Samantha clenched her hands, worry welling inside her. “You have to be wrong. I never took from her.”
“But I’m not wrong, am I?”
“You must be.” A thought gave her hope. “I haven’t lived at home for five years now—where would I have gotten life essence since then if I need it so much?”
Tain shrugged, a slow rippling of muscle, but he spoke gently. “You see your mother often. And for the last year, you’ve had a very strong life-magic werewolf for a partner.”
“Logan?” Samantha rolled off the bed and onto her feet. “No, I never have. He would have noticed. He’d have stopped me. Wouldn’t he?”
Tain remained on the bed, watching her with eyes that had gone dark blue. “Maybe not if you didn’t take much. Logan’s a very powerful werewolf, maybe even a pack leader or close to being one. He has strength to spare.”
“You’re wrong,” Samantha said, her breath hurting her. “About me. And about Logan. Logan’s strong, sure, but he would never let me feed off him.”
Tain’s voice was quiet but reasonable. “He might if he knew you needed it. He must have understood the risks of working with a demon before he took the job.”
“Half demon.”
“You aren’t used to taking much,” Tain said. “My life essence overwhelmed you because you got too strong a dose of it. I should have muted it for you.”
Samantha balled her fists. “I don’t want to take any dose of it.”
Tain came off the bed beside her, dominating her small bedroom. The sleek little gewgaws she collected from various craft fairs around Los Angeles and the curtains she’d made from scrap upholstery dulled next to the exotic demigod and his beautiful, naked body.
“It is what you are, Samantha,” Tain said in his deep timbre. “It’s the hardest thing in the world, to be what you truly are.”
“Are you trying to bully me because I’m demon? I’m not the one who kept you prisoner all those years—it wasn’t me.”
“I know.” Tain caught her elbows and pulled her against his body. He smelled of warmth, sleep, and their lovemaking, and his fingers tingled with healing magic. “I know, my Samantha.”
Samantha barely heard him through her clenching confusion. She wasn’t like Merrick and his demons or the girls who sold themselves on the street to take life essence. She wasn’t like the matriarch, cold and business-like, or her equally cold majordomo. She wasn’t even like her father who’d met her mother in secret while waiting for Samantha to grow up enough to accept him.
Samantha had lived her life as a human, with human ambitions and needs. Being demon was an inconvenience, or else something that gave her insight into how to catch demon criminals.
Samantha balled her hands against Tain’s chest. “I don’t want this.”
“I know.”
She felt his magic slide through her, trying to soothe her, but she fought it, somehow needing the grief and guilt. “Please go away.”
“No.”
The one-word answer was typical of Tain, taciturn and indicating he’d do whatever he damn well pleased. Samantha knew he’d decided to stay with her tonight because this was his agenda, not hers.
“I need to get some sleep,” she said, hardening her voice. “I have to go to work in the morning.”
“Sleep then.” Magic trickled through her, too strong to fight, numbing Samantha’s anguish. Tain had to be wrong, and in the morning, after she slept, she’d prove it.
Samantha felt his lips in her hair again, his warm hands on her back. Tain lifted her and laid her on the bed, then got himself beside her and pulled the covers over both of them. Samantha saw Pickles decide that all was well and curl into a nose-to-tail ball before she slid into hazy sleep.
Tain stirred the charred bits in the frying pan as he heard Samantha’s bedroom door open. Without turning, he felt her gaze on his bare back and the kilt he’d pulled on over his hips. The rest of his clothes had been ruined by the demon’s acid and the shower, the kilt the only thing salvageable.
He also felt the weight of her beauty, her dark eyes and straight black hair, the memory of her body under his. He remembered those lovely eyes widening in horror when he told her she’d drunk his life essence—he’d assumed she already knew.
What had he expected? That Samantha would smile and gloat that she’d just imbibed from an Immortal? Her astonished look and the tears that followed had turned his ideas upside-down.
