My Dangerous Pleasure (18 page)

They were heading north into Sonoma County to the farmhouse where he used to live. In the store, she pushed the grocery cart while he dumped in food. Every so often, she looked at his selections and put them back when she thought he wouldn’t notice. She threw in plenty of the fruits and vegetables she stocked in the house and tried to get him to eat instead of pizza or leftover takeout, but she also cleaned the store out of Swiss chocolate and loaded up with a bunch of other cooking supplies he wouldn’t have known to buy.

When they got to his favorite aisle, the cookies and chips, she didn’t make the turn. He shot out a hand and bodily pulled the cart left. She pulled back, but he was stronger and forced the left turn. She planted her feet. “No way.”

“Yes.”

“This aisle is evil.”

He dragged the cart down the aisle and grabbed a bag of chips.

“Evil,” she said. “Pure evil. Trans fat. Carbs. Salt. Partially hydrogenated vegetable oil. Chemicals you can’t even spell let alone pronounce. Don’t put that stuff in your body.”

“Evil tastes even better than chocolate.” Iskander tossed in another bag of Doritos and headed for the baked goods.

She gasped, laughing. “Blasphemer.”

“We should get doughnuts.” He was glad he could make her laugh. “Those little powered ones. I love those.”

“No. No. Absolutely not.” She jerked the cart backward so his doughnuts landed on the floor instead of in the cart. “I’ll make you doughnuts.”

He turned around and arched one eyebrow at her. “Powdered ones?”

“Yes, powdered ones.”

“Really? You’re not just saying that?”

She sighed. “Really. I will make you powdered doughnuts.”

“Awesome.”

They finished the shopping and got in line. He also won the argument about who was going to pay by refusing to notice her digging in her purse and being faster than her to take out his plastic. She, of course, did not have plastic with her. He handed over his and smirked at her. “I’d let you pay, cupcake, but you didn’t bring your block of ice.”

“You’re lucky, because I’d hit you with it.”

Damn, she was pretty when she smiled. “I love it when you threaten me. Do it some more.”

She made a face at him.

They put the groceries in the back of the truck. While he had the chance, he fished the driver’s-side window out of the well and duct taped it to the top of the door frame. “This is why you should never travel without duct tape.”

“That’s not enough tape,” she said. The weather was colder here than in the city, and she buttoned her peacoat against the chill.

He studied his handiwork. “Sure it is.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“This here is the AC.” He tapped the window with a knuckle. “If I put more tape on it, I’ll never get the window down when it’s hot. Not the normal way.”

She shivered. “Right now it’s cold.”

“It’s not much farther. We’ll be fine.” He opened the door and she slid in, scooting over to the passenger side.

She looked at him sideways while he started the truck. “Bet you a dollar that window falls.”

“Done.” He wiggled his fingers at her. “Show me the green, Paisley. I’m not taking plastic or IOUs from you.”

She rooted around in her purse and came up with three quarters, two dimes, and five pennies. “There. Now you know I’m good for it.”

“Sucker.”

The window stayed up for the twenty minutes they were on the freeway, but five minutes after they were on the back road, the duct tape failed. She crossed her arms over her chest and stared at him. He pulled a crumpled dollar out of his pocket and handed it to her.

“Thank you very much.” She shoved the dollar into her jeans and made a show of buttoning her coat.

He stuck his elbow out the window and kept driving. Back roads meant street lighting was nonexistent except at rare intersections. He knew the way well enough that his lead foot wasn’t a problem even on these narrow, twisting roads in the hills between northern Marin County and southern Sonoma County. Before long, he turned the truck down the long rutted gravel driveway that led to the farmhouse. Paisley braced a hand on the dash.

He parked the truck in the barn and got out. Paisley did the same, stretching while she looked around. This was where his life with Fen had fallen apart. They’d moved here after Fen hooked up with Harsh, when the guy still believed he was a normal human doctor and was stashing his money in real estate that hadn’t yet gotten insanely overpriced. Harsh had come into his power here, with Iskander and Fen to get him through the confusion of the change.

