Forever

by Jacquelyn Frank

  “He’s right, Max,” Jackson said, although he was surprised Asikri had any opinion on the matter. Asikri tended to be the big grouchy type, never too pleased with what was going on around him and the tasks he was set to. Oh, he did everything efficiently, but Asikri and happiness were not words often used in the same sentence. Granted, there were reasons for that, but not necessarily reasons his friends agreed with. “Don’t do anything that will complicate things. It’s complicated enough on its own. Just keep her away from the main house during the day and keep her and her sister in your sights.”

  “You don’t have to tell me how to do my job,” Max said, sounding a little affronted.

  “No. Of course not,” Jackson conceded quickly. “I know you’ve been trained very well by your father and by Ram. He wouldn’t have you here in the house if you weren’t.”

  “You know, it’s strange when I think of my great-granddad doing the job I’m now doing for you all those years ago,” Max said. “I find that to be weirder, believe it or not, than knowing who and what you are. There’s a sort of eeriness to it.”

  That made Jackson laugh. “You know, your granddad said something very similar to me when it was his turn to watch over us.” That gave Jackson pause as he remembered Menes’s memories and felt the things that Menes felt. It hadn’t been until he was propositioning Marissa that he had gotten an inkling of the grief that had led to Menes’s last death. It disturbed him, the idea that he could be so swept away by the emotions of his counterpart. How had Menes’s host felt about what was happening? How could he have possibly been in agreement with that course of action?

  And yet, as the Blending took deeper root inside him, as Menes’s memories and personality became a part of him, it was as though the lines between them were starting to blur. He felt it most in moments like this, when he fully felt a memory, such as speaking with Max’s great-grandfather. And while Menes had instigated a lot of what had happened before with Marissa, he had been very present for all of it, and most definitely a part of the way he had taken command of her, touched her … wanted her until every cell was screaming for it.

  But, of course, it was very likely that it would be a cold day in hell before that happened now. Being asked to die wasn’t exactly whispering sweet nothings expression on his faceioihly into a girl’s ear.

  No wait. Scratch that. A woman’s ear. Marissa was all woman. There was no mistaking her for anything else. She had no sweet girlish behaviors, no naiveté. And perhaps that was a part of the problem. She was jaded on some level she refused to show him. Oh, she was still a believer in romance and true love, but not for herself. She would believe it for anyone else, she would counsel accordingly, but something was holding her back from allowing herself to feel what she wanted to feel. There was something … some intangible thing …

  “Jackson?”

  Jackson started when he realized Ram was talking to him. He had completely tuned him and Max out. Looking more than a little sheepish, he apologized. That seemed to amuse Ram to no end.

  “It’s like this every time. You never get tired of the chase, do you?” he asked.

  That made Jackson grin like an idiot. Now here was something he agreed with Menes on fully. The chase. The seduction. The oh-so-sweet victory.

  “This is only the second time I have come ahead of Hatshepsut with the intention of choosing a host for her. She was … very reluctant to return to the mortal world that time as well. It had hurt her deeply, leaving our child behind. She has not wanted another since then, and I doubt that will have changed now,” he said with a dark sort of frown. Jackson had never really put much thought into it before, but he wanted children. When the time was appropriate of course, but if this queen of theirs did not want children, what could they possibly do to change her mind, knowing the grief and loss she had suffered? And that brought him to another question. Did Bodywalkers give birth to mortals or other Bodywalkers?

  Our children spring from our host’s mortal bodies. They are everything mortal and we leave them behind when we go, never to know them again unless, one day, we discover the actual death and find our way into the afterlife. We tend to outlive them before we pass, which is equally difficult. It takes ancient rituals and a complex mummification process, most of which are lost to us, to create more Bodywalkers. Odjit perhaps would be capable, since she was truly a priestess in her time and was well-versed in the Book of the Dead. And perhaps her niece, Tameri.

  Tameri. Their unique defector with her extraordinary power. That defection had definitely fallen into the “good” column as far as things were concerned. He’d had no idea just how powerful she was. Nor had he realized how fearful Odjit had been of losing her. So afraid that she had come for Tameri herself, with all of her power brought to bear and every intention of destroying her if she did not come back to her willingly. And it was truly the power of fate at its finest that, in spite of all the massive Nightwalker power involved in that battle, Odjit had been felled by simple human hands.

  Hands, he thought with a sudden choke of rage-filled emotion, that were presently unaccounted for. Jackson was loath to count Leo out without seeing an actual corpse, but it was hard to imagine that even Leo’s strong and powerful body could recover from the bloodbath that had been left at his home. Next to protecting the women, this was Jackson’s top priority. He was going to find Leo, dead or alive, and he was going to seek justice for whatever had been done to him.

  “I need Ahnvil,” he said abruptly. “I’m going to send him back to New York as soon as possible. And get me Diahmond. I don’t know to make me feel …>AP who has her in their care, but I want her well in place before her mistress is resurrected. She can help keep a closer eye on the women as well. No offense to Asikri or to you Max, but there are just some places you’re not going to be able to follow them just by nature of your sex. When I say I want them watched, I mean every single minute. I’m not giving any opportunity for someone to get to them.”

