Another Kind of Dead Page 24

  “I’m scared.” I breathed the words, unsure if they had enough volume to even be counted as spoken.

  He must have heard me, because he tensed. “Of me?”

  The question pierced my heart like a needle. “God no. Not of you, Wyatt.”

  Only a fraction of tension lifted. “Of sex?”

  Yes. No. A little of both. “Of after.” My eyes stung and my throat closed. No, dammit, I was not going to cry. His earlier words about a cruel déjà vu came back to me like a splash of cold water. Could I do this to him again? To us?

  “Come here.” He pulled me close. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and melted against his warm skin, face pressed to the crook of his neck. His hands rubbed up and down my back. The embrace should have been awkward, given our nudity, but it wasn’t. I found an unexpected strength in it—in him.

  God, I hated losing this. I hated not having an actual choice about giving him up. I hated Thackery for taking Phin, and myself for not being smart enough to find another solution. Any other solution.

  Dammit all.

  A soft sheet caressed my skin. I hadn’t noticed us moving or curling up together on the bed, or Wyatt pulling the blankets up over us. I snuggled close to his chest, our legs twined together, and tucked my head beneath his chin. I wanted to climb inside of him and stay there, embraced by his strength and love. I inhaled him, safe in his arms. Temporarily.

  I shoved away my macabre thoughts and self-loathing—nothing I could do about any of it at this late hour. I concentrated on feeling Wyatt all around me. Just us.

  Our combined breathing was the only sound for a while.

  “I’ll get you back, Evy,” he whispered.

  I nodded, the only response I could muster for his impossible-to-keep promise. My heart was tearing in two. One half was desperate to make love to him, to feel him in my body, to see his face when he climaxed—to give him this final gift. The other half was terrified it meant I wasn’t coming back. As a Hunter, my life was about dying to protect others; as supercombo Evy, my life was about so much more. I had something to lose.

  I loved Wyatt. Whether I wanted to or not, I loved him. It didn’t matter anymore if it had started with Chalice’s attraction, or if it had started that night in my old apartment when he kissed me for the first time. Hers or mine, I no longer cared, because we were me. And both parts were vital to my survival in the here and now. More than anything else, I needed to love Wyatt. I needed to live for him.

  Yes, I could give him this. Give us this.

  I trailed my fingers down Wyatt’s abs, through the coarse hair below his belly button, and wrapped gentle fingers around his erection. He trembled, and I reveled in the power of such a simple thing. I stroked my hand up and down, working a light, steady rhythm, encouraged by the soft sounds coming from his throat. His half-lidded eyes and loving smile made my heart flutter.

  “You keep doing that, and I’m going to come,” he gasped.

  “Better not.”

  “Is that a challenge?”

  I grinned. “Maybe.”

  With a soft growl, he shifted us in the small bed so that I was on my back with him settled nicely between my legs. He captured my mouth in a bruising kiss that meant business. His right hand tickled down to cup my breast, tweaking the nipple into hardness and sending liquid heat straight to my core. I arched up, wanting more, and his erection rubbed hot against my belly.

  A wicked gleam sparked in his eyes. Fingers skated across my hip, down my leg to my kneecap, caressing the skin and tickling. He kissed me again, his tongue licking into my mouth, as those questing fingers drew circles back up my leg. So close to where I wanted his touch. I made a soft, begging sound—not a whimper but damned close.

  Please, Wyatt, oh please …

  Finally, he slipped a single digit down, down, then into the very center of me. I cried out against his lips and clenched around him, amazed and alarmed at how full I felt. In and out, over and over—his finger worked me, hitting all the right places. A second finger joined the first, and my hips thrust against his hand, eager for the ache to be replaced by something else. My belly tightened in anticipation. Then he moved his thumb up to press against my clitoris, and lights winked behind my eyes.

  It hadn’t felt like this before, had it? No, it had never felt like this before.

  I didn’t think it would happen so soon, but it did—I came hard, gasping nonsense, and he didn’t relent. He nibbled my throat, my cheeks, my mouth, drawing out the orgasm until I cried for him to stop.

