One Hell of a Guy: The Cambion Trilogy, Book 1 (9 page)

Maybe she was too traumatized to notice the eyes thing, or to care about the violence she had just witnessed — but Lily didn’t think so. Sebastian had done something to her, something to make her stand there like a mannequin when by all rights she should have already been twenty blocks away.

Lily could hear him murmuring to the woman but couldn’t make out the words. The growling rumble of his voice seemed to be easing, though; he sounded more like himself every second. The woman nodded, seemed to be listening.

Then she put her face in her hands and started to cry.

Sebastian pulled off his coat — a coat which Lily happened to know had cost something in the neighborhood of two thousand dollars — and wrapped it around the woman, buttoning it at the collar as gently as any mother had ever bundled a child into a jacket.

He finished saying whatever he was saying to her, and tucked her hair behind her ear. She looked up at him and Lily’s heart tripped a little — the naked gratitude was hard to watch.

Finally, the woman walked off — with Sebastian’s coat, Lily noted — and Sebastian approached Lily.

“Let’s go back to the hotel,” he said, softly. “I won’t touch you.”

“What was that?” she said, shaking — still pressed against the wall where she’d almost been violated, because at least it was rock solid. The whole rest of her life felt like it was on shifting sand right now.

“Can we just go back to the hotel?” he said. “We can talk there, I promise, but I’d really like to be anywhere but here right now.”

She looked at the crumpled bodies around them — Baggy Shorts had managed to evacuate the alley at some point but the other three were still down — and nodded, shortly. “Okay.”

She followed him back to the Venetian meekly, and didn’t ask any more question until they were safely back in the suite — but as soon as the door closed behind them, she swung around and poked him in the chest.

“Explain that to me.”

“There’s nothing to explain, Lily,” he said. “I assume you wouldn’t have rather I just left things as they were?”

And she could see he would dismiss her, and evade any questions if he could.

So she said it — the thing she’d been thinking of all the way back to the hotel. It was crazy, but she said it anyway.

“You’re not human.”

Chapter 11

“I DON’T KNOW what you’re talking about,” Sebastian said, but he didn’t look her in the eye, “or what you think you saw—”

“I saw you,” Lily said, “tossing four guys around, one hand each, like they were rag dolls.” She knew she wasn’t crazy. She wasn’t sure she was entirely sane, either, but that was
not
the point right now. What he’d done wasn’t possible. “No one is that strong.”

“I am.”

“No one
normal
is that strong,” she insisted. “And I’m not talking, like, ‘Oh, I work out.’ What … what are you?”

The question hung in the air, like it had a life of its own. Just by being spoken, the words divided her life; there was the part up till now, when things were how they’d always been, and the part from now on, where she admitted there was more to the world than she’d known. Because what had happened went beyond abnormal. What he’d done wasn’t something a human being could do.

Until now, her world had been … regular. Now her world held the unhuman. Maybe being so quick to accept it meant she watched too much television, but if that was the case then so be it.

Sebastian wasn’t human.

He also wasn’t answering her question, so she asked it again. “I said,
what are you
?”

He didn’t meet her eyes. “That’s an odd way to phrase a question, Lily.”

“It’s the exact right way to phrase the question,” she shot back. “If I’m gonna be inside an episode of
Supernatural
or whatever, fine. I can live with that. What I can’t live with is not knowing, being ignorant. I want you to tell me the truth, now.”

He sighed, and he finally met her eyes. “You don’t know the word for what I am.”

“Try me.”

“The technical term is
cambion
.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Does that mean anything to you?”

Deflated, but only slightly, she shook my head. “Okay, no, I don’t know that word. What does it mean?”

“It means one of my parents — my mother, in this case — is a demon.”

She swallowed, her throat suddenly very dry. “A … demon.”

He nodded. “You said you wanted the truth.”

“I did,” she said. “I do. What about your father?”

“A human,” he said tersely. “I don’t know why my mother chose him, and I don’t know why she chose to leave me to be raised by him. My mother doesn’t talk about things she doesn’t choose to talk about. What I do know is, she came back for me a couple of years ago and told me what I was, and what I could do.”

