This situation just kept getting weirder and weirder. Strangely, Cara wasn’t freaked out by things that would have had her hyperventilating a couple of days ago. Just yesterday, actually.
A moment later, she and Ares were alone, and she peered around the sparsely decorated bedroom. “How did I get here? I don’t remember falling asleep.”
“I gave you a mild sedative.”
Mild? It felt more like he’d clobbered her with a bottle of whiskey. She rubbed her eyes, but it did little to clear away the sleep-haze. She realized she was still holding his hand, but she didn’t let go. In fact, she squeezed harder, needing an anchor. He stood there, looking vaguely confused, as if he wasn’t sure what to do.
“Thank you.”
“For what?” He tried to pull away, but she wouldn’t let him. He might still be a virtual stranger to her, but he was the most familiar thing around.
“For being here.” Idly, she smoothed her thumb over his. His hands were so rough, and yet, for all the times he’d manhandled her, he’d never hurt her. “Your brother and sister scare me.”
“They should.”
She sighed. “You really aren’t very good at giving comfort, are you?”
“I’m a warrior, not a nursemaid.” His tone was completely void of sympathy.
“No kidding,” she mumbled. “So why do they hate me? Your brother and sister.”
“They don’t hate you.”
“Right,” she said dryly, as she studied a scar in the web between his thumb and forefinger. How odd. If he was immortal, why would he have scars? “I must have slept through the warm hugs.”
Ares peeled her hand away and stepped back, flexing his fingers as though trying to rid them of her touch. “They don’t trust you. You’re human. Easily corrupted and brainwashed. Weak of mind and body.”
Weak. The word was a spear through the heart, completely obliterating the mild annoyance at the reminder that she’d been drugged without her knowledge. She’d been weak once, but she’d spent two years building herself back up. Therapy. Weightlifting. Self-defense classes. Not that any of her training had come in handy when she’d been attacked by the demon-slayer people. Fear had taken over, and in the midst of the terror, she’d forgotten most of what she’d learned about self-defense.
Well, she remembered now.
The mark between her breasts throbbed as she swung her feet over the side of the bed and stood, not caring that her pajama top had fallen open. “I might not be some sort of biblical legend warrior guy, but I’m not completely helpless.”
“Against the beings in my world, you are.” His gaze raked her, pausing a little too long on her chest, and a sound broke from his lips, a whispered curse, she thought. “So you’ll listen to me and do what I say.”
“So that’s it? You drag me to your island, drug me, shove me in a room, and hold me prisoner?”
“That about sums it up.” He pivoted on his heel and started toward the door. “Go back to sleep so you can contact your hell mutt. We need to find out where The Aegis took him.”
Oh, no. She would not be held against her will again. Fury and frustration at her helplessness, her situation, and Ares made something inside her snap, and she launched herself. He spun and caught her easily as she struck out, and in a heartbeat, she found herself backed into the wall, his body pinning her, one hand gripping her shoulder, the other cupping her chin so she couldn’t so much as turn her head.
“I am the only thing standing between you and death,” he said through clenched teeth, “so I’d be a little more grateful if I were you.”
“Are you completely delusional?” She wriggled, but she might as well have been trying to move a boulder. “You want me to be grateful? Okay, how’s this? I’d be grateful if you’d find someone else to transfer this… this… agiwhatever to. I’d have been grateful if you had protected the fallen angel who had it so he didn’t need to give it to me. And I’d be really grateful if you released me.” She struggled more, and this time, his big arms bucked under her struggles, and after a brief flash of surprise in his expression, his grip grew firmer.
“Listen to me carefully, Cara.” His voice had gone quiet. Chillingly quiet. “Don’t ever use violence against me. Violence… excites me. You do not want to be part of that.”
His dark gaze narrowed, his jaw tightened, and for a moment, she thought she’d gone too far. After all, she didn’t know anything about the Horsemen beyond what she’d seen in the movies, read in books, or heard in Bible school so many years ago, and none of it was very flattering. Her heart pounded as her anxiety level rose, and then a subtle shift in his expression made her heart pound for a different reason.
He’d softened. Even his grip had loosened, and yet, he somehow had gotten closer. The brand between her breasts drummed, and as she studied the pulsing vein in his temple, it occurred to her that the rhythm was the same as her own.
She became achingly aware of a dozen different sensations, including erotic energy radiating off him, and though the room was already warm, his weight, his heat… sent a fluid surge of lust to her very center.
And his mouth… she remembered putting her lips on him. Yes… when they’d been in the room with the ram-demon thing. They’d been talking, she’d had some water, and then… then she’d felt funny. A sudden clarity made her pulse roar in her ears.
“You said you put a sedative in the water!”
“I did.”
“Then why did it make me…” Heat blasted her cheeks.
“Horny?” he finished. “Orc-weed is an aphrodisiac for some species. For others, like humans, it’s a sedative. For you, apparently, it’s both.”
“Oh, isn’t that wonderful,” she snapped. “And you keep this date-rape drug handy… why?” Probably not the smartest thing to say to a man who was three times her size, and whose name was War, but she was tired of being a victim. Of being helpless. Helpless…“Oh, my God, you didn’t—”
“No, I didn’t,” he said, and was it wrong to notice again how good he smelled? Like leather and horse, warm sand and rich spice. “I wouldn’t have had to. You molested me on your own.”
“Because you drugged me!”
He shrugged, a slow roll of one massive shoulder. “Would have happened eventually. Females always yield to me.”
Yield? What. A. Jerk. “Female what? Demons?”
His thumb stroked her cheek, and she hated herself for liking it. “I prefer human females, but—” He gnashed his teeth so hard she heard the crack.
“But, what?” she pressed. “They’re too smart to put up with your crap?”
“I make them combative.”
“Well, gee, with your personality, I can’t imagine why that would be.”
Something sad flickered in his expression, but then it was gone, replaced by that ruthless cruelty again. “It’s my curse. When I’m around humans, they want to fight.”
She squirmed in his grip. “You think?”
His smile was both sensual and wicked. “This is normal fighting. You seem to be immune to my effect.”
“Really? Because you seriously piss me off.” He did other things to her, too, things he shouldn’t, but it seemed that when it came to him, her body and brain were divorced.
“Yeah. Really.” Amusement glittered in his eyes. “If you weren’t immune, you’d be insanely pissed for no reason, and you wouldn’t have any moments of rational thought.”
She wasn’t feeling very rational right now, that was for sure. “Am I the only human who isn’t affected? Is it because of the agimoney thing?” The mark grew hotter, and an intense energy spread over her skin and seeped into her veins, where it seemed to circulate through her entire body.
“Agimortus. And yes. Though Guardians are immune as well. They wear enchanted jewelry to ease the effect. I’m the reason they started enchanting their bling in the first place.”