Chapter Fifteen
Evan flung open the back door and stepped onto the battle-damaged porch. From the distance came a muffled scrape and the steady beat of hammers. Someone was building something, and not too far away. Across the river, maybe?
Didn’t matter. Evan shrugged off the noise and looked around for Taryn. Gone, dammit to hell. Good riddance, right? Red was a prickly, pain-in-the-ass, stuck-up, holier-than-thou do-gooder. And those were her good points.
So why the hell did he like her so much?
Whoa. He didn’t like Red. She drove him nuts. They were too different. He was earth, and she was fire.
Oh, she tried to hide it, the heat, but it was there, buried beneath the thick layers of ice like some damn dormant polar volcano. He was something of a hand at hiding things himself, so he’d seen through her act almost at once. She was a challenge, Miss Sober Sides, and he enjoyed ruffling her feathers.
Harmless, right? He’d thought so, but somehow, she’d wormed past his defenses and gotten under his skin while he wasn’t looking.
Aw, hell. He’d broken his number-one rule and gotten attached. To a demon hunter, no less. Of all the self-destructive dumbassery, that took the prize. Evan Beck, poster child for idiots. He might as well take a nap on a railroad track or sleep in the rain with his mouth open.
But it wasn’t too late. He didn’t have to be a schmuck. He’d never let a woman turn him inside out, and he wasn’t about to start now, even if the woman in question had eyes the color of a summer storm.
She had really nice eyes. Too tall and skinny, though. He’d never gone for the model type. Nice legs, he had to admit—long and lean and strong, and a mouth that made a man think dirty thoughts. Her mouth was a work of art, full and tender. Made for kissing—a real honeypot when she wasn’t riled about something. When she was ticked, which was most of the time, she pulled her lips so tight you couldn’t pry them apart with a crowbar.
Evan grinned. Man, he loved to get her goat. It gave him a real kick, the way her eyes flashed and her expression would get all stiff and disapproving. He was going to miss their little spats when she finished the rogue job and left Hannah for good.
He was going to miss her.
His smile faded. He didn’t want Red to leave. He wanted—
His mind shied away from the half-formed thought. Resolutely, he focused on the real issue. Red had called him a liar and given him the brush-off. No way he was letting her have the last word. She couldn’t have gone far, not with the rogue still out there. He’d find her, read her beads for whale shit, then wish her good hunting and walk away, a man in control.
He rolled his neck and shoulders. Yeah. See how she liked them apples.
Lifting his head, he took a lingering sniff and caught Red’s unmistakable scent on the breeze. She was in the woods. She hadn’t warped off to Middle Earth or disappeared into the never-never in pursuit of the rogue. She was still here.
Something that had been stretched tight to the breaking point inside him relaxed. Not that he cared what she did. Hell, no. He was determined to set her straight, that was all.
He shifted into his go-to animal, a rangy bluetick coonhound, and set off into the forest. The hound’s sense of smell was incredible, and the woods were a sensory buffet. His nose caught the scents of pine needles, dust, damp earth, wild mushrooms, and rotting leaves, logs, and bracken. Pale, stubby flowers with three petals and a lemony scent grew beneath the towering trees. The hound nuzzled them without interest. He was on the hunt for something else, something sweeter and more elusive.
He trotted deeper into the woods, moving his head this way and that. His sensitive nose twitched—there, the faint hint of violets mingled with frost and warm female. He had her now.
He took off with a drawling bay, his paws kicking up leaves as he bounded through the woods and tracked her to a tiny glade carpeted in ferns, wood sorrel, bead lilies, and deer’s tongue. Sunlight speared the woodland floor in splintered beams. At the edge of the little clearing, dogwoods grew in the shadows of oak and elm, like timid children clinging to their mother’s legs, and blue mistflowers displayed downy blooms.
He crept closer and saw Taryn. She knelt in a shaft of light in the center of the glade, her lean form graceful and proud. She was praying, her slender arms raised in silent supplication. Her back was to him, and her legs and feet were blanketed in white clover, her face raised to the forest’s green roof. Her eyes were closed, and she’d unbound her hair. The deep red locks brushed her trim hips. Seeing her hair loose gave Evan a strange, hollow feeling, like a starving man looking at a rich man’s feast he was forbidden to touch.
He hunkered down in a thick bank of ferns to wait, taking care to make no sound. But to his annoyance, she lowered her arms almost at once and turned her head slightly, as though sensing his presence. His rankling suspicion was confirmed when she turned and looked directly at his hiding place.
“You can stop lurking,” she said, rising in a lithe movement. “I know you are there.”
