent between us. As I moaned into the kiss, he slid a hand to my backside and brought the other up to tangle in my hair to hold me close. He rolled me to my back, and I went unresisting, opened to him and wrapped my legs around his hips as he slid inside me. My hands dug into his shoulders as he drove deeper, quickened the pace. Without words I urged him on, merged our desire and ecstasy.

With a strangled cry he plunged into me as I bucked against him, gripped him close, and greedily took all he had to offer. His eyes shone with wild need, and as we crested together, I dragged his head down, covered his mouth with mine, and joined my scream of release with his.

I stroked his chest while I pillowed my head on his shoulder. “Do you do that lightning thing often?”

“Perhaps thrice a year,” he replied. “Though I called it only two days past after returning home because of the severe depletion.”

“You don’t feel at all depleted now,” I said, pressing close. “We should work on that some more.”

His hand slid to my ass, and he chuckled low. “Ah, you will indeed deplete me, again and again.”

I laughed. “Before any more depletion, I need to get something to eat,” I told him. “Plus, my friend Jill is here. Y’all should meet.”

“Yes, it is time to know Jill Faciane,” he agreed.

We found our scattered clothing, quickly dressed, and returned to the house. Jill and Jekki sat at the kitchen table, heads bent together and apparently deep in conversation. She looked up as we entered, sly smile on her face in an I-know-what-you’ve-been-up-to expression, but then her eyes widened in obvious
Wow, Holy Shit!
appreciation as she took in the sight of Mzatal up close.

Yeah, my boyfriend was pretty impressive. Especially as radiantly vibrant and super-charged as he was right now.

“Hey, Jill,” I said with a smile. “This is Mzatal. Mzatal, this is Jill.”

She managed to scrounge together some composure, stood and offered Mzatal a hand, though she was clearly trying hard not to stare. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Mzatal took her hand in both of his. “Jill Faciane,” he said with a small smile. “It is a pleasure to finally meet.”

Jill’s mouth dropped open, and I knew she felt the tingling vibration from super-charged Mzatal along with a good dose of his natural mojo.

She abruptly jerked and let out a small
Oof!
“Sorry,” she said with a shaky laugh as she put her other hand on her belly. “She’s a bit wiggly right now.”

Mzatal’s eyes dropped to Jill’s belly, and an odd expression came over his face, fascinated and perplexed at the same time. He tilted his head slightly, kept hold of her hand, and placed his other hand on her belly. His expression grew even odder, as if struggling to remember a phrase or saying that was on the tip of his tongue.

Silent, I watched the curious exchange. Surely Mzatal had encountered a pregnant woman before? Jill remained motionless and didn’t say a word about the somewhat rude business of touching her belly without permission, though I saw it in the slightly wary-but-baffled look in her eyes. Beneath their hands the baby kicked some more, to judge by Jill’s occasional winces. I sensed him extend, mentally touch the baby.

Rare, naked curiosity lit Mzatal’s face. His lips parted as he leaned closer, feeling the movement of the baby, and connecting on the non-physical level. He abruptly sucked in a gasping breath and straightened, face contorted in pain as he jerked his hands to his head and took a staggering step backward. I seized his arm to steady him.

“Mzatal!? What’s wrong?” I demanded, worry flaring as I sensed his excruciating pain. He let out a low groan and took another step back. I shot a look at Jill as she backed away in confusion. “You okay?” I asked. She blinked and nodded, and I immediately shifted my full worry and attention to Mzatal.

I snaked an arm around his waist. “Outside,” I said as I worked to maneuver him in that direction. “You do better outside. C’mon, Boss.”

He didn’t resist, but it took all of my effort to keep him steady. He nearly stumbled down the back steps, but grabbed onto the post in time to shift the fall into a heavy sit onto the steps.

Jekki ran up beside me, chittering in distress. Keeping a hand on Mzatal’s arm, I shifted to crouch before him. “Mzatal? Boss? How can I help you? What do you need?”

Mzatal kept his eyes squeezed closed in a rictus of agony. “Ilana,” he managed to choke out.

Shit. Couldn’t ask for something simple, like Percocet. “She’s not here,” I said. “I can try to summon her.” Could one of the demahnk even
be
summoned? I turned to the faas. “Jekki, is Zack here?”

“Dahn dahn dahn.” His tail twisted in worry.

Yeah, that would have been too easy. “Can you get tunjen for Mzatal, please?”

