by Holley Trent
She closed her eyes and savored the brush of his lips against hers and the sound of his gentle breaths as he lingered there, caressing her cheek. “I like you, John.”
“I’m glad you like me. Glad you didn’t kick me out of your car, ’cause I like you, too.”
“You sure it’s not just my driving you like?”
His tongue flicked against the seam of her lips, teasing it to open, so she let him in.
He kissed her long and tenderly, and although Ariel knew that on this night the kiss wouldn’t escalate to sex, it somehow seemed the most erotic thing they’d done to date. Maybe it was because it was just a kiss and not foreplay. Not a come-on. Not a tease.
He drew back with a sharp inhale and took a moment to catch his breath, resting his forehead against hers. “The driving’s just a bonus. You’re a special woman, Ariel.”
She’d heard that before. A couple of times. “Are you about to give me the it’s not you, it’s me speech?”
“No. I’m not giving you an escape route. You’re going to have to put up with me.”
“You make that sound like work.”
“You have no idea. Would you be content with being with a man with no education? Who works with his hands for a living?”
“What kind of woman do you think I am?” Of course she’d be content. Going home to a man like that every night? Someone who made her feel like the woman she was and not some silly little rube? Who wouldn’t be content? An idiot, probably.
“One that’s too good for me.”
He sounded like he really meant that. She leaned back and gave him a good, hard stare. “What makes you say that?”
“Sweetpea, you picked me up from a roadside. I spent the first twenty-eight years of my life in a cult where I was trained to believe I had no value. I had even less value than some guy’s fourteenth wife. I don’t know how to do a whole lot. I don’t have any friends. I’ll never be able to take you home to meet my mother. I’m rife with dysfunction. You have a life. I’m basically your roadie. You’re the headline event, Ariel.”
She rolled her eyes. “Stop. You can have a life, too. You’ve just got to put down some roots somewhere. Figure out where you want to be.”
“I’d follow you to the bottom of the sea and put down roots there if I had to.”
Her cheeks burned and she had to pull her gaze away from his intense blue stare for fear she go lightheaded. She stood. “Don’t stay up too late. Momma gets up early, and five A.M. seems especially hellacious when she’s rattling around in the kitchen.”
“You getting up early to go running?”
“No. I think I might just sleep in for a change.”
“What would your grandmother say if I … ” He stood, too, and pushed back that swath of hair that’d fallen into her eyes again, this time tucking it behind her ear. “ … if I slept in your room?”
“What would she say? She wouldn’t say anything. She’d just assume.”
“Assume what?”
“That we’re … together. Monogamous. Committed. Right now, she thinks you’re just a friend from way back when.”
“I’m okay with her making assumptions.”
“And are you okay with the slew of questions that’ll go along with it?”
“I’ll figure something out. I’ll make up a whole history for us. It’ll be fantastic.”
“Okay.” She laced her fingers through his and pulled him to his feet. “You’d better grab that pillow then.”
He did.
She led him to her childhood bedroom, now decorated in simple mauve with minimal embellishment, and closed the door. “There’s no air conditioning in here. You’d better take off some of those clothes.”
“Now-now. Walls are pretty thin. Wouldn’t want to wake your grandmother.”
“I can be quiet.”
His doubtful expression didn’t need translation.
“Let’s see if you can be.” She hooked her fingers into the elastic waistband of his pants and eased them down. “Have anything else you’ve always wanted to try?”
His cock sprang to attention even before she wrapped her fingers around its base. She dropped to her knees and swiveled her eyes up to see his face as she lapped his head with her tongue.
He took in a ragged breath and shook his head. “No. But, this is nice.”
“And quiet.”
“Mm-hmm.”
For now.
Chapter Thirteen
By Monday morning, John had already developed a proprietary feeling over the little house and its occupants. Ms. Morton — Clarissa — was sweet and doting, and seemed to really appreciate the company. Coming from such a sprawling family himself where individual attention was so precious and rare, it was nice to enjoy the quiet fellowship. And Ariel, well … He hadn’t stopped being sure about Ariel. In his estimation, she was the perfect woman, and that made being around her incredibly difficult. Every time they made love or even kissed, that incubus part of him flared to life and threatened to suck her dry.
If she caught on to how tentative he was with her, she didn’t show it.
“Well, wish me luck,” Ariel said.
John was in the back yard in the early morning, shoring up Clarissa’s chicken coop when Ariel stepped out onto the deck, all dressed up in dark slacks and a ruffled silk blouse. Once again, he was reaffirmed about how out of his league she was. She was a vision — all sophisticated and wearing make-up for the first time he’d seen — and he wanted to keep her at home, all to himself.
He dropped the hammer he was holding and climbed the deck stairs. “You don’t need my luck. You’ll do fabulously.”
“You’ll be here when I get back? You won’t take off?”
He shifted his weight. He was still upholding the pretense that there was a job waiting on him down in — where had he said? Myrtle Beach? What would happen when she really did have time to drive him there, only to find there was nothing?
