“Thank you for reminding me. I really do think that this time it should be ‘drink me.’ ”
Jack’s eyebrow rose and she could see that he was getting ready with another smart remark.
“Be a good boy and say it nicely,” she urged with a wicked smile before he could speak. “ ‘Drink me, Io.’ ”
Jack paused, perhaps to think, but didn’t hesitate for long.
“Go ahead. ‘Eat me, drink me, love me to death’—or any other way.”
Io leaned down and touched their lips together, a light graze, no more. Magic would distract her if she lingered, and she wanted this to be a moment purely of the flesh. She began a careful retreat down his body, peeling back covers as she went, rubbing cheek, chin, hair and lips down his torso, the indentation of his navel, all the way to his—
“Jack, is this real, or a spell?”
He laughed even as he stiffened. “I’m hurt that you have to ask.”
“Hurt! Ha! The strongman in the circus couldn’t bend this.”
“That’s fine because I don’t want the strongman to bend it,” he pointed out. His eyes began to gleam. “You, on the other hand, are welcome to do anything you like.”
“Naughty, naughty,” she chided. But pleased at his light response and willingness to let her take charge when he was so clearly designed to be on top of every situation, she smiled at him before turning her head away.
Jack was abundant, ready, and not resisting. And for what we are about to receive, let us be truly thankful.
He tasted of salt, of the sea. His flavor mingled with the ever-present magic, which refused to stay politely buried and calm. Io knew that he burned as she suckled, a rare sweat sheening his skin and his breath going immediately ragged.
She burned, too, down to the deepest root on every nerve in her body. But she didn’t hurry. She let her hands and mouth explore, gentle at first and then with longer, slower, firmer touches reaching with fingers where her mouth could not. She was descended from siren feys; she had her own magic to call and knew exactly what she was doing. It wasn’t decent, wasn’t decorous, but it was oh-so-effective when one wanted to tease.
Io watched through slitted eyes as Jack bent his knees and tried to find purchase on the slippery cotton ropes of the hammock, knowing he wanted to quicken the leisurely pace. It was a useless effort and almost made her chuckle. He was helpless and she refused to be rushed.
“Io!”
She hummed an answer.
Jack muttered something under his breath. Io flattened her tongue and pushed him against the roof of her mouth, pressing her lips tight.
“Okay, that is probably enough!” He gasped and his tone grew a little wild. “I don’t think the ‘drink me’ thing is a good idea. Great in theory, but this isn’t enough—Io! Damn it!”
Io finally took pity on him and slid her left hand below, cupping and then stroking upward the root of him. Hammock, or no hammock, Jack managed a splendid back arch that lifted his body and Io’s as the delayed climax rushed up through his body and to an escape.
After a long moment wracked in an incredible posture, he collapsed back into the swaying bed.
Io touched her slightly swollen lips and turned to look at Jack’s face. She climbed back up him.
“You forgot to say thank you,” she teased.
“Tricky little siren fey.” He rolled her beneath his body, shaking his head in mock admonishment. His eyes weren’t blank now; they made her heart roll over. She wasn’t afraid, but Jack looked just a tiny bit dangerous, looming over her. And, of course, he was. That was part of the attraction.
“What a bad girl.” He touched a finger to her inflamed lower lip.
“And I thought I was being good,” she murmured. “I was certain I did that right.”
“You were being a tease.”
“I don’t think, technically speaking, that can be called teasing,” she defended, trying to shift, but being defeated by the weight of Jack’s body and the infirm nature of their bed. “Now, if I’d stopped…But I didn’t.”
“Hm. I’ll let you slide on the technicality, but we both know that you were enjoying tormenting me. I should probably tickle you until you admit what you were doing. I know the backs of your knees are vulnerable. I was paying attention last night in the shower.”
“Well…maybe I enjoyed teasing you to a modest degree. But only a little, and not for so awfully long,” she admitted, flattening her legs as much as she could, but knowing such precautions were useless if Jack did decide to tickle her.