  He did. Using his elbows for leverage, he smiled at me. I could only grin lazily, still a bit breathless. Tiny aftershocks made my stomach quiver. God, but I wanted this always. The thought hitched the air in my lungs.

  He kissed me, his tongue stabbing into my mouth, and I welcomed it greedily. I traced circles on his back, over each lump of his spine, across the scar I hated so much, down to his ass and squeezed.

  With a soft growl, he tore his mouth from mine. His hips jerked and pressed his length closer. I saw how hard it was for him to take it slow and savor each moment. Saw it in the tight pull of his mouth, the lines of concentration around his eyes, the beads of sweat on his forehead.

  “Make love to me, Wyatt. Please.”

  My encouragement broke the last of his restraint. He raised his hips. I slid one hand around to grasp him and guide him to my entrance. With agonizing slowness, he slid inside. Filled me, stretched me achingly far, made my body weep with discomfort and pleasure. Chalice … we … I hadn’t been a virgin. No, just inexperienced—so the opposite of what I’d once been.

  But oh, how I wanted this.

  Our hips finally met, and Wyatt could go no farther. A sense of completion washed over me, tinged with something else that clambered in the far reaches of my mind. I shoved away the memories that threatened to surface and destroy everything, and concentrated solely on him. On us, finally together.

  “God, Evy.”

  I thrust my hips just a bit, reveling in the exquisite fullness of having him inside me. “Love me.”

  He groaned. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “You won’t.”

  He was hesitant at first, his thrusts shallow and gentle, allowing me to adjust, but it was not what I wanted. I encouraged him with upward thrusts of my own, and his hesitation crumbled. I wrapped my legs around his waist and locked my ankles. He slid in and out, his hard, burning thrusts timed with his labored breathing. I rose to meet him, my own pleasure building again over the persistent throb in my back and the exquisite ache of his length stretching me. Loving me. I tried to ignore the wounds and concentrate wholly on Wyatt.

  Not on my position beneath him.

  On the way my insides quivered, and on the thick slide of him in my body, the scent of his sweat, the heat of his breath on my face.

  Not on the way he pressed me down, held me hard to the mattress.

  On Wyatt.

  No one else. Nowhere else. Here and now.

  Breath on my face … sweet and heady and human breath.

  Holding me down … pleasuring me, driving me to orgasm.

  Pressing me into the mattress … making love to me.

  Making love.

  His pace slowed; a thumb brushed my cheek. “Evy?”

  I met his concerned gaze but couldn’t force out words. My mind and body were consumed by conflicting emotions as old memories scratched just below the surface. I didn’t want them but couldn’t seem to turn them off.

  Somehow Wyatt knew, or he simply guessed my back was bothering me. He rolled us until Wyatt was beneath me, me straddling his waist, hands on his chest.

  In control.

  Just us.

  I didn’t think I could love him more if I tried.

  I set the pace, starting slow, a gentle glide up and down, and nothing else existed. The memories stayed away, beaten into the recesses of my mind by the pleasure coiling in my abdomen. I leaned down, thrusting my tongue into his mouth to taste him,
and once again, we shared a breath. He squeezed my hips, and I rocked faster, harder. Our labored breathing melted into a dull roar that blocked out everything except the pounding of my heart and the joining of our bodies. Faster. Harder still, unrelenting. I closed my eyes and held on, his thrusts matching mine, as a second orgasm washed over me, fast and blinding. Pleasure rippled from head to toes, trembling my limbs and seizing my heart. I shouted, hearing only Wyatt’s voice as he roared his climax and spilled into me.

  We melted together, a tangle of arms and legs and sweat and sex. I felt his lips on my face and throat. After a bit—seconds? hours?—he slipped out, and we rolled onto our sides. I snuggled close, nearly bursting with satisfaction.

  Wyatt grinned at me with swollen lips and rosy cheeks. “You continue to amaze me, Evangeline Stone.” The awe in his voice threatened to turn me into a puddle of goo.

  I kissed the center of his chest, tasting the salt of his sweat. “You’re not so bad yourself.”

  Laughter rumbled through his chest. His hands stroked my arms and shoulders. “Careful, or you may inflate my ego.”

