djinn wars 02 - taken

by Christine Pope

  When he spoke, however, he sounded more weary than angry. “Yes, I know those feelings very well, as you’ve made them abundantly clear on more than one occasion. I have not had speech with the others, and see no reason to. They are set on their course, and we are protected here, and that is all we need to concern ourselves with. For now, I would advise you to enjoy this reunion with your beloved, and to let the rest of this go. I should think you would be eager to be together, rather than belaboring the same point over and over again.”

  Well, that was one thing Zahrias and I could agree on. While I understood the need for this debriefing, for lack of a better term, what I wanted most was to be with Jace, to hide ourselves away in our suite for a while so we could rediscover one another. Or, in my case, discover him for the first time. We had made love many times, but that was when I’d thought he was Jason Little River. I needed to be with him now, in his true form, so I could fall in love with him all over again.

  Something of these thoughts seemed to have communicated themselves to Jace, because he nodded at Zahrias and said, “That is true enough. I suppose we can discuss the device more tomorrow.”

  “I will have Lauren see if there is anyone in the group who can contribute to that conversation.”

  Those words had the tone of a dismissal. Jace said, “Until tomorrow, then,” and I chimed in,

  “Thank you, Zahrias.”

  He seemed somewhat surprised that I’d thanked him, but recovered enough to incline his head and say gravely, “You are very welcome, Jessica Monroe.”

  That seemed as good a time as any to make our escape.

  We didn’t go immediately to our suite, however, but to the dining hall to see what we could scrounge up. By then it was almost noon, and so Phillip, the former chef turned cook for the djinn/Chosen colony, was in the kitchens overseeing lunch preparations. Although he startled upon seeing us — it seemed as if word hadn’t yet begun to spread regarding Jace’s and my return — when Phillip heard we hadn’t had a proper meal for some time, he put together a wonderful lunch together for us and set it all on one of the resort’s room service carts.

  “Just leave it outside your door when you’re done, and someone will come along to get it,” he told us, blue eyes glinting slightly. That glint seemed to indicate he understood that we probably wouldn’t be all that eager to leave our suite anytime soon.

  Both Jace and I thanked him and headed off to our room. We’d left a fire burning in the hearth, and the pleasant scent of wood smoke greeted us as we opened the door. I trundled the room service cart in while Jace shut the door. To my surprise, he didn’t follow me as I went over to the little table for two by the window, but remained standing where he was, surveying the space.

  “Is something wrong?” I asked. Maybe he didn’t like the room, for some reason. It was done in a vaguely Native American motif, with a kiva fireplace and neutral tones. I thought it was beautiful, but….

  “Nothing’s wrong,” he said at once. “It’s just…this. Being here with you. Those weeks I was being held captive, I didn’t think I would ever see you again, let alone have the chance to be with you like this. I think I’m trying to tell myself that this is real, and not a dream I conjured to comfort myself while enduring Margolis’ torments.”

  Something about his words brought home to me more than anything else everything he’d gone through. I let go of the cart’s handles and crossed the room to him, took his hands in mine. At least his fingers were warm, which meant he had recovered…physically, if nothing else. I pulled him closer, whispering, “I’m so sorry. I should have tried to get you out sooner. I was trying to blend in, get them to trust me. I knew if I got caught, I’d never be able to get you away from there. But I got caught anyway, so I shouldn’t have wasted all that time.”

  He brought my fingers to his lips, kissing them, and a tremulous sort of warmth went over me. I wanted him so badly, and yet this still felt so strange. This was Jace — I recognized the intonation of his voice, even if it was slightly deeper than the voice he’d used as Jason Little River. And those dark eyes were the same shape, more or less, although they now showed more laugh lines when he smiled. The lines of the mouth, so close, but subtly different, enough that when I kissed him, I had to remind myself that this was Jace, but also Jasreel, and that they were one and the same, even if my eyes weren’t still entirely convinced of that fact.