For a while, things had gone well. Harsh was in the city a lot, but he came up whenever he had time off. Once in a while, Iskander and Fen had driven to the city to meet Harsh, but that was rare because back then neither he nor Fen dealt well with other kin or crowds of humans. Then Fen had betrayed them with Rasmus Kessler, and his life and Harsh’s had become a nightmare.

Not all the memories were bad, though. Nikodemus and Carson had saved his life at this house. In the driveway behind the house, he motioned to Paisley and tapped his chest. “Do you feel anything?”

She stayed where she was, on the gravel area between the barn and the house, hands shoved deep in her coat. In the dark, her hair was a shadow of its usual color. “No.”

“All right, then.” As they walked up the steps to the back porch, he resisted the urge to take her hand. He said, “Whoever Harsh got to look after the place is doing a good job.” The house had been recently painted, there were no cobwebs, and the yard was weed-free. In rural Sonoma County where native grasses could easily hit six feet high, that was an accomplishment. The proofing was solid and remained in place. He wondered who Harsh had found to take the dog.

He held up a hand. “Stay here until I say it’s okay to come in, all right?”

She nodded.

After dealing with the proofing inside the house, he hit the light switch. The lights came on. The first thing he noticed, besides the place being clean, was that all signs of Fen were gone. That had to be Harsh’s doing, from whenever he closed up the house after Nikodemus established himself at the Tiburon place. Harsh had just as much reason as Iskander to want to eradicate Fen from his life. She’d cost Harsh his freedom and the life he’d built for himself among humans. He appreciated the follow-through.

Farther in, his spine tingled, but he recognized that as a reaction to the magical residue of his now-long-ago encounter with Nikodemus and Carson. He’d been so close to giving in to the insanity, but instead he’d ended up severed from Fen and sworn to Nikodemus. Best two things ever to happen to him. He took a deep breath before he walked back to where Paisley waited, leaning against the porch railing. He motioned to her. “Come on in.”

“Nice place,” she said when they were in the living room. She looked around while she took off her coat. She was still wearing her work clothes, which consisted of black pants, chef’s jacket, and rubber-soled clogs. She looked good. “It’s cute.”

“Thanks.” He cleared his throat. “I’ll get the groceries.”

“I’ll help.” She help up a hand. “Don’t argue. Please.”

They put away the groceries, and when that was done, he said, “Can I borrow your phone? I have a couple of calls to make to find out where we stand. Then we’ll talk.”

She handed over her cell. “Are you hungry?” she asked.

“Starving.”

“I’ll make us some dinner. Go make your calls.”

He went into the living room and set up the phone to connect to his e-mail. While the messages downloaded, he dialed his voice mail. He had twenty messages, three more than the last time he checked, and disconnected without listening to any of them. If Durian came after them here, Iskander figured his chances of taking down the assassin were fifty-fifty at best. He called Nikodemus.

Nikodemus answered on the first ring.

“It’s Iskander.”

“Talk to me.”

The tension in his chest eased. If Nikodemus had sent Durian or Gray to track them down, he’d have told him so up front. He sat on the couch and talked for a long time, keeping his voice low. He told Nikodemus what had happened at Café deMonde, about Fen showing up, what he saw Paisley do to the witch, and what he’d done to get her out of there.

“The witch in question,” Nikodemus said slowly when Iskander stopped talking, “is plenty pissed off.”

“I don’t think Paisley knew what she was doing. She was protecting herself.” His tension returned. He was telling Nikodemus the truth. But there were layers to the truth, and an oath of fealty tended not to flex with self-deception. He’d been sworn to Nikodemus for almost two years, and not once had his oath to the warlord ever been called into question. The tightness in his chest wasn’t pleasant. He didn’t like it. At all. But he wasn’t going to throw Paisley under the bus. He couldn’t, and that was a fact.

Who’d have thought there was a third person he’d die for?

“Did she really release the magic the way you said?” Nikodemus asked.

“She did.”

“You don’t have any doubt?”

“No.”

