CHAPTER EIGHT
Jonathan woke up with his tongue filling his mouth and his hand on fire.
As he struggled to sit up, Cassie rushed over to his side. She was still here. “Your tongue’s swelling up again.”
He nodded and held up his puffed-up hand. “The other shot?” Nic had packed two doses of each of them.
“I put it in my purse. I’ll get the nurse to give it to you.”
“He won’t. Won’t be sure what’s in it.”
She looked over her shoulder at the closed door and then took out the syringe. “I still don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Just do it.” He preferred not to try himself with his left hand while his skull felt like it was about to break into bits. She’d gotten it done the first time.
She unwrapped his hand, removed the safety cap from the needle, took a deep breath, and gave him the shot. He watched her face as she concentrated on the task. I should’ve kissed her before. As she wrapped up his hand again, the slight physical contact and, particularly, the way a strand of her hair brushed across his arm sent a dark thrill racing through him, and his groin flooded with heat. As if a swollen tongue weren’t enough to deal with. What was wrong with him? He was tempted to suspect she was a bruja of a very different kind. “Thanks,” he said when she finished. “Ice?” He needed a minute away from her.
“I’ll get some. Be right back.”
He stared up at the ceiling, his heart drumming hard. It had been more than two years since he’d been with a woman, and maybe it was getting to him. His last relationship had ended badly. Honestly, though he hadn’t been able to recognize it at the time, he and Sophie had been wrong from the start. On some days, she’d seemed close to him, and on others, she’d been distant and closed off. He’d had no patience for it, and they’d oscillated between sex and fighting.
Cassie returned with a cup of ice. He took it from her and thanked her. A woman who could send angry bears after him might not be an improvement over his last girlfriend. He knew this, yet a stubborn part of him remained unconvinced.
Within a half hour, the burning in his hand and the swelling of his tongue had mostly subsided. He listened to her talk about the first horse she’d ever ridden, not quite tracking, because his brain kept going off in incredibly inappropriate directions, but enjoying the sound of her voice—which, in fact, contributed to those inappropriate directions.
The nurse’s voice interrupted them. “Hello? David’s friend is here to see him.”
“Gracias.” The curtness in Gabi Bravo’s contralto voice suggested, You can go away now, and the nurse did. Gabi entered into the room and shut the door behind her. She wore an olive green utility jacket, unbuttoned to reveal a black tank underneath, khaki pants, and work boots. Her natural hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and a duffel bag hung across her back.
Now that she was here, Jonathan would have help if Cassie triggered another animal attack, not to mention the advantage of her long experience. He didn’t know exactly how old Gabi was—somewhere in her forties or maybe early fifties. She’d been Michael’s mentor, and Jonathan gave her credit for helping him in many ways beyond actually learning to carry out a mission.
Cassie got to her feet.
Easing himself up into a sitting position, Jonathan said, “Salaam, Gabi. You made good time.”
“Salaam.” Her thick brows drew together in a frown. “You look like hell.” She strode over to the hospital bed, pulled aside his hospital gown in back to inspect his wounds, and then clucked her tongue at the sight.
Jonathan said, “Could have been worse.”
“Much worse, you’d be dead.” Her heavy-lidded gaze rose to Cassie, flat and hostile. “This is the bruja?”
Cassie bristled.
“Not a bruja.” Jonathan said. “Gabi, this is Cassie Rios. Cassie, this is Gabi. She works with me.”
“I figured,” Cassie said, stony-faced. “Hi.”
Gabi asked him, “You ready to get out of here?”
“He needs at least a couple more days,” Cassie protested. “And tell them to send more shots!”
Gabi held her in a level look. “Let’s get something clear. You even start to lose your temper, I’m authorized to use any force I see fit.”
Jonathan might’ve behaved in exactly the same way if a sonámbula injured one of his fellow Knights two times in as many days. Gabi was probably even more on edge than usual because of Michael’s recent death. At his memorial service, she’d wept the entire time.
Gabi wouldn’t make a move against someone without a reason. But Cassie didn’t know that, and she stood as stiff as a steel beam.
