"What am I?" Panic blurred her vision as she looked at Gabriel. "Tell me, what the hell happened to me when I died?"
Gabriel held her by the shoulders, his big hands warm and comforting. "I don’t know. Breathe now, Rose. Be calm." His own breaths were slow and even.
"I'm calling in reinforcements," declared Justin.
"And who would that be, exactly?"
"A sorcerer I know slightly named Kendall Sorbis. Hopefully he'll take my call. Don't start with me," Justin ordered, frowning as Gabriel opened his mouth to object. "We need help. This just got too big for us to handle on our own."
Rose shuddered at the memory of fire shooting out of her fingers.
God oh God oh God, what has
happened
to me?
Gabriel rubbed her arms gently, bringing her a measure of comfort.
We'll figure it out, Rose. I swear it.
Rose wiped her mouth. "Good pizza. Thanks."
"You're welcome." Gabriel had watched Rose devour almost a whole medium pepperoni mushroom pizza. He hadn't wanted any himself, but watching her eat had been a revelation.
Each bite looked like ambrosia from her reactions. Those sexy, low moans of appreciation she gave, her tongue sweeping her lush lower lip swiping up any remaining sauce, almost undid him. Gabriel hadn't had this much temptation in front of him since high school. Not to mention the pull she had on his demon blood.
"Tell me, what was that? With the fire, I mean. I didn't mean to hurt you, you know that, right?"
"It might be something you brought back with you from the waiting room." Like a fire demon, which could mean he was doomed to repeat his past. Morose, he watched her lick her fingers.
Had food ever tasted as good as she made it look? He'd been eating just to survive for too many years to count.
"Brought back with me? I don't understand."
Gabriel shifted in his conference chair and desperately wished for Justin. He didn't do conversation well. Right now his mind didn’t want to talk, and his body had its own agenda. "You said you watched a medical team work on your body. That you were above yourself, which I saw as well."
"Yeah. Pretty much." Rose shrugged. "Why?"
“The waiting room is a kind of holding tank, a place for souls between places. Call it Purgatory, for want of a better word. Your body was on earth, hovering between life and death. Your consciousness, your soul, was elsewhere, in-between."
"In-between what?"
Gabriel shook his head. "I'm not sure. Between this life and whatever is next, I suppose." Hell, if she would just stop asking questions that he had no answers for. Talking to her brought his past too close.
Brought
her
too close.
He didn't dare do what his body ached for, even if she’d allow it. He didn't trust himself enough. Gabriel jumped up and stalked to the window. Where in hell was Justin?
"So...I brought something back with me? Like a virus or something?"
"That's the current theory."
The door opened and Gabriel turned in relief. "Any luck finding your sorcerer?"
Justin shook his head. "Not so far, but I've left a few messages. Any luck on your end with finding Satine?"
"Not yet. If you can take care of Rose, then I'll get back to it." His morning search of the mountain ranges near the coast had left him veering out of control. He kept refocusing on Rose, on the need for her building inside him, instead of on Satine. It had been a frustrating and wearying exercise. "I need to be alone this time."
"Sure, I can do that. I’ve got some filing that needs to be done."
"Uh, no. I'm not going anywhere without Gabriel. I’m feeling a whole lot better now, and I’m sticking." She glared at them both.
"You can't. Not this time." Cut and dried. No slack. He had to break this fascination with her, starting right now. "Absolutely not. I need to concentrate, and I can’t do that with you here."
"Don’t care. Not budging," she said, and settled further down into the chair. "Not one bit. I'm not moving, I promise you that."
Gabriel looked at her, firmly planted in the chair on the far side of the conference table. He’d take the loophole she gave him. “Oh. Good. Enjoy." He left the conference room and walked down the back hallway. Another office sat at the very end. He slipped in and closed the door, allowing himself a deep breath of relief.
Alone.
Finally.
He hadn’t been around people this much in months and he’d started to feel suffocated around Justin and Rose. Here he could breathe, at least. It wasn’t his hideout in the mountains, but at least he was alone.
He walked to the far windows and stared out at the slim band of the sea. Rose. What was he supposed to do about her? She'd wormed herself into his life and she scared him to death. He'd known her for what, a handful of hours? Whatever she was drew him. He’d locked onto her when he first saw her, just like that lesser demon had. The demon wanted to devour her. So did he, but in a completely different way.
Rose was too
much
for him. She didn't know what she was, and that put everyone else in the dark. Maybe put them in danger. His fingers brushed the burns on his forearm and he sighed. A fire demon, at least partially was his guess.
The drug thing – well, she
looked
clean, if a bit too pared down. And, he had to admit, she
felt
clean, too. The pure energy she'd given him every time they touched attested to it. Yet he'd seen into her memories, seen her as an addict, a girl with a big, gaping hole inside her.
Poor kid. At least she wasn’t a killer. She hadn’t crossed that line, no matter what else she may have done. But if she’s a Soul Chalice, he didn’t have a clue how to handle a myth come to life.
