Stone Goddess (Isabella Hush Series Book 3)

by Thea Atkinson

A low, passionate moan trembled out from the thicket and I almost gave in to curiosity.

  "They'll keep themselves busy for a while," he said. "You can come closer. I don't bite."

  I was already closing the distance between us when he pulled the pipe to his lips again and blew into it. This time it called out names, followed by hollow sounding cries of passion.

  "You're trying too hard now," I said with a laugh.

  "You're right," he said in disgust and tossed it into the thicket where it wheezed out a bagpipe sounding noise. I put my hands over my ears.

  "Seriously?" I said. "Who likes that?"

  He shrugged. "Who knows? But it was worth a shot."

  One by one, slender, pale looking women with pert breasts and long legs emerged from the woods and clamored toward him, pushing each other out of the way.

  He regarded me with something like suspicion. "Like the ladies do you?" he said. "Because, seriously, who would give up a chance to be with a god."

  "Maybe someone who is an atheist?" I said and laughed.

  At my retort, he merely chuckled deep in his throat.

  "And what of women?" he said.

  I shook my head. "Men exclusively. Particularly older men. Men that look like Sean Connery. But not the young Sean Connery. The older one. Like in The Untouchables."

  "I loved that movie," he said and I instantly liked him.

  "Finally," I said. "A Kindred with class."

  He canted his head at me. "You should know I can be whatever you like. Classy, nasty, sassy."

  He waved away several of the nymphs cavorting around him and they settled into the bed of cushions. They perched there instead of lazing, waiting for a chance to do his bidding. One of them glared at me as though I were an anomaly she didn't understand.

  With a wave of his wrist, he held onto two overflowing goblets of wine, pulled from somewhere as though there was an invisible curtain hiding a cornucopia of enchantments. He tilted one toward me.

  "Share?" he said.

  I knew I should be searching for Absalom's target, and I hesitated. Even in the human realm, I didn't take drinks from someone I didn't know. Call me cynical, but a gal can't be too careful about belting back a drink that's been in someone else's fist. It couldn't be much different in the Kindred world. A god might be a god, but this was Errol's soiree afterall.

  He held out the two goblets to his side and stared down at his bare chest.

  "It's not drugged, don't worry. I have no need of artificial intoxicants when I look like this."

  His chest was hairy and lush like a bear rug but beneath all of the fur, his muscles were taut and thick, even if they did trail down to loins made of goat legs.

  "Pan," I murmured and a grin split his face into two cheery half moons as his cheeks crested over deep dimples.

  "My reputation isn't dead, then, even if the rumors of my demise abound."

  He scooted over on his lounge, making room. "Sit," he said. "Tell me about yourself."

  I accepted the goblet and held it between my knees as I perched on the edge of the lounge. I faced him without fear, liking his affable demeanor. If he was dangerous, it was to goats and nymphs, I decided.

  "There's not much to tell except that I'm new to all of this," I admitted.

  I must have given him a rare treasure with the statement because he agitated forward, sniffing the air in front of me the way a hound might proffered fingers, testing for character. His eyes rolled back in excitement as he leveled his gaze to the heavens.

  "Sweet Zeus and here I am without the powers to divest you of your lovely costume."

  He eyed the material over my nipples with sadness.

  "Of course, I do have hands. And teeth. And tongue. Do you prefer that mode of undress, perhaps? Newbies are my specialty," he said with a wink. "Mind you, newbies and virgins are different altogether. One must coddle a virgin. They are skittish and in my experience, guarded about their wares. Newbies just need a bit of encouragement."

  I was beginning to enjoy his company; looks not withstanding, he had charisma.

  "Can I encourage you, newbie?" he said. "I have every size, shape, and color all ready to tempt you." At that, he brushed his lap with the back of his hand and the nymph closest to him gasped. I averted my gaze when I realized what he was referring to.

  He sighed, disappointed with my reluctance.

  "You might be a newbie but you act like a virgin. Why are you here if not to cavort?"

  He set down the goblet. "Unless you just haven't been wooed the right way." He leaned toward me, sniffing the air again and wrinkling his nose.

