by Jane Kindred
His spine began to tingle as he squeezed the blood into the censer, the prickling sensation spreading outward to his shoulders as if Quetzalcoatl were spreading his wings. With a sudden bang, the garden doors flew open, the brisk monsoon wind whipping through the room and making the candles on the altar sputter. It lifted Rafe’s hair—he always wore it down for ritual—and then an odd sensation followed in the tattooed skin on his back, as if the wind were drawing the ink out of him. The sky lit up with a multi-branched fork of lightning. With the nearly simultaneous thunderclap, Rafe hit the floor, dazed, as though the current had traveled through the ground into the room and he’d conducted it out.
The sound of beating wings overhead made him roll swiftly onto his back and he watched in disbelief as a massive crow flew out of his room and into the storm. As soon as the crow took flight, he knew what it was and what had happened. Rafe got up and went to the mirror, turning to look over his shoulder. The tattoo was gone.
In his mind’s eye, a sort of picture-in-picture display of the crow’s-eye view was visible as it flew south—not constant, as if he were flying himself, but as if the nagual were periodically checking in with him, keeping him apprised of what it saw. Because there was only one explanation for what was happening here—Rafe had released his own nagual.
While a refreshing wind flowed through his room and against his bare skin, Rafe sat on the bed and watched the crow arrive at Phoebe’s house, seeing through its eyes as the crow alighted on the palo verde tree in the yard. Phoebe crossed in front of the window wearing a short, silk kimono, her bare legs reminding him of how they’d felt wrapped around his hips.
Before he could let that train of thought get out of hand, one eye of the nagual focused on the road as movement caught it. Just a slight flutter of what could have been only the buffalo grass, but which Rafe—or the nagual—instinctively knew was Coyote hiding within it. “Crow” imparted this to Rafe through a kind of instant telepathic understanding, as though both naguals were the avatars of legend.
Coyote saw Crow, the yellow eyes revealing naked animosity instead of the amusement Coyote had viewed Rafe with during his recent encounters. Crow’s presence meant Rafe’s quetzal was awake and aware, and Coyote wasn’t pleased.
Coyote paced along the perimeter of Phoebe’s property. Perhaps that was also part of his displeasure. It seemed Rafe’s protection spell was working and Coyote couldn’t cross the imaginary boundary Rafe had envisioned around Phoebe’s house.
Crow fluffed its feathers as the clouds broke overhead and rain began to fall, its other eye trained on Phoebe. The water obscured her somewhat through the pane, like a watercolor filter in a photo-editing program. Her hair was tied up in that bouncy ponytail again, fresh from the shower, and Rafe could imagine the smell of her shampoo and body wash. He was, as his mother would have put it, thoroughly smitten. But the thought of his mother depressed him and he wished he hadn’t gone there.
His mother’s infidelity was inextricably linked with Rafe’s trust issues. Not simply because she’d been unfaithful to his father, but because of whom she’d been unfaithful with. The usual rage accompanied this line of thinking. How could she have not known what kind of a piece-of-shit, dirt-bag loser Ford was? And that putting her son in close proximity with him just to facilitate her own affair would damage Rafe irrevocably? How could she not have seen?
The flood of angry emotion and adrenaline had drawn his consciousness away from Crow and he could no longer see Phoebe. Rafe leaped from the bed and paced, as Coyote had, fists clenched at his sides. He came up short before the mirror and it took everything in him not to smash his fist into the glass. Irrational bursts of anger, his school therapist had told him all those years ago, were hallmarks of PTSD.
Rafe had been getting in trouble at school for starting fights. Teachers, and his father, thought it was because of his mother’s recent death—the overdose of her bipolar meds ruled accidental because no one wanted to damage Rafael Diamante Sr.’s reputation. And there was certainly that in it—anger at his mother for dying. And for screwing around on his dad. But the school-assigned therapist had managed to discern that Rafe’s anger had a deeper, more personal, source.