  “I don’t understand how you think you’re going to keep all of this a secret from that girl,” Asikri said. “And neither one of them looks like they’ll have enough sense to obey whatever rules you set down for them. That spitfire alone will be hard to keep under wraps.”

  Jackson didn’t bother to hide his amusement. “Did she really get you in the—?”

  “She’s lucky I didn’t have bad intentions,” Asikri groused. “Doing something like that could go a long way to pissing off an attacker and making what happens next a lot worse.”

  “Some would say it’s better than just quietly letting someone do whatever they want to you. I know for a fact that every one of us would go down fighting. Why should it be any different for them just because they are women?” Jackson loosed a wry laugh. “I once arrested this guy who had gotten rough with his date and wasn’t taking no for an answer. By the time we got there we were forced to pull her off of him and ended up having to rush him to the hospital with stab wounds to certain tender places.”

  Every man standing there winced.

  “Never underestimate the power of a frightened woman,” Ram said.

  “I don’t underestimate any of them,” Jackson said, thinking about Marissa and how brave she had been in spite of being terrified. She didn’t have to race him to safety the way she had. She could have just left him to rot. She might have had every right to it, too. That impulse to be of need, to help anyone in need of it was going to go a long way to convincing her to become a Bodywalker.

  “I better get messages out to the Gargoyles. It’s growing near dawn and we still have a lot to do,” Ram said. “Max, take the women to the guest house and see they are comfortable. We’ll touch base at dusk.”

  Jackson’s first impulse was to tell Max to leave Marissa behind. It was strange, but he found himself craving her constant company now. It was as though, now that all secrets were out in the open and the walls of their respective jobs were no longer a hindrance, he was making up for lost time. And there was a lot of
that time to account for. Jackson knew that Menes wasn’t overly impressed by his performance so far with Marissa. To the ancient Egyptian it was simple. See something, want something, go after that something with all barrels blazing. Jackson realized that was in some ways a very good quality in a ruler. He was not very tolerant of the many human protocols that interfered with doing the best or the right thing. In this way they agreed that the right thing deserved to be done, but they were almost polar opposites when it came to how to execute it properly. Menes would have gone after Marissa without wasting time … or rather, without wasting life. How funny, Jackson thought, that this nearly immortal being was so much more appreciative of the shortness and preciousness of life than perhaps Jackson himself was. Perhaps because Jackson had always thought there would be time later to do certain things. Now, having tangoed so closely with death, he felt quite www.ballantinebooks.comofihlyan understanding for Menes’s straightforwardness.

  “Dusk then,” Jackson said, realizing after a long moment that they were waiting for his release. That was going to take a little getting used to. Not that he didn’t know how to take command. Training Sargent and his predecessor had taught him a lot about that, much in the same way the Academy did. All things being equal, however, he had never shouldered a massive responsibility like the one he currently held as Politic ruler. Not many men would have. There were not very many monarchies anymore, and those that did exist rarely took place in a crucible of war and power of this magnitude.

  “What about Kamenwati,” Ram asked him once the others had moved out of earshot. “Docia said you were entertaining some idea that he might want to defect to our side? Do you know how insane that sounds?”

  “When has any of this ever sounded sane? It’s no more far-fetched than Tameri herself defecting. The niece of Odjit? I would never have believed it. I’m amazed that you did when she finally told you who she was.”

  “It was difficult,” Ram said slowly. “But by then …”

  “You’d already lost your heart to her?”

  Ram smiled at that, very clearly enjoying a memory about the incident. “Something like that. It could easily have been a trap and I could just as easily be dead right now, a knife in my chest while I slept. But, as you know, your sister is very special and well worth the risk involved.” Ram smiledg.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Jackson was out of his mind. Or that’s what he thought. Crazy and probably hallucinating that he was holding Marissa in his hands, the soft coppery strands of her hair streaming between his fingers like magnificent red waterfalls, gleaming with a touch of gold. Her warmth was emanating into him—he’d never known such enticing warmth before. Pervasive. Steady. Patient. Waiting for him to recognize it. Waiting for him to take charge of his damn life and go about the business of living. Everything was in flux, everything was changing. His home. His job. Himself. Hell, even his sister had changed. Nothing was the same as it had been three weeks ago.

  Nothing but Marissa. And even there Menes’s proposal was to change her. To use her as a means to an end. A goal that meant far more to him than resolving this war, and he took that priority very seriously.

  “I’m sorry I ever suggested …” he blurted out, trying to find some way of reassuring her that she wasn’t anything insignificant in her own life or just exactly how she was.

  “No. Don’t be sorry. I … I’m actually flattered, I think. It sounds a lot like … oh Jackson, in a way it’s expression on his facebecauseibig incredibly romantic. Don’t you think? Two people born dynasties apart … and then this thing, this magical thing happens and they get to meet and create, literally, a love for the ages. Imagine. It’s as if you were Romeo asking me to become Juliet. Although perhaps that’s a bad choice as a metaphor because they—” She broke off suddenly, her breath catching in her throat.

