The Dark-Hunters (587 page)

Smiling, she leaned herself against his chest and cuddled there like a kitten while their bodies were still joined. She let out a deep sigh as she stroked his shoulder and arm. “That was even better than I’d ever dreamed.”

Ash flinched, still expecting the worst. “You’re not mad at me?”

“Why would I be?” She took his hand in hers and brought it to her lips so that she could nibble his knuckles.

Ash relaxed as he realized that she wasn’t angry or upset at him for what they’d done. And the more he relaxed, the more he enjoyed the sensation of her naked body lying against his. “I could stay like this forever.”

“Wouldn’t it be nice?”

He nodded as he leaned his head against hers and inhaled the scent of her hair. Unfortunately, he felt himself sliding out of her. Damn.

“I better take care of this.” He reluctantly moved her to her side so that he could pull the condom off.

Tory watched as he left the bed. Hating to not see him, she reached over to get her glasses. After they were in place, she opened the Sprite that she’d left there and took a sip.

Ash returned with a wet cloth for her. “Sorry it’s so messy.”

She fingered his lips. “I like your mess. I think you taste wonderful.” She exchanged her drink for his cloth.

Ash had never tasted a soda before. Curious, he took a drink of it and was surprised by the sharp tartness. “Wow, this is actually good.”

“Haven’t you ever had a Sprite before?”

“No.”

She rolled her eyes as she cleaned herself. “I know, you stick to beer.”

Ash didn’t answer as he took a deep draft of it again. He frowned as a strange wave of dizziness went through his head. If he didn’t know better, he’d think he was getting a buzz from it. But that was impossible. As a god, he didn’t get drunk. And even if he did, there was nothing in soda that would intoxicate him.

Tory frowned as she watched Ash down the whole twenty ounces of Sprite in one gulp. “Ash?”

“Is there more of this?”

He was acting peculiar. Like he was drunk.

“There should be another bottle in the fridge.”

He licked his lips as he cupped her chin in his hand. “You know, you are beautiful for a human.”

“What else would I be?”

He laughed before he kissed her. “You could be a goddess, but you’re not bitch enough for that. Then again, Katra isn’t a bitch. She’s beautiful like you.” He cocked his head as if another random thought had occurred to him. “I need to see my daughter soon. She’s going to have a baby. A girl like her, only not like her. It’ll be a baby her with a lot more power. I just hope she has enough of her father in her not to be a goddess of destruction. There are already too many of us. We need more who are innately good.”

Tory was baffled by his rambling tone that was half Greek and half English. “What in the world are you talking about?” There was no way he was old enough to have a daughter old enough to give birth to a baby. “Are you screwing with me, Ash?”

He nipped her breast. “I’ve already done that, Soteria, and I enjoyed it like nothing I’ve ever enjoyed, ever. Where’s that drink?”

She handed him another bottle. “Are you drunk?”

“I feel drunk.” He looked up at her and smiled brightly. “I’m drunk on your beauty. Look what you’ve done to me, human.” He took a drink of Sprite, then set it aside and reached for her. “Touch me, Soteria. I feel so clean and whole when you touch me.” He rubbed her hand against his chest, raking her nails against his nipple and as he did so, she saw a scar appear that ran from his throat all the way down past his navel. Another scar, a hand print, appeared around his throat as the hair on his entire body changed from black to blond.

“Ash?”

His eyes turned a dark, fiery red.

Terrified, Tory got up to run for the door.

Somehow Ash appeared in front of her. “Where are you going?”

Terrified and unsure of him, she gulped. “What are you?”

“I’m a god, Soteria. The last of the Atlantean pantheon.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Terrified, Tory backed away from Ash as those words went through her. He was insane … and she was in a soundproof room, naked with a lunatic.

Oh dear God!

“Okay,” she said slowly, stretching the word out until she could think of some way to get to the door behind him and safely out of the room before he killed her. “Let’s calm down. Can I get the normal, brooding Ash back?”

