“Do you know what you did wrong?” Mordecai asked.
“No.” I’m not prone to panic attacks, but I was having problems getting enough oxygen, and my chest hurt.
“You didn’t focus on your reality. Were you by chance wishing things were different? You’ve brought us to a parallel Earth Universe, where it appears this hotel was built to similar specs, but a different designer was responsible for the decor.”
I’d been wishing I wasn’t embroiled in supernatural politics when I focused on the hotel room. “So, a different version of me exists in this universe? One who never met Aaron or any other supernatural?”
“Probably, but we’ll break all kinds of rules if we go exploring.”
“So I got lucky when I traveled before?”
“Do you think you can get us back to the correct reality this time?”
I nodded, he grabbed my arm, and I focused on the correct everything as I stepped out of the parallel universe and back into the reality we’d stepped out of. My reality.
I made sure we were back in the right place before I let myself consider the ramifications of alternate realities. Maybe the thing with the Berenstain Bears really was because an alternate universe switched it around, because I know it used to be Berenstein.
Mordecai let go of my arm and my aura felt like it flashed dark, then really bright, and then dim. My knees felt weak and I took a few steps backwards to lean against a table.
“Do you need grounding?” Nathan asked.
“I’m not sure what I need,” I admitted.
“You’ve gone up a power level,” said Abbott. “It’ll take time to get used to your new signature.”
“Signature?”
“Who you are,” Nathan explained. “Your aura, your power. I’ve watched others go through it, and I felt it when I took on the Amakhosi mantle. You’re exhausted, which is making it even harder to deal with your new power level. You need sleep.”
“You need to look over the room service menu and order something,” said Adonis. “Nathan’s right, you’re tired and hungry, and that’ll make dealing with this harder than it has to be.”
“Who else saw us glowing when we returned?” I asked Adonis. “Did you explain to them why we needed to talk without anyone overhearing? How many people know we left, and how many saw me leave on my own?”
Adonis looked to Abbott, who told me, “I rearranged the memories of those I could. We hope to keep word of it from reaching Mount Olympus.”
“Thank you. I know this means I owe you.” I’d found out Abbott doesn’t rearrange memories for free. He’d never demanded payment from me for anything he’d done on my behalf, but I still owed him.
“I’m keeping you safe because I don’t wish to see you harmed, Carena. You owe me nothing.”
I didn’t argue, but I also didn’t erase the tally I was keeping. I’d find a way to repay the kindness. Somehow.
Nathan handed me a room service menu and I made the call to order a veggie burger and fries, thrilled it was an option. Because I was starved, I added key lime pie for dessert.
“When can Lauren, Xiaolan, and I go home?”
“I’m hoping we’ve caused Aquila and his collaborators enough problems they won’t have time to mess with you or Josh while they step back and regroup,” said Bran. “I’m keeping tabs, but we’ll keep Ryan around until I’m sure of it. With any luck, you’ll be home in the next two or three days.”
“I’ll stick around a few weeks to help Mordecai with your training,” said Adonis. “I can act as guard while I’m with you.”
I looked at Nathan because I knew he’d have the final say, and he shrugged. “I have feelers out, I’ll let you know.”
“Where am I sleeping tonight?”
“That’s my call,” said Ryan. “I have a few options, depending on how the evening goes, but you won’t be sleeping here.”
Which meant I couldn’t kick them all out and crawl into bed. Damn.
“Ya’ll have me until the food arrives and I eat, and then you’re going to let Ryan take me somewhere so I can sleep,” I told the room.
Abbott took a step closer, seemed to think better of it, and stopped. “As supernaturals gain power it doesn’t come gradually, it comes in spurts. When a new level hits there’s a big learning curve. When I met you, you had the energy level of perhaps a two-hundred-year-old vampire, what I’m feeling coming off you now feels like an eight-hundred to a thousand-year-old vampire.”
“Your physical body,” said Nathan, “is having a hard time dealing with the extra energy.”
Mordecai stood and walked to the window, looking out as Ryan had earlier. “Long term, this is a good thing. Short term it could provide some difficulty.”
“I just want to go home.” I sounded whiny even to my own ears. And I took a breath and tried to sound assertive. “I want my bathtub, and my candles, and my books, and my bed, and my dog. Most of all, I want my family back under one roof, and I want us to be safe there.”
I heard footsteps coming down the hall, and I stopped talking as Nathan looked out the peephole. He turned and nodded at Ryan as a knock sounded, and Ryan stepped in front of me as Nathan opened the door. He accepted the food without letting the guy in, and I can only hope he tipped him because I couldn’t see. As soon as the door closed, I walked around Ryan and Adonis, followed Nathan to the little table, and sat down to eat.
I spent time getting the mayo and ketchup where I wanted it before I really dug in, and then I ate every single bite and crumb of food in front of me, and drank the entire Coke. I heard the guys talking as I ate, but I wasn’t focused on what they were saying because all my attention was directed on the food, the taste, and the process of eating. I hadn’t realized I was ravenous until I smelled the food. I popped the last fry in my mouth and looked up to see them all watching me, and I lifted my brows hoping someone would tell me what was going on.
