Divine Fire

by Melanie Jackson

  “My German isn’t especially fluent, and I may have made some mistakes in translation, but you are saying that you’re like those…soldiers Dippel wrote about?” Her voice held no expression. Neither did her white face.

  “Not exactly. They are unusual. I’m…” He tried to think of some way to describe himself that wouldn’t seem unbearably horrible.

  “Zombies, you called them. Did you mean it?” she asked. Her gaze never wavered.

  “Yes—at least that’s as good a word as I can come up with. They started off as dead things, and Dippel pieced them together, attaching dead limbs to living hearts and organs. Their brains are fried, their wills hijacked, their bodies not especially quick but very determined to carry out whatever mission they are given.” They weren’t quick, not by his standards. They would seem plenty fast to Brice, though. It was another thing he chose not to say. “It isn’t magic or voodoo that animates them, but the result is the same. The dead are up and walking around.”

  “You’re talking about the real Frankenstein monsters. You’re saying that everything in Dippel’s journal was true. He really raised the dead.”

  “Yes. It seems his experiments succeeded. He’s finally managed to make his nearly undying soldier.” Damien looked full into her eyes, waiting to see if she understood the implications, and if the understanding repulsed her.

  Brice finally nodded. “I see,” she said, and looked away quickly, as though suddenly unable to bear the sight of him. Her next words surprised him.

  “Aren’t you going to finish undressing? I know what you’re thinking, but this doesn’t change anything. I still want you, you know. I probably always will.”

  Her eyes were deep pools. He wanted to jump into them and dive to the very bottom where her deepest thoughts lay. And even if he could do that, Damien knew it wouldn’t be enough.

  Her declaration seemed to open some floodgate of emotion inside Damien, and Brice found herself pulled from the narrow counter and held tight against the entire length of his body. Between them, steam began to rise. She could feel his heat penetrating her organs and limbs, driving out the horrible cold.

  “Consider this carefully. It’s a little early for us to be thinking about happy-ever-afters,” he said, and abruptly his voice was low and rough. Outside, thunder roared, shaking the building.

  Brice ran her hands over Damien’s arms and then down his back. The gold mesh of scars was beginning to rise.

  “Erectile tissue,” she murmured, smiling slightly.

  Damien made a low sound that might have been a laugh. It might equally have been a moan. He lowered his mouth to her neck and bit down, once.

  Brice shuddered, but no longer with cold. The primitive caress sent the last of the old chill fleeing.

  “I haven’t thought about ever-after for a long time,” she finally said. She turned her head and buried her face in his hair. Her hands, much more dexterous now, began searching for the zipper of his pants. “I’m not asking you to promise me one now.”

  “But you should ask,” he said. “You have every right to expect one.”

  “You mean I’m due because I’m a good person and I’ve suffered a loss,” she said gently, shaking her head. “But we both know it doesn’t work that way.”

  “I do know. And I don’t like it. If I could, I would change it all. I would keep all this pain from you.”

  Brice looked up then and the expression on Damien’s face made her want to cry out. She had never seen such naked need. She stopped wrestling with the wet fabric of his pants and brought both arms around his neck. She leaned up on her toes and set her mouth to his.

  The kiss stole from her the ability to speak, to think, and for a moment to breathe. His body was hard, burning to the touch, and she knew that he was exercising extreme restraint in not taking her right there on the counter.

  Not that she would have minded.

  “We aren’t truly safe here, and less so in the bedroom,” he said, his voice rough when he finally lifted his head from hers.

  “We don’t need a bedroom.”

  “But this floor, the counter, even the shower—all are unpolished granite. It would abrade your skin, bruise you.”

  “Not if we act with care,” Brice answered, and seeing the crystal decanter that held some sort of oil, she pulled out the stopper and then poured the oil in an arc on the wide shower floor. The smell of sandalwood filled the air.

  “That’s real sandalwood oil, isn’t it? Sorry,” she said. “That will be some expensive lubricant.”