Busted, he thought, but we’ll see who has the last laugh. He would string her along. Play the friendly pooch. Then, when he had her wrapped around his paw, he’d shift. Man, oh, man, he couldn’t wait to see her face when he shed his doggy disguise.
He sprang up and trotted into the clearing, head high and muzzle parted in a toothy grin. He circled her, tail wagging, and waited for a welcoming pat or a scruff of the ears. This shit worked every time—chicks loved dogs.
To his surprise, she folded her arms and gazed down at him without interest. His tail drooped, and he eyed her uneasily. Holy shit, was Red one of those, a person who didn’t like dogs?
And then she spoke, knocking him for a loop. “Evan,” she said in a cold, flat tone. “Why do you follow me when you have made your disdain abundantly clear?”
She knew who he was? Holy freaking shit.
He was so startled that he shifted involuntarily. The damn clown pants reappeared as soon as he returned to human form. At least the dog got to have some dignity.
“You knew?” he said, staring at her in dismay. “What gave me away?”
Was he losing his touch? This was bad. This was real bad.
“No need to look so perturbed. Your transmutation was complete.”
He scowled. “Then how?”
She regarded him for a moment, as though turning something over in her mind, before she spoke. “It is true, is it not, that the kith possess varying talents?”
“Yeah. So?”
“The Kir and the Dal are likewise endowed with different abilities.”
“And you pulled some kind of X-ray vision out of the goody bag that lets you see past a shifter’s form?” The thought made him feel exposed, naked in a way that being without clothes didn’t.
“’Tis a bit more complicated than that.” She regarded him steadily. “I see a person’s true self. I was chosen to apprehend the rogue because of my particular gift. I can look into the heart of the betrayer, see the essence of the warrior, and judge him accordingly.”
“Jury, judge, and executioner, huh? Nice.”
“ ‘Nice’ is not an apt descriptor.” She tilted her head, regarding him. “Would you like to know what I see when I look at you?”
His lip curled. “Don’t bother. I can guess.”
He knew what he was. It was there every time he looked in a mirror. Liar, thief, panderer, murderer. And his personal fave, the guy who’d tried to kill his own sister. He didn’t blame Beck for hating him. He hated himself.
“Your vulgarity and biting wit are bravado you use to keep others at bay,” Taryn said, as though he hadn’t spoken. “But beneath your shield lurk anger and hate. Vulnerability, also.” Her voice softened. “And pain. So much pain.”
Evan tensed. “What a load of craptastic psychobabble, Red. You don’t know shit.”
She regarded him in her grave way. “You are wrong, Evan. I see you. I see the good and the bad. I see your loneliness and need.”
“You got it all wrong. I don’t need anybody. And that goes double for you.”
He turned to stalk off, but her voice stopped him. “The ogre is your rage. If ever you hope to control him, you must first conquer yourself.”
He whirled and strode back to her. He was angry, so angry. Light zigzagged at the edges of his vision, red as blood. “Yeah? Well, maybe I don’t want to control him. Maybe I like the ogre.” He was trembling with fury. “Nobody pushes the ogre around. Nobody beats him, or starves him, or buggers him. Nobody can make him do shitty things. And let me tell you, Miss Pure-and-Perfect, after a lifetime of having that shit sandwich shoved down my throat, that’s a good thing.” He grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. “Now leave. Get out of here. Go find your goddamn rogue, and leave me the hell alone.”
He tried to let her go. He really did. Everything in him screamed to push her away and run like hell. It was a matter of survival. Instead, he jerked her close and kissed her.
And the world dissolved like crumbling sand around him, and he was falling, falling into her volcano and heat. She tasted like rain. She tasted clean. She tasted like every good and perfect thing that had ever existed.
That mouth, that goddamn honeysuckle mouth was beyond anything he’d imagined. She was redemption, and he couldn’t stop kissing her, not if his life had depended on it.
And maybe it did. Kissing Red was stupid. In a lifetime of screwups, hands down, the stupidest thing he’d ever done. He’d survived abandonment, enslavement, rejection, and torture, but he wouldn’t survive this. Red was going to hurt him, bust him wide open and end him, but he didn’t care. Even knowing she’d destroy him, he couldn’t end that kiss. He would have stayed there forever, drinking her in like a man dying of thirst, fool that he was.
She was the one with the strength to end it, not he. She shoved him away and stepped back, her cheeks flushed and her gray eyes, usually knife-sharp and keen with intelligence, dazed. Poor Red. She’d been knocked ass over teakettle. Evan had a sneaking suspicion he looked the same way. He’d kissed Red—Red—and he’d liked it.