Nathan looked at Ryan and said, “I’ll be coming wherever you take her to sleep tonight.”
I took yet another centering breath before telling Nathan, “I appreciate that, and I’ll feel safer having you around, but when ya’ll get too close it’s like it threatens to short circuit me, or it adds to whatever I already can’t deal with.” He looked hurt and I tried to explain better. “I can barely handle my own energy, and having yours spilling onto me right now is too much.”
I looked at Bran and remembered Lugat aren’t magical. I walked to him, touched his arm, and... nothing. I breathed in relief as I told him, “You don’t make me want to crawl out of my skin. That means Alex won’t either.”
“No more people,” said Ryan.
“I can block my energy,” Adonis told me from across the room. “If you just need contact with someone who doesn’t fry your circuits, I can give you that, at least.”
I rolled my eyes at Adonis and looked back to Nathan. “What else do I need to know?”
“I’m assuming Ryan has a nice secret hidey-hole. If so, then Adonis and I’ll help him guard you, so we’ll only have three people around you. I don’t want you running off because you can’t handle things again.”
“I have some things to see to,” said Mordecai. “I’ll handle them tonight and will return tomorrow or the next day. Adonis can reach me if I’m needed.”
“You just met me,” I told Adonis. “Why are you offering to guard me?”
He glanced at Mordecai before telling me, “I have my reasons.”
“Can I trust his reasons?” I asked Mordecai.
“He’ll keep you safe.”
So, I couldn’t trust his reasons, but he’d keep me safe. Right.
Chapter 18
It was nearly two hours before we walked in the back door of a sizable home in a residential area outside the city. We’d run everyone off, driven the car at the hotel to a grocery store, and walked about a half-mile to the house. Another vehicle was in the driveway, which gave us a way to leave if needed. I could always skip out on my own, but I wou
ldn’t leave Nathan and Ryan to fight by themselves, and I couldn’t take them with me through the nothingness. Or, maybe I could, but I wouldn’t try it until I was certain I could do so without losing them — and without landing in a parallel universe. Also, Mordecai didn’t want people knowing we could travel when we disappeared.
I was so tired, I didn’t even argue when Ryan put Nathan in the bedroom across the hall from me and assigned Adonis to watch over me as I slept. Ryan informed us he’d hang out on the roof to make sure no one came close.
Adonis closed the bedroom door, leaned against it, and gave me a speculative look as he said, “I can help you sleep.”
“It’s all I can do to handle my own energy right now.”
“I can help with that. Let me hug you for thirty seconds and I’ll show you.”
I took a step back and shook my head, but he held his hand out and said, “Okay then, rest your hand on top of mine for a moment. Give me a chance, love.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“As you wish.”
I rested my palm on the back of his outstretched hand and immediately felt a little better.
“What are you doing?”
“Smoothing out your energy.”
“I’d rather adjust to it on my own terms.”
“Don’t make it harder than it has to be.”
“Tell me why you’re really helping me.” Nothing’s ever free.
“There’s always someone who breaks a barrier first, and then others who follow. If you’re the first then we could be seeing the next stage of human evolution soon. You have demon marks on you, but you’re still evolving. It shouldn’t be possible.”
I was certain I’d kept the marks out of sight when he was around, but perhaps I’d screwed up? I had a long-sleeved shirt on now, but the shower had washed the makeup off and I didn’t have my wrist brace. Perhaps I’d lifted my arms over my head and he’d seen them? But, they just look like tattoos — could gods sense demon marks on people?
I made a mental note to ask Mordecai later, and pretended I wasn’t bothered by Adonis knowing.
“Perhaps the demon marks are allowing me to bridge the worlds? Maybe I’ll lose the ability once I get rid of them. We won’t know until they’re gone.”
He was silent long enough I had a feeling he was checking with someone.
“Talking to someone else while you’re having a conversation with me is rude.”
“Wasn’t. The thought hadn’t occurred to me, and I was just running the possibility through.” He sighed. “You could be right, but it doesn’t explain the divinity smell. The two things shouldn’t be possible on the same being, no matter the species.”
“Maybe the act of going into the nothingness makes you smell a certain way? Since you and Mordecai do it, it’s part of your smell. Maybe that’s why you think I smell like you.”
“It’s called the primordial void, and you really don’t want to be one of us, do you?”
“I’m human.” If I’d been my patient, I’d have pointed out the ‘He who doth protest too much,’ thing, but I truly didn’t feel as if I were no longer human.
“And yet, you aren’t attracted to me?”
“You’re attractive, but people who think they’re a sure thing are a turn-off to me.”
He sat on the edge of the bed. “If things were working as they should, I’d be whatever you wanted. I’d be your ideal.”
“That must suck.”
He leaned back on his arms, and his chest and ab muscles rippled under his too-tight t-shirt. “How do you figure?”
“When do you get to be yourself?” I asked, focusing on his face. “When do you get to have someone want you for you? Love you for who you are?”