“Yeah, I’ll be here. Going to try to get that gutter back up and fix that section of shingles.”
“You’re wonderful for doing this for Momma.”
“Hey, it was the only thing I was good for back at the compound.”
He stooped low and kissed her lips. “You’d better get going. Don’t want to be late on your first day.”
“I’ll be home by seven.”
“I’ll be watching the clock.”
She stood on tiptoes and gave him one last peck before disappearing through the sliding door, passing Clarissa on the way back in.
Clarissa grinned at her and bid her farewell, then crossed her arms over her voluminous chest and narrowed her eyes at John.
It was an odd expression from her. Her countenance had always been so pleasant up until that point. Well, except for that night she’d caught him ogling her crosses.
Ariel’s car door slammed, then there was the sound of her ignition starting, and her backing down the gravel driveway to the country road.
“I should be finished with the coop in a couple of hours,” he said. He pulled his work gloves from his jeans pockets and crammed his hands inside.
“That’s great. It’ll be nice having fresh eggs again.” Her voice was utterly flat. She sounded like she could care less about the eggs or anything else for that matter.
John nodded and bounded down the stairs. He picked up the roll of chicken wire and reached into his pocket for some poultry staples.
Clarissa followed him across the dewy yard in her house shoes and stood some distance from him, scowling.
“Did you want this done a bit differently or … ?”
“What are you?” she said in response.
“I’m sorry?” His stomach dropped, but somehow he managed to keep his expression emotion-free. He st
ill wasn’t sure what she was asking. Maybe she was asking him about his occupation or his religious affiliation.
“What are you? What side are you on?”
The coffee he’d poured down his throat that morning felt like acid burning its way back up right then. “What side?”
“Don’t play dumb. Ariel may not know about this stuff, but I do. I know it too well. Lost a sister and more to it.”
He squatted and wrapped his fingers around hammer with his free hand. Then he started tacking chicken wire into place as if he hadn’t heard her.
“You a demon?”
“Not exactly.”
“What do you want?”
“I want Ariel.” He kept hammering.
“That much is obvious. What do you want her for?”
He stilled his tapping and studied the grain of the wood post in front of him. “What do I want her for? I want her to love me.” He knocked the next tack in and stood.
“Why?” Clarissa walked over and put a steadying hand on the wire roll while he fastened it.
“Because that’s the way it works, right? You love someone and you want them to love you back. It hurts when it’s only one way.”
“Why her? Why haven’t you moved on?”
“She’s my first. My only.”
“So, a novelty, then.”
“No. A major inconvenience.” He sighed and ferreted a pocket bible he’d found in Clarissa’s kitchen drawer out of his back pocket. “I think right now, this is the only thing keeping my father from appearing here. And the crosses you have inside.”
“What kind of sorry half-breed are you?”
He scoffed and leaned against the post, shaking his head. “The kind who was at rock bottom because he had absolutely nothing going for him in life. My father offered me a way out — a way to see the world, and I took it. I thought I could handle what it meant to be a cambion, an incubus. But, I don’t want to be either of those things. I just want to be normal.”
“I believe you.”
“Why?”
“Because only an idiot like you could pick up the one book in the house that has a demon-repelling charm inside and not be affected by it. I don’t know why you’re not, but you’re not. You think I don’t know how many of you half-breeds are moving around? I suspect there were a few at Ariel’s high school. They left her alone, though, probably because they knew what happened to the last one who came here.”
“What happened to him?”
“Oh, that’s a family secret. Even Ariel doesn’t know. Suffice it to say, it’s part of the reason her parents aren’t around. It’s for their own safety. They’ve got targets, you know. They keep moving.”
Jeez. And all this time she thought they were bad eggs.
John unrolled the wire a bit more. “I’m trying to get help. My brother says I might be able to suppress it. I’m biding my time. But tell me, how could you tell I wasn’t quite human?”
“Because I’m equipped to. I made it my business after one took my sister and made my daughter run. I know the signs. I can feel the charge in my body. Made my damn ankles swell up.”
“Sorry.”
She flicked a hand at him. “What are your intentions toward my Ariel?”
He blew out a breath and dragged his shirtsleeve across his sweaty forehead. “I just want to be so good to her and never stop. If she’ll have me. The only money I have to my name is courtesy of a certain demon, and I think once he figures out what I’m up to I’ll be eternally cut off from the cash flow.”
“Being broke sucks.” She held out a tack to him. “They started as angels, you know.”
“Yeah, my mother used to always tell me. Again and again as a kid. I didn’t understand why she used to harp on it. Seemed like an obsession.”
“Maybe she knows something she can’t say in plain language.”
That simple statement rang very true to John for some reason. “Maybe so. Unfortunately, I don’t really have a way to contact her. She’s in a cult.”
“Where there’s a will, there’s a way. You want some coffee?”