“Uh-huh. Even if I give you a pass on this, we are still left with one other bit of unfinished business.” Jack’s right hand slid down her leg, pausing halfway.
“Yes?”
Eat me.
“Jack!”
Io knew that she colored, and the sight made Jack smile. It wasn’t the kindest thing she’d ever seen, and it made her heart beat wildly.
“Um…is this wise in a hammock?” she asked. “I’m pretty sure a chiropractor would advise against it unless both parties are double-jointed.”
“I’m not sure it is even possible, but we’ll see.” Jack’s hand reversed itself.
“Do I have any say in this?” she asked.
“Of course. Say anything you like, but it’s this or the knees.”
She pretended to think for a moment.
“I really hate the knees,” Io confessed.
“I know. I was counting on that.”
Jack smiled as he slid down her body. He didn’t bother trying to keep the magic contained.
“That’s cheating,” Io gasped as her abdominal muscles contracted. “I was merciful and didn’t use magic on you.”
“How foolish of you. Next time you’ll know better,” Jack murmured the words shifting her up the hammock without causing it to sway.
Io could feel his breath on her belly and marveled that he was so close. It didn’t seem possible, but Jack Frost was her lover. He had kissed her, been in her, was planning on—
“Jack!”
“Beg if you want,” he murmured against her thigh. “But I have to warn you that mercy isn’t one of my primary character traits.”
Sparks flew, caught hold of her body and imagination both, and started a fire.
“I’m very ticklish,” she said breathlessly, reaching up behind herself and grabbing the large eyebolt that held the hammock in place. “Be a little rough.”
Jack laughed silently and then pulled her legs over his shoulders.
The hammock never moved, but the world certainly swayed. Io was glad that she had been doing yoga and was flexible. She stared for a moment into Jack’s beautiful eyes and then closed her own against the sight. It was too embarrassing—or would be, when she was back in her right mind—and too intimate. Was that possible? Being too intimate?
His hands were hot, his breath, too, the instant before he laid his mouth against her. Clever Jack! He found new nerves even as he started her to burn. The fire would have her—yes! Let it burn…
Sweat poured off her body and dampened the cotton, making the knots prickly beneath her. Io’s super-sensitized skin made note of the new stimulation, unsure if it liked it or not.
Jack’s head lifted as he slipped a finger inside her.
“You will tell me when I’m doing this right, won’t you?” he asked, his voice a teasing growl.
It took Io a moment to find the breath to answer him. Passion clogged her throat and stilled her tongue. “You’ll probably be able to tell when—yes!” she hissed as he slid a second finger inside. “That’s definitely right.”
She felt him laugh, his amusement another sort of thrilling vibration that sent magic running over her. After that, she had trouble sorting out what was Jack and what was sorcery. Io dropped her arms and clapped hands over her eyes, giving herself to the fire, no longer caring which was which and what would happen.
Arousal twisted tighter, tighter, tighter—Jack please!—until it could wind no more.
She would break, die, be torn asunder if she did not escape the rack!
And then finally she broke free. The coil unwound, throwing her into the living, glorious fire. She shuddered against him—beyond her normal emotions, embarrassment, pride, concern, or even fear.
“So, do you need a doctor?” Jack asked, as the last spasms left her body. He carefully slid her boneless limbs off of his shoulders and onto his thighs. He rolled back, facing her from the opposite end of the hammock, his legs dangling on either side. “I know this orthopedist…”
Io pried an eye open and took in his self-satisfied expression. She considered making a bid for a more modest posture, but abandoned the idea immediately. Movement simply wasn’t a possibility yet. Her brain would have to reconnect the dissevered synapses and remember how to make her limbs function.
“I don’t know,” she finally answered. “Ask me again in an hour.”
“You don’t need a nap, do you? That is usually a guy trick—and we get scolded for it.”
“I know it is a postcoital bit of rudeness, but yes.” Io closed her eyes. “And you can’t blame me. It’s all your fault.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Io made a note to deal with Jack’s smugness later.
