Chill Factor

" Marion! Don't talk, just listen. I'm inside, but there's something wrong here. A whole different set of-"



Click. The line was dead. I rattled the posts, banged the receiver helpfully against the nightstand, then hung it up.



"You know," I said to the empty air, "this would be a whole lot easier if I had some help from a friendly neighborhood Djinn. Come on, I know you're here. You've been hanging around for hours. And thanks for not saving me, by the way. I wouldn't want to get rusty."



There was a heat blur in the corner. I focused on it, and watched Rahel sculpt herself out of shadows into glittering hard angles and cutting edges. Not that the Ifrit was recognizable as Rahel, of course, but I didn't really think that any other half-Djinn would be following me around like a lost puppy.



"Can you help me?" I asked her. No answer from the black, insectile statue in the corner. "Look, you went to big trouble to come here with me. I can only assume you had a reason. Can you tell me what it is?"



She stirred. That was unsettling, because she no longer moved like either a Djinn or a human. More like a bag of razors shifting. I took a step back, found the bed behind my knees, and sat.



"Do I have any allies here?" I asked her. "Anybody I can trust?"



I wasn't sure, but that kind of looked like a nod. Maybe.



"Who?" Useless question. She couldn't speak; she didn't have enough power left from her gorging feast earlier.



An arm of hard right angles and coal-black glitter extended. Claws extruded pale as crystal from something that vaguely resembled a hand. I resisted the urge to crawl back across the bed; if she wanted me, she could get me.



I felt something tug deep inside. Panic spiked deep, and I tried to move but it was too late.



Her glittering diamond claws plunged into me. Not me, exactly. There was no damage to my human flesh, but as I flashed up to Oversight to view what was happening on the aetheric, I saw what she was doing.



She had hold of a glowing white-hot core centered in my abdomen, just above my pelvis. Cradling it in her claws, carefully.



I caught my breath, staring down through the crystal lattices of my aetheric body at this revelation, this glowing strange visitor inside me.



"Oh, my God," I heard myself whisper.



I'd never seen anything like this before, and yet I knew exactly what it meant. I was pregnant.



I freaked.



First, I threw myself back across the bed, putting distance between me and Rahel's claws, instincts screaming. She didn't try to follow. I couldn't seem to get my breath, couldn't think, and as the world did a Tilt-A-Whirl spin I put my back against the hotel room door and slid down to a sitting position, head in my hands.



Impossible. This is totally impossible. I haven't... I couldn't...



I remembered Jonathan's sharp reaction to me, in the room at the Bellagio. His cryptic words: If he told you it would guarantee I wouldn't hurt you, he lied. Jonathan had assumed I knew about this spark of life inside me.



I gasped and looked up. Rahel was frozen across the room, still in a crouch, claws extended. Still as a black statue in the soft, filtered afternoon light. Alien as something out of H. R. Giger's nightmares.



"That bastard," I said. My voice sounded strange. "He knew, didn't he? David knew he was doing this to me. You guys don't do anything by accident."



I knew that because I'd been Djinn, recently, and I knew how much control they had over the forms they chose. David had chosen to put life into me-Djinn life. One thing I'd been taught in school-Djinn didn't reproduce. They couldn't. So how the hell was this possible?... According to the Wardens, Djinn were sterile and eternal, and they controlled them all. Except, of course, the Wardens had been dead wrong or outright lying about controlling them all, anyway. There were free-range Djinn, a lot of them. So it stood to reason they'd be wrong-or lying-about the Djinn being sterile, as well.



I knew with an absolute and unexplainable certainty that the Djinn could reproduce when they felt like it, and for some unfathomable reason, David had felt like it with me.



Of course, he'd forgotten to ask me first. Or even tell me after the fact.



Memory flashed hot. David saying, You have to trust me, his eyes flashing copper. And me saying, like an idiot, Yes.



Rahel made a move. I flinched back against the door, and she froze back into stillness, claws working as if they weren't really connected to the rest of her. Creepy. They slowly melted back into the glittering angles of her hand. Gone.



"You know what's going on," I said. Nothing. "Guess we need to find you something to eat if I want any more help out of you."