The candles on his altar went out in a gust of wind and Rafe shook himself. He’d left Phoebe vulnerable. The circle he’d cast hadn’t been properly opened. He closed his eyes and tried to reconnect with the nagual. The images from it were hazy and jumbled. Someone was yelling. Phoebe.
With a kind of heavy, mental thud, Rafe was back, viewing the world through Crow’s eyes. Coyote was attacking him and Crow screeched as the other nagual whipped him about by the left wing, going in for the kill at his throat.
The yelling he’d heard turned into screaming and Phoebe ran at them through the rain, wielding a broom. “Let go of him, you bastard! Get the hell off my lawn!” She swung and hit Coyote in the rump and Coyote let go of Crow and turned and snarled at her.
Rafe’s consciousness began to overwhelm the primal instincts of the crow—or to merge with them, perhaps—and he lunged at the coyote. Only crows didn’t lunge, exactly. The crow flapped its wings, screeching furiously, and then Rafe was stumbling on his two feet in the mud, an odd, howling yell coming out of his mouth as he went for the coyote, instinct telling him to tear it apart.
“Oh, my God.” Phoebe gaped at him and Rafe realized he was naked—and human—and standing in Phoebe’s yard threatening a coyote. The animal bolted into the darkness and Rafe slipped and landed on his ass.
Chapter 18
There were worse things Phoebe could think of to find in her front yard than a stark-naked Rafe Diamante. Though how the hell he’d gotten there she couldn’t begin to understand.
As she’d helped him up and into the house, he’d given her some excuse about the necromancer casting illusions that was obviously nonsense. One minute, the coyote had been attacking a defenseless bird. The next, Rafe had been barreling across her yard in its place, naked and howling like an Aztec warrior. That had been no illusion.
He was in her shower now, washing off the mud, while Phoebe tried to find him something to wear. Spare men’s clothing wasn’t exactly a thing she kept around. When he came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel, she handed him a pair of roomy stretch-cotton pajama bottoms and an extra-large T-shirt she sometimes wore to sleep in. He looked askance at the pink-and-white-striped bottoms.
“Sorry.” Phoebe shrugged. “That’s the only thing I’ve got that might fit you.”
“Well, this should be interesting.”
Phoebe couldn’t suppress a little smirk when he’d dressed and emerged from the bathroom. The pajama bottoms came midway down his shins and hugged his body snugly, leaving nothing to the imagination, and the faded red T-shirt stretched across his abs left the little trail of hair below his navel visible.
Rafe rolled his eyes. “I look like the gay Hulk.”
“Now why hasn’t anybody done that?” Phoebe grinned. “That would be an awesome idea for a comic.”
“But would it be gay Bruce Banner or would straight Bruce Banner just suddenly hulk out in style?”
“Tough call. Except he’d be wearing the pants beforehand, of course. The real question is would his skin be green or something more fabulous?” She folded her arms across her damp bathrobe and flicked her eyebrows. “So. Would you like to tell me what’s really going on?”
Rafe sighed. “I was working a protection spell for you because I was worried about the necromancer’s nagual—with good reason, as it turns out—and I...seem to have activated my own.”
“Your own...what?”
“Nagual. The crow—it emerged from the ink and separated from me. The tattoo was gone.” He turned and tugged up the back of his borrowed shirt, revealing the colorful serpent. “It’s back now, I assume.”
Phoebe nodded. “Right where it’s suppos
ed to be. But why a crow? Why not the feathered serpent?”
“Maybe because its intent was to go unnoticed? A flying, feathered snake would definitely draw attention.” Rafe let the shirt slide back down over the smooth, strong muscles of his back. “I don’t really know why a crow, except they’re sometimes associated with Quetzalcoatl. Maybe I chose it unconsciously.”
“To do what?”
That telltale pink appeared at the tips of his ears. “To watch over you, I guess. I didn’t expect that to happen literally, but it turned out I could see through the crow’s eyes, like a sort of running background image in my head.” He nodded toward the living room window. “You should close those curtains, by the way. Maybe all your curtains.”
