Thea Harrison - Oracle's Moon

“There aren’t any beaches nearby,” she said, dumbly. Stand on his head? Where the hell had he gotten his information on dating?

With one hand, Khalil made a gesture grand enough for the most accomplished of stage magicians. “That is a minor inconvenience only, since I can transport us anywhere we may wish to go.”

With that, he opened up a whole different vista in front of her. The possibilities were staggering.

This whole Damascus business had turned into quite a trip. If only she had realized, she would have packed some bags.

“We’ll go somewhere local,” she said, almost dreamily. No witches’ haunts, not with the kind of chilly reception she had been getting all day. “There’s a pub in town that caters to a wide clientele from the Elder Races. I’ll eat something and maybe have a drink.” Maybe she would have a stiff scotch. “A quick, quiet date. No drama, no fuss, bed by midnight. And you’ll give me my present.”

He gave her that slow, mischievous smile of his, the one that oozed sin and sensuality. “Absolutely.”

“Okay, then,” she said. She looked around. If she was giving in, she might as well chuck away her whole stance. “You can transport us anywhere?”

His smile turned into a grin. “Why, where did you want to go?”

Was it bad for her to ask? Or was that the Darrin in her talking? She said, “The bathroom on the second story of the house.”

Before she could change her mind, Khalil snatched her up and a whirlwind embraced her. She lost touch with the ground or with anything solid or familiar other than the strong, confident hold of his arms and his lean, hard chest. She threw her arms around him, shrieking as though she plummeted from the top of a cliff.

Then the world reformed around them. Squinting up, she saw his long hair whipping around his starred eyes and elegant face. He was smiling. They were standing in the deep shadows on the second-floor landing of the house, just outside of the bathroom.

“Think I’m going to take a bath,” she croaked. The main reason was she didn’t think she could stand upright.

“Please yourself,” Khalil said. “I’ll change and be waiting for you downstairs.”

He dematerialized. She couldn’t blink as she watched him go. It was a spectacular sight, no matter how many times she saw him do it.

What was he going to change into?

And what was her present?

She sighed and let the rest of the day fall away. Then she headed to the bathroom. Bubble bath. It might be a quick one, but it would still be freaking awesome.

She didn’t care what she put in the bath, as long as it foamed. After starting the water, she grabbed the first bottle that came to hand. It was Sesame Street Wet Wild Watermelon Bubble Bath. It sounded divine. She dumped some under the water and went to her bedroom to grab something to wear.

She didn’t have time to dither. She wouldn’t let herself have time to dither. The red glowing numbers in the clock upstairs read nine thirty-five. Ready by ten o’clock, home by midnight. This was the only way she would date from here on out. She would put herself on a ruthless schedule and stick to it. Not that she would get all that many opportunities.

But it was good to have rules.

Climbing into the bathtub was bliss. No matter how she might wash everything at the kitchen sink, it just didn’t feel the same as total submersion in water. She scrubbed everything, lathered her hair twice, rinsed and dried and dressed in the skirt she had put on so briefly the other day. It was bright and patterned with deep, rich orange, pink and purple flowers, interspersed with green leaves.

The colors should have clashed. Instead, the shades had been cleverly chosen, and they complemented each other. She paired the skirt with a light green tank top. The bright outfit brought out her own colors, the peach of her skin, the different flecks of color in her hazel eyes, and the red-gold hues of her strawberry blonde hair. She could wear her knee brace and nobody would notice. She slipped on flat, pretty leather sandals.

There was hardly any time for makeup, which was an-other good thing. A swish of blush, a swipe of gloss, and a few brush strokes of eye shadow, and badda-bing, badda-boom, she was ready to go by nine fifty-seven, and feeling calm and virtuous to boot.

All of that was a good thing, because the date really was the most goddamn ridiculous thing she’d ever heard of. The sooner she went on it, the sooner she could collect her present and come home and go to bed and get on with the business of living the rest of her real life.

Because she needed every scrap of her strength and attention on meeting each challenge as it arose. There wasn’t any room in her real life for dating or her growing obsession with a haughty, child-loving, mischievous, kick-in-the-head-sexy prince of the Djinn.

She told herself she was all right with that.

And listened to the silence.

Grace descended the stairs carefully, holding on to the banister. Her wretched knee decided it didn’t like the strain of carrying her weight while bending in the downward motion, so she had to go down lopsided, the same way she had climbed the tunnel. Khalil had turned on a few downstairs lights. Her pulse was racing too much as she opened the gate at the bottom of the stairs and rounded the corner to the living room.

She told herself she was being idiotic. After all, it wasn’t as though she hadn’t seen Khalil…

Hadn’t seen Khalil a hundred times…

A tall man stood in her living room. It was Khalil; she knew it was. She could feel the familiar blaze of his Power coming from the man, although it felt peculiarly muted at the moment, as if clouds had drifted over to obscure the sun.

But this man looked completely different. Well, not completely different. He was still very tall, well over six feet, and massively built. He still had pale skin, long, raven black hair pulled back in a simple leather tie and regal, elegant features.

That was where the similarity with the old Khalil ended. This man wore a black T-shirt that strained over the wide, broad muscles of his chest and thick biceps, faded jeans and black boots. His features and his skin…His skin was human, with the kind of paleness that went with black-Irish coloring, and a slight, dark shadow of beard along his lean cheeks and jaw. She edged closer, staring. There were even slight laugh lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes.

Then he turned to look at her, and all semblance of humanity ended. For lack of a better description, she tried to call the color of his eyes gray, but that wasn’t right; for even though the strange crystalline-like quality of his gaze was muffled like the rest of his Power, they were still starred with too much radiance.

“You’re so different,” she breathed. Fascinated, she edged closer. Did he have pupils? She couldn’t tell. His eyes seemed to take in and multiply the amount of light around him.

Khalil’s lean face creased with a keen smile. “You are beautiful,” he said with evident pleasure. His pure, gorgeous voice sounded the same. “Clearly bathing suits you.”

She choked on an unexpected bubble of laughter. Khalil had quite a way to go in the learning-how-to-give-compliments department, but she wasn’t about to bring that up, when he spoke with such sincerity.

She reached out to touch his forearm then hesitated self-consciously. “Do you mind?”

“No,” he said.

She laid her fingers on him. His skin not only looked human, but it felt like human skin too and warm to the touch, not quite as hot as usual. She stroked lightly down his arm. He made a surprised sound and looked shocked. She snatched her hand away. “Did that hurt?”