“What is it with you, Ariel, and the coffee?” He grinned. Ariel had said as long as Clarissa offered food, it meant she was okay. That she’d tolerate him.
Clarissa shrugged and shuffled through the damp grass. “It’s genetic.”
John took a break from outside chores at around eleven and sat down to a lunch of cold cut sandwiches and chips. While Clarissa chattered to the television screening soap operas in the living room, he scrolled through his notifications. There was a missed call and message from a number he didn’t recognize. He queued up the message and put the phone to his ear.
“Hello, number three. That’s your new name, all right? I can’t keep up with all these goddamned nicknames. Claude’s one. I’m two. You’re three. All right, this is my new number. I’m passing through the desert wasteland in Arizona and thought of you. I only have a couple of minutes. I’m in this chick’s truck about to handle business. Let me know how you’re making out.”
Charles disconnected.
John immediately returned his call. He saw the opportunity there. Like Clarissa had said, where there was a will, there was a way.
“Hey, number two. It’s three. I need your help. I need to get a message to my mother if you’re still in the area. I’m not sure how you’d manage it. They don’t let strange men get too close to the compound, but if you’re near Kofa, let me know. I might be able to come up with something.” He pressed End and hoped Charles was still in the area.
After a whomping bite of his sandwich, he returned Claude’s earlier text message.
“Little problem here in North Carolina. I’ve been outed, sort of, by Ariel’s grandmother. She can identify us, but she’s tolerating me for the moment. I’d like to keep it that way. Have you found anything else about my mark? I have three full siblings. I’d like to figure this out before Gulielmus reins them in. Clarissa brought up the angel thing again and I suspect Ariel’s being watched by one or two.”
It was all he could do for the time being. So, he finished his sandwiches and when Clarissa called to him, suggesting he check out the silliness occurring in her favorite soap opera, he did.
He had to pick a team, and right then, Clarissa was the stronger captain. Best he do what she said.
• • •
Ariel wasn’t sure how she felt about her first day of work. It hadn’t been especially productive, though she hadn’t expected it to be. Mostly, she filled out stacks of paperwork, set up her office — which she was grateful to have, even if she had to share it with a copywriter who started the same day — took a tour of the converted warehouse the agency was set up in, and met all the critical personnel.
Many of them were actually excited to meet her, having anticipated her arrival. One surly creative director named Agatha had peered at her over the top frame of her reading glasses, studied her from head to toe, and said, “Thank goodness you’re here,” in a flat monotone that was so devoid of inflection, Ariel wasn’t sure if she should laugh.
The human resources flunky leading her around had whispered, “Don’t mind her. She’s the one who told us to recruit you. She likes your style. You’re the first woman she’s personally suggested, and she’s been here for fifteen years, the old battleaxe.”
“Good to know,” Ariel had said.
Work may have been a little weird so far, but it felt damned good to be home. Already, she could tell the atmosphere was far more in sync with her Southern instincts. When she said she wanted “sweet tea,” people knew what that meant and didn’t try to give her that fancy fruity crap. No one gave her a sideways look for wearing flip-flops instead of pumps with her slacks.
She felt like she’d made the right decision.
On the way t
o Momma’s, she made a quick stop at Target for coffee and men’s pajamas, thinking of how funny it was that Momma hadn’t given John the third degree yet. At least, not really. She must have been wearing down with old age. Had he been any other man, he would have already made his apologies and left on the first thing smoking.
She could see John on the little house’s roof half a mile down the country road, his white T-shirt standing out in stark contrast to the ochre shingles. Just as her heart began to race at seeing him still there — reminding her that this wasn’t a dream after all — her stomach sank. Instinct said, “He’s going to fall.”
And he did.
Just as she reached the driveway, he had a misstep, caught his foot in the gutter tray, and tumbled off the roof edge, headfirst.
She barreled down the driveway, spinning up gravel and not caring what it was doing to her paint. At the porch, she parked haphazardly and ran from the car, leaving the engine running and door wide open.
“Momma!” she shouted through the screen door as she ran past the porch. “Momma, call an ambulance.”
She heard movement inside the house, but didn’t wait to see if Momma was on her way or if she’d heard at all. John was hurt, and she had to help.
When she made to his body — prone in the three-inch grass, neck at an awkward angle — his face had colored bright red.
Eyes closed tight, he hissed through clenched teeth. “Shit,” he said.
“Don’t move, John. We’re going to call the paramedics.”
“Don’t — don’t.” He peeled one eye open and lifted an arm, flexing his fingers and determining the feeling did indeed go all the way to the ends.
Momma stepped onto the porch with the cordless phone. “What happened?”
“He fell off the roof. I saw it driving up.”
“Oh.” She tucked the phone into her apron pocket.
“Are they coming? Did you call?”
“Ariel, I’m okay.” With a grunt, he straightened his neck, and methodically tested all his limbs. All functional.
“Don’t try to get up. What if you hurt something in your back?”