by A. J. Aalto
“No, you lay down,” I shot back, a bit too loud.
Outside the tent, we heard Declan cough out uncomfortably in the dark. “Well, somebody lay down! I’m going for a walk.”
Batten dropped his forehead to mine and we chortled, caught-out, heads together.
“I’m gonna be on top,” I told him. “You better hold on to something.”
“Woman, be serious,” he growled.
“I’m as serious as a bullet in the ass.”
“Hot,” he noted.
“Hope you packed a helmet, cuz I’m going to rock your skull right open. Wait, head wounds aren’t sexy.”
“Not especially,” he said, though he didn’t sound put off one bit. I chewed my bottom lip, trying to recover by flashing my you-still-want-all-this eyelash flutter. His teeth grazed my collarbone and moved to my throat, and for a second, I felt disoriented and ached for the tentative but possessive press of Harry’s fangs. Guilt made me flinch and my gasp must have transmitted my resistance, because Batten’s rhythm slowed.
His eyes searched mine. His voice was an intimate murmur. “You okay, Snickerdoodle?”
His hips drew away from mine in anticipation of withdrawing completely. I wrapped my legs around him and tightened, drawing him closer. “Yeah,” I said, trying to capture his mouth with mine. He dodged it.
“You sure?”
I rolled him to his back, which I couldn’t have done without his settling into his new role of naked playground equipment. This wasn’t our usual play; Batten had always been in charge once the clothes had come off. He lived to control things. I wondered how long he’d permit this before I got my ass flipped. The thought of him reclaiming control sent a shot of electricity through me from tits to toes, hardening my nipples in anticipation. I straddled him, feeling at once vulnerable and in control. He could tell. Batten knew me too well.
He took my hands away from my breasts and put them on his shoulders to brace against, saying low, “Don’t be shy, babe. I want to see you, too.”
I eased down on him, wriggling my hips to sheathe his cock. Stretching me, passively filling me with his hard heat, Batten let out a relaxed sigh and stroked down my body until his thumb found my clit. It was soon obvious, though, that this was not my comfort zone. I writhed and ground against him, but couldn’t find what I needed.
Batten watched me with a pained look on his face; he wasn’t about to put up with me frustrating myself for long. “Whatcha doin'?” he asked, flashing me that grin. “Problem?”
“Probably, it has to do with my prancing legs. They’re still twitchy.”
“Uh huh.”
“The fact that I’m still wearing one shoe is rather distracting.”
His smile was a smug line of perfectly white teeth. “I tried to help, but you were Miss In-Control.”
I gave a thrust of my hips, driving his cock deeper inside me like it was warning or something. “I’m still Miss In-Control.”
“How do you like it?” he asked conversationally, as though his dick wasn’t hilt-deep inside me and his hands weren’t fondling my breasts.
“I’m not terribly good at it,” I admitted. “But I think it’s critical at this juncture in our relationship that you learn your place.”
Batten’s laugh was hearty, and his body shook beneath me. “Is that so?”
“Yeah,” I said, rolling my hips around, making a face. “Except, I don’t think I’m gonna get very far up here.” I tilted a bit, tried to wrangle with the angle. “Batten?”
“May I be of some assistance, ma’am?” he drawled, teasing a nipple with his fingertip.
I considered this for a moment, while Batten put his hands on my hips to pull me and rock me on top of him. “Okay,” I said. “But only 'cuz I told you to.”
“Toppin’ from the bottom,” he agreed, but we both knew I was full of shit. As he flipped me back over and my hips rose against him, he gave my ass a swat. “You have a gentle body, babe.”
His tongue teased my earlobe with a delicate swipe that reminded me of how lovely that tongue felt pressed flat and hot against my clit.
“You need this,” he said into my mouth, and grabbed my hips, driving into me hard to demonstrate.
He was so right, and I let out a soft oh! of agreement. I loved having his big body on mine, feeling his hips pump forcefully between my trembling thighs. Loving it, conflicted, I whimpered and clutched at his shoulders.
“Tell me how you want it, babe,” he growled against the side of my throat, handing me back that tiny thread of control I craved, slowing his thrust until it was a delicious draw in and out.