  This time Damien did laugh. He stepped away from his pants and toward the shower, tugging her after him. His eyes were hot. “Extravagance has never bothered me.”

  They sank down onto the floor. It was cold, but Brice didn’t notice. There was no sill to the shower, and the floor sloped downhill toward a drain. Brice reached out quickly, intercepting the stream of oil that was trying to escape. With slippery hands she reached for Damien.

  Her fingers hummed with pleasure as she kneaded the muscles of Damien’s arms and chest. Her whole body thrilled when he wet his hands and slid them down her back and over her buttocks, then around her thighs. He left hot, bright trails of oil behind that glowed gold in the candle’s flickering light.

  “How you fascinate me,” he said. A small shudder passed down his body. “You look at me with those wide eyes and I can see your desire as plainly as the moon or sun. And you don’t hide it—not from yourself. Not from me. You’re half afraid of me, of what I am. Yet I know that when I touch you, the fires will rise in you and you will burn along with me. Do you know how rare that is—how long I have waited for this?”

  Brice nodded her head and then immediately shook it. “You fascinate me too,” she said a bit helplessly, unable to find a way to explain the fierce longing and attraction he had always caused in her. “You have always fascinated me. Your words reached across centuries and touched me, brought me back from grief, made me want to live again. Whatever those rational, timid parts of me want, how could I do anything but go into the fire with you when you ask this of me?”

  His hands framed her face as he looked into her eyes and then her soul, searching for the reality.

  “It’s the truth,” she told him.

  “I thought that I had nothing left to learn about passion or compassion,” he answered. “But I was wrong. I’ve learned about both things tonight.”

  Damien’s black eyes shone like a night full of stars as he brought his mouth to hers. Brice reached eagerly for the embers that blazed to life between them.

  The warmth of her mouth called to him, and, unable to be calm any longer, Damien laid her out on the floor. A part of him worried about bruising her on the stone, but just as she predicted, their bodies moved smoothly over the oil. Damien loved the contrast of cold, hard granite and soft, warm Brice on his overheated skin.

  He touched her again, loving the curve of her hip as it swooped from waist to thigh. He lay down beside her, getting close—as close as he could and not yet be inside her. He touched all of her, lovely face and soft breasts, lithe legs and delicate hands, and all of it thrilled him.

  And she touched back, no shyness or hesitation slowing her as she explored his body.

  Thunder again sounded, the late announcement of the lightning’s continuing approach, but he didn’t need to hear it to know the storm was rising. Tempests of pleasure ripped through him, making his muscles quake and his heart stutter as hurricanes of desire laid him low.

  Moved by a kind of hunger he’d never felt before, Damien returned to Brice’s lips. His hands shifted on her body, reaching into the cleft between her thighs where the heat was strongest, where he most wanted to be. And her response was instinctive. The male animal asked and she responded, opening to him, leaving herself undefended because she trusted that the wildness in him would not hurt her.

  Color had returned to her body while they kissed, and she wore a pink flush over all her skin. Lips and tips of her breasts we
re again dark with the blush of passion.

  Intrigued, Damien touched one nipple and watched as sensation burst in her body, telling him of the sensitivity of her skin. Her back arched, and he watched as the blush traveled outward, marking her fair complexion with a deeper blush.

  A part of him said that Brice was a miracle he shouldn’t believe in, that there was no passion that could reach deeper than old pain. The rest of him knew she was a once-in-a-lifetime chance at emotional rebirth that he couldn’t refuse.

  His hands slid under her and her buttocks filled his hands—warm, smooth, as fine as softest kidskin. He flexed his fingers once, enjoying the resiliency of her muscles, and he pulled her over him, rolling carefully so her knees would be spared. She slid into place—almost into place, and looked down at him with her passiondarkened eyes.

  This was safer, he told himself. Let her be in control. He was more than a little crazy now; the charge growing inside him was buzzing in his brain.

  “I want you,” she said. “Don’t hold back. There’s no need.”

