“How did the ice goddess get past your walls?”
“You mean Lara?” Alex watched Stacey’s temper soar higher, the red on her cheeks deepen, and wondered what he’d done now. Although she’d remained scornful, he’d thought her rage had been cooling. Or at least been under control.
“I bet you never treated her the way you did me.”
Alex watched Stacey’s ponytail swing as she tossed her head. Why hadn’t he loosened her hair last night? Hell, he’d been dying for the feel of it and he’d missed his chance. He had definitely been in too much of a hurry.
“Look, I didn’t mean to walk away from you the way I did last night.” He knew that was inadequate as an apology, but it would have to do.
“Oh, yeah, I bet you didn’t mean to.” She huffed out a breath that had her bangs flying. “You accidentally fastened your pants and strolled away as if nothing had happened. Why don’t you at least admit the truth? We both know it didn’t mean a thing to you!”
Alex pulled his hands from his pockets, took hold of her shoulders and lowered his head until they were nose to nose. She didn’t try to break his grip, but glared up at him. “It meant too damn much,” he said, his tone atypically heated.
He wasn’t sure who was more surprised by his words, Stacey or himself. He never meant to admit that. It gave her power over him and he’d sworn he would never give another woman a chance to shatter his heart. Abruptly, he stepped back and moved to the cabin door. “We need to get going,” he said when he had his usual dispassionate voice working. “We still have a lot of ground to cover before we reach J Nine.”
“What do you mean ’it meant too much’?”
Alex ignored her demand. “Come on, Johnson, let’s move.”
*** *** ***
“You really don’t think I’m a coward?”
Damon quit playing with the water and groaned. “Are you trying to kill me?” he asked, turning away from the shower to look at Ravyn. She worked absently at a knot in her damp hair.
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. Any more positive reinforcement and neither one of us may be able to walk for days.”
Ravyn reached for him and sharply tugged some chest hair. He caught her hand and pressed her fingers flat against his pecs. “Okay, okay. No, I don’t think you’re a coward.”
She bit her lip and he knew she had yet to be convinced. It would take time for her view to shift. He tugged her body against his own, just holding her. She moved easily into his arms, returning his embrace without hesitation and he knew a peace he’d never felt before. It lasted until she pressed her mouth against his chest and gave a little lick. Conscience battled with baser instinct and won. Reluctantly, he took a step back. He knew Ravyn had to be sore and he had no intention of adding to her discomfort. Damon put her away from him.
“Finish getting dressed, sweet pea.” The sight of her in a top that clung to her breasts and pair of panties that showed off her long legs played hell with his determination that they make it out of the suite today. She pulled on a pair of pants, but it didn’t help him any. They were red and fit much too close.
He turned his back to her and started switching the water on and off again. Ravyn had shown him how to manage the lights and water with a flick of his wrist and focused concentration, and he remained fascinated by the technology. At first, he hadn’t been able to make any of the controls work; then Ravyn had told him to quit analyzing his actions. After he’d stopped thinking, it had been easy. Still, Damon couldn’t keep from trying to figure out the process. Near as he could tell, they pulled up minute amounts of energy from the planet, directed it toward, say the showerhead, while imagining water coming out of it. He hadn’t figured the whole thing out yet, but he did know the process was more deliberate and time consuming for him than for Ravyn.
“Damon, are you going to play with the water the rest of the afternoon?” she asked, sounding amused.
“Sorry.” He turned the shower off and left it that way.
“I think we should destroy our clothes,” she said. “We have a whole closet at our disposal anyway.”
He looked at the pile of mud-encrusted garments on the floor and then shifted his gaze to the closet door. Ravyn had opened it after their shower. The thing was huge, bigger than a lot of rooms he’d seen, and loaded with clothes, both men’s and women’s. Damon tugged at the black pants he wore. They were about three inches too short “I don’t know,” he said, “at least my pants, dirty as they are, fit me.”
Ravyn glanced down at his ankles and sank to her knees. “I can fix that,” she told him.