Something to eat, other than the glowing nucleus of energy inside of me. Which, to her credit, she hadn't tried to consume. Maybe it wasn't even the equivalent of an after-dinner mint yet.



"Any Djinn in this building?" I asked. Her head tilted slowly up, then down. "Let me guess. The Ma'at have some." Another slow, creaky, alien nod. "Perfect. So all I have to do is face down the opposition, steal a Djinn, let you snack on it, and I'm home free. Assuming that you don't just walk away and let me twist in the wind."



She didn't confirm or deny, like Quinn.



I let my aching head fall back into my trembling hands.



Oh, Jesus, I was pregnant.



I was going to kill him so very dead.



To pass the time while I worked out a plan- because nothing was immediately jumping up and down, waving its little arms-I took a long, hot shower, washed my hair, dried it, applied skin moisturizers from the complimentary selection in the bathroom, then slipped into the Jacuzzi tub to bubble away my troubles for a while. I stared out at the horizon, remembering how it had looked to see a black roller crest on that flat sandy plain.



I needed a Djinn, but the Ma'at weren't about to go trotting one out in public unless they had to. That meant trouble, big-ass trouble. Public trouble.



Something shivery crawled up my skin, and it wasn't bubbles. Maybe the heat was getting to me, but I had an idea.



Not a good one, but any idea at all was an improvement. It had two chances of success, at least. If plan A failed, plan B was still perfectly viable. I liked that. Plan A rarely worked, anyway.



I soaked awhile longer, waiting for a better idea to saunter into my head, but nothing arrived. Night was still hours away, but the sun was burning its way down the western half of the sky. I slipped into a luxurious cotton robe embroidered with the Luxor crest, wrapped my arms around my waist for comfort, and wished I could talk to David. Scream at him, preferably. What the hell was he thinking? Exactly when had the whole discussion about offspring happened? I'd been unconscious a few times. Maybe he'd mentioned it then. That would be guylike.



I couldn't deal with it now. I had other things to do, and everything was risky. Too risky to be attempting with that fragile, brilliant spark of life inside me, but I didn't have that much of a choice. David hadn't damn well given me one. I didn't know the first thing about baby Djinn, and I had no one to ask but Rahel, who couldn't answer me and probably wouldn't tell me the truth even if she could.



I put my clothes back on and went shopping.



There are two things you need to be successful as a hard-core Vegas ьber-slut: couture and attitude. I had the second. A trip downstairs to the Luxor bazaar would ensure that I had the first.



I toured the options and decided on a discreet place that reeked of high price tags-not that it was an indicator of class, but discount stores definitely were out. I needed the best, and I needed it now.



I came in, all wrinkled and lived-in, and showed the clerk the color of my Luxor card. She was a beautiful little thing, Cleopatra-cut honey-blond hair, gray-green eyes, skin like pale spring roses. Wearing Donna Karan, which went perfectly with her body type. Good shoes, too, something from the Valentino family. I was still partial to Manolos, but I wasn't monogamous.



"Day or evening, miss?" she asked, raising perfectly shaped eyebrows. She had a perfect, cultured, West-End-London accent.



"Evening."



"Casual or-"



"Tell you what, gorgeous, just show me what you think will make me absolutely irresistible."



She grinned, and mischief danced in those gray-green eyes. "That won't be difficult," she said, which made her my best friend ever. "Have a seat. We'll sort something for you."



Forty-five minutes later, I was standing in front of a trio of mirrors, wearing a knee-length midnight-blue raw-silk sheath dress. That wasn't anything so special, until you considered the parts that were missing. I turned slowly, gauging the effect. Transparent blue mesh from a high neck to a band of raw silk over my breasts-the parts that get you arrested, anyway-that faded into transparency again over my waist, dipping into beaded splendor low around my hips. Gorgeous. Striking. Utterly impossible to wear without supreme self-confidence.



Twenty-four hundred dollars, plus change. I did a slow turn again. The salesclerk draped a sapphire pendant around my neck, something large and real enough to make my heart skip a beat.



"Well," I said. "They say accessories are everything."