“What are you burning?” she asked.
Tain warmed at her voice, the sultry one that haunted his dreams. But her tone was sharp, the prickly, don’t-touch-me Samantha returning.
“It was eggs and bacon.”
Samantha came to him, took the pan off the burner, and peered at the ruined contents. “I’ll grab something on the way.”
She’d dressed in conservative black slacks, white blouse, and blazer, Samantha in her professional garb. Tain pictured himself kissing her while he peeled back the jacket and parted the buttons of her rather virginal blouse.
He settled for skimming his hand through her hair, liking that she let it hang loose and free today. Her face had healed completely, only a few pink lines remaining from the attack.
Samantha stepped away from him. “Can I drop you somewhere?” She’d become all business again, pretending to put what had happened between them behind her.
“I need to wait for my brother,” Tain answered. “He’s bringing me clothes.”
“Then you’ll be gone when I get back.”
It wasn’t a question. Tain lifted one brow at her and put the pan back onto the burner. He liked burned eggs and bacon.
“The attacking demons were Djowlan, and have been arrested,” he said. “Each clan is assuming the other is responsible for the battle.”
Samantha blinked, and he saw her shift thought gears back to the demon problem. “How did you know that?”
“Logan called on your cell phone.”
“It survived the demon acid?”
Tain shrugged. “Guess so.”
Samantha grabbed the phone from the counter, checked its readout, then slid it into its pouch on her belt. “Why didn’t you wake me when he called?”
“You needed to sleep.”
Tain had gone back into the bedroom after speaking to Logan to find Samantha curled on her side, her head resting on her bent arm. Her black hair had fanned out on the pillow, her even darker lashes tight against her skin. He’d stood still and let her beauty soothe his heart.
“I don’t even know if my father’s all right,” Samantha said, worried. “We left him with the matriarch . . .”
“He called while you were showering. The matriarch had him driven home, but he’d heard you were hurt. I told him I’d healed the burns, and you’d be fine.”
Samantha flushed. “I’m sure he wondered why you were answering my phone at six in the morning while I was in the shower.”
Fulton hadn’t sounded very surprised. In fact, Tain had sensed his relief that Samantha hadn’t been left alone and unprotected. “I don’t think he wondered at all.”
“Terrific.” Samantha swung away from him and grabbed her purse from the sofa. “I have to go. Don’t give any of that burned stuff to the cat.”
Tain came to her, greasy spatula and all, and touched her face, subtly and quietly sliding a protection spell around her. The spell wouldn’t stop a bullet, but it would keep her from ordinary kind of harm.
“Cerridwen’s blessing on you,” Tain said, then kissed her forehead.
Samantha jerked away and started for the door. On the threshold she turned back. “Thank you,” she said awkwardly. “For the healing, I mean. I wouldn’t have survived that attack.”
Tain didn’t answer. In his mind, he thanked the goddesses for giving him the healing gift that had allowed him to save her life. He knew that if she’d died last night, he would have drifted back into his madness and never come out.
Samantha gave him another self-conscious look, the
n turned and left him. Tain watched her go from the kitchen window, enjoying the way her backside swayed under the blazer as she hurried down the stairs.
Pickles jumped to the counter to sit next to him. Tain absently slipped him pieces of blackened bacon as they watched Samantha climb into her car and roar off to join Los Angeles traffic.
“You look pretty good for a woman who got slimed,” Logan said, leaning back in his chair. “You all right?”
Samantha’s attempt to slip in quietly and bury herself in paperwork about last night’s incident had failed miserably. Everyone in the department had heard about the battle, Samantha’s injury, and the fact that Tain had taken her home—the uniform who’d driven her to her apartment had made sure the story whizzed around Paranormal Division at the speed of light. She’d had at least twenty congratulations and commiserations before she even reached her desk.
“I got lucky,” she told Logan. She couldn’t make herself look her partner in the eye, still trying to sort out her thoughts.