I moaned and told him, “Faster.” When he obeyed, my body thrummed happily and my head forward back as I sank into the pleasure, letting it ride through me wildly and rampantly. “Harder,” I pleaded.
“Not yet,” he said raggedly.
“Please,” I gasped.
He made a demanding growl in my ear that meant no and I knew the tables had turned. My control fled quickly, but having Batten back in charge was exactly what excited me. I could have been stubborn, but his husky whisper in my ear, “not yet baby, don’t you cum yet,” made my toes curl hard. His urgent thrusting sank any desire I had to remove him from power, and though my need to cum was sharp and urgent, I held back, squeezing my lips tightly, closing my eyes, quivering badly as I danced along that delightful edge. I couldn’t wait for long; his powerful pumping had me so close that I had to bite my lip.
His breathing became ragged in my ear and he let out a low noise in the back of his throat that I knew was my permission, my cue. I bucked back against him eagerly, spilling over into ecstasy. When I cried out, I bit down on the blanket, smothering the cry as I felt him release inside me, thick and hot and delightful. We froze there, shuddering for a moment of shared ecstasy, before separating cautiously and spooning, my backside pressed against the delicious strength of his legs and core.
“Batten?” I rolled my head towards him. He made a sleepy inquisitive noise and I told him, “You’re not good at following orders.”
He snort-laughed. “Kidding me? I called you ma’am.”
“And then ignored every order I gave you.”
“Not all of them,” he reminded me with a lascivious grin, reaching over to stroke my hip fondly.
“You totally disregarded me at the end.”
“And you’re welcome,” he said knowingly.
I smiled despite myself at that. “I'm real glad you're not always a jerk."
“Hate to break it to you,” he grumbled against my shoulder. I arched one brow at him and he grinned around my shoulder at me. “I just settled that argument with dick.”
“You should go back to not talking.”
He smug-chortled. “I think I like you bossy.”
“Well, maybe I just settled that argument with pussy, then, ever think of that?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered on a yawn. We both knew I was full of it. Batten could easily say no to me. Me saying no to Batten was never gonna happen.
We heard a polite throat-clearing out by the fire. “So, I’ll just take next watch then, shall I?”
All three of us burst out laughing. I was still smirking when I finally slipped off into dreamland.
***
I only slept an hour or two at best when the sound of Declan snoring woke me. Batten was missing, and had been replaced by a shivering dhampir. I tracked Kill-Notch down by the fireside, where he was feeding sticks to the crackling flames. He was mostly dressed except for his jacket. His boots were unlaced.
“Make better time if we split up,” he explained, pulling his arm into his jacket.
My heart sank. “Oh?”
“Not that it’s not interesting traveling with you, Snickerdoodle.”
A lousy compliment to start with, it didn’t even feel genuine; though I couldn’t summon the Blue Sense to probe further, I really didn’t need to. Interesting? That’s what I am? Squid documentaries are interesting. A good
Sudoku puzzle is interesting. I said, “Thank you. It’s on my bucket list to be found interesting at least one time.”
He snorted while he laced his boots. “Mission accomplished.” He took longer with the last lace, fiddling. “I can’t go to Cairo. Take care of Dr. Edgar. You need to be careful there.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“The political climate—“
“I don’t need your help,” I lied. “Enjoy Kathmandu. Text me when you find the yeti, I guess.”
He seemed to take that as a dig, because his jaw rippled unhappily. Good.
I felt Declan stir in the tent behind me, the familiar, warm caramel-and-herbs feeling of the dhamphir. “Going to stay long enough to say bye to Declan?”
“You guys get the canopic jar. I’ll find Devarsi Patel and get started on the yeti business, find us a Sherpa. Catch up with me there.”
“In a hurry?
“Aren’t we?
Fair enough. It didn’t soothe my nagging doubts, though. Something worse than being blown off started thrumming in the deep recesses of my brain. I ignored my stupid heart for a second and studied his well-honed cop face. As always, it revealed little… but not nothing. There was a funny tightness around his eyes this morning. Was it just the brightness of the morning sun on the snow? Was it the wind? Was it regret? I studied the way his jaw was moving. “You’re either forty-five seconds from violence, or you’re going to cry like a baby. Which is it?”