  “They die.” He finished it for her, not afraid of the stark truth of it. “Imagine,” he said back to her, “if death were only the beginning for those lovers. Imagine if they knew that the other would always, always be there for them when next they were reborn.” He touched a thumb to her lower lip, tracing the lushness of it. “What strength of purpose that can give them. What pain will come when one of them has to leave the other once more.” He sighed softly, his breath stirring her hair. “The last time we were reborn, I came three months ahead of her. I chafed at the bit, fretted and stomped about. Nothing would satisfy … nothing could satisfy until my love was born again. But … it was only a single week after she finally came to me when Odjit found her and assassinated her before my very eyes. And I could not bear it, this world, without her. First I sent that faithless bitch back to the Ether, but then … I went back for my love, so she would have my soul next to hers in the Ether … and so I wouldn’t have to bear a lifetime without her.”

  “Suicide.” She breathed the word over him. “You committed suicide.”

  He nodded. “Had my host been a different sort of man it might not have been possible, but we were both swept away by our emotions. I will feel everything Menes feels just as sharply as he feels it. And he feels everything I feel, just as sharply as I feel it. He knew, better than I did myself, what I feel for you.”

  “Feel?” She whispered the word over him, like it was a dirty little secret. “How can you trust what you feel? He could … he might be manipulating—”

  “No!” The word was sharp, his hands tightening around her head. “Listen to me,” he said as he brought her forehead into contact with his own. “For once … stop thinking with this loud head full of thoughts and just feel.” He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply, dragging the smell of her into himself. A sweet shampoo made with vanilla, a musky floral perfume touched lightly to her skin as if she’d walked through a light cloud of fragrance. “Before anyone else … before Menes. Before all of this … before Chico …” He breathed her in again. “It was a Sunday. I remember because I was in a hurry to get to the flag football game at the park … we’d been beating the pants off of the Middletown PD the last two games.”

  She laughed. “That means it must have been a Sunday?” she asked.

  “Yeah. Flag football gets you in the mood for Monday Night Football. Jesus, don’t you have a brother? An uncle? Some guy somewhere in the family tree?”

  She shook her head in between his hands. It made the silk of her hair slip back and forth between his fingers and he swallowed hard. Something about the sensation felt illicit. It felt like knowing her on an intimate level. Only someone close against her would know how her hair felt. And he knew she didn’t let just anyone touch her hair. expression on his faceou. i

  “My father died when Lina was two. I was eight. I don’t remember much about him. No brothers. I only have an aunt and she’s been associated with … umm … about two dozen uncles … that I remember. Before she died my mother didn’t let us spend too much time around them.”

  “Smart lady. When did she die?”

  “I was nineteen.”

  “You …” He laughed then, turning up his chin and pressing his lips to her forehead as he squeezed his eyes tightly shut. “It was a Sunday,” he whispered against her as his mind raced. She had raised her sister. Just like he had raised Docia. Only he had had Leo to help him. Leo had always been there, watching Docia when he had a test to study for or when he went to the Academy. Who had been there for her? How had she gone through medical school by herself with a kid sister to take care of? “And I came into the station with Chico. I had him off leash. Bad habit, really. I trusted him so much that I’d forget he was still an animal. I never forgot he was dangerous, don’t get me wrong. I trained with him too much to let that happen. But he was still a dog, you know? And he smelled something. I was rushing through to get to the park, picking something up off my desk … I can’t even remember what it was … and Chico got wind of something and did something he has never done before. He left my heel. Chico always stayed at my heel. Always.

  “But something caught his nose and he l
eft me. I saw it out of the corner of my eye … so I looked up and saw you. Do you remember now? He was at your feet and he growled. It’s why you shied from Sargent the other day. You remember Chico growling. And it wasn’t playing. You froze because you knew that was not a playful sound.”

  He heard her swallow and he pulled back so he could look into her eyes. “Yes,” he said softly, “you remember. You were wearing something so loose. A skirt that swept your toes, full of fabric, light and whimsical, like a hippie girl straight out of Woodstock.” It was a joke. Everyone in Saugerties knew that Woodstock wasn’t held in Woodstock. It had been held in a little town called Saugerties, New York. “You looked so damn pretty. And I remember thinking, what’s so wrong with us that you won’t dress that way at work? A brief flash of thought before calling Chico to heel.”

  “But he didn’t,” she said, her voice as whisper soft as his was, as if they were in church telling secrets.

  “No. He snarled and growled again. I dropped everything in my hands and flew … I mean flew across that room terrified he was going to bite you. And I remember thinking you stupid damn dog if you bite her she’s never going to go out with me!”

  She gasped, a small laughing sound. “You did not!”

  “Did too,” he said with a smile. “That was the minute I realized I was crushing on you big time. Of course I couldn’t examine the feeling because—”

  “Because your dog lunged for my throat?” she said dryly.

  “Don’t be a drama queen. You know full well it was the perp behind you he was gunning for. Deitz did a shit search on him and he cuffed him in front, the stupid lazy bastard. The guy expression on his faceou. i had a knife and he was seconds away from sticking you. But he froze exactly the way you did when he saw Chico lunge. I called him out but he barreled right past you and went for the guy’s arm. Took me a minute to realize why. Had my gun up the guy’s nose two seconds later.”