  He wanted her too—hands, mouth, body and in no particular order. Groaning, he rolled back over, putting her under him. He wanted to be on top, he wanted control, he wanted…everything. He’d just be careful while he took it. Surely he had that much control left.

  Sheened in sweat, skin a mass of crisscrossed scars, breathing too hard, he knelt over her. He lowered himself to one breast, taking it into his mouth, teasing it with lip and tongue until the taste of sandalwood gagged him.

  Brice, who had been busy biting the muscled forearm propped by her head, also spat.

  “Maybe I don’t like sandalwood after all,” she said, wrinkling her face.

  Damien found himself smiling, in spite of the bitter taste that coated his mouth.

  “Yet I will always recall this scent fondly when I remember this night.” He inched his way upward, letting his arousal settle between them. Heat radiated up from her now, telling him that she, too, burned with need.

  “And we will remember it? You truly believe we’ll have tomorrows to recall this in?”

  “Oh, yes. This isn’t our night to die.” His voice was full of conviction and so strong that it banished her doubts.

  “Good. I want there to be more tomorrows. Many, many of them.”

  Brice rocked against him, a siren calling to her—what? Mate? Prey? At that moment, he didn’t care. Accepting her invitation, he slowly slid inside her, inch by excruciating inch, enjoying the torture of delayed gratification. Then he retreated again, teasing them both. But soon he moved less slowly. The passionate heat and fragmented commands were too powerful to ignore—and he and Brice both wanted. Needed.

  The fire went wild. Their responses became involuntary, as inevitable as the beating of their hearts. Electricity arced between them, covering their bodies in a sheet of white fire that should have meant death but instead was all about life.

  Their eyes were wide open, and neither hesitated once in giving themselves to the storm.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Like measles, love is most dangerous when it comes late in life.

  —Byron

  It’s strange that modesty is the rule for women when what they admire most in men is boldness.

  —Ninon de Lenclos

  When someone blunders, we say that he makes a misstep. Is it then not clear that all the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill our history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great leaders have arisen merely from a lack of skill in dancing?

  —Molière

  I never wrote anything worth mentioning till I was in love.

  —Byron (Conversations, 1824)

  They did the best they could to clean up with towels. Most of the oil came off, but Brice feared that they both smelled like a bordello.

  “We need to dress and leave immediately. This was complete insanity. These stupid storms make my I.Q. plummet,” Damien muttered in self-disgust.

  “How soon they forget,” Brice muttered back. “Ten minutes ago I was a goddess. Now I’m back to being luggage.”

  She looked over at her wet clothes and shuddered at the thought of putting them on again.

  “I haven’t forgotten,” Damien answered, taking hold of her hair and tipping her head back for a quick kiss. “And I’m not complaining. That was the loveliest bit of insanity I’ve ever experienced. But unless we are actually prepared to die for our love, we really need to leave.”

  “No one’s bugged us yet.” That was a non sequitur and she knew it, but Brice wasn’t ready for round two of Lord Byron vs. Frankenstein’s monsters.

  “The door to the office is subtle and blends with the paneling, and the insulation that keeps out magnetic waves also dampens sound, but it isn’t exactly a hidden, soundproof, bullet-proof room. They will eventually find it.” Damien pulled a dark blue robe of alpaca wool off the back of the door and handed it to her. “It’s not like the vault—where you would be safe.”

  Brice sniffed. “You lock yourself in the vault with me and you’ve got a deal.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Damien frowned at the robe as she held it up against her. “You’ll have to roll up the sleeves. But it will be warm, and not too much in the way. You’ll have to wear your own boots, though. My slippers won’t fit.”

  “Thanks.”

  Feeling suddenly at a loss as reality rushed back around them, Brice shook out the robe and slipped it on slowly, paying unneeded attention to the belt as she tied it with elaborate care. “So, where exactly do we go now?”

  “I fear you won’t like this much,” Damien began.