“Which would be?”

“You saw what happened in that alley. I’m strong.”

“And?”

“And a host of other things.”

“What other things? Can you read my mind?” She wasn’t sure why this was the first and most pressing thing that occurred to her, but once it did she was quite sure she’d die of embarrassment if the answer was yes.

Though what the hell difference did it make when all he had to do was ask her a question anyway?
 

“I can’t read minds, no,” he said, and she was more than a little annoyed to see he looked amused.

“Promise?”

“I swear.”

“Then how did you find me in that alley?”

“I —” He faltered. “I’m actually not allowed to tell you.”

“Not allowed?”

“That’s what I said. And if you leave it alone and don’t badger me about it, I promise I won’t yell at you for leaving your phone behind when you went out to wander around an unfamiliar city.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out her phone, handed it to her. “I texted you after you left, and I just about had a heart attack when it went off in your room.”

She said nothing. It had been a stupid and thoughtless thing to do.

He waited a second, nodded when she remained silent. “But I can assure you, my abilities do
not
include mind-reading.”

“Then what
do
they include?”

“I’ve hardly got the time or the inclination to sit here and catalogue every inhuman ability that comes with my heritage. And, honestly? There may be some I don’t know. It’s not entirely normal for someone like my mother to procreate.”

“What is your mother?”

He looked away again. “My mother?”

“Yes, your mother,” she snapped. “You said she’s a demon. What kind of a demon? Are there even different kinds? Different levels? Are there politics?”

“You don’t ask much, do you?” It wasn’t a question, the way he said it. “There’s politics in everything, Lily. That can’t be much of a surprise to you.”

“Are there different types?” She was wracking her brain for Sunday school tidbits and coming up pretty blank.

“Yes,” he said, slowly.

“What is your mother?”

“What makes you think you’ll know that any better than
cambion
?”

His very unwillingness to answer told Lily she very much needed to know. She repeated the question. “What is your mother?”

He sighed. “She’s a succubus.”

Lily went icy cold, then flushed. “I live in the world, Sebastian. You knew perfectly well I would know what that is.”

“What is it, then?” he challenged.

“It’s …” She floundered a bit, then recovered. “It’s a sex demon. Like, a temptress.”

“That’s simplistic.”

“They make people desperate to have sex with them.” She could tell from the heat of her face that she was beet red right to the roots of her hair but she refused to back down. “They give off some kind of … sex vibe. And people just fall all over them.”

“I suppose that’s a workable description —” he began.

“Workable, my ass!” She was furious
. “You’ve got it too
.”

“Some of it,” he conceded. “Notably, I have … persuasive abilities.” He smiled a little. “I suppose I could have made those guys leave, rather than tossing them around like that.”

“Persuasive abilities?”

“Yes,” he said. “I can … make people do things. If I concentrate, if they’re not naturally resistant — there are people who are. There are some ifs. Nothing is foolproof.” He grinned again, a little feral this time. “And I wasn’t really in the mood to reason with them anyway. I was in the mood to break bones.”

She shuddered, but forced her thoughts away from it. They’d got what was coming to them. She wasn’t going to be squeamish about it; she knew what they’d had in mind for her.

What mattered right now what that
he’d been fucking with her head
.
 

“And what else do you get from your mother?” She moved in close to him, which was actually a mistake, because as soon as she did a little jolt of something very like electricity tingled along her nerve endings. She stepped back. “What about the sex demon stuff?”

“I have some of that, yes.”

“Yeah,” she said, furious. “
Some
of that. You’ve got a
lot
of that, and you used it on me.”

“No —”

“Yes!” She took two more careful steps back. “You’ve got this
woo-woo sexytime
magic that makes girls …”

“Makes girls what, Lily?”

“Oh, I don’t know — makes girls behave in ways they wouldn’t usually, and get fired from their very nice jobs for
immoral behavior
?”

“That’s not what—”

“Miri was right,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “You roofied me — with your mind, but what difference does that make? It’s the same thing. And you got me fired!”