  “Beloved,” he said, the word making my heart turn over. I didn’t think I would ever get tired of hearing him call me that. “Please, if you love me, do not berate yourself. You did what you thought best. I truly believe it was the best strategy, because you’re right — if you had simply shown up and immediately tried to go where you were not allowed, I have no doubt that Margolis would have apprehended you at once. It was bad luck that you were caught when you finally did have the opportunity to find me. We were very close to getting away, after all.”

  Not close enough, I thought, but I knew better than to utter those words out loud. Jace and I had already been over this, and I knew he wanted me to let the matter go. Sometimes that was hard for me; I wanted to work at a problem until it was resolved to my satisfaction. Some things couldn’t be fixed, however. I didn’t have a time machine; I couldn’t turn back the clock and head another direction down that corridor at the labs, and possibly elude capture that way. Besides, even if the two of us had gotten safely off that floor, we still would have had to attempt to rescue Natila, and we could have gotten caught just as easily doing that.

  “I suppose so,” I said reluctantly, and he pulled me to him then, brought his mouth against mine. I could taste the sweet-spice of the mulled wine on his tongue, and in that moment regret was forgotten, worry cast aside. There was only Jace…Jasreel…this amazing man whose lips seemed to fit so perfectly with mine, even if they were a slightly different shape from the lips of the Jace I had first kissed.

  We held the kiss for a long moment. At length he pulled away, though, sending me an apologetic look. “Beloved, I want you…more than you can possibly know. But I also know I won’t be able to love you properly without eating something first.”

  I wanted to laugh, just because he seemed so worried that I would be offended. How could I be, though? For all I knew, he hadn’t eaten a decent meal in weeks. Smiling, I replied, “Jace, I think I can manage to wait another fifteen minutes or so. Besides, I’m hungry, too.”

  He seemed to relax then, going over to the cart and picking up one of the smoked turkey and provolone sandwiches Phillip had made for us. One bite, and Jace’s eyes widened. I had to fight back a smile, since I’d had roughly the same reaction when I first tasted Phillip’s cooking.

  Although he must have been ravenous, and probably could have devoured the whole thing in just a minute or so, Jace stopped and set down the sandwich. “Aren’t you going to eat?”

  “Yes,” I said. I hadn’t been lying when I’d told him I was hungry, but there was something oddly satisfying about standing there and watching him eat, knowing it had been a very long while since he’d had any real food. But since it appeared he intended to wait until I began to eat as well, I went to the room service cart and retrieved my own sandwich. As I’d thought, that widening of the eyes hadn’t merely been from satisfying what must have been a raging hunger — those sandwiches would have been amazing even to someone who didn’t feel like eating. Smoked turkey, and thick slices of provolone, and roasted red pepper and fresh-baked ciabatta rolls…I wasn’t sure how Phillip managed it all, except that Taos was apparently like Los Alamos in that it had never suffered a loss of power, and so all the food in the various restaurant freezers and so forth had survived more or less unscathed.

  Jace and I took our food over to the little table by the window and sat down, eating in companionable silence while we watched a playful wind blow through the courtyard outside, sending little flurries of snow fluttering into the air. The meal had something of the feeling of a ritual. We’d eaten together many times before,
but this particular breaking of bread seemed to renew and reestablish our relationship, to bring us back together, sealing the djinn and Chosen bond.

  Once he’d finished his sandwich, and the small bowl of sliced apples that had gone with it, Jace wiped his mouth with a napkin. “And you don’t mind?”

  “Don’t mind what?” I asked, wondering what he was driving at. I’d been about to pick up a slice of apple but paused, something in his expression stopping me.

  “That I am…not the man you fell in love with. Not precisely, anyway.”

  I met his gaze squarely. Yes, there were many similarities in his appearance to Jason Little River, but Jasreel was not the same person. I’d already begun to catalogue the differences, to recognize them for what they were, and then to put them aside. So what if the shape of his jaw was slightly different, or the arch of his brows? Those were all trivialities. They weren’t Jace. I’d never known Jason Little River, not the real one. I’d only known Jace, wearing Jason’s appearance. But the person inside?