Only one thought filled his head at the sight of her kneeling before him and it had nothing to do with the length of his trousers. The image of her mouth on him had the crotch of the borrowed trousers becoming uncomfortably tight. She tugged at one leg and the material stretched. While he stood, amazed, she moved to the other leg and repeated her actions until he had a pair of slacks that appeared made for him.
“How—? Never mind.” Damon shook his head and fastened the shirt he wore. The sleeves were too short and he pulled at them. Nothing happened. He tried drawing energy from his surroundings as he imagined the cuff reaching his wrist. A small thrill of elation shot through him when the fabric began to lengthen. By the time he finished altering the shirt, Ravyn stood, watching him with an indulgent smile on her face. His lips twitched. Okay, so he was like a little boy with a new toy, Damon admitted to himself, but it was different to be able to adjust things by thought alone.
“Come on, let’s get some shoes on. There’s something I’ve been wanting to check out.”
Her grin widened, but she followed him into the bedchamber without comment. He grabbed her boots and handed them to her.
“Oh, wow. Thanks for cleaning them.”
“I had to do something while you were sleeping.”
She wrinkled her nose at him, but otherwise ignored his comment and sat on the bed. He had his own boots on and tied before she managed to get one foot shod. Damon watched her meticulously work the laces of her boots. It didn’t matter what she did, he never tired of observing her. He doubted he ever would. That brought a thought to mind.
“Ravyn.”
“Yeah?” She looked up from her task.
“The colonel really won’t like the idea of the two of us.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment. When she had both her boots tied, she walked to him. Her toes almost touched his before she stopped. “I’ve never let Alex pick my friends. I’m certainly not going to let him tell me who I can have as a lover. If he doesn’t like it, he’ll just have to get over it.”
Damon took exception to being referred to as her “lover.” What they had went far beyond that, but he let it pass. After studying her, he decided she meant what she said about the colonel. For now, at least. Things might be different when she faced her brother’s disapproval head on. He dropped the subject and took her hand. “Come on.”
He led her unerringly through the hallways to a wall. There were symbols embedded in the stone with brightly colored gems. It was so familiar and yet not quite. Ravyn linked her fingers with his, and when he glanced over, he realized she had the same interest in the pattern that he did. Her free hand reached out and touched it, tracing the swirl that went through the center of the figure. Without warning, she jerked her hand back.
“What is it?” His body tensed, prepared to defend her.
“There’s incredible power there. I don’t know if it’s in the image itself or behind that wall, but I’ve never felt energy like that before in my life.”
He touched the wall himself, not expecting to feel anything, but he did. And he understood why Ravyn had pulled her hand back so quickly. A force seemed to fill every cell in his body, making him hum with electricity. He loved the sense of invigoration, but, at the same time, it made him uneasy. Whatever the force was may have started out natural, but it had been formed and guided by the people who had lived here.
Raising his hand, he pressed a number of stones in a sequence he remembered from his daydream. The wall opened as he’d known it would. Damon could have explored while Ravyn slept, he’d passed this spot on his way out of the building, but some intuition told him to bring her with him.
He led the way down the stairs, Ravyn close on his heels. Her hand was cold and he knew she was scared. He also knew she berated herself for feeling that way. “Turn on the lights for me,” he told her and almost instantly the stairway lit up.
These stairs were not gray like everything else, but clear as if they walked on ice. The bottom tread had an inclusion that made him think of a star burst. He stopped and stared at the stone beneath his feet.
“Did you know clear quartz puts human energies in sync with the universe?” Ravyn asked, but she didn’t wait for an answer. “It’s a powerful stone used to increase telepathic and psychic abilities. I wonder what the inclusion is?”
Uneasy with the idea of getting in sync with the universe, Damon stepped onto the milky white floor and pulled Ravyn with him. He hoped she didn’t tell him anything about this white stone that he would be happier not knowing.
The glow from the stairway didn’t go far into the room and he mentally felt for lights and brought them up. Ravyn sucked in her breath and he followed her gaze. There on a clear dais stood the blue obelisk he’d seen in his vision of the Old City. White walls made the crystal column the focal point of the room. Ravyn broke his hold and went to it Resting her hands on the stone, she closed her eyes. She stood that way for a long time before her eyes opened and she smiled at him. “Touch it, Damon.”