  “Arrogance is your emotional tap, right? Just doing my duty as your partner.”

  Partner. It was an odd word to use for a man who’d been my boss for the four years I’d known him—save the last month or so of our lives as we’d first become allied fugitives, and then so much more. All in such a short amount of time. Triumph and defeat. Love and loss. Joy and fear. We’d defied death, defeated a demon-possessed elf, protected the future of a were-Clan, saved the lives of countless innocents, and summoned half a truck into a log cabin—not too bad, really.

  Wyatt folded me against his chest, and I could have stayed like that forever. Or until restlessness drove me back out into the world, ready to hunt and fight. Knowing I’d be able to return to his arms at the end of the day and be loved and protected all over again.

  But I wasn’t able to.

  Lips brushed my forehead. “Think we should change the bedding?”

  “Be my guest.”

  He chuckled. “We should probably get up, though.”

  I lifted my head and peered over him. Groaned. The blue neon numbers on the bedside clock announced ten minutes until company arrived. “You’re right.”

  “Go clean up. I’ll find some clothes and tidy up in here.”

  I gifted him with a soft kiss, which he returned with enthusiasm, then reluctantly climbed out of bed, chilly from the loss of physical contact. I gathered my scattered clothes and went across the hall.

  In the bathroom, I washed as best I could, then scrubbed my face and brushed my hair. No time for a proper shower. Everything ached deliciously and for all the right reasons this time. My cheeks were flushed and my eyes bright, and for the first time since waking from that damned coma, I looked somewhat healthy.

  I returned to the living area. Wyatt was dressed in someone’s dark blue jeans and a hunter-green polo, not his usual color combo. “What, no black?” I teased.

  “Not that looked clean.” He closed the distance between us and settled his hands on my hips. He didn’t have to ask the question lurking in his mind.

  “I’m fine. Better than fine, actually. Kind of amazing.” I drew him into a gentle kiss, just enough to put the taste of him back on my lips.

  The doorbell rang. I jumped, both of us startled by the unfamiliar chime.

  “Gina wouldn’t ring,” Wyatt said.

  A second chime, followed by a fist rapping on the door. “Mr. Truman?” a muffled male voice said, oddly familiar.

  “Who the hell knows you’re here?” I whispered.

  He crossed to the door on silent feet and peered through the peephole. His shoulders tensed. Not good.

  “Mr. Truman, I need to speak with you.”

  Wyatt turned his head toward me and mouthed two words I didn’t understand at first: “James Reilly.” I stared. Mouthed back: “Who?” Then the penny dropped. The private investigator who’d cornered him at Alex’s memorial last week. Fucking hell. Wyatt waved at me. I bolted into the bathroom (apparently my new favorite hiding place) and closed the door nearly all the way.

  The front door creaked open. “What can I do for you, Mr. Reilly?” Wyatt’s voice was icy.

  “I was hoping for a few moments of your time,” Reilly said. That same conversational tone, designed to set his interviewee at ease.

  “I really don’t have a few minutes today. I’m about to head out on business.”

  “Of course, and I apologize for—”

  “How did you know I was here?”

  The silence was deafening. I craned to see. They hadn’t moved from the front door. Still out of my line of sight.

  “I’m an investigator, Mr. Truman. It’s my job to find people.”

  “Have you been following me?” We both knew that wasn’t possible.

  “No, I’ve been following a red-haired young woman who’s come to this apartment several times over the last week.”

  Bastard was following Kismet? Why? Reilly said he was looking into the fire at Rufus’s old apartment building, and Kismet wasn’t involved in—Shit. If she’d gone to visit Rufus recently—

  “So you were watching the apartment,” Wyatt said, “and you saw me come inside.”

  “Yes, with a rather pretty brunette, as a matter of fact.”

  I didn’t have to see Wyatt to know he’d tensed up, even if he’d somehow managed to keep his expression neutral. This Reilly was a major pain in the ass.

  “Mr. Truman, may I come inside?”

  “No. Like I said, I’m leaving very soon.”

  “Of course.”

