“Good.” But she noted he didn’t exactly look either relieved or happy. What now? she wondered. They’d gotten absolutely nowhere with the looming threat or solving the murders, so it wasn’t as though they could go their own ways. Not yet.
Well, she’d wanted this issue settled. She was sick of feeling as if she were a constant thorn in his side, and sick of wondering what it would be like to give him what he wanted. She already knew he was practically unparalleled in his sexual skills. Now she knew that being drunk from by a vampire was at least as good as any sex she’d ever had.
Where did that get them? Nowhere, except maybe he could relax a little around her, which would make it easier for her to relax.
What a mess. “Look,” she said a little sharply, “we need to get back to work on identifying this elemental and who summoned it. Before I get killed. Unless you want to spend the rest of my life guarding me. For my part, I’d like to be able to get back to my regular life as soon as possible. I’m a cop, for God’s sake, not some woo-woo mage. I want to get back to the real world.”
At that, his stony facade cracked a bit. The corners of his mouth tipped up, and he relaxed visibly. “So you want to get back to the real world?”
She didn’t like his sarcasm, but she couldn’t blame him for it. The real world? She wasn’t sure anymore that she even knew what it was.
He bent and picked up the talisman Alika had given her and held it out. “Figure out what this is, cop. Focus everything you’ve got on it. Once we know what it is, we’ll know something about both you and Alika.”
“How so?”
“We’ll know some of her intentions. We’ll also know what she thinks she was protecting you against. Or what she was trying to draw toward you.”
She accepted the pouch gingerly. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to sit here and remember. My skills may be rusty, but they’re not completely forgotten.”
She sat cross-legged on the couch, closing her eyes as she held the pouch. It occurred to Damien that they had shared an awful lot of intimacy for two people who had never gotten as far as removing their clothes. Not that his imagination failed him. It was easy in these modern days to imagine what lay beneath a woman’s clothing, and he had little trouble imagining Caro naked. He had no doubt he would find well-toned perfection. For just a short while, he let his imagination travel that path.
He waited a few minutes, then settled himself on the arm of a chair. He had to admit, drinking of her had settled his impulses down, although it hadn’t killed them. The taste of her lingered in his mouth, and he wanted more of it, but for now those clamoring desires were quiet enough to let his mind wander elsewhere.
And wander it did, over roads trodden centuries ago, over rites and rituals he hadn’t needed in a long time.
He was sitting in one of the temple gardens in the shade of a tree, reclining on pillows, thankful he could no longer feel the heat of a Persian summer night. A woman walked toward him, clad in the loose white gown of an offering.
Once such women had brought him plates of figs and olives, or succulent bits of fish or lamb. Now they brought themselves, prepared to serve him in any way he chose. Once they had seen him as a powerful priest. Now they saw him as a god on earth, filled with powers and strength they could not comprehend. They feared him, but once they had served him, they yearned for him always.
Such was his power.
But he had other powers as well, powers that went beyond being undead. He could feel that power tingle in his fingertips, and when he allowed it to build, the tingling filled him until he could cast bolts of lightning, or make things levitate, or even kill without touching.
That was one of the reasons the priesthood had changed him—to take those powers and put them in an undying body. He sometimes wondered if the spells he chanted actually worked, or if it was merely a way of focusing some ability he had that most of the other priests did not.
But he rarely entertained such thoughts because there were so many delights to enjoy, and so many things the temple demanded of him.
Sometimes he felt caged in his priesthood, in the way he existed to serve his masters when he knew full well he could destroy them all and rule the temple alone.
But he never gave voice to those thoughts. They were evil thoughts, and he more than anyone realized how important it was that he never be without constraints.
The things he might do....
Like a kaleidoscope, memory took him down the paths of centuries, through changing times where adaptation had required other things of him, when his powers had been useless or even dangerous to himself.
All the way to the present day.
Damien’s eyes snapped open. He saw Caro across from him, either asleep or still concentrating on the gris-gris pouch. No, he didn’t smell the hormones of sleep around her, so she must be doing as he asked.
Then he looked down at his own hands and examined them, noting that they tingled faintly as they had not in so long a time. Had the spells and rites really been necessary? Or was his power inherent?
Given the times and how long it had been, he didn’t know. He wasn’t sure he should trust something he hadn’t used in so long. Would he have the focus to control it? Could he summon it without remembering the right incantation? Damned if he knew, but he didn’t want to discover his limits at exactly the wrong time.
But the tingling felt good, like the embrace of an old friend he hadn’t seen in forever. Cautiously, he focused on it and tried to strengthen it.
It grew. Just a bit, but enough to bring back all his old questions.
He glanced again at Caro, inevitably remembering the gift she had just given him. Once such gifts had been meaningless to him because they came by order of the temple authorities. When times had changed, he had changed with them, learning new ways to entice willing donors. But since coming to this town and staying with Jude, he had for the very first time developed a true appreciation for the kind of gift a woman bestowed upon him by sharing her blood.
Especially this woman. With his needs temporarily quieted, but not at all somnolent, he studied her, thinking about what his attraction to her meant. That she was attracted to him wasn’t the question. Nor, except for that first night, had he tried in any way to seduce her, and her reaction then had set him back on his heels.
But it had started something between them, something that disturbed him deeply. He should be able to walk away from any woman, and he couldn’t blame his inability to walk away from Caro entirely on their current problems.
No, she called to him in a way no one ever had. Through all his centuries, no one woman had ever meant more to him than a delightful feast for the senses, pleasant to dally with but not missed once they left at the end of the night. Delightful creatures, but he had never felt any desire to stay with even one of them. They satisfied his needs, sometimes repeatedly, and then he let them go. A few had tried to linger, but he had never permitted it.
So what was it about Caro?
Even as he asked the question he knew there was no answer. As he had said to her, there were cosmic mysteries beyond understanding. The only thing he could be certain of was that he needed to be careful. He sensed danger, the danger of involvement.