The faas darted off, and I returned my attention to the lord. “Boss, talk to me,” I urged. “What’s going on?”

His breath hissed between his teeth, and a sheen of sweat covered his face. He gave a sudden cry that sounded more like frustration than pain. A shudder wracked his body, and a heartbeat later the rictus of agony faded from his expression. He opened his eyes, wiped an unsteady hand over his face.

“I do not know,” he said, voice thready. Jekki ran up with the glass of tunjen and gently pressed it into his hand. Mzatal murmured a low thanks and sipped, color slowly returning to his face.

“It started when you connected with the baby. Was something wrong with her?”

He started to say No—I
felt
it—but then the pain spiked through him again, as if caused by the mere
thought
of extending to touch the baby. He drew a breath and remained quiet, and the tension in his face diminished.

My worry for his immediate well-being began to ease a bit now that he didn’t look as if his head was going to explode, though I had plenty of concern beyond that. “Has this ever happened before?”

He drank more tunjen, then set the glass aside and reached for my hand. “Yes, many times,” he said, fingers tightening on mine. “Not for almost a year though.”

I moved to sit beside him on the step. “What triggered these other times?”

He took a long breath and released it. “No single trigger that I have found,” he said. “It has happened when working deep in the plexus. Once when simply talking with Helori. Many times with . . . nightmares.”

I brought his hand up to kiss his fingers. “I’ll try to summon Ilana,” I told him. “Maybe she can help.”

But he shook his head. “The demahnk rarely answer a summons,” he said. “I am unsettled, but the pain has receded. Do not worry, beloved.”

“Yeah, like
that’s
going to happen,” I said with a roll of my eyes, then kissed him gently.
Rarely answer.
Did that mean they could resist at will? “You should go lie down.”

“Yes, it would be wise,” he agreed. “Yaghir tahn.”

“No need for apology, love.” I gave him a warm smile.

He finished the glass of tunjen, then stood, swaying slightly. “I will be by the pond.”

I rose with him and slipped an arm around his waist. “How about I walk you there.”

His arm encircled me as we started for the path. “I much prefer it that way.”

We made it to his pavilion without incident. I got him onto the bed and made sure Jekki would monitor him. It was clear that Mzatal remained very unsettled, even if the pain had gone.

He rested a hand on the faas’s head, his eyes on me. “Thank you, zharkat.”

“I’ll be back to check on you,” I told him. I leaned over to kiss him. “I love you.”

Mzatal laid his other hand against my cheek, the simple gesture like a caress of my essence. “I love you,” he replied, then took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

I stayed a few more minutes to watch over him, then gave Jekki’s head a scratch and returned to the house.

Jill sat at the kitchen table distractedly flipping through an old
Forensic Times
magazine. She snapped her gaze to me as I came in. “What the hell was that all about?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “And I don’t think Mzatal does either.” I slumped into a chair. “I felt him connect with the baby and then felt him wracked with blinding pain. No clue
why
though,” I saw the worry in her eyes, and I hurried to reassure her, “but I honestly don’t believe it was because something might be wrong with you or the bean.”

“Okay. Good.” She let out a breath and relaxed. “I want you to know, your boyfriend is seriously hot and seriously freaky.”

“Yeah,” I said, then grinned. “I think I like the freaky.”

She snorted, laughed. “You have pine needles in your hair from whatever
freaky
things you two were doing in the woods.” I opened my mouth to respond, and she jerked a hand up. “Do
not
tell me what they were.” She paused, appeared to consider. “Not right now, at least.”

“I’ll save the sordid details for the next girls’ night out.”

“Make notes so you don’t forget anything.”

I laughed and headed off to my room.

 • • • 

A quick shower and a change of clothing did a lot to restore my overall equilibrium. As I came into the living room, Bryce glanced up and paused the game he played, leaving a purple and green alien frozen in mid-splatter on the screen.

I flopped onto an empty space on the couch. “Is this day over yet?”

“Still a few hours until midnight,” Bryce said as he set the controller aside. “A little lightning wear you out?”

“What, that?” I gave an exaggerated snort. “Pshaw. I have lightning strike through me
all
the time. Old hat!” I twisted my face into a comically freaked out expression.

“I’m not going to lie,” Bryce said with a shake of his head. “That was unbelievable.”

“Mzatal says it will help him remain here longer.” I mentally crossed fingers for that. Even three or four days at a stretch would be nice. With Idris on Earth, there wasn’t much Mzatal could do from the demon realm.