Jonathan told Gabi quietly, “She’s agreed to come with us.”
Gabi took something out of her duffel bag. Leaning over, she pulled the IV out, and then pressed a square of adhesive gauze against the top of his hand. “He’s better off with us,” she told Cassie. “They’ll have more antivenin by the time we get there.”
Cassie’s shoulders relaxed slightly. “But I didn’t even pack a bag.”
“Nic packed one for you.” She added to Jonathan, “He brought you fresh clothes, too.” She unzipped her duffel bag and set a roll of clothing on the bedside table. Jonathan maneuvered out of bed and took off the hospital gown. “We’ll drive your car back. They’ll come to get mine later.”
As he bent forward to put on the boxers, the pull on the stitches in his back made him wince. The venom from the coral snake still pounded in his head. “I don’t think I can drive.”
“I’ll do it. What’s another nine hours?”
Jonathan felt for her. He’d had long hauls like that before. There was no point suggesting that Cassie, the only one who was healthy and well-rested, could take the wheel.
Cassie was staring at him—specifically, at his body, with frank appreciation. She met his eyes, and her cheeks flamed as she looked away. He couldn’t help but feel pleased. Christ help him, he was fighting a losing battle. Maybe he’d already lost.
He asked Gabi, “Why didn’t Nic come with you? He loves to drive.”
“He had another mission to run. Ramon and Samir are headed to Kansas City. Somehow, a bunch of haunted houses there have started to feature real, live homicidal ghosts.”
Jonathan grunted. “The most wonderful time of the year.” As he eased a white undershirt over his back, Cassie was still eyeing him, a fact he tried his best to ignore. He put on a gray shirt and fastened a couple of buttons with his left hand. “Maybe you should sleep a little first,” he said to Gabi.
She shook her head. “They’re worried about that bite of yours. I’ll manage.”
Jonathan sat down on the edge of the bed and started to put on a sock. A simple enough task, but between the strain on his stitched back, the stiffness in his bitten hand, and the dizziness that overtook him whenever he bent over, it wasn’t easy.
Cassie came over and took the sock from him. “Here, I’ll do it.” Her eyes were filled with concern, and when she crouched down near his feet, her nearness and her position summoned vivid erotic images to his brain. Her hands on his cock, her mouth…
“No, that’s—” He stopped himself, having no real reason to object. The desire and guilt intertwining in him were his own problem. “Okay.” As she put on his socks and then his boots, he stared at the corner of the hospital room. When she was finished, he said, “Thank you,” and his voice came out too formal. Gabi regarded them both with obvious interest.
Cassie stood up. “I have to call my parents first. If I’m going to be out of town, they need to know.”
“You’ll do that from the car,” Gabi said.
They didn’t tell anyone at the hospital that Jonathan was leaving. At Jonathan’s SUV, Gabi told Cassie, “You’re in back. You too,” she added to Jonathan. With his orders to stay next to her, he’d been planning on it. They pulled out of the parking lot and got onto the interstate. A bus engulfed them in a cloud of diesel smell, and Gabi sped up to go around it. Gabi looked back at Cassie. “Call your mother now on speakerphone. Make up an excuse.”
Cassie’s chin jutted out in defiance, even though she’d just said she needed to call. It reminded Jonathan of his brother’s stubbornness. Once he trusted and respected someone, he would follow any order, but it had to be earned.
“You don’t want anyone worrying,” Jonathan told Cassie, meaning both her mom and Manus Sancti.
Cassie pressed her lips together, turned on the speakerphone, and dialed.
Mrs. Rios picked up right away. “Hi, honey. What’s up?”
“Not much,” Cassie said. “No, a lot, actually.”
“What is it? Your dad’s here, too. I’m going to put you on speakerphone.”
Speakerphone on both sides, then. Cassie said, “You know that guy you met the other day? David Ramirez? I’m, uh, taking a trip with him.”
“Oh.” A small silence that followed. A male voice interjected. “Taking a trip where?” Cassie’s father, obviously.