“It isn’t my lot. This is who I am. The point is, I instinctively call people by the name they desire to hear from their lover’s lips. In every way, I appear to them as their perfect man. If they want domineering, I am. If they want seductive, I can’t help but be what they want.”
I rolled my eyes and sat on a decorative metal bench. “The thing I want most is a Dom who uses me for his pleasure, but loves me and cherishes me for being what he needs. If I know the Dom is hurting me simply because he knows I enjoy it that way, I can’t enjoy it. You and I would never work.” He didn’t respond, and I noted, “It’s almost like you’ve been turned into the sex slave. You have to conform to what they want. It’s backwards.”
“It’s who I am and it works for me. I enjoy becoming what the woman in my bed wants. I love fulfilling her deepest desires and being her personal fantasy.” He shrugged. “I get to pick the women I want to be with — it isn’t like they’re thrust on me without choice. Once I choose though, I become what they want. I’m only theirs a few weeks. They can’t keep me forever. When I’ve fulfilled their fantasies, I’m ready to move on. Always.”
“The various mythologies about you have you falling in love or in some cases getting married.”
“With others of my race, but it’s only ever brought misfortune and stints in the various levels of the underworld into my life, so I’ve stopped looking to my race for companionship.”
And that may have been the saddest thing of all.
I know when someone doesn’t want to keep talking about a subject, so I chose to be a friend instead of a therapist and move on. “You say you choose people not of your race to have your flings with — did you choose me?”
“I did, but it didn’t work.” He gave me an almost pitying look. “It always works for humans. It nearly always works for shapeshifters and other supernaturals, though sometimes not for the strongest of them.”
“You’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. Perhaps it worked, but I’m just so fucked up you can’t be what I need?”
“Tell me more of what you need, and I can tell you if I’ve ever made it work for another human with your wants and desires. I’ve been around a long time — odds are you aren’t the first.”
“I’m a submissive masochist. I need pain, but I need to know the Dom wants to hurt me. If I know he’s doing it just because it’s what I like, it gives me too much power and it doesn’t work for me.”
“There are certainly plenty of women with your proclivities, and I’ve had fun with more than I can count — but they didn’t understand the relationship. They didn’t know I was doing it because it was what they needed. Perhaps you’re right.” He shrugged. “The bitch of it is? I want you, and it appears I can’t have you.”
“Not just for a night of sex,” I agreed. “Maybe I’m crazy for turning down a night with the legendary Adonis, but I see you as a person and I’d feel guilty for using you for sex. I mean, now that I understand how things work for you? It feels too much like you don’t have a choice, like it wouldn’t be consensual.”
“Oddly, I appreciate that.”
I wasn’t sure how to interpret his sigh. Wistful, perhaps?
“At any rate,” he continued, “Mordecai’s your teacher and I’d like to be your friend. I have much to teach you, and we’ll need to drop into teacher and student mode for lessons, but I hope to forge a friendship with you.”
“Because you want in on the freak who might be about to change human evolution?”
“No, because you see me as a person, and not for what I might do for you in bed.”
His words broke my heart and I walked to the bed and pulled him into a hug before I realized I was going to.
“You’re a Dom if the woman needs it — are you also submissive if the woman’s a Domme? Do you switch from sadist to masochist at the whim of your partner?”
“It’s happened a couple of times, and yes — it turned me on and was what I wanted at that moment in time. Perhaps it only happened enough for me to understand what women feel when they want me to hurt them sexually? To spank and whip and pour hot wax on them? Or, perhaps it was what I needed to experience... or maybe it’s none of that and all about me making the woman I’m with happy. I honestly don’t know.”<
br />
“So, not even the gods understand how fate works?”
“Not all of us. I believe some understand more than others. I’m the offspring of...” he shook his head. “I think the firstborn understand more than their offspring. There are exceptions, but for the most part it seems to be true.”
I wanted to ask if he’d had to submit to CBT, to butt plugs, to a zillion other things, but I didn’t. It wasn’t any of my business. Can you imagine being immortal and not being allowed your own happily ever after? Centuries rolling into millennia, and you can only be what the woman you’re with needs.
“Lie down,” he said, his voice soft so it was clear it was a request. “Let me hold you until you fall asleep. I’ll get up and watch over you once you’re in dreamland.”
“Okay, but only because I think you might like the idea of being my friend.”
“Has it occurred to you that you need a friend more than you need a few weeks of fantastic sex right now, so perhaps I’m still being exactly what you need?”
I shook my head. It was too fucked up to contemplate.
“Why do you have blond hair and blue eyes? Greeks usually have dark hair and olive skin,” I asked as we slid under the sheets from opposite sides of the bed. Shit, I was getting in bed with Adonis? Had I lost my mind?
“What makes you think the Greek gods were Greek? We’re our own race, and most have light hair and blue eyes though there are some notable exceptions.” He rolled me onto my stomach and rubbed my back with long, sweeping, relaxing strokes. “I'm known by different names in different pantheons. I'm Tammuz, Osiris, Kamapua'a, Freyr—”
“Freyr!” I interrupted as I sat up and looked down at him. “Surtr is supposed to kill you during Ragnarok!”
Of Humans and Monsters Page 20