“Let’s go back to being just friends,” Batten said with a long-suffering sigh, and I hoped he was joking.
“We were friends?” I asked.
“Uh huh.”
I cocked my head. “Like, friends the way we were in Buffalo?”
“Like, friends the way we were before we met.”
“There’s a word for that. Strangers.”
Batten grunted. “Okay, let’s go back to being just strangers.”
“I thought you hated psychics before you met me.”
Batten nodded once, solidly. “I still hate psychics.” He gave me the side eye. “Maybe more than ever.”
“Devarsi Patel will never disclose the location of yeti breeding grounds to a well-known vampire hunter. Dig me or not, you still need me for that.”
Batten hung his head. “I need you for a lot of things,” he agreed, “but not this.”
Thanks for clearing that up. “You’ve never met Patel. He’s…” I ransacked my brain for a sufficiently all-encompassing term, “quirky.”
“So you’ve said.”
I'd told him about Lenny Epp, too, but compared to The Chicken Whisperer, Dev was an order of magnitude weirder. Maybe two.
“You don’t get it,” I said. “Dev’s complicated. He’ll play the invalid and then rope you into strange situations. You have to be on your guard but ultra-honest with him. He’s been hunting the most elusive creatures on the planet for decades and he’s got super-senses.” Batten arched one eyebrow and I answered, “No, he’s not a DaySitter, or any kind of magic user. He’s just damn good at his job. He’s tricky.”
He stood, stretched his back, and hooked his go-bag over his shoulder. “Accustomed to dealing with nutcases,” he assured me, his glance accusing.
I folded my arms, but maintained my distance because that felt right. I didn’t like that it felt right, but something deep in my belly was telling me that a hug would be a bad idea right now. “Try not to get yourself killed. I kinda like your dick.”
He snort-laughed and shook his head, casting me what I thought was a gathering look, like he was downloading the sight of me into his memory. “Be careful, Snickerdoodle.”
I clenched my teeth to trap all the things I wanted to say to him, feeling a little sick. “In or out, Mark, you need to think about what you’re doing before you do it.”
“I always do,” he said, and gave me a big smile; a real Mark Batten smile, just for me. It tilted upward on one side and he shot me a wink that didn’t get anywhere close to hitting me in the lady bits the way it usually did. “Try not to fuck everything up.”
Ditto, I thought.
Chapter 26
Figuring I’d earned a free breakfast on the town of Grimston, if not a key to the city, I gave the vending machine another shake until I heard a thunk. The thunk was satisfying. I’d have liked to thunk Mark Batten right in the fucking schnoz. After all that sex and snuggling, he just takes off? “I can’t go to Cairo,” he’d said. No further explanation. Well, who needed him? Not me. Not us. Me and Bubba Nyarlathotep's canning jars didn't need Hotass McJerkface. No, sir. I'd just shove a Sphinx up his sphincter and tell him to pound sand. Maybe he'd had a traumatic childhood encounter with a camel. I bet that was it. And then he'd seen Aladdin at an impressionable age (drunk, in college) and had gone into gibbering flashbacks when the Genie had said, “Be careful, they spit.”
Muttering obscure imprecations about a certain hard-assed pain in my own, I fished around with a gloved hand and pulled out a diet Pepsi, which was a fair approximation of my typical breakfast in that it was a brown, caffeinated liquid, but it was miles removed from a hand-drawn demitasse cup of Harry's espresso. I crawled into the tent, sat cross-legged beside Declan, and soothed myself with watching him sleep for a while before cracking the tab and letting the carbonated hiss be his alarm clock.
The dhampir grumbled at me and spied out of one disturbingly green eye. “What time is it?”
“Batten’s gone. He walked off about an hour ago.”
“He left us?” Declan shot out of his sleeping bag, reaching for his old-timey pocket watch to check the time. “What about all the sex?”
“Like that was gonna last longer than ten minutes,” I huffed. “Guess he’s Mark Fuck-and-Run Batten.”
“Why did you let him leave?”
Let him? Was I supposed to hog tie him? Okay, the idea had merit, but not while either of us were wearing any clothes.
“You don’t need him,” I said, lifting my Pepsi. “You’ve got me.”