Cassie scrunched up her face. “Uh, to Mexico.”
Her mother asked, “Cassie, are you still saying you two are just friends?”
Gabi glanced over her shoulder at Jonathan, her eyebrows raised.
Cassie sighed. “It’s complicated.”
“What part of Mexico?” her father asked. “And for how long?”
“Cancun.”
Mrs. Rios said, “I told you about him, Eddie. He’s a very nice guy.”
“All right,” he grumbled. “What are you going to be doing on this trip?”
Cassie rolled her eyes, and Jonathan half expected her to say something disastrously honest. Put myself in the hands of a scary secret gang. Keep wild animals from eviscerating my enemies. “Go to the beach, drink some beer.”
An image of Cassie in a bikini, beer in hand, flashed through Jonathan’s brain. If only she could be having a good time, away from a worthless ex, the shadow of unemployment, a deadly curse—and away from him and Manus Sancti, as far as that went.
“I think it sounds fantastic. Fantastic!” Mrs. Rios said. “You deserve to take a break and have fun! As long as you don’t go too crazy with the money.”
“It’s his treat,” Cassie said.
“Isn’t he in grad school?”
“He, uh, he has a trust fund.”
Gabi snorted.
Cassie’s mother chirped, “You didn’t tell me about that! How long do you think you’ll be out of town?”
“Um. I’m not sure yet.”
“Oh. Well, let us know if you get a chance. We hope you have a wonderful time!”
Jonathan regretted making Cassie lie to her mother, although it was for the best. When Cassie got off the phone, he said, “Your mom’s nice.”
“She thinks the same of you.”
He leaned his throbbing skull back on the seat and closed his eyes. They drove for a long time without talking, and he was half asleep when the chorus of a very silly pop song began playing. Gabi’s ringtone.
She answered her phone with a smile. “Hey, baby. I was just about to call you.”
Cassie lifted her eyebrows. No doubt she was surprised to hear Gabi speak in that tone of comfortable warmth after the woman had threatened her.
Gabi continued, “I’m a little tired, but I’ll be all right.” After a pause, she said with a glance at Jonathan, “He’ll live. Rough couple of days. I’ll tell you later. How was the Palimpsest meeting?” She listened for a while and then responded, “I’m sorry. But six months, that’s not that long.”
Jonathan leaned his head back on the seat again.
Gabi laughed at something. “I know, Athens. He talked to me about it before we left.” Another pause. “Well, I’m not as against it as you are. I’m a little against it— All right. Yeah, love you, too.”
She hung up, and Jonathan asked lazily, “Who was that?”
“Ha ha.”
Jonathan often watched football matches with Gabi’s husband, Andre, a Diviner. Sometimes, they even watched American football, because Andre had played it as a teenager in Alabama and he was a big fan. Jonathan had taken a mild interest in it while he’d been at West Point.
“Hey, I have a question,” Cassie said. “How do you know if there’s a witch or a demon out there? Do you watch the news a lot, look for weird things?”
Jonathan glanced at Gabi, who said, “I don’t care. Capitán says they’ll probably wipe her memory anyway.”
Cassie’s eyes widened in sudden alarm. “Don’t tell me then! I don’t want my mind messed with!”
“They’re not going to. Not if I can help it.” He ignored Gabi’s look. “There are people who do nothing but monitor what’s happening in the world and find cases of supernatural evil. Sometimes, it’s through the news, yeah, but they watch everything. Strange weather patterns, government investigations, groups on social networks, the deep Web—”
“That can’t be legal.”
“It’s for the best. Some cases are pretty obvious, like yours or the Dakos demon. Others are more subtle. The Diviners notice changes in patterns and find connections others would miss.”
“The Diviners?” she repeated.
“They used to have prophetic abilities, hundreds of years ago.” He put the sunglasses on.
“They’re hundreds of years old?”
She was probably thinking about vampires again. “No. There used to be people who could divine the future. But the gift died out.”
“Why did it go away? Do you know?”