As if compelled, he moved forward. He stood close, pressing his body against her, and placed both hands beside hers on the obelisk. The stone seemed to hum beneath his fingers, stronger than the sensation he’d felt at the wall. Damon could sense Ravyn’s arousal and his own body grew hard. They were getting turned on from touching a big rock, but he couldn’t pull away.
“Greetings and salutations to you on this very fine day.”
The voice, though sweetly feminine, did not belong to Ravyn.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ravyn drew a quick breath. The voice startled her, but didn’t scare her. Still, she took comfort in the solid warmth of Damon’s body surrounding her. She knew with all her heart he would never let anything harm her.
“Telepathy?” Damon’s murmur tickled her ear. His calm acceptance had her glancing over her shoulder in surprise.
“Has to be,” Ravyn said, just as quietly. This lost society couldn’t have spoken English. That went beyond the realm of possibility. A shimmering behind the teal obelisk caught Ravyn’s eye. She couldn’t take her hands off the stone to point it out to Damon so she used her chin. “Look over there.”
“Damn.”
She understood the awe in his voice. She felt it herself. There, real as life, stood a man and a woman on the other side of the column. Ravyn felt a shiver go down her spine. The other couple seemed to be looking right at them, waiting for the shock to wear off. It had to be an illusion. Another tremor went through her body as she realized she and Damon wore this couples’ clothes, slept in their bed. The woman smiled as if sensing her thoughts and Ravyn leaned into Damon a little bit harder.
She couldn’t tear her gaze away from them. They were both humanoid. In fact, they could stroll down the street in any town in America and no one would give them a second glance. Except for their eyes. Their irises were gold. Not the golden brown Ravyn saw when she looked in the mirror, but the yellow-gold cats had. Even their pupils were shaped like a cat’s. It should have been eerie, but it wasn’t. Something about it seemed familiar.
“You realize,” Damon said, “we’re the first to see what these people looked like.”
“We’ll be the only ones.” Ravyn didn’t know where the knowledge came from, but it resonated within her. She studied them, trying to memorize everything. The same part of her that knew nobody else would see this couple and she and Damon would only see them this one time.
Their dress seemed formal considering most of the closet held casual clothes. The woman wore a flowing gown of the lightest, most gossamer fabric Ravyn had ever seen, yet she was covered more than adequately. The dress was the palest of blues and pinks. Aquamarine and rose quartz, she realized.
The man stood protectively at the woman’s side. His pants were black and fit closely to a very impressive pair of thighs. Not quite as impressive as Damon’s, Ravyn decided loyally. The shirt he wore should have made him look like a court jester, yet it did not. The green and gold fabric draped a broad chest and massive shoulders. It explained why Damon could wear the man’s clothes, even if they were too short for him.
The woman raised her hand and pushed her long, midnight hair away from her face. She looked back at the man, caught his nod and turned to her and Damon once more. “Allow me to perform introductions. I am called Meriwa and this is my mate, Kale.” The man inclined his head, his dark hair falling in front of his shoulders. Meriwa paused and Ravyn wondered if she and Damon were expected to reciprocate. This had to be a recorded message, yet it was so lifelike it felt rude to stand there.
Meriwa smiled again, giving Ravyn goose bumps. Millennia-old images were not supposed to read the minds of people in the here and now. Thankfully, the woman continued before the sensation grew more pronounced. “We are the gatekeepers of this planet. If you have been here for any length of time, you are aware this world harbors a menace to all sentient beings.”
“Oh, yeah,” Damon said dryly, “we noticed.”
“This threat is not of our people.” Meriwa’s “voice” shook slightly, but it was hard to tell whether it was a fault in the message or high emotion. “Many died and many more returned to our home world before we learned who committed the mutilations. The being is exiled here from a distant planet. It was difficult to scan his mind without him discovering the intrusion, but we felt we had no other choice if we hoped to neutralize the threat. We learned he believes his goddess requires the sacrifice of sentient beings. He arranges their bodies in her symbols, the lightning bolt and the flower, as a tribute.”