Chapter Nineteen
The place that Jack and Cisco had chosen to meet was a Chinese restaurant that didn’t deserve the one-star rating it would have gotten in Michelin’s or Fodor’s, had any of the guide books ever found the no-name place down in the maze of narrow streets where it churned out its strange cuisine. The food was bad, the ambience under the fluorescents and Formica was nonexistent, but it had the benefit of not being frequented by anyone that Cisco or Jack was likely to know—cops or criminals. They’d been meeting there for years whenever Jack blew into town.
Chang, the old man who waited tables, showed Jack to his seat with the sort of bowing that was usually reserved for deities or at least their high priests. Jack gave him the finger, a show of disrespect that made the old man laugh and stop his mocking servitude.
“You want to see specials?” the old man asked. It was another joke. The old man always served the same thing, no matter what they ordered.
“Surprise us,” Jack said, slipping into the seat across from Francisco Vega. The old vinyl creaked under his weight but didn’t split. Jack didn’t take off his shades, and Cisco didn’t ask him to.
The old man wandered away chortling. He disappeared behind the bead curtain that spanned the doorway between the large plastic light-up Buddha and the red, broken wall-mounted pay phone that were the restaurant’s only decorative items.
“Wondered if you would show, amigo,” Cisco said, pouring out tea for both of them and shoving one of the cups Jack’s way. “Big storm in Goblin Town last night. Somebody must of tread on old Glashtin’s shoes.”
“Wasn’t me,” Jack answered, wondering if it were true. He offered, “Might have been Zayn. He’s been around Goblin Town a lot lately.”
“If it was Zayn, he got out alive last night. Someone saw him bolting through the gates just after dawn like the hounds of Hell were chewing on his skinny ass.”
“I hate when that happens,” Jack answered, his face completely straight.
“Yeah, me too. Probably because I got more ass to chew on than I used to.”
“A lot more,” Jack agreed.
Cisco called him a name. Then, “I suppose it could have been the gargoyle trouble that pissed Glashtin off and sent Zayn flying.”
“Yeah? What happened?”
“I hear Hille Bingels’s stony pet got loose during the show and bit a few stoned patrons who didn’t figure out it wasn’t a hallucination.”
“Maybe he chewed on Glashtin, too.”
“Maybe. But he’s a dead gargoyle if that’s true. Old Glashtin is supposed to have poison skin and a worse temper.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” Jack agreed. “Lots of people around Glashtin end up dead. I hear he’s half curare toad.”
Chang appeared with a large plate of steamed-to-death vegetables and a bowl of sticky rice. They waited until he was gone to begin discussing business.
“So, you weren’t real clear on the cell, but you’ve got something else for me?” Cisco asked, taking up his chopsticks. He and Jack had learned to use them because Chang didn’t bother with standard silverware.
“Yeah.” Jack reached into his pocket and pulled out the two samples of goblin fruit he had wrapped in a bandanna. It had been off the vine for a day and still looked succulent. There was no sign of wilt or rot. “Go ahead and have the boffins test it, but I already know what it is.”
“This is the super-fruit you were looking for?” Cisco eyed the items for a moment and then carefully stowed them in his own coat pocket. “That’s bad news then.”
“Yep, and I’m afraid that means it’s going to have to be a Sherlock-Holmes-and-Moriarty type of final solution, and soon. This is an act of terrorism. There are fields of this stuff down there all ready for picking. If Neveling Lutin is to make his perfume launch date, then they’ll have to begin harvesting shortly.”
“So Lutin is involved.”
“Right up to his antennae,” Jack answered, thinking of Io’s insistence that the goblins really were bugs.
“You’re suddenly smiling, amigo. That always worries me. Is it the girl? The fey you told me about?”
Jack nodded once. His tone was reluctant, but he volunteered “Her name’s Io.”
“Tigre Cypher’s daughter? And you’re letting her in on this party?” Cisco didn’t bother to hide his amazement. “Man, you always did have the biggest cojones.”