  That hadn’t changed.

  “You are exactly the man I fell in love with, Jasreel.” My voice was calm, the use of his full name deliberate. Despite my going to Los Alamos to find him, despite everything we’d both been through, it seemed he still had his doubts.

  I could think of only one way to convince him that nothing between us had changed. Not really.

  Rising from my seat, I reached out to him, and he took my hands and stood as well. Now that he was no longer under the influence of one of Miles Odekirk’s devices, his fingers were as warm as I remembered, strong and sure as they closed around mine.

  He had to be just a little taller in his true form; I realized that I had to go up on my tiptoes to touch my lips to his. And God, the taste of him, sweetness of apples, the heat of his mouth, the strength and power in that body as it pressed against mine. The clothes he’d been given were djinn garments, loose robe and full pants, and through the silky fabric I could feel the hardness of his arousal, the size of him. That seemed to be a little larger as well.

  I decided I needed to find out for myself.

  The pants had a drawstring, and I loosened it as I sank down on my knees, taking him into my mouth, knowing somehow that this was the best way to show him exactly how much I wanted him, that I felt no need to restrain myself. His hands knotted in my hair as he let out a groan, and I moaned a little as well, a soft guttural sound low in my throat that reverberated against his shaft, awakening an echo in his own chest. Then he sighed.

  “Jessica….”

  Warm heat pulsed between my legs as I suckled him. Yes, he was bigger. Not by a lot, but enough that I noticed. Enough that I shivered at the thought of him inside me.

  He must have felt that tremor, because he gently withdrew from my mouth and took me by the arms, raising me so he could kiss me again, his lips closing on my tongue in an echo of the way I’d been sucking him just a moment earlier. And then my feet left the floor as he held me and we hovered in the air, which felt far warmer than it should have, even with a fire blazing away in the hearth.

  “Is this how the djinn make love?” I whispered. Maybe I should have been frightened, floating several feet above the ground like that, but somehow I couldn’t be. Not with Jace holding me.

  “It’s how I want to make love to you,” he said.

  Warm winds seemed to wrap around me, caressing me, and somehow my clothes were pulled away, drifting down to the floor. The silky heat of Jace’s flesh touched my bare skin, and just that brush of body against body was enough to make me cry out.

  But of course that was only the beginning. His mouth closed on my nipple, and his hand stroked its way up my thigh, fingers at last sinking into me, stroking me, touching me in that way only he knew how.

  The orgasm came hard and fast. I clenched around him, moaning, and while the tremors were still shivering their way through my body, he pushed himself into me. I gasped, clutching the heavy muscles of his arms to steady myself, feeling how he filled me, so thick, so strong. And we found our rhythm again, floating there, no bed to constrain us, no gravity to tell us which position we should assume next, only the need driving us together, hanging on to one another as if the other person was the only real thing in the universe.

  I could tell when he was close, as the gentle, warm winds blowing around us increased their speed, whipping at my hair even as he thrust into me. And then a groan so deep it could have been a rumble of thunder, and he let go, the heat of his orgasm spilling into me, while I came as well, my legs wrapped around his rock-hard thighs, pushing him even deeper as I cried out in a release I’d been craving for weeks, one I wasn’t sure I would ever have again.

  Softly we descended, landing on the bed. For a long while we only held one another, neither of us wanting to let go of the moment, to suffer yet another separation. But at last I pulled away just a little, mostly so I could look into his face, stare at Jasreel’s features in the aftermath of his climax, and memorize his expression just as I’d memorized Jace’s before.

  He reached out to cup my cheek, fingers tracing the contours of my face. “You are so very real,” he said. “So beautiful. So strong.”

  “No,” I demurred, but he shook his head.

  “You are, Jessica. To me, you are perfection itself. While they were keeping me prisoner, I kept thinking of you. Remembering you, our time together…it’s what kept me sane. From time to time I did wonder if my memory was turning you into something you were not, but now that you’re here with me, I realize those memories were only a pale imitation of the woman you truly are.”