With a frown, Phoebe stepped into the living room and drew the drapes, reaching up on tiptoe to pull them tight at the top. When she turned around, Rafe’s Hulk pants were noticeably tighter at the crotch.
She cast her eyes deliberately toward the bulge and back to his face. “Well, thank you very much. It’s nice to be appreciated.”
Rafe glanced down with his hands on his hips. “Jesus. Sorry. Your robe is all damp and clingy, and when you were up on your toes—” He swallowed. “I should probably go.”
Phoebe couldn’t help but burst out laughing. “What, are you going to walk all the way to Stone Canyon like that?”
Rafe grinned. “I’m pretty sure it won’t be like this—” he copied her downward eye graze “—for more than the first mile. Two miles, tops.”
“Wow, two miles? I’m impressed. You did seem to have some serious stamina the other night.” Phoebe gave him a sideways look. “It does beg a certain question in my mind, but I’m not sure if it’s rude to ask.”
Rafe lifted an eyebrow. “Ask away.”
“In the relationships you’ve had before...” Phoebe bit her lip. “It was actually a problem for these women...that you...had such staying power?”
To her relief, Rafe laughed good-naturedly. “As much as I’d like to claim superhuman powers in that department, I have to attribute a fair amount of my “staying power” that night to just how much I’m attracted to you. Which is a significant amount, as I think is pretty obvious by now.” His grin broadened. “But the experiences I’ve had with other women were, to put it mildly, extremely frustrating. For both of us.”
Phoebe wanted to kick herself. Of course they were. “I’m sorry. That was insensitive of me, just thinking in terms of my own pleasure.”
Rafe cocked his head, reminding her of the crow. “Are you? I mean—thinking of it?”
She laughed, brushing her hands up her forearms into her sleeves. “Uh, yeah. Definitely thinking of it. Really kind of hard to think of anything else at the moment.”
Rafe’s smile was still quizzical. “When you said my problem wasn’t a deal-breaker, I kind of thought you meant...sometime in the future, maybe. If I were to somehow manage to redeem myself.”
Phoebe smiled. “I think materializing in my yard to save me from an evil coyote spirit ranks right up there in the redeeming-yourself department. And the gay Hulk pants really clinch the deal.” Rafe laughed again, but he still had the uncertain look on his face. “Anyway, I don’t mean to put pressure on you. I’m just trying to subtly, maybe not so subtly, suggest you stay here tonight. We can just talk. Maybe watch The Hulk.” She winked and his smile broadened.
“That would be nice.” Rafe folded his arms, leaning against the support beam between the hallway and the living room. After a brief moment his arms unfolded once more and he straightened. “Wait. Are you saying you own a copy of The Hulk?”
Phoebe laughed. “Yes.”
“As in The Incredible Hulk with Edward Norton? Or the Eric Bana version?”
“Both, actually. I have all the Avengers movies. I also have the complete Bill Bixby series.”
“Oh, my God. I might have to marry you, Phoebe Carlisle.”
It was clearly a joke, but her heart did a little flip-flop just the same. She gave him a wry smile. “Let’s just start with dinner and a movie and see where it goes from there.”
* * *
True to her word, after ordering a pizza, Phoebe broke out The Incredible Hulk. Rafe had never spent such a relaxed evening with a woman before. Every date he’d ever been on had been fraught with tension. Knowing the evening would inevitably end in awkwardness if he didn’t make a move, or disappointment and frustration if he did, made it hard to just be himself with a woman.
With Phoebe, the awkwardness was already out of the way. And instead of setting up in the living room, she’d grabbed the pizza and the movie and headed straight to the bedroom to watch and eat from bed. No transition from one room to the other necessary to signal something was expected to happen. They were just two friends hanging out. If something happened, great. But if it didn’t, he felt completely at ease that she’d be fine with it.
Before the movie was halfway through, however, it was obvious Option A was in play. Still wearing the silky robe, Phoebe had snuggled up against him with Rafe spooned around her—while Puddleglum surreptitiously made off with her pizza crust—and Rafe had become unbearably distracted by the scent of her hair.