He looked as if her words hurt him. “Don’t be afraid of me, Tory. I wanted to tell you that I was a god, but I didn’t know how.” Closing his eyes, he slid down the door to sit on the floor with his legs gathered tight to his chest. That gesture reminded her of a little boy who was upset that he’d been banished to his room for something he hadn’t meant to do. “I knew you wouldn’t like me if you found out the truth. No one ever likes me when they find out.”

He looked up at her and his eyes returned to that swirling silver color. “He will be called Acheron for the river of woe. Like the river of the underworld, his journey shall be dark, long and enduring. He will be able to give life and to take it. He will walk through his life alone and abandoned—ever seeking kindness and ever finding cruelty. May the gods have mercy on you, little one. No one else ever will.”

Tory frowned as he recited something that obviously caused him a great deal of pain. “What is that from?”

A tic worked in his jaw as his cheeks mottled with color. How could a lunatic be so handsome?

“It’s what the priestess said over me when I was born into the mortal realm as a cursed god because my father wanted my mother to kill me to prevent our pantheon from falling.” He looked away. “I wish she had … You don’t know what it’s like to walk through the world always alone in every crowd. Everyone sees me, but no one knows me.” He hung his head in his hands. “I should never have touched you. What have I done? I will pay for this night for the rest of eternity.” The anguish in his tone tore through her.

Tory approached him slowly. “If you’re really an ancient god, prove it to me. Make me see clearly without my glasses.”

He kept his face buried on top of his arms. “Okay.”

The word had barely left his lips before her vision clouded. She sucked her breath in sharply at the pain. Removing her glasses, she blinked and then gasped as everything came into focus. Everything.

Her sheer babydoll then turned into a flowing silk gown that clung to her body and covered her completely.

Unable to believe it, she ran her hands over the cool, slick material and looked around the room at things that had always been shadows to her. It was all sharp and crisp now.

All
of it.

Which meant she had a choice to make. Either he was telling her the truth, or he was a very hot-looking faith-healer, or they were both nuts.

She opted for the truth, which explained a lot more than just her sudden ability to see. It explained those strange eyes of his and his ability to read a language no one else could even identify.

Kneeling on the floor by his side, she approached him warily, ready to bolt if she needed to. “You kept me from dying, didn’t you?”

He lifted his head and reached out to put one hand over the small scar on her forearm that she’d had there since a childhood accident from a broken bottle. As he touched it, it glowed and then vanished. “I know better than to interfere with the natural order, but I couldn’t let you die. I didn’t want to watch you suffer.”

“Why would you do that?”

He led her hand to his face so that she was touching his cheek as he stared at her. His eyes and the pain in them burned her soul deep. “Because I don’t feel broken when you look at me.”

Those words brought tears to her eyes. “How could you feel broken?”

He rubbed his face against her palm and when he spoke, his breath scorched her skin. But it was his words that branded her heart. “I was shattered as a child and thrown away, like a piece of trash no one wanted. But
you
don’t treat me like that. You see in me the human bit and you touch that part of me. You make me feel whole and wanted.”

Tory pulled him against her and held him close as her tears finally fell.

“I love when you hold me,” he whispered against her shoulder.

Tory laid her cheek against the top of his head. “Why did you come to Nashville?”

He went rigid in her arms, then spoke in a language she couldn’t understand.

“I don’t know what you’re saying, Ash.”

He pulled back and cupped her face so that she could see the fury in his eyes as red tinged the outer line of them. “No one can know about Atlantis. They can’t know about me, Soteria. No one can ever know what I was there or what I am now. I didn’t mean to hurt you, but I can’t let you expose me.
Ever.
” He growled that word through clenched teeth.

A tremor of fear went through her along with a jolt of anger. “Are you the one who killed my parents when they got too close?”

He shook his head in denial. “I don’t like taking human lives. They’re too short. Daimons, demons, immortals and gods … they’re fair game. But I don’t tamper with humans if I can help it. I won’t do to them what was done to me.”

“What was done to you?”

He grimaced and pulled away. He tried to stand, then staggered and fell back to the floor. His expression baffled, he reminded her of a boy and not a powerful god. “What is wrong with me?”