  “You aren’t proposing to leave me again, are you?” she asked quickly, rolling up her sleeves, this time in a most purposeful manner. “I don’t want to get stuck in any vault—I don’t care how well hidden it is. What if there’s another fire?”

  “I understand your concern. And I fear that I am suggesting something like that—but hear me out. There is an executive bathroom in the lawyers’ offices on the fifth floor. It can only be opened with a key, which you would have. The door is heavy, and the room is lined with marble and is as safe as a bunker. You can wait there while I go down to the generators and get the power turned on.”

  “No. I am going with you—and I don’t want to hear any arguments. Damien, I mean it! Short of tying me up, you can’t make me stay there.”

  Damien looked at her with narrowed eyes, and she knew for a moment he was actually considering the option of doing just that.

  “You wouldn’t dare,” she said, shaking her head as she backed up a step.

  “No, I suppose not. I can’t leave you in a position where you are unable to defend yourself.” He sounded regretful as he pulled on his shirt. It was damp but would dry quickly on his overheated body, so Brice didn’t waste time feeling sorry for him. “Okay, here’s the drill. You can come with me—as long as you can manage elevator shafts and dark stairwells. At the first sign of trouble, I am ditching you in the nearest place of shelter and going after these bastards. I have to take them out when I find them; and I don’t want them to know about you, so, no, you can’t help by playing Doc Holliday to my Jesse James.” Brice opened her mouth to argue, but he overrode whatever she might have said. “That’s the deal, Brice. It’s this or the executive bathroom. I can take a bullet, as long as it isn’t to the head. You can’t. And I can deal with these creatures—they aren’t that hard to kill—but not if I also look after you.”

  “Okay,” she said, not liking the options but choosing the one that seemed less evil. She reached for her pistol and stowed it in the robe’s large pocket. It made the garment hang crookedly, but she didn’t care.

  The silence of the building was eerie. In a high-rise this size there should have been constant background noise from elevators, heaters and fans. And people—voices talking, heeled shoes walking, toilets flushing. But all was dead quiet except for the soft swishing of the bathrobe Brice wore.

&n
bsp; The only other exception to the abnormal silence was when they passed through the stairwell on the sixth floor where Cyber QT, a personalized self-help software company, was located. There, the various and sundry motivational screen-savers were still active, flashing and chirping and generally being obnoxious. Brice wondered how long the backup batteries on the computers would hold out. The very best of them wouldn’t last more than ten hours. Three was more common.

  Though Brice would just as soon have given it a miss, she and Damien made a brief stop there while he looked for weapons. They stopped everywhere to look for weapons. Or, more accurately, for ammunition. Unfortunately, all that immediately offered itself was a small flashlight, which he pocketed.

  While Damien hunted for bullets, Brice stole candy off of desks, munching on anything she could find because her hunger had come roaring back. Nothing like a near-death experience to give a girl an appetite. Or maybe it was playing Slip-N-Slide with Damien, she thought in an inappropriate spurt of humor.

  “I’m glad you can still smile,” Damien remarked, looking up from the desk he was ransacking.

  “I could frown, but would that help anything? Besides, frowning makes bad lines on the face,” she added lightly. The comment earned a quick grin from Damien.

  Brice wandered off and soon found the employees’ lounge where she helped herself to a can of orange juice and then reached for another. The cans and bottles in the silent refrigerator were still cool, and she realized that she was feeling dehydrated.

  Damien joined her for a short drink, but was ill at ease in the windowed room and soon pulled her out.

  They saw no one and heard nothing on that floor. Brice was feeling hopeful that Dippel had given up and left, but Damien seemed positive that he was still somewhere in the building.

  Their luck held for three more floors. They encountered no one in the stairwells, and the batteries in the smoke detectors continued to work, providing them with light so that they could conserve the batteries in their small flashlight. The occasional sharp chirp from the alarms overhead was at first unnerving, but Brice was growing accustomed to the electronic cheeping and was soon able to mostly ignore it.