Liked it? He’d fucking loved it. He wanted to do it again. And again.
“I must away.” Her fingers went to her lips, as though she could still feel him there. “I have my duty, and you would distract me.”
Evan reached for her. “Wait, Red. I—”
She was gone. Pfft, into the ether, without warning or sound, without leaving so much as a sparkle in her wake.
Gone, without so much as a goddamn good-bye. Gone, and he had no idea where to find her, where to look, or even if he’d see her again.
Gone. She’d ripped the heart out of him and left him bleeding.
Evan threw his head back and howled.
* * *
Cassie blinked at the spot where the ghost had been a moment before. “Slop Bucket, am I?” she said, fuming at the acerbic ghost’s insult. “We’ll see about that.”
She made a beeline for the master bath, vowing to add a ghost repellent spell to the wards around her house. Anxious to remove all traces of Mr. Lizard, she stripped out of her reeking clothes and deposited them in the trash can. The nauseating smell of roasted demon poured out of the receptacle, a stink so strong it was almost a solid. Cassie flung open the bathroom window, tossed the can outside, and headed for the shower.
Demon funk, it turned out, was pernicious. It took her two showers, a bar of orange soap, a box of baking soda, and a soak in the tub to get rid of it. By the time she’d washed and conditioned her hair the third time, she was ravenous and trembling with exhaustion.
She towel-dried her hair, balled it up in a knot with a clip, and smeared lotion on her body. Wrapping a dry towel around her like a sarong, she padded into the bedroom in search of clean clothes and skidded to a halt.
Duncan stood in the doorway, arms crossed, one broad shoulder against the frame. He was fully dressed in a white T-shirt, clean jeans, and boots. The T-shirt was form-fitting and left absolutely nothing to the imagination. Not that flight of fancy was needed. Cassie had seen Duncan in the altogether. The image of his hard, muscled body was permanently burned onto her retinas and imprinted on her mind.
“You changed clothes,” she said, and immediately felt like an idiot.
“’Tis a small matter to replicate clothing, once the proper garb is identified so as not to attract undue attention.”
“Replicate? You used magic?”
He shrugged. “Of course. It was nothing.”
Cassie nodded. It didn’t matter what he wore, he was glorious, and they were going to have sex. The thought sent a thousand butterflies dancing against her rib cage. She’d had other lovers over the years, but none of them compared to Duncan.
He straightened. “I would see what I have bargained for.”
Expectancy tightened her nerves as he crossed the room. Stopping a few feet from her, he looked her up and down, slowly, starting at her feet, an agonizing perusal that left her breathless. His gaze moved up her bare legs to the curves of her bosom concealed beneath the towel and finally came to rest upon her face.
“The towel, thrall,” he said. “Take it off.”
“Now? But I—”
“A thrall does not argue. Take it off.”
Cassie felt a flutter of uncertainty. She didn’t know this pitiless, predatory stranger.
His lips curved in a humorless smile. “Changed your mind?”
She lifted her chin and reached for the towel tucked between her breasts, her heart kicking like a rabbit. “Not at all.”
She unwound the towel and let it drop. He looked his fill, his gaze brushing her body like fingers. His unwavering scrutiny lingered on her breasts until her nipples tightened in response and gooseflesh rose on her skin, then moved with agonizing slowness to the blond hair at the juncture of her thighs. He walked around her, taking his time, assessing her without comment, his body so close to hers that she could feel the heat pouring off him, but he did not touch her.
By the time he’d finished his perusal, Cassie’s pulse was pounding and her skin tingled with longing. Touch me, she wanted to beg. Put your hands on me. Please.
He did not. He made a full circle and came to stand in front of her. “Your breasts are fuller and your rump more luscious,” he said in the dispassionate tone of someone discussing the weather. “Otherwise, your beauty remains unchanged and as remarkable as I remember. You will do.”
“I’m delighted you approve,” she snapped.
He reached up without warning and took the clip out of her hair. Her damp locks tumbled around her shoulders. “I like your hair down,” he said. “In future, you will wear it that way.”
Cassie glared at him, her temper rising. “This is Alabama, and it’s hot. I’ll wear it down in the bedroom. Agreed?”
“A thrall does not wrangle. A thrall seeks to please. And you mistakenly assume our coitus will be confined to the bedroom.” His face was impassive. “Perhaps, if you please me, I will allow you this one concession.”
“You’re too good,” Cassie said in a honeyed voice. “Where do you want me? The bed? The chair? The floor?”
He arched that infernal brow again. “The kitchen—the repast I prepared grows cold.”
Turning on his heel, he strode from the room.