He leaned in close to breathe it in and placed his lips against the side of her neck.
“Hey. Blonsky’s about to turn into the Abomination and go on a rampage.” The shiver as she moved her head to the side gave the lie to her casual tone.
“Spoiler alert,” he murmured, kissing lower on her neck. “Hulk defeats him. Almost kills him. Betty stops him. And finds him better pants than the ones you gave me.”
Phoebe chuckled as he moved down the slope of her neck. “Well, damn. I guess we can just turn it off then.”
“Guess we can,” Rafe agreed, reaching around her for the remote and taking matters into his own hands.
Tossing the remote aside, he slid her robe from one shoulder, his cock growing hard as the tip of her breast was exposed. He tilted her head back against his shoulder and leaned over her to taste it, and Phoebe moaned appreciatively.
While he sucked the hard nipple into his mouth, Phoebe loosened her robe at her thighs and teased herself open with her fingertips. If not for his problem, Rafe might have come right then. It was incredibly hot watching her fingers dip between the blush of her sex—shaved since last time, he noticed, though she’d left a neatly trimmed bush above—and disappear inside her, reemerging glistening and sticky before they dipped again.
Phoebe reclined against him. “Can I ask you another personal question?”
Rafe pulled his mouth away from her breast with a slick pop, cupping the breast in his hand and strafing the damp nipple with his thumb. “You can ask. But you may not get an answer. I’m kinda preoccupied.”
Phoebe rubbed a wet finger against her clit, eliciting an involuntary groan from him. “Can you...follow through...manually?” Ah, the million-dollar question.
Rafe slid his hand over hers to intertwine their fingers so he could feel exactly how she liked to stroke herself. “When I’m alone, sure. Unfortunately it’s not a magic fix for the problem of finishing something I’ve started with someone else.”
“No, of course not.” Phoebe guided his middle finger with hers into the slick heat inside her for a moment with a sweet little noise of pleasure before pulling him out. Rafe loosened the tie on the Hulk pants with his other hand to give himself some air. “I was just thinking maybe we could both take care of ourselves. Together. But I’m okay with whatever you want to do. Or not do. Seriously. No pressure.”
Rafe paused in drawing his damp finger over her thigh. “Together? You mean...like next to each other? At the same time?”
She tilted her head back and glanced up at him with a soft, self-conscious laugh. “Is that a stupid idea? Should I just shut up?”
He couldn’t help b
ut turn her head toward him for a smothering kiss before answering. “Not a stupid idea at all. You’re amazing.”
Phoebe laughed again with the same soft, sexy self-deprecation. “Or maybe I’m just horny. But I think it would be fun.” She turned around and came up onto her knees, straddling his thighs—which were broad enough with his legs stretched on the bed that her own thighs were generously spread, giving him a fantastic view. And that one exposed breast was almost hotter than if she were naked. “Like this? Will this work?”
Rafe released himself from the Hulk pants with a groan, stroking almost unconsciously as he looked up at her. “God, yes.” He wasn’t even concentrating on his own stimulation as he watched her spread herself open, two fingers slowly penetrating. She pinched her nipple with her other hand, rocking into her strokes and making whimpering noises as her eyes closed.
He stroked himself with vigor as he watched Phoebe gyrate into her hand, pumping faster, the slick sound of her fingers and the breathless rhythm of her little moans making him harder. She seemed to be balanced so precariously as her excitement built that he reached out with his free hand and cupped her ass to steady her, letting his fingertips curl into the cleft.
That seemed to push her over the edge. Phoebe let out an almost-surprised little cry as she clenched her knees against his thighs, followed by a rapid succession of little gasps in a rising pitch, her fingers deeply buried, until at last she let out something between a sigh and a wail and let her weight sink back into his hand.
She opened her eyes, bright with pleasure, and Rafe’s unconscious, rapid stroking became incredibly conscious. The usual anxious feeling seized his gut and he moved his hand away, rubbing the back of it across the sweat at his forehead in a nervous gesture.