Settling on the wide window ledge, he let the sun warm him as he closed his eyes. He'd look for Satine in closer areas than the mountains, start at the sea, and work east. The vampire had to be in L.A. somewhere. He’d tracked her to this area, and all he had to do was find her.
Rose’s image filled his thoughts, interfering with his search. He cursed and cleared his mind once more. Focusing on Satine’s signature vamp aura, he searched carefully, touching minds along the beach cities ten miles north and ten miles south. Slowly he worked outward, lost to the sun as he filled his mind with thousands of other people's thoughts.
Finally he found Satine. He lurked, hoping to escape her notice as she stirred in the dark, naked on her silken bed. He watched as she ran her hands through her dark red hair and over her full, naked breasts. Her eyes remained closed, but her smile turned feral.
Gabriel. You have come to me. Where are you, my love? Oh, did you think I wouldn't know you were there? Silly man.
Her voice in his head brought knives of pain.
You have something that belongs to me, Satine. I want it back.
Lover. It pains me to refuse you
.
Her mental voice was slurry, as though she'd had too much blood.
Come to me tonight, though, and we shall discuss it.
Gabriel didn’t hesitate.
Where?
Twisted. My new nightclub in Santa Monica. You'll find it, I'm sure. Three in the morning, and don't be late.
She sent him images of the two of them, naked and coupled together, using each other like animals.
He shuddered and began the tedious task of walling her out of his mind again.
* * *
Rose watched as Gabriel sat, unmoving, on the window ledge with his eyes closed. After an hour of Justin’s questions and delays, she'd finally just left the room to find Gabriel. She poked along all the offices in the suite. There were five, not counting the front reception desk and the conference room. She'd found Gabriel in the very last one.
Moving quietly, she curled up on the ledge next to him, her attention veering between the man and the glorious horizon.
Never in her life had she wanted a man the way she wanted him. That alone made her suspicious. Trust didn't come easily to her.
Gabriel and Justin were good people. Tribreds. Whatever. She could
feel
it inside them, just knew that their souls were good. She knew she couldn’t be anything but safe in their company. Rose frowned. Safe.
God
. This was the first time in she didn't know how long that she felt
safe
.
She studied him, her fingers fisted tight. The need to touch him had been building since early that morning. She reached out and laid her hand on Gabriel's forearm. He held an energy that sparked inside her.
She let out her breath in relief. Just touching him, skin to skin, made all the difference in the world. Here was stability and goodness. Here was eroticism. Here was l...
That part of her that had been so empty for so long opened to him in a rush of sweet pain that skimmed her entire body. A shimmering light came from him and spilled into her, went up her arm and into her chest. It dissolved there, a golden warmth that made her giddy.
At last, at last!
Her body exulted in the feel of him inside her even as she felt the taint of evil edging his soul.
“What did you just do?” Surprise filled Gabriel's voice, breaking the silence around them. He pulled away from her and backed up, staring. “I’m… Something’s different. Something’s different with you, too. You’re glowing.”
Rose blinked as the exalted feelings faded with his disapproval. “I touched you. I needed that physical connection to you. I don't know why. I just knew that I had to touch you." She reached for him again but he shifted away.
Rose brushed away the hurt.
"What the hell did you do to me?" Gabriel wiped the sweat off his face and frowned back. "I’m off balance and you’re glowing. This feels bad. Really bad."
“Like I said, I touched you. Then I felt this rush, and you were staring at me like I had three heads.” Those golden feelings swept through Rose again, clearing away all her small aches and pains, disintegrating her exhaustion. “I feel great.”
Understanding dawned on Gabriel’s face. “Of course you do, damn it. You took the only thing of value I had left.”
“What? I don’t understand what you mean.”
“You took what was left of my soul.” Bitterness dripped off his words. “I should have known. You are just as bad as Satine.” Gabriel pulled her off the window ledge. “Come on. You’re going to fix this.”
“Hey, wait a minute,” she protested, and twisted around to look at Gabriel. He kept his hands on her shoulders, moving her inexorably forward.
"Don’t talk to me. Right now I need Justin’s help."
Sounds of shouting came from down the hall. They both stopped dead and looked at each other. "I don't know," he said. "Come on." He shackled one of her wrists in his hand and towed her along behind him, her glow not a bit diminished. "I'm not sure what's going on here, but trust me, you’re not going anywhere."
Rose sighed, exasperated.
Gabriel shoved the door open to his brother’s office.
Justin and a tall, voluptuous woman, her body poured into jeans and some sort of flowy, gypsy-like top, were standing toe-to-toe and snarling at each other. A big purple leather bag sat on the desk. Rose envied her both the bag and the curvy body.
"Just tell me where Kendall Sorbis is. I need the real deal, not a floozy who'll wave sage in the air and do a few chants," Justin sneered at the woman in front of him.
She crossed her arms tightly over her ample chest. "Kendall's on his anniversary trip," she retorted, her voice a whiskey rasp. "I really don't think whatever emergency you've cooked up to embarrass him this time is going to pull him away from his wife and their celebration. Wasn't the last time you manipulated information bad enough? It took almost three years for him to repair his reputation."