“Belphegor’s ballsack!” he swore, his eyes wide.
I cough-spit, then dried my shirt front with my leather glove. “I’m better than Batten.”
“You’re worse.” He shoved his jeans under his emergency blanket to haul and wriggle into them in the relative privacy offered by his thin, silver bedding. “So much worse.”
“Okay, that’s true, but I’m cuter.”
“That won’t save our lives, Dr. B,” he assured me.
I shrugged with one shoulder. “You’d think that, wouldn’t you? But I get by.”
“Is this because you tried to save him?” Declan demanded, as though I’d know the answer. I didn’t think it was. I thought we’d made up. Then again, Batten hadn’t actually agreed to back down and let me help. I realized that he hadn’t actually backed down and let me take control. Not even a little. He had distracted me with dick. Oh, that jerk.
“Did he tell you not to save me?” Declan asked, and it was an excellent question.
“Nope. He made no specific mention of that at all. In fact, he said I should take care of you.”
“What sense does that make? I’m immortal, he’s not.”
We pondered this for a moment. “Well, he's an asshole, and you're not, so there's that. Did he get up your nose when you tried to protect him against the ferals?”
He pressed his lips together in thought before shaking his head. “So, what’s our plan?”
“Breakfast,” I said, taking another pull from the can. “Then we kick ass.”
“Whose ass?”
“Well, we need to find some ass first. That’s always been my problem.”
Declan’s lips twitched. Some of the stress drained out of his face. “You’re the worst,” he repeated, and then got out of his sleeping bag, tucking in his shirt. “What’s next on the list?”
“The Golden Sap of Huxtahotep,” I replied.
Declan said. “We need flights to Cairo.”
“I also need an Indiana Jones ha
t. And a whip.” I made wha-cha noises and a nifty wrist motion. “Definitely need a whip.”
“I need a vacation.”
“C’mon.” I patted his thigh. “Let’s go steal Dr. Huxtable’s can of peas.”
“Try again.”
“Hoochie Coochie’s Golden Grahams.”
“Almost.”
“Hubba Bubba's honey bucket.”
We abandoned Batten’s tent, because fuck that guy, and after walking back to town, we finally were able to hire a car – okay, mostly it was Declan doing the people skills stuff, especially with his pouring on the local boy accent – and returned to something closer to civilization so we could get to the airport. The fastest itinerary from Belfast to Cairo would take about eight hours gate to gate with a short layover, so we booked ourselves on the flight out that afternoon and estimated we’d land in Egypt around two in the morning.
***
“So, I’ve been doin’ a bit of research, Dr. B., on that drink the clurichaun gave you,” Declan said, once we’d settled into our seats.
“What, the rat bile?”
“Would you say you tasted any ground ivy or prunes?”
“It was crispy on the nose, robust and dirty, with a bouquet of rusty cans and rodent effluence,” I said in my snootiest wine enthusiast voice. “Short legs, but it finishes well. Like me.” I showed him a broad wink.
“That leg thing, the fairy spell,” he said. “The Witch Ever Dances. We’ve got to watch that. It could come back in times of stress until the ale makes its way out of your system.”
“It should be gone by now,” I said. “My legs don’t feel restless anymore. How long is it supposed to last?”
“Results vary,” he said, scanning the articles with a swipe of his finger on his phone.
“My dear assistant,” I said, toying with the thin blanket the stewardess brought me, trying to cover myself all over. “You could say that same thing about all magic.”
“It’s just something we should keep in mind.” His unnaturally green eyes showed concern. “I’m not saying it could be permanent, I’m just saying it could still be lingering.”
“Great, a faerie-induced case of Riverdance Leg Syndrome.” I sighed and got out my Moleskine to look over my notes, drawing sketches. The gold seed pod was securely in my go-bag. One down, two to go. Next up was the Golden Sap of Huxtahotep. The instructions indicated that there would be a specific “misfit” canopic jar to get. I didn’t know how we’d know which one was the right one, but I did have an advantage in Giza: my old chemistry partner, Pia Bakaras. I'd texted her the details of our flight, and her reply assured me that she was “on it” and would be waiting for us at the airport with a car.