Eileen Wilks - Ritual Magic

Rule would hear the catch of her breath. Did he hear her heartbeat pick up, too? Could he hear those sleeping nearby? Grandmother and Li Qin and Toby and the woman who wasn’t a woman now, but a young girl . . .

“Shh,” Rule said as if she’d spoken that thought out loud, and he stroked soothingly down her hips.

. . . her mother, who wouldn’t wake to hear her daughter having sex because she didn’t have a daughter, and besides, she’d been placed in sleep by the black dragon after he knit together her fraying mind. She wouldn’t wake for hours. Julia Lin—no longer Julia Yu; there was no Julia Yu—would not be sleeping in this house now, her plundered mind wandering whatever dreams were left to her, if not for Lily. Her destruction might be no more than a pleasant perk for Friar on the way to whatever goal he’d set, but she had been included among the victims on purpose. Because of Lily.

A shudder took her.

Rule’s hands paused. “Lily?”

“Don’t let me think.” She pulled his head down and kissed him hard, and if there was more desperation than desire in the kiss, she didn’t care.

Rule did her bidding, but not as she expected. Instead of a hot, hasty race to the top, he was thorough and deliberate and ruthless. He stripped her quickly enough and laid her in their bed, but then he wanted to taste. With mouth and teeth and touch he took her up and shoved her off that high sensory peak—then dragged her back up the cliff so he could do it again. This time with him inside her.

Oh, he was ruthless, all right. And deliberate and thorough. Also effective. For a long time she didn’t think of anything but sensation, need, and Rule.

In the cool, close darkness afterward, with her skin slick with sweat and her breathing beginning to steady once more, she lay with her head on his shoulder. “I’ll probably go back to work in a minute.”

He was stroking her back. “Will you?”

Her head moved in the tiniest of nods. Her eyes were heavy. She’d rest them for a bit. “She never wanted me to be a cop, you know.”

“So you’ve said.”

“She wanted all of us safe, but also . . . prestige. Wanted us to have prestigious careers.”

“Many parents do want that for their children.” He kept stroking in long, slow slides.

“For us or from us. Do right by the family, y’know.” The outer darkness was seeping in, dragging her down, making a mumble of her words. “I never thought about the price. The price to me, yeah, but my choice, so I pay the price, that’s okay. Didn’t think about the price others would pay. Expected them to pay it, but didn’t think about it.”

“No one could have thought this would happen. That it even could happen.”

“Not the point.” What was the point? She couldn’t remember, not with all that heavy darkness dragging her down . . . oh, yeah. “Can’t face her. ’S my fault. Can’t look at her like this.”

“Okay.”

That roused her. “What d’you mean, okay? I’ve got to. She’s my mother, and she’s here .”

That soothing hand never stopped petting. “But you won’t be, most of the time. You’ll be busy working yourself into exhaustion again. That’s why Madame Yu and Li Qin are here. Let the rest of us deal with her. You don’t have to.”

There was a flaw in that reasoning. She was sure there was a flaw, but the relief was so intense it unmoored her. With a sigh, she let go and fell off into sleep.

SHElay in an exhausted heap against his side, and even now, flattened by a succession of climaxes, the warmth of his breath on her skin made her tingle with longing. It took so little for her senses to be overwhelmed by him . . . all of them save one. His skin was smooth and warm and slightly damp with sweat, but she couldn’t smell it. Couldn’t smell at all in this place.

“You are troubled,” he breathed into her ear. “Tell me.”

“It’s wicked to allow any sadness in when I’m with you.”

“And yet, you do.” He sat up abruptly and fear spiked sharply—she’d displeased him, angered him—but no, he was smiling down at her. His face was always his somehow, though it changed to suit his whim. Tonight his skin was dusky, his nose long, and his hair as brown as a mink’s, only curly. His eyes remained fathomless black. “By your own logic, then, you are wicked. Confess to me.”

She had to smile back. “I’m foolish. It’s just that when I wake, you won’t be there. You won’t be anywhere in my world, and the ache grows hard to bear.”

“Ah.” He touched her nose playfully. “But that time is almost over. Soon you will bring me fully into your world.”

“Soon?” Her heart lurched. “I don’t experience time as you do . . .”

He laughed. “Very soon, even as you measure time, my sweet mortal. Tonight I will give you the rest of your instructions. Pay close heed, for after I act I will be too weak for a time to call you to me.”

Alarm stiffened her. She sat up. “Too weak? You didn’t tell me—oh, beloved, don’t spend yourself too freely and leave yourself open to—”

“Do not?” he said very softly. All the light and laughter fled as winter rushed into his face, his voice—a chill as absolute as the empty sky above them. “You would tell me do or do not?”

She hung her head, shame mingling with terror. “I fear for you. It makes me foolish. That’s no excuse, but I . . . I’m so flawed. You’ve blessed me beyond reason with your loving. I should make my life a song of gratitude, and instead I—I spoke as if you weren’t so far beyond me that—”

“Child.” Not winter in that voice now, but no merriment, either. He placed a hand beneath her chin and tilted her face up. “I will not punish you this time. It would distress me to do so, I admit. Already you are dear to me. But you will remember, won’t you? You must not speak so to me.”

She nodded, dizzy with fear and relief. She listened carefully as he told her exactly what she must do . . . and what he planned to do. Some of it he’d told her before. Some he hadn’t, and parts of it frightened her deeply, and yet . . . she peered at him out of the curtain of her hair. “You said you must do this in order to wrest the path from the other one, the one she wants. You have to—to tip that path toward you before I can act. I know that’s true, but I think it—it’s not the entire truth.” Breathless with daring, she let her own small portion of mischief tilt her lips up. “I think there are many ways you could do that, some of them easier, less costly. But this will be more fun .”

And his laugh rang out merry and full, rewarding her for having risked so much. “It will, oh, it will. I give her all that she wants, or thinks she wants . . . in a way she will surely hate.” He stroked her cheek. “You do delight me. We will make much pleasure between us, you and I, when you are my high priestess and we meet body to body.”

Heat shivered through her, lust as pure and potent as whiskey, and sweeter by far. They would make love in the flesh . . . surely she would have that much, before he betrayed her. For he would, one day. From spite or anger or simply because that was what he did. What he was. He might laugh then or mourn, just a little, for he said she was dear to him . . .

“Ah, sweetheart,” he whispered as he stroked her between her legs, “do you not yet know that much about me? I can do both.”

JULIAwoke up in yet another bed that was not hers. There was a window by this one. It didn’t have any curtains, so sunshine poured in. Early morning sunshine, the kind that looks like it’s been brewed up fresh for the day. On the other side of the glass, birds were making a fuss about dawn.