  "What is that smell, anyway?" he said. "You've got a stink of virgin on you, but you're not virgin. I can tell those a mile away."

  I was about to ask what he meant by that but at that, the door flung open and Maddox stormed in.

  He was shielding his eyes with one hand and holding that ridiculous looking sex toy with the other.

  "Isabella?" he yelled. "Are you in here?"

  Pan laughed out loud.

  "Oh dear," he said. "Ask and ye shall receive."

  Maddox pulled his hand away from his eyes.

  "Pan," he said. "I should have known you'd be here somewhere."

  "You two know each other?" I said.

  Maddox closed the distance, swallowing up the paces of the room in moments. Just the look on his face, all sheepish and shy made Pan guffaw.

  "Now I understand the stink, newbie," he said, swinging his gaze to me.

  "This place is revolting," Maddox grumbled. "I had to fight my way through six naked nymphs and two sucubbus to get here." He scanned the room, and seeing me, stormed across it, swallowing up the distance in a heartbeat.

  "We have to leave," he said. "I don't think the target is here."

  "Leave?" Pan said. "But the best entertainment of the party is yet to come. This is just the prelude, my boy."

  He turned to me to explain. "Later, we shall all be joining in one massive cavorting, where gods and mortal pets and and sorcerors and all the like combine their lusts. It's really something you shouldn't miss."

  Maddox sucked the back of his teeth. "It's disgusting not to mention dangerous."

  He reached his free hand out to me, shrugging off one of the nymphs who had begun to wrap herself around him.

  "The danger is part of the fun," Pan said.

  "Oh my God," I said, watching as Maddox did his best to extricate himself from the nymphs. "It's true. Kerri was telling the truth when she complained about your reluctance for threesomes."

  "Threesomes," Pan laughed. "Maddox here won't even have a onesome."

  I squirreled my gaze Pan's way while he sipped his drink, both eyebrows lifted with knowing.

  "What does that mean?" I said.

  "You don't know?" he said. "Maddox is celibate."

  CHAPTER 15

  I stared dumbly at Maddox, who couldn't meet my eye. Instead he was busy batting away feverishly exploring hands as the nymphs began tempting him in earnest at the news. Some of them tangled their fingers through his hair, others decided that their best ploy was visual. I could almost hear the sensual lilt of belly dance music accompanying their undulating moves. It sounded like it was coming from the thicket where Pan had thrown his flute.

  I gaped at Maddox.

  "You're celibate?" I said.

  Maddox said nothing, but his jaw clenched.

  Celibate. This man whose every pore dripped sex. This man whose masculine hands were meant to explore the female form. It couldn't be accurate and yet, the way Pan's acolytes were behaving, and the frigid, awkward response Maddox was giving as he tried to extricate himself said it all.

  It all started to add up: the clinical way he'd bathed me, Kerri's complaints those weeks ago that he wouldn't try out any of her sexual fantasies. I'd thought it a show to create a distraction. But maybe Kerri was complaining in earnest and using the information to her advantage.

  Maddox's expression had turned markedly sour
.

  Pan chuckled from behind me. "Ask him how long."

  I swung my gaze from one to the other, still trying to process the fact that a man of Maddox looks and raw sexual energy had sworn off sex.

  I couldn't imagine what might have initiated such an extreme reaction. Maybe he'd lost someone he loved dearly. Maybe he'd been stung; heck, we'd all been. But for him to agree to attend a party thrown by an incubus had to mean he was also a bit of a masochist. I mean, who would volunteer for that. No wonder he'd been so anxious. No wonder he hated seeing all the nudity.

  "Celibate?" I said again because if Maddox had heard me, he'd decided that the way Pan's acolytes were taking it as a challenge was a bigger priority than answering.

  They'd now begun to peel his clothes away and guide him toward a luxurious looking settee that had sprung from the trunk of a broad redwood. He didn't have enough hands to block them all.

  He fell backwards onto the lounge and they fell over him. He was all but invisible through the skin, hair, and hands.

  "Fuck," I heard him say from within the cluster.