  Heat flooded my cheeks. I wasn’t used to being praised in such a fashion, and I didn’t know what to say in response. A crack — “you’re not so bad yourself” — would have been a reply the old Jessica might have made, but I couldn’t do that now. Not when he was staring at me with those earnest dark eyes, his soul seemingly laid bare to me.

  “I love you, Jace,” I said. “I never — I never thought I could feel this way about someone. Those people in Los Alamos…they think I’m a traitor to my own kind. But they don’t know you. If they did, they’d know how good you are, how amazing. How perfect.”

  He pulled me against him, his mouth brushing against mine. Need pulsed in me again, but I ignored it. We’d had our moment, and would have another soon enough, I was sure. Now, though, I wanted to be here, held in his arms, feeling safe and comforted in a way I’d thought I never would be again, as he laid his cheek against mine and stroked my hair.

  For some reason, I blurted, “I gave our goats away.”

  His hand stilled on my hair. “What?”

  “When I went to Los Alamos. Evony and I thought maybe they’d be more likely to take us in if we brought them gifts, so we took the goats and the chickens. I’m sorry.”

  For a long moment, Jasreel didn’t reply, and I worried that I might have upset him with that revelation. After all, he’d put a lot of work into taking care of the animals, building shelters for them, feeding them. But then he said, voice amused, “Beloved, I doubt those were the only goats and chickens in New Mexico.”

  “Well, true, but — ”

  “And they would not have survived on their own. At least now they’re someplace where they’re valued and taken care of.”

  I had to hope that was the case. The goats were worth far more as milk producers than as meat animals, and maybe the chickens were, too. I had a feeling that Captain Margolis wouldn’t scruple at chopping the head off a hen if she stopped laying, though.

  “Thank you, Jace,” I said simply, but he seemed to understand.

  “I can’t fault you for doing what you thought was best. And no doubt they have plenty of animals here in Taos, so perhaps they’re doing more good in Los Alamos anyway.”

  Smiling, I shifted in his arms so I was gazing up into those dark, dark eyes of his. “Are you sure you’re a djinn?”

  An eyebrow lifted. “What else would I be?”

  “Well, wh
en you make statements like that, I have to start wondering whether you’re some sort of saint instead.”

  The crinkles around his eyes deepened as he smiled back at me. “No, Jessica, I am most assuredly not a saint. And I realize that most of the people in Los Alamos probably have no idea what Margolis has actually been doing. They just want to live, to be someplace where they can feel safe after the world they knew was torn from them so suddenly. I can’t begrudge them something that might help them to live, not when we have plenty here in Taos.”

  I hadn’t thought I could love him more than I already did, but in that moment it felt as if something inside me gave way, aching for him, for all that he’d given me…and others, if they would just let him. How he could even be of the same race as those who’d destroyed most of humanity, I didn’t know. Certainly Zahrias hadn’t exhibited many of the same characteristics. And as for the djinn who were out hunting down the human race’s few remaining members…well, I’d count myself lucky if I never had to encounter any of them.

  “You’re being a lot more charitable than I would if our situations were reversed,” I said after a long pause. “Especially considering what they did to Natila.”

  Jasreel shut his eyes for a few seconds, long black lashes sweeping against his high cheekbones. Then he opened them and gave me a piercing look. “‘They’ did not do that to Natila. Captain Margolis and Miles Odekirk…and their henchmen…did. Rest assured that if I should ever encounter either of those two again, they will be made to pay the price for the crime they committed.”

  Strong words, said with conviction. I didn’t bother to point out that if Odekirk’s devices were still operating, then Jace wouldn’t have a lot of options when it came to giving the two men some frontier justice. Still, it was possible he might still get satisfaction one day. After all, we’d managed to capture one of those boxes, and if we were able to get it to give up some of its secrets…well, then the tables might turn for sure.