“She’s nothing like her mother. And I couldn’t stop her—not without…” Jack shrugged. “Anyway, I need her help. She can do some incredible things with even average spells. I’ve never met anyone who fine-tunes the way she does. It’s like putting a killing edge on a knife.”
“Good. You’re going to need a lot of help, amigo, if you’re taking on Horroban and all of Goblin Town. And a little extra firepower would help, too.” Cisco spoke persuasively.
“That’s why I’m here,” Jack agreed.
Cisco leaned back, further surprise showing in his dark eyes. “It isn’t like you to be so reasonable. This mess is really that bad then?”
“Yeah. The goblins aren’t kidding.” Jack finally took off his sunglasses and looked his friend in the eye. “We stop it here, or we’re all screwed.”
“You’d better tell me everything. Could they really addict the world with this stuff?”
Jack nodded and began talking.
Io knew that Jack would not be happy with her for answering Zayn’s note and agreeing to this rendezvous while he was gone from town, but she was loaded with enough magic to wipe out a regiment of goblins, including a truth-resistance spell. Surely that was sufficient to protect her from any tricks Zayn might try to get information out of her.
As she walked, she was careful to keep an eye on the imps chattering up in the trees. They were part of the park landscape, though not as charming as squirrels, or as pleasant to look at—and they were certainly more dangerous.
A pitiful screech from the base of a park bench drew her attention. Someone had set a wrought-iron leg down on top of a gray imp’s tail. Probably the imp had been annoying and deserved its fate, but Io found that she couldn’t leave it there suffering to starve or be tormented by the others. If it kept whimpering, something was going to come along and eat it.
Io put down the two cups of coffee she carried. Flexing her fingers inside her gloves, she bent down and quickly wrapped a hand around the leathery jaw so it couldn’t bite her with those tiny, razor-sharp teeth. She then quickly lifted the bench and pulled the imp out. A fast look assured her that its tail wasn’t broken.
She put it on the ground and, releasing it, stepped back smartly. The imp, though it couldn’t see her, knew she was there and set about repeating the sort of screechy begging that had likely gotten it pinned in the first
place.
“Go on, beat it,” she said.
The imp ratcheted up his whining and the others of his kind paused to see what the fuss was about. They began to creep closer.
Sighing in exasperation, Io reached inside her pocket and flipped a stick of gum down onto the sidewalk. The creature would probably devour it, paper and all, but that wouldn’t hurt it. Imps ate anything. They were like buzzards.
Delighted with his minty prize, the imp picked it up and scurried off, his hairless and featherless body shivering with delight. Other imps began chasing after him, shrieking with jealousy.
Io waited for them to rush by her, then picked up the coffee and moved on.
She finally pulled off her invisibility when she reached the park bench where her fellow agent provocateur waited and there Io sat down next to Zayn. He flinched when she appeared, his whole face twitching.
She had never seen the fey look so nervy.
Io gave him one of the cups of coffee as a peace offering, and then looked into the distance at the beds of dead flowers while he collected himself.
“Okay. Spill it,” she finally said. “Hurry up. It’s cold.”
She pulled her sweater around her with her free hand. The snow had melted, but it was still unseasonably cold in Goblin Town. The sun was well up, but just didn’t seem able to warm things. It was as though the heat of the city was being sucked straight down into the earth.
And maybe it was.
“We had some excitement last night. Hille’s pet gargoyle somehow managed to swallow your dish of ticks along with some bits of tourists when it got loose at Glashtin’s club.” Zayn took a gulp of coffee, wincing at both the heat and the taste. Io didn’t blame him. No one in Goblin Town seemed to have mastered the art of making drinkable java.
“That explains Glashtin’s temper tantrum and the sudden snow.” She was relieved to know it was this and not the foray into the Labyrinth that had been responsible. “I wonder how much he had to lay out in bribes to shut everyone up about the gargoyle feast.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s what made him mad. Deke said he went storming out of the club just after midnight and didn’t come back.” Zayn didn’t seem to notice that he named another H.U.G. operative. Or maybe he assumed that Xanthe had told Io who else was working in Goblin Town.
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