Now that Tain had introduced the possibility that Samantha had taken Logan’s life essence, and that Logan had let her, she felt awkward with the man she’d always been able to relax with.
Samantha could plunge herself into denial, inventing all kinds of reasons why Tain had told her what he had, but something inside her knew the truth. She had been stealing from Logan, and Logan must have known. Why he’d said nothing was the mystery. The knowledge rose like a knife to cut into their friendship.
Equally mysterious was Tain’s certainty that Logan was a wolf high in his pack, even a leader. But if a high-ranking wolf had come out to Los Angeles to work a mundane job, that spoke of big problems in the pack. She did know that much.
“It wasn’t luck,” Logan said, cutting into her thoughts. “It was an Immortal. One good at healing, I think you told me.”
Samantha looked up at him, still avoiding his tawny eyes. “What are implying?”
“Implying? Me? I think you’ll make a great couple.”
“We’re not going to make any kind of couple,” Samantha said sharply. “He kept the acid from burning me, that’s all.”
“Sure thing, partner.” Logan gave her a knowing look. Of course, he’d called her cell phone early this morning, and Tain had answered. He understood exactly what Tain and Samantha had done all night. “The Lamiah matriarch is calling for blood,” Logan went on. “But the Djowlan matriarch is claiming no responsibility for the attack. She says the attackers were rogues who acted without her approval.”
Samantha glanced at Logan’s report, thankful to focus on something other than her messed-up feelings about Tain. “One of the demons who led the attack said his daughter was kidnapped and killed. Was he brought in?”
Logan looked surprised. “I hadn’t heard this. We arrested a lot of demons last night, but haven’t had time to question them.”
“Can I talk to him? Damn it, I knew I should have called in.”
“You were down, Samantha,” Logan said, the teasing leaving his voice. “You needed to recover—I’m surprised you’re even here this morning.”
Samantha was too, but Tain’s healing magic amazed her. The acid should have killed her—painfully—and here she was walking around with barely any scars.
Besides, she couldn’t have stayed home after Tain’s revelations, no matter how delicious he’d looked in her kitchen in that kilt. When she’d walked in and seen him in at her stove, wearing a kilt and nothing else, she’d wanted to get down on her knees, lift up the plaid, and enjoy what was beneath.
Right then, she hadn’t wanted to talk about her feelings, or her inner demon, or Tain’s past. She’d only wanted to make love to him again and again until she forgot her own name.
Logan took Samantha down to the cells where last night’s arrests waited. Demon cells contained strong witch wards that kept demons from breaking down the doors with their immense strength. The demons from last night, however, looked defeated and subdued, not about to attempt a breakout.
The demon with the delicate face who’d confronted Tain looked up in anger as Samantha entered the interview room and sat down across the table from him.
“You,” he snarled, then looked past her to Logan. “Who’s he? What happened to your Lamiah-protecting lover?”
Samantha slid a paper encased in a plastic sheet across the table to him. “Is that like the notes you’ve been getting?”
The demon glanced at the paper with its cutout letters, the last Merrick had received before his club burned down.
“Like that, except the one they sent back with my daughter’s body and her ripped-out heart was more specific.”
“What did it say?” Samantha asked, maintaining her calm interview voice, despite her growing sympathy and horror.
“Two lines.” The demon shoved the letter back at her and folded his arms. “Another one down. The rest of you to go.”
Hunter brought Tain a change of clothes, then lounged on Samantha’s sofa flipping channels while Tain showered and changed.
“Did you bring the other things I wanted?” Tain asked when he emerged again.
Hunter lifted a duffle bag from the sofa beside him. “I raided your apartment. You didn’t have much to raid.”
“I travel light.”
“A man after my own heart. Leda likes to buy mysterious gadgets for the kitchen and learning toys for the baby every time she leaves the house. I tell her we can’t take any of it to Ravenscroft, but she doesn’t care.” Hunter rumbled but Tain noted the gleam of pride in his eyes.