Nikodemus didn’t say anything for a bit. Iskander waited him out. Nikodemus wasn’t stupid. He understood the implications of someone who could do what Paisley had done. “I need to meet her.”

“No.” The center of his chest contracted. It fucking hurt.

“There’s not going to be a sanction.” Nikodemus was more his normal, brisk self now, and the pain in Iskander’s chest eased again. “The witch asked—don’t get me wrong. She wants Paisley dead. We talked and eventually she got around to saying she wouldn’t do anything about it.”

“She was lying.”

“No shit.” Nikodemus laughed.

“How pissed off was she?”

“Enough to cause me a lot of trouble.”

“She killed a lot of us, Warlord. There were dozens, and they were all in agony.” Iskander waited out the silence.

“Before I let you go,” Nikodemus said.

“Yeah?”

“I told her you were most likely to be at the farmhouse. I assume that’s where you are now.”

“Yeah.” Throw the witch a bone by telling her where to find the people she wanted to off. As setups went, it was brilliant. Nikodemus knew exactly what he’d sent the witch to face.

“So.” Amusement colored his words. “Pissed off witch headed your way.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Make sure nothing happens to that human of yours.” Even through the phone, the warlord’s imperative settled into Iskander’s bones. Nikodemus didn’t give orders like that often—the ones that obligated him to do what he was told. “Keep your girl under wraps until you hear otherwise, and keep her alive until I have a chance to meet her. When the witch finds you, do the needful. Harsh will take care of any cleanup.”

Iskander smiled. He did his share of wet work for Nikodemus, but this was the first time the warlord hadn’t set limits on what he could do. No limits was good. “Got it.”

“I’ll be in touch.” He paused. “This the best number to reach you?”

“For now.”

He stared at Paisley’s phone after Nikodemus disconnected. The tension of believing he would be forced to break his oath of fealty to the warlord was gone, and in its place was anticipation. He stayed where he was until the smells from the kitchen reminded him that he was hungry and that he owed Paisley some explanations.

In the kitchen, he watched her cook. All her concentration was on the food. He set her phone on the counter. “What are you making?”

“Chicken with blood oranges. Rice.” She glanced at him. “Chocolate soufflé for dessert. Almost done, if you want to set the table. Slice some of that bread, too.”

“Sure.”

It wasn’t long before they were sitting down to the best meal he’d had since the last time Paisley had cooked him dinner. He savored every bite. The farmhouse was quiet in a way the city never could be, and he was okay with sitting here with Paisley, eating great food and not saying much. There hadn’t been many women, none actually, who he was comfortable being around for long. He didn’t spend much time with women when one or both of them weren’t thinking about the sex to come or the sex they’d just had. He was good with women that way. But this… this went beyond his experience. He didn’t know much about women like Paisley.

“Can we talk now?” she asked.

With a sigh, he put down his fork. “The woman you did that thing to is a witch.”

She picked up a slice of the sourdough bread he’d cut and separated the crust from the inside. “You mentioned that.”

“We call them
magekind
. Witches and mages. Humans who can do magic. Some of them kill demons, because taking their magic in a certain way extends their lives. The bodies of the demons die, but the magic doesn’t, and we—Nikodemus and I—agree that’s the screaming you’ve been hearing. The part of those demons that’s still alive and trapped.”

Her fingers pulled at the bread, rolling bits into tiny balls.

“You took back the magic she stole, Paisley. Magic she murdered for. And now the demons you heard screaming aren’t suffering anymore.”

She met his gaze steadily. That’s what he liked about her. She was calm until she had the facts even when the facts she had were turning her life upside down and inside out. “Demons?”

“The kin. Demons. A kind of demon.”

“Who’s
we
? You said ‘we call them magekind.’ ”

“People like me.”

“You mean the kin, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” he said softly. “I do.”

Iskander heard the sound of the motor before Paisley did. He held up a hand for silence. The car was still far from the house but was coming closer. The motor cut off, but he heard wheels crunching over gravel as the vehicle coasted down the driveway.

He smiled.

Game on.