“This is ridiculous,” he said, and stalked over to her, took her by the shoulders. “I wanted you; you wanted me, too. That’s as simple as it gets.”

“I didn’t have any choice,” she said, and the fact that she was leaning into his chest rather than pulling away did not escape her, but there didn’t seem to be a whole lot she could do about it. “You’re doing it now.”

“It’s not like that,” he said. “I’m not doing anything.”

“Yes, you are,” she said, weakly. “You touch me and … I can’t think. I don’t like it. I don’t like what you’re doing.”

“I’m not doing anything,” he said again. “I
can
— I have, before, even with you. That first night, when I took your hand, I
made
you dance with me.”

“So you admit it?”

“No, what I’m saying is, since then? I haven’t forced a single thing on you.” He ran his hands up and down her upper arms, raising gooseflesh there, and it was all she could do to even listen to what he was saying. “And that night, Lily, let’s not forget, you walked away. I didn’t know that could be done and you did it. You’re the only woman who ever has.”

“Fat lot of good it does me, when I just keep coming back,” she said. “That has to be coming from you. Why would I keep doing something if I didn’t want to?”

“What if you want to, Lily?” he asked.

“How can I know? The minute you’re in the room, I just … fuzz up.”

“I don’t have all the answers. Maybe there’s a certain element of it that just happens, because of what I am.” He shrugged a little. “I can’t help being what I am, any more than I can help wanting you.”

“But why do I want you too, so much?” she asked.

“Is it too much to imagine it might just be because you do?” he said, and he actually sounded almost … wistful.

“I’ve never felt like this before, not with anyone. And it gets a hundred times worse if you touch me.” She shook her head again, wished she had the strength to shove him away. “It’s not normal. It’s because of what you are.”

He sighed. “Then I suppose it is. But if being what I am, and wanting you, makes you want me too — what am I supposed to do about it? Cease to be?”

“So because you want me, I don’t get a say?” she protested. “Do you not even see how dicey that is, for you to get all
woo-woo
and take away my right to decide?”

And just like that, he wasn’t touching her anymore. He took both of his hands off her, very deliberately, and stepped all the way other side of the suite’s living room section. “Of what, exactly, are you accusing me?” he said, his voice very cold.

“No,” she said. “I don’t mean —”

“You are making a comparison I would ask you to evaluate very carefully,” he said, and it was evident from the cadence of his speech that he was choosing his words very precisely. “We were both there in that alley an hour ago. Are you seriously trying to draw a parallel between that situation and this?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Then what?”

“I just mean …” What
did
she mean? “I just mean — I want to know I can choose. I don’t want you using your mojo on me.”

He sighed again, shook his head. “My
mojo
, as you call it, doesn’t have an off switch.”

“Have you tried?”

“I’ve had no reason to try,” he said, and he sounded pretty pissed off. “You’re the first to complain, that’s for sure.”

“And that’s another thing,” she said. “I don’t like the idea that if I
did
get involved with you, every woman in the five boroughs is going to be tossing herself at you.”

“I don’t want any other woman in the five boroughs,” he said, “or anywhere else for that matter. I’m tired of women tossing themselves at me. It’s boring.”

“You said that,” she said. “The first night in Abaddon, you said that to the bartender.”

He leaned his hip against the nearest wingback chair, looked down at his hands for moment. “The thing you have to understand, Lily, is women have always thrown themselves at me, for as long as I’ve been aware of women. I thought it was because of something I did — because I was smart, or because I lettered in track, or because I helped them with homework — whatever. Maybe just because I was good-looking.”

“That’s not something you
do
,” she said. “Even in … mere mortals, that’s genetics.”

“Maybe, but I
could
have eaten a lot more pizza and done a lot less exercise. And I went to school with plenty of guys who washed their hair once a week whether —”

“— they needed it or not,” she finished, and smiled shyly. “My dad used to say that. Okay, so you were a hottie and you loved it when the chicks were all nuts about you. This isn’t exactly reassuring.”