“Let’s go inside.” He shifted to walk beside her, his arm around her shoulders. “Nick and Quinn already got a table. She really needed to eat.”
Riley had so much crowding her head, wanting out. Confusion about the buzzing and prickling, curiosity and concern about the transfer they were supposed to be doing this weekend, and speculation about everything she’d heard in Atlanta. But it all had to wait, some of it until much later.
They went inside the rustic, crowded restaurant decorated in antler chandeliers and red-and-white-checked vinyl. Sam waved off the hostess and took Riley to a corner booth, away from the bulk of the families filling the place.
“Have a seat.” Sam let her slide onto the bench and followed her. “Riley Kordek, this is Quinn Caldwell and Nick Jarrett.”
“Hi.” Riley smiled shyly. The beautiful fortyish woman seemed to be upright only by virtue of the hot blond guy propping her. “I really appreciate that you came all this way to get me.”
“Pleasure’s all mine.” Quinn eyed Sam as she said it, a twinkle in her eye that belied her obvious weariness, and Riley was surprised and amused to see him blush.
“Glad to meet you.” Nick saluted her with his beer bottle before taking a swig. He looked like he wanted to launch into an interrogation, but the server approached to take their orders. Riley let Sam talk her into a steak, knowing she needed a real meal to help her recover from everything that had happened. She hoped it’d calm her stomach, which now roiled unpleasantly, still protesting the fight-or-flight response she’d put it through.
“All right.” Nick leaned forward. “Tell us what you got in Atlanta. What’s Millinger, and what’s he doing with it?”
“Nothing good,” Riley said. “And nothing by himself.” She told them about the men in the office, and how the conversation sounded like they were trying to recruit goddesses, or maybe coerce them. “I don’t know what for, though. Anson works for the men, but his plans for me seemed completely separate.” She explained what he’d said about his grandmother’s journal. “He wanted to rescue me. Make me grateful and stuff. But you did that.” She smiled at Sam, who frowned.
“That all fits. But why didn’t he move in sooner?”
“He said something about not having a choice, because of the Numina? I overheard John and Jeannine mention them, too. She wanted to keep it quiet until they knew more, but he didn’t want to.”
Sam’s frown turned into a scowl. “This must be what John wanted to talk to me about, but he didn’t get a chance because I took off to Mississippi.”
Nick frowned thoughtfully. “Numina,” he repeated.
“That’s Latin,” Sam said.
“I know.” Nick nodded. “Something you can tell with your mind, but not see or hear or whatever.”
The guys eyed each other, communicating in the silent manner of people who’d known each other well for a long time.
Riley glanced out at the full parking lot, the late sunlight reflecting off the cars that provided cover for anyone who wanted to be unseen. Unease crawled over her again. Nick had just described the prickling when she sensed the suits in Anson’s office, and the buzzing that connected her to Sam, even now.
Sam continued, “Ancient Romans also used it to worship emperors without offending the real gods by calling them gods.”
“Human gods,” Nick said.
No one had to say “holy crap.” It hung in the air between them for several seconds.
“This is bigger than leeching,” Sam said.
Nick leaned back, his eyes worried. “It always was, apparently.” He looked at Quinn, who hadn’t said anything. “You ever heard of this?”
She shook her head. “Never. All our lore, our education, says the gods went extinct millennia ago, and no one knows why. I found some odd references in my research to men who seemed to have abilities, but I dismissed it as unrelated. There are people who can do extraordinary things without being descended from ancient deities. But now…”
“I can’t believe, all that time, Anson wasn’t working alone.” Sam’s hand closed into a fist on the tabletop. “Those people orchestrated the leeching?” He turned to Riley for confirmation.
“That’s what it sounded like. Part of a bigger plan that went to hell when he was caught and imprisoned.”
“You didn’t recognize the men?” Quinn asked Riley. “Or their names?”
She pressed her lips together. “Not really. I can’t tell you what Anson called them, but they sounded familiar. Like, well-known people. Businessmen, or politicians or something. But I don’t pay a lot of attention to that stuff. I just don’t know.”
“They don’t have to be gods,” Sam said. “They can aspire to it. I mean, when have we ever had any hint that men with inherited power existed?”
“Never,” Nick said. “Doesn’t mean they don’t. Secret societies are all the rage, you know. Look at The Da Vinci Code.”
Sam ignored him. “I think it would be very difficult to hide for so many centuries, especially in modern society.” He stopped talking while the wait staff delivered their food. Steaks still sizzled on cast-iron plates set into wood holders, and blobs of butter melted into baked and mashed potatoes. Riley’s stomach growled, and they put the conversation on hold while they dug in, the others seeming as hungry as she was.
The residual effects of adrenaline finally dissipated, and the food soothed as well as satisfied. Since no one said much while they ate, Riley sat and absorbed Sam’s nearness. His knee and part of his thigh pressed against hers, and he kept glancing her way, his body angled protectively toward her. She had to fight the urge to lean into him the way Quinn leaned into Nick, their contact both casual and possessive. Sam wasn’t yet Riley’s to touch—though her longing for him had only grown since she saw him standing outside waiting for her. She wanted his silky hair in her hands, to taste his mouth again. She wanted the right to want those things.
She also wanted to talk to him alone about her new awareness. That was the one thing she could do. But she already had an idea of what it meant, and she couldn’t withhold it from the others, not when there was obviously something so much bigger than her to worry about.
“Whether or not gods exist doesn’t matter,” Quinn said when she was halfway done with her meal. “Not by itself. What matters is why they’re suddenly trying to recruit goddesses.”
“Or not so suddenly,” Nick contradicted. “Anson initiated his plan way back in college, remember? We thought he learned everything he knew from Sam, but according to what he told Riley, we were wrong.”
Sam paled. “You think these Numina guys set him up over a decade ago? The long-term planning for something like that…the foresight and patience…”
It was mind-boggling to Riley, but it sure seemed as if that was what had happened. Which meant their plan was likely even bigger.
“You think Numina is like the Society?” Sam asked Quinn. “Some governing body for these guys who think they’re gods?”
Quinn shrugged.
“I think they actually exist,” Riley said. “Not just want to be.” They all looked at her.
“Why?” Nick demanded, seeming to get she wasn’t simply offering an opinion.
She took a deep breath. “Something happened while I was in there, listening. I don’t know what triggered it. I never noticed it before. Not when I first met—” She cast a quick glance at Sam and regretted it when Nick immediately looked at him, eyes blazing. “I mean, there was something different about the men in that room. The guys in suits created a prickle, like when your fingers go numb, but in my brain. I could sense where they were without looking, almost exactly. And there was a smaller, buzzy sensation I got from Anson. It was different.”