Bryce nodded. “He said as much back at his place.” He let out a low whistle. “He worked with the lightning there, too—while standing on the balcony rail about a billion feet above the rocks. I’ve
never
seen anything like it.”

I eyed him. “He was standing on the railing of the balcony?”

“Yep, barefooted and shirtless and calling in a storm,” he said. “On the
railing
.”

“I’ll kill him,” I said with a sweet smile.

Bryce’s face abruptly twisted into the expression of a man who suddenly realized he’d told his buddy’s girlfriend that said buddy had been at the strip club all night. “Uh, he didn’t fall or anything,” Bryce fumbled out as he struggled to retract his earlier statement. “I mean, he seemed to be in complete control of what he was doing.”

I snorted. “I’m sure he knew what he was doing.” Then again, it wasn’t as if I could call Mzatal on it. He’d simply give me an implacable
look
and tell me he was always in control. Dating a demigod sure carried its own set of unique issues. “I’m glad I wasn’t there to see it, though.”

“I’m glad I
was
,” Bryce said. “I’d only talked to him once, briefly, before witnessing the lightning-on-the-railing thing. I’m not likely to forget it.” He shrugged. “And today’s was impressive too, but something about there being nothing but sky beyond him, and the whole different world thing, it was beyond surreal.”

Jill came into the room with a large bowl of something weird and gloppy half-resting on her belly. “Jekki made pickle peanut butter pretzels for me,” she announced. “Anyone want some?”

“Oh, wow, gee, Jill.” I made an exaggerated wince. “Y’know, I
just
had that for lunch, so I guess I’ll have to pass.” I shuddered.

“I’m not even going to pretend I want any,” Bryce said, giving Jill the warmest smile I’d ever seen on the man. He nodded toward the bowl in her grasp. “That looks and sounds disgusting.”

Jill returned the smile, chuckling softly as she lowered herself into the chair and rested the bowl atop the swell of her belly. “Says the man who likes spicy pickled cabbage.”

I looked at the two of them. They’d sure gotten to know each other quickly. The alarm panel in the kitchen buzzed, indicating that someone authorized was coming through the gate. Either Zack or Ryan, since all the other chicks were at home to roost. I stood and moved to the window. “Zack’s home,” I remarked to nobody in particular. Nobody who was paying any attention to me, at least. I watched as Zack pulled into his usual spot and got out of the car, face grim. He closed the car door, then leaned back against it and looked up at the sky, expression somber and with an odd longing I couldn’t quite parse.

“Yes, but there are other people who like and eat kimchee,” Bryce was saying with a laugh. “I doubt
anyone
else eats that concoction.”

Jill merely gave a serene smile. “Pregnant chicks all over the world would eat the hell out of this if they knew it existed.”

Zack pushed off the car and headed up the steps, expression all surfer-dude Zack and not somber at all by the time he reached the porch. I stepped away from the window as he opened the door and entered.

He gave Bryce a broad smile, everything in his posture indicating customary good mood and joviality. I almost doubted that I’d seen the earlier gloom. “Welcome back to the land of the living, Mr. Thatcher,” he said with a congenial air as Bryce hurried to stand.

“Bryce, this is Special Agent Zack Garner,” I said to help him out.

“It’s nice to meet you, sir,” Bryce said to Zack, extending a hand. “Can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done for Paul and me.”

Zack took his hand and shook it, and I noticed the faint flicker in Zack’s eyes as he did. Assessing Bryce, I knew. Apparently he passed the quick assessment since Zack continued by saying, “Sure you can. You can lose to me—badly—in a game of
Alien Bloodbath
later.”

Bryce chuckled. “I’ll be sure to go out in an impressive blaze of glory.”

“Of course you will,” Zack said with a laugh. “I’m that good.”

Jill snorted and rolled her eyes, but when Zack moved to her and leaned down to give her a kiss, she melted into it, then lifted a hand to his face and gave him a lovely, warm smile. “Hey, babe,” she said. “How was your day?”

“Long. And not over yet.” He sighed and dropped to sit beside her. “Waiting for Ryan to get home at this point.”

I watched as her smile flickered, saw the thought plain upon her face:
He’s bailing on me again.
And since she had no understanding of
why
, how could it feel like anything but rejection? Yet on the heels of her disappointment, I saw a shimmer of relief. If Zack bailed on her, then that was one more night where she wouldn’t have to face the giant winged elephant in the room and ask him about his demon side.