  The nymphs tittered as one and drew back. He was shirtless, his nipples hard pebbles and the V line in his lower abdomen trembling above the waistband of his pants. He was breathing hard, trying his damnest not to stare at the breasts swaying in front of him. The hand on the settee was clenched.

  Celibate, perhaps, but still very much a slave to primal desires.

  "Is it true?" I asked him.

  He dragged his gaze to mine and might have answered except a brazen acolyte reached ran her hand down along that chest, teasing its way down as it tracked his median line. He tried and failed to pin her hand from plunging into his pants. He caught his breath and his eyes rolled back.

  The moan that came from him was anything but a protest.

  "Maddox," I said, fighting my way between two fleshy nymphs, and only managing to get a few feet away. "How long?"

  It was Pan who answered. "If it helps," he said. "I only found out three centuries ago."

  I could feel my jaw gaping open.

  "Centuries?" I said in disbelief. "You haven't had sex in centuries and you come with me to an orgy."

  At that, Pan let go a peal of laughter.

  While the sound might have amused me before, now I was outraged.

  I couldn't push through the last three naked nymphs, but I could see the effect they were having on Maddox. His features were painted with bliss. He was enjoying himself even if he didn't want to admit just how good it felt. Even so, I knew the way he was squeezing his eyes shut, that he was anguished over it. He was loving the feel of hands on his skin, but he didn't want to love it.

  And yet, he'd been able to resist me quite adequately.

  I wondered which would be the best decision: let him enjoy it and ruin his vows or interrupt his enjoyment.

  The way one of the acolytes gasped and caught another's eye with delight made the decision for me.

  I shouldered my way through the remaining trio and palmed one of them—the one with her hands down his pants—right in the forehead, pushing her aside more roughly than I'd intended.

  She fell back with a glower.

  "No means no," I said to her.

  Pan called out to her, saying humans could be terribly jealous and not to pay me any mind.

  "Shut up," I said, not caring if he was a god or not.

  Maddox blinked at me in relief as I peeled another set of hands from his chest.

  "Why didn't you just tell me?" I said, my mind reeling back to how I'd thrown myself at him in my apartment. How I'd done it again in the foyer. I felt foolish. Somehow part of me would have rather that he just didn't find me attractive. But the thought that I had so brazenly offered myself to a man who had sworn off women made me feel ashamed.

  Especially since he had such a damn hard time resisting these brazen hussies.

  I pinched the bridge of my nose in humiliation.

  "I can't believe it," I said. "Don't you think things would have been easier if you had just told me you had sworn off women."

  "Oh, that's rich," Pan said and I turned to discover he was standing right behind me.

  He was completely nude now, the goat legs transformed to human legs, and his acolytes had returned to him like moths to a candle. The fact that one of them was stroking his member didn't help the blush that was already burning my chest and face.

  "What's so funny?" I demanded.

  "You." He pointed at me with his hips. "Assuming he has simply sworn off women."

  Pan shrugged off his acolytes who sulked away from him. He held out his arms and two of them pulled a purple silk kimono from thin air and slipped it over his shoulders. He tied the belt as he advanced on me.

  "What I find so funny is that you're denying yourself me and saving yourself for this."

  He jerked his chin in Maddox's direction, indicating he was the this he spoke of. "I'm the God of wantonness," he said. "I know desire when I see it. And it's stamped all over your face."

  "What's stamped all over my face is anger and humiliation," I said.

  He sighed and sat down next to Maddox, putting his arm over the back of the settee.

  "Are you going to tell her, Maddox, or am I?" he said.

  I cupped my elbows over my chest. "Tell me what?"

  Maddox looked at his knees. "I've never..." he started to say. "I mean, it's not something I –"

  Realization washed over me as I took in the look on his face, full of shame and embarrassment.

  "Oh my God," I said. "You're a virgin."

  The blush that crept up from his neck and colored his face was all the answer I needed.

  "You're hundreds of years old and you've never had sex?" I said.

  "A thousand," he said.

  "A thousand what?"