“Leda’s enjoying herself.”
“She is.” Hunter looked around Samantha’s apartment with its soft chairs and the kitchen’s curtains and matching towels. “This is pretty cozy. Better than the dump you live in now.”
“Where I live is cheap.”
“There’s an extra bedroom at Adrian’s house,” Hunter said, sounding casual. He brought it up every time they saw each other.
“I don’t need Samantha to be alone right now.” Not with demons spitting venom at her and clans at war. Tain didn’t want Samantha out in the city without him either, but he acknowledged that she’d be with Logan or inside the well-warded police headquarters.
“You and she can share Adrian’s guestroom,” Hunter suggested.
“She won’t.”
Hunter shrugged. “You mean she’s proud and independent, like someone else in this room. You two should get along famously.”
Famously was not how Tain would put it. The look in Samantha’s eyes when he’d told her she’d taken life essence from her mother and Logan, like the demon she was, had been anguished.
Tain hadn’t realized she hadn’t known. Demons loved to suck life essences, and Samantha’s pleasure when she’d taken Tain’s had been intense. But instead of triumphing that she’d tasted the power of an Immortal, Samantha had been scared and stricken.
Hunter watched him, his green eyes narrowing. “Are you telling me Samantha hasn’t fallen for you yet? You can’t be trying hard enough.”
Tain sat down next to Hunter and snatched the remote from his hand. “The last thing I need is advice about women from you.”
“No, the last thing you need is for Leda to come down here and try to shove you two together. Seduce Samantha until she can’t live without you—end of problem. Then Leda and I can go off to Ravenscroft.”
“Leaving me with someone to look after me?”
Hunter looked slightly embarrassed. “Something like that.”
“I’m glad you care.” Tain was, in truth. Having his brothers cluck around like mother hens was preferable to not having his brothers around at all.
“But leave you alone?” Hunter went on. “Nope. Sorry. We left you alone for too long. You’re stuck with us now.”
Tain sat back on the sofa, flicking through channels full of curious activities people of this century considered entertainment. He and Hunter had spent hours like this whenever Tain had visited Hunter during the p
ast year, sitting side-by-side in companionable silence in front of a television, commenting on the odd things humans liked to watch. Staying still too long made Tain restless, but he realized the importance of it, the bond strengthening between himself and his brothers.
Samantha needed life essence, and Tain had it to spare. The solution was simple. Samantha could take life essence from Tain whenever she needed to, which would never hurt him. That way she wouldn’t have to worry about harming her mother or Logan or anyone else.
Is this my redemption? he silently asked Cerridwen. To give this woman my life essence so she won’t hurt the people she loves?
He didn’t think this was quite what the universe had in mind for Tain’s atonement, but at the moment he didn’t care. Samantha could have all she wanted of his white-hot life essence, and he’d assuage his own inner pain by letting her take it.
“Don’t let me lose track of time,” Hunter said after a while. “Leda’s giving a lecture at six to some group about using protective witch magic. She’ll kill me if I miss it.”
Tain glanced at him, his interest stirring. “Mind if I tag along?”
Hunter shrugged. “If you want to come, sure.”
Tain looked back at the television, where two wrestlers were enjoying themselves slamming each other to the floor. For a brief moment Tain’s memories of himself, Hunter, and Darius slid through the turmoil in his mind—they’d spar then argue about who’d won. Go off to get drunk together, and try to entice ladies to choose which brother they liked best. Or Tain and Adrian would fish on the bank of some flowing river, neither speaking, watching the water and the silver flip of fish that always seemed to avoid their lines. Tain let the memories of the past come for the first time since his release, accepting their comfort.
Tain didn’t need to wonder what had opened the dam to let the memories through. It had happened last night when he’d dragged a half-demon woman back from death and made love without pain for the first time in centuries.
The Redeeming Page 13