He shrugged. “It was always rare. Recessive gene, probably. And a lot of people who had it… They went crazy and died young.”
“Or they were burned at the stake as Devil worshippers,” Gabi added, her voice tart, as she turned onto an exit ramp to head east.
“So the Diviners do all kinds of internet research, they tell you when things are going wrong, and you to go take care of it,” Cassie said.
Jonathan shook his head. “They tell our boss, who sends us on missions.”
“If those people are called Diviners, what are you called? Like agents or soldiers?”
“Knights.”
“Both men and women? That’s pretty badass. And you’re all over the world? Gabi, where are you from?”
Gabi raised her thick eyebrows at Cassie’s attempt to get to know her. “Brazil. I grew up in Sao Paolo.”
“Oh. I guess that’s a Portuguese accent.”
“Guess so.”
Late in the day, Cassie woke up as the car turned onto another highway. Still wearing his sunglasses, Jonathan relaxed back into the seat at an angle, probably to avoid too much pressure on his stitches. His long legs sprawled wide. The fact that she’d seen him naked made it even harder for her to ignore the proximity of his body to hers. Maybe he wasn’t even aware of how ridiculously good he looked. She got the sense that he treated his body as a vehicle or a weapon—to take care of, certainly, but only so he could rely on it.
What was he like in bed? Gentlemanly? Domineering? She’d seen him both ways.
Sex with Rick had lacked a certain kind of passion. Not that it had been exactly bad. She hadn’t been stupid enough to marry someone with whom the sex was terrible. But once a person got divorced, she admitted all kinds of things that she’d pretended were okay before, and Rick had always been very…calm.
She knew now that Jonathan had strong emotions. And obviously, he could be forceful. At least once again in her life, she wanted someone to just shove her up against a wall and kiss her until she couldn’t breathe. To tell her what to do, which she loved during sex as much as she hated it at almost every other time.
“Thirsty?” Jonathan held a bottle of water out to her, and she shook her head. She needed to pee, and if they didn’t stop soon, she was going to have to ask them to. “Open it for me,” he said. She obeyed and handed it back to her. He took a long drink, the muscles of his throat contracting.
Gabi glanced back at him. “Guess you’d better drive for a while. I’m about to nod off.”
“Sorry, better not. My hand’s swelling up again, and my head’s about to explode.”
Cassie peered around him to see his bandaged hand. It was puffy, though not as bad as before.
Gabi sucked in a breath. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“Nothing we can do about it.”
She smacked her palm on the steering wheel. “Why didn’t Nic pack more antivenin?”
“It’s hard to get. I’m lucky he tracked down two.” They passed a sign announcing gas stations and a fast food restaurant at the next exit, and he said, “Hey, I need to stop.”
Gabi hesitated. “All right. I need more coffee.”
They pulled into a convenience store, and Cassie went to the women’s room and peed furiously. When she emerged, Gabi was waiting for her right outside the door. “Hurry up, we need to go.”
Jonathan already stood at the entrance. She couldn’t blame them for rushing because of his hand. Once they were pulling onto the highway, he asked her, “You’re sure it was them?”
“I’m sure.” She nodded at the rearview mirror. “Look.”
A black Jeep drove far behind them. Cassie felt shaky. “Are they following us?”
Jonathan squinted back at them. “Yes.” He drew his gun.
Shit. “Who is it?”
He paused before answering. “Coyote Shifters.”
Coyote Shifters. She repeated these two words in her head a few times. He’d said they existed, and that they weren’t all nice. Obviously, these were the not-nice kind. She glanced back at the truck. She couldn’t see them well, but they were in human form, of course. Coyotes didn’t drive. “Why are they following us?”
Jonathan ignored the question. “What are you thinking, Gabi?”
Gabi glanced back at Cassie. “Can her animals help?”
Cassie blinked. She didn’t expect to be considered as an ally.
Jonathan shook his head. “She doesn’t have any control of it.” It gave her a pang of regret, even though it was true.
Gabi said, “Then I’m thinking we’re getting off the road.” She turned and stepped on the gas.