  "Years," he said. "I'm almost a thousand years old. Give or take." He waggled his hand in the air in front of his chest.

  Even the nymphs gaped at him.

  "Sweet Jesus," I said.

  The flute made a comical sound from the bushes.

  "But I thought you had been to dozens of these things?" I said, holding out my arms to indicate the surroundings. "You said you've seen plenty of things in your time."

  He shrugged. "I have."

  Pan laughed. "I've seen him at these things every so often over the centuries, and he's always the same. Grouchy. Prim and proper. I keep telling him that the best thing for him is to just get laid. But no. He won't have it."

  Maddox swung on him. "I don't take vows lightly," he ground out.

  Pan's lifted eyebrows nearly met his hairline as though he was vaguely insulted that he might consider a vow a light thing.

  "As well you shouldn't," he said. "Vows and commitments are binding. No one understands that better than a god."

  "Damn right," Maddox said.

  "Wait," I said, holding up my hand. "What are you talking about? What vows. What commitment?"

  Pan waited until a nymph brought him a large bowl filled with fruit before he spoke. He inspected the contents of the bowl with his finger and finally lifted a string of green grapes to his mouth. He chewed the way a goat did, back and forth. He watched my face.

  "You mean you don't know?" he said as he chewed around three at a time. "Maddox here is a monk."

  I felt my own eyebrows lift in surprise. "A monk?"

  "He's been a monk for as long as I've known him and no doubt longer than that."

  "Since I was 18," Maddox said and his eyes fell to his feet.

  I sank down onto the nearest velvet mossed log. All thoughts of finding the target gone. This news was even larger.

  "A monk," I repeated. I tested it on my tongue. It didn't feel right. It didn't sound right. Not for the man that I'd come to know. But then, he wasn't a man, was he?

  "Monks don't act like you do." I said to him.

  He shrugged. "Monks like me do. Although, to be honest, my vows haven't been quite as important the last couple of
centuries. Not since the stone went missing."

  I snapped my gaze up to his. This was getting uncomfortably familiar.

  "The stone?" I said. "What stone?"

  He pushed himself from the lounge and crouched in front of me. He took both of my hands in his. I thought maybe he was doing it to keep me from hitting him.

  "The Lilith stone," he said. "I'm a guardian."

  At the admission, Pan clapped his hands loudly and the nymphs scattered. I wasn't sure where they went, perhaps into the wallpaper to cavort among the trees there, but Pan didn't disappear at all. He stood in front of us like a referee, putting both of his hands on each of our chests.

  "Wait a minute," he said to Maddox. "Are you saying the Lilith Stone has been found?"

  Maddox looked up at him. "In a manner of speaking, yes."

  He twisted around so the god could see his ribcage where the tattoo stood out against this skin.

  "It's why I'm here," Maddox said.

  Pan nodded. "I should have known he wouldn't have come here if it wasn't something important."

  He swung his gaze to mine. "The last orgy he attended was to extricate a guardian acolyte." He shook his head. "That was nasty business. Just nasty."

  I started to ask about what constituted nasty, curious beyond what I should have been to know some of Maddox's history, but Maddox stooped to pick his shirt up from the floor and cut me off.

  "We have business today as well," he said.

  Pan paused in shoveling another grape into his mouth. "You don't say?"

  Maddox nodded. "It's why we're here. We've got intel that there's a gentleman here who has info on the stone."

  It was an outright lie, and I thought Pan knew it too because he held Maddox's gaze for a long time before he spoke. Maddox didn't so much as flinch under the scrutiny.

  "A Sean Connery type," he said, flicking his gaze to mine. I did my best to hold it without flinching too, but didn't do as well as Maddox.

  Pan sighed. "Well as you well know, Maddox," he said. "People come to me, I don't go to them. And those who come to me and are admitted are only the youngest and most beautiful of form."

  He ran his gaze up and down my form, obviously enjoying the look.

  He spread his arms. "As you can see we are all beautiful in here, so I would have no way of knowing if the man you're looking for is here in the event at all. But if he's more human than creature, there's only one other room designed for the more delicate of species."