Darynda Jones - Second Grave on the Left

“Are they—” I stopped midsentence and swallowed hard. “—are you okay?”

“I’m unconscious,” he said, edging closer, his tongue wetting his full mouth.

My stomach somersaulted, but only in part because of the tongue. “You’re unconscious? What do you mean?”

He had braced a hand against the countertop on either side of me, imprisoning me within his sinewy arms. “I mean, I’m not awake,” he said a heartbeat before nipping my earlobe with his teeth, just hard enough to send a quake skimming over the surface of my skin.

The deep tenor of his voice reverberated through my bones, liquefying them from the inside out. I fought hard to focus on his words instead of the turmoil each syllable generated, each touch. He was like chocolate-covered heroin, and I was an addict through and through.

I’d had him inside me before. I’d known heaven for a brief period of time, the experience so surreal, so earth-shattering, I was certain he’d ruined me to all other men forever. Seriously, who could compete with a being created from beauty and sin and fused together with the blistering heat of sensuality? He was a god among men. Damn it.

“Why aren’t you awake?” I asked, struggling to redirect my thoughts. “Reyes, what happened?”

He’d been busy nibbling his way to my collarbone, his hot mouth evoking seismic activity at each point of contact.

I really hated to interrupt, but … “Reyes, are you listening to me?”

He raised his head, a sensual grin playing at the corners of his mouth, and said, “I’m listening.”

“To what? The sound of blood rushing to your nether regions?”

“No,” he said with a husky chuckle that made me tingle everywhere. “To your heartbeat.” He leaned in again, began the aerial assault again.

“Seriously, Reyes, how did you get hurt?”

“Painfully,” he whispered into my ear.

My chest constricted with his answer. “Time-out,” I said, grabbing the wrist of a hand that was doing the most amazing things to my girl parts.

He twisted his hand around and wound his fingers into mine. “You’re putting me in time-out?”

“Yes,” I said as a shaky sigh slid through my lips.

“If I don’t go, do I get a spanking?”

A burst of laughter escaped before I could stop it. “Reyes,” I said in admonishment. “We need to talk.”

“So talk,” he said, stroking my wrist with his thumb.

I placed an index finger on his shoulder and nudged. “Let me rephrase that. You need to talk. Please tell me what happened. Why are you unconscious?”

He let out a slow breath and leaned back to focus his liquid brown eyes on mine. “I told you last week, they found me.”

“The demons.”

“Yes.”

“What do they want?”

“The same thing I want,” he said, his eyes raking over my body, “but perhaps for different reasons.”

He’d explained before that they wanted me, the portal, a way into heaven. I had no idea they would go to such lengths. “Are you still alive?”

“My corporeal body is like yours. It’s harder to kill, much harder, than most humans’.”

Relief flooded every cell in my body. I took a deep breath and said, “Tell me what’s going on. Exactly.”

“Exactly. Okay, they’re waiting for exactly one of two things to happen.”

“Which are?”

“For my body to die so they can take me back to hell or for you to find me. One would give them access to the key,” he said, indicating the smooth, flowing lines of his tattoos with a nod. Amazingly, his tattoos were a map to the gates of hell. Without it, the hazardous journey through the void of eternity rarely ended well for any entities trying to escape. “And the other would give them access to heaven.” He looked at me point-blank. “Either would make them exceedingly happy.”

“Then tell me where your physical form is, and we can … I don’t know, hide you.”

He shook his head in regret. “Afraid I can’t do that.”

My brows shot together. “What do you mean, you can’t do that? Reyes, where are you?”

A humorless grin tipped one corner of his mouth. “In a safe place.”

“You’re safe from the demons?” I asked, my voice full of hope.

“No,” he answered. “You’re safe from the demons.”

When he went for a jugular again, I pulled back. “So, they know where you are? They’re trying to kill you?” What he was proposing sounded like my worst nightmare. Injured and helpless somewhere, with a madman trying to kill me. I’d never considered the culprit to be demonic, but now that I had new fodder, surely my reoccurring nightmare would update its software to reflect an evil presence. Wonderful.

With a loud sigh, he stepped back and sank into the chair at my computer desk, propping his feet up and crossing them at the ankles. “Do we really have to do this now? I may not have much time.”

My heart stumbled in my chest. I wondered how much time he had. How much time we had. I didn’t have a table and chairs, but I had a snack bar with a couple of barstools. I sat at one and turned to him. “Why won’t you tell me where you are?”

“Lots of different reasons.” His gaze slid over me like a veil of fire. He could ignite my deepest desires with a single glance. I decided right then and there no more reading romance novels by candlelight.

“Can you tell me what those reasons are, or should I guess?”

“Since I probably can’t stay all day, I’ll tell you.”

“At least we’re getting somewhere.”

“The first one is because it’s a trap, Dutch. Set for you and you alone. Why do you think they haven’t killed me yet? They want you to look for me, to find me. Remember, you don’t see them, they don’t see you.” He’d mentioned that before, but the truth was difficult to comprehend. Not to mention disturbing.

“And if I see them?” I asked.

He let his gaze travel over me once more. “Let’s just say, you’re hard to miss.”

“So, we’ll do this incognito. You know, like Navy SEALs or SWAT or something.”

“It doesn’t work that way.”

“That’s not good enough for me.” My hands curled into fists. “We have to try. We can’t just let them kill you.”

“You haven’t heard the second reason.”

That sounded foreboding. “Okay, so tell me.” I crossed my arms and waited.

“You won’t like it.”

“I’m a big girl,” I said, raising my chin a notch. “I can handle it.”

“Fair enough. I’m going to let my corporeal body pass away.”

Every muscle in my body stilled.

“It’s not like I need it,” he continued with a callous shrug. “It slows me down and, as you have witnessed yourself, makes me vulnerable to attack.”

“But in the camera, when you woke up from the coma, you disappeared. You dematerialized your human body.”

“Dutch,” he said, casting me a chastising gaze from underneath his dark lashes, “not even I can do that.”

“Then how did you just disappear? I saw the tape.”

“I can interfere with electrical devices anytime I want to. So can you, if you concentrate.”

I never knew that. “I just thought—”

“Wrong,” he said, his tone absolute. He was so testy when he was being tortured.

“Fine. I was wrong. It’s not like being a supernatural entity came with a manual.”

“True.”

“But that’s no reason to let your corporeal body pass away. I mean, what will happen to you? You just said that if you die, they’ll take you back to hell.”

“Even they don’t know if they can take me back to hell or not. That’s simply what they’re hoping for. There’s one surefire way to find out, I guess,” he said, raising his brows at the challenge.