  “I still have your business card, so why don’t I call you—”

  “May I speak with Chalice Frost please?” Reilly’s tone had changed completely. Gone was the genial fellow asking harmless questions, replaced with cold determination. “Because unless she has an unrecorded twin roaming the city, she was the brunette I saw come inside with you. So where is she?”

  Crap.

  Chapter Twenty

  “I really think you should leave,” Wyatt said.

  “Why?” Reilly asked. “Because you have a dead woman hiding in this apartment? Or because the redhead I’ve been following has fingerprints that match those of a young woman named Virginia O’Malley who died seven years ago?”

  Seven years ago—the time Kismet joined the Triads. It shouldn’t have surprised me that she’d changed her name, but it did. This guy was learning too much. There were always detectives or self-important P.I.’s who poked into Triad business, hoping to make a name for themselves or discover some huge cover-up. We had always dealt with them the same way—by making an offer they couldn’t refuse. Reilly was teetering very close to the tipping point.

  “Fine,” Wyatt said. “Come in.”

  Uh-oh.

  The door clicked shut. Shoes shuffled across carpet.

  “Might as well come out and show him.”

  Trusting Wyatt to have a plan, I emerged from the bathroom and presented myself. Reilly stared wide-eyed, lips parted, as though he hadn’t quite believed his own bluff. He took a step toward me. Wyatt slipped behind him and got the older man in a choke hold. Reilly wheezed, fingers clawing at Wyatt’s forearm, face turning red. He was unconscious in moments, and Wyatt let his body slump to the floor.

  “Now what?” I asked.

  “He becomes someone else’s problem.” He crouched and searched Reilly’s pockets, producing a small notepad, which he flipped open. It looked nearly full of cramped, precise printing. Wyatt’s eyebrows shot into his hairline.

  “Do I want to know?” He continued flipping pages as though he hadn’t heard me. “Hello?”

  “Audaìn.”

  My stomach knotted. “What?”

  “It’s the name of—”

  “Of a Blood Family. I know.” Or more precisely, of Isleen’s family. Isleen was as close to a friend among the vampires as I’d ever admit to having. She’d saved my life onc
e by fishing me out of a sunbaked trash bin after I’d been stabbed and tossed into it. We were tentative allies. “Why does he have that name in his notebook?”

  “Don’t know, but something tells me he’s not as disinterested in the paranormal side of this city as he seems.” Wyatt put the notebook aside and emptied Reilly’s pockets—wallet, handgun, car keys, an envelope of photographs.

  I flipped through the pictures. They were impersonal shots, probably from surveillance. Photos of Kismet and her Hunters outside this building, Phineas outside his apartment building, various people I didn’t know at all, Wyatt at the cemetery with Leo Forrester, Wyatt exiting our old building. Near the end was one that startled me into nearly dropping the entire stack—long white hair, willowy build so slim as to appear sexless, eyes hidden behind sunglasses, pale skin shimmering in what was obviously daylight.

  “Holy fuck,” I said, showing the photo to Wyatt. “This is Istral. It’s Isleen’s sister.”

  “The one Kelsa killed?”

  “Yes.” The night old-me was captured by the goblins, I’d gone to see Max, a gargoyle informant, and was blindsided. Max had been arguing with Istral about rising hostilities among the various races. Perhaps to prove she was serious, Kelsa—the goblin Queen who tortured me to death—shot Istral with an anticoagulant round that killed her within seconds. That was a month ago.

  So much for Reilly investigating the apartment fire, which had happened over a week later. Four more photos of different Bloods I didn’t recognize followed, the last pictures in the stack. No names, no dates. The backgrounds had no discernible buildings.

  “He knew a hell of a lot more than he was letting on,” I said.

  I rummaged around in the kitchen until I found a couple of zip ties to secure Reilly. Wyatt’s cell rang. He flipped it open with a terse “Yeah?” A pause. “We have a problem upstairs that needs to be babysat.” He explained briefly, then listened, and I shifted impatiently. “Okay.”

  “Kismet?” I asked when he hung up.

  “Yeah. She and Milo are on their way up.”

  “Nice of her to call first.”