She gave me a knowing, conspiratorial smile and held up a pair of matching Manolo Blahnik pumps, midnight-blue raw silk, with pinpoint heels that raised me a good three and a half inches.



We high-fived. She gave me eight hundred in change from the chip card, bagged my old outfit, and promised to send it up to my room after cleaning. I tipped her generously, squared my shoulders, and called up my A-game.



Time to get to work.



I cut a swath through the bazaar, drawing stares from men and whispers from women; there were few who didn't look, even if they frowned. The Manolos felt perfect on my feet, completely natural; the dress clung like an expertly tailored second skin. Security watched me just like the rest of the gawkers, with a touch of assessment. They knew who I was, of course, but still, the dress had its effect.



I headed for the highest-stakes tables and came up with a likely candidate. I didn't recognize him, but he had designer clothes and two big, burly guys who were obviously bodyguards, and he had a stack of chips that could build a model of the Titanic without losing too much in scale.



I eased up to the table, gave him my best smile, and put down a single chip. Ah, we were playing blackjack. Cool. I was good at blackjack.



The croupier took my chip and dealt cards, and I crossed my legs as I sat down on the high stool. The man I was smiling at started smiling back. He nearly forgot his hand.



"Your play," I said, and nodded down. He focused quickly on the cards, asked for a hit, asked for another, busted, and watched about a thousand bucks travel into the croupier's territory. Then he swung around and watched me in open, frank appraisal. I pretended not to notice, checked my cards, and flipped over the ace on top of the jack. "Pay me." I salved the pain for the dealer with a smile and a wink. He smiled back.



Two professionals at work.



I got paid, a tidy little profit, and left a chip to ride as I scooped the rest back into the small, elegant bag that the saleswoman had insisted on throwing in. Midnight blue, with beadwork. Matched the shoes, of course. It wasn't Fendi or Kate Spade, but you don't get Fendi for free, now, do you?



The guy next to me leaned in closer with every turn of the cards. We did a little gambling, a lot of flirting. Drinks were free, but I had a passenger on board to worry about now, and even though Djinn were well-nigh indestructible I wasn't so sure about baby ones. I stuck to cola.



Mr. Big Spender introduced himself as a blur of syllables I didn't bother to catch. He mentioned a couple of TV shows and a film he'd starred in, none of which I'd seen. Big, broad-shouldered, dark hair and dark eyes. A face that was beautiful or brutal, depending on the lighting and angles. He liked dark colors-black, cabernet, midnight blues. We matched well.



Which was, for him, what it was all about, the look. I could tell that within seconds of making eye contact. He wasn't looking for intellectual stimulation. I wasn't sure if he'd ever actually had intellectual stimulation.



I was on his arm, with the bodyguards trailing behind, in about ten minutes, and suggested that the casino at the Bellagio might put out (and I might, too, with the proper application of cash or credit). We cut quite a swath through the crowd on the way to the lobby. A substantial number of tourists recognized my pickup, and stopped him for autographs; some snapped photos. He took it with good humor and used me as a poseable doll, which I suppose was the function most of his dates fulfilled both in public and in private.



We were halfway across the lobby, heading for the doors, when Quinn appeared. He took one look and knew what I'd done; fast, that boy. He didn't try to go for my date; he stepped straight up to the larger of the two bodyguards and did some whispering. Dammit. I was watching plan A turn to crap.



The bodyguard moved up to whisper in the pale ear of my escort, who looked nervous and gave me a twisted smile. "Ah..." He didn't seem to quite know what to say. We were in the lobby, nearly to the doors. "Sorry. You're really... that's quite a look you've got going. The dress and all. It would fool anybody. But I really don't... I can't be seen with... no offense. Really."



He nearly tripped over himself in his haste to beat a retreat back to the blackjack tables. His bodyguards closed in to let me know my presence was no longer welcome when I tried to follow.



I turned to Quinn and glared. "You told him what, exactly?"



He gave me a top-to-bottom look, and smiled. "That you had a little surprise for him under the pretty wrapping. Of the frank-and-beans variety."



"You told him I was a guy!"



Quinn shrugged.



"And he believed it?" In this dress? I think I was more upset about that than the failure of plan A.