“I think you’re drunk.” He sounded extremely intoxicated.

“I am drunk, but I don’t know why.” He started to lie down on the floor.

Tory caught him. “We need to get you into bed. C’mon, sweetie, help me get you there.”

His hair turned black, then a very dark green laced with black streaks through it as they staggered toward the bed. The stud in his nose vanished, along with the scars of it ever having been pierced. She helped him lie down and covered him with a blanket. As he closed his eyes, she realized something.

For the first time, she was looking at the real him. He was completely naked and exposed to her. And she wasn’t talking about his body. He had no defenses against her. No sunglasses or piercings to hide behind. He was completely vulnerable to her and something told her that he’d never been like this with anyone else.

She ran her hand over his chest as another thought tore through her mind. Acheron was Atlantean.

Atlantean … He knew every secret she’d spent her lifetime trying to learn.
Dear Lord, I’m touching someone who’s lived thousands and thousands of years.
She could barely fathom it. He’d seen every culture that had ever fascinated her. “Ash?”

“Mmm?”

“What was Atlantis like?”

He let out a tired sigh. “It was ugly and beautiful.”

“Can you show me?”

*   *   *

Ash came awake to the worst imaginable pain throbbing in his head. For the merest instant, he thought he was human again, waking up after a night of binge-drinking and drugs.

But that was thousands of lifetimes ago.

Blinking open his eyes, he found himself naked in bed with Tory sitting on the floor, staring at him as if she were in shock while an odd noise kept an off-beat rhythm in the background.

“Is something wrong?” he asked, his voice thick and scratchy.

She screwed her face up as she scowled at him. “Define something wrong.”

Ash rubbed a hand over his face. “Did you beat me with a hammer while I was sleeping?”

“No.”

“Then why do I feel like this?”

She still hadn’t moved from her spot on the floor. “Apparently you can’t hold your Sprite, buddy.”

“Wha…?”

She pointed at the two empty green plastic bottles on the nightstand. “Did you know that when you get drunk,
she
gets drunk too?”

“She?”

Tory gestured toward the strange sound Ash had been hearing, but ignoring. He looked to see Simi lying on the floor, under the TV with her legs propped against the wall while she slept on her back and snored. That would have been bad enough, but the fact that she was in her demon form, complete with horns, tail and wings, made his stomach shrink.

What had he done?

And then his gaze fell to the three-dimensional hologram on the floor that was a perfect replica of Atlantis. It even had tiny people moving around like some glowing white movie …

Oh, shit.

Shit, shit, shit. It was all he could think to say as disbelief overwhelmed him.

Tory rose slowly and folded her arms over her chest. Narrowing her gaze on him, she approached the bed. “You don’t remember anything about last night, do you?”

“I remember us…” He looked down to see the blood on the sheets that substantiated that part of his memory. They had slept together. The memory of her touch was branded in his mind and on his skin.

“But you don’t remember the Sprite?”

He shook his head.

“Interesting.”

He didn’t know why that one word frightened him, but it did. “Interesting?”

She nodded. “You’re a very cuddly drunk and quite the chatterbox too.”

He felt the blood leave his face. “How chattery?”

“Very … Apostolos.”

Ash sat up, mortified by what he might have said to her.
Please, gods, please
 … surely he hadn’t told her what he was. Surely he wouldn’t have been so stupid as to lose the only person he’d ever found who didn’t see him as a whore. And it was then he realized she didn’t have her glasses on. “Did I—”

“Fix my eyes? Yes. Then you summoned your demon and the two of you fought over taking me to Atlantis. Simi’s the one who made the map on the floor so that we could all stay here because she said going there while you two were drunk might be bad since you’d probably destroy it before your mother had a chance. And then you shrank me down to toy size and took me through the city street by street, telling me about every piece of it, until you both passed out. Thankfully when you did so, I got bigger.”

Still his stomach churned. “Did either of us physically take you to the real Atlantis?”

“I should tell you yes, to make you sweat. But Simi won the battle and we stayed here.”

He let out a long relieved breath that he’d listened to his demon. Thank the gods for small favors there.