The Mephisto Covenant (15 page)

“What I have on.”

He looked her up and down. “Nice, but you need other clothes, Sasha. Let me take you shopping. We’ll go anywhere you like and get anything you want.”

“I don’t have much money.” “I’ll pay. No strings, I promise.” “I could tell Tim, and he
’d buy me some new stuff. If it
wasn’t for him, I’d be living on the street because Melanie would kick me out. She’s brutal, Jax. She told me this morning that the CIA thinks my mother is dead. I feel sorry for him, because he has to be married to her.”

“Then don’t make him feel worse. Let me help you, and he won’t have to know what Melanie did.”

She didn’t see that she had much of a choice. Telluride was superexpensive, and it wasn’t like she had any way of getting to another town, one with stores that real people could afford.

Unless she wanted to wear the same clothes every single day, she had to accept Jax’s offer. Looking up into his black eyes, she was struck all over again by random, vivid, unfamiliar emotions, but somewhere in the depths of those eyes, she also saw sincerity . . . and genuine affection. “All right, Jax, but let’s call it a loan. Even if I’m never able to pay you back, it’d make me feel better about being a mooch.”

“You’re not a mooch, and you can pretend you mean to pay me back if you want. I’ll even pretend that I’d accept.” He moved closer and slid his arms around her. “Where do you want to go?”

She tried not to slip her arms beneath his trench coat, or spread her palms across his broad, muscular back, or inhale the delicious scent of him, or rest her cheek against his hard, warm chest. She tried. And failed. “San Francisco,” she finally said. “It’s where I know how to find things. Start at Macy’s in Union Square.”

A moment later, they stood in the men’s department. Glancing around, astonished that no one appeared to notice they’d materialized out of nowhere, she said, “I was kinda thinking about jeans and sweaters, instead of a pinstripe suit.”

“I need something to cover my eyes.” He dropped his arms and stepped back, then reached for a pair of sunglasses from a rotating display. Sliding them onto his face, he said, “What do you think?”

They were dark wraparounds. In his black trench coat, with his black hair and dark stubble,
he looked awesome. She resisted
the urge to melt into a puddle at his feet. “They’ll do.” From behind her, someone
said, “Hey, Sasha! What’s han-
gin’, babe? Somebody told me you moved to Colorado.” With her heart in her throat, she turned just as Smith Hardwick swooped down to plant a kiss on her lips. It didn’t mean anything. He did it to every
girl who ran with their group,
because that’s just who he was. Before she could say a wo
rd, or decide whether or not to
introduce Jax, or formulate some kind of lie about why she was in San Francisco, Smith was on his back, sliding across the slick wooden floor toward a rack of Polos. Jax stood just next to her, looking like a demon from Hell, his hands clenched into fists.

seven

he didn’t punch the guy.just mentally shoved him as

hard as he could to get him away from Sasha. He saw him kiss her and instinct took over, but the second he saw the guy hit the rack of shirts, he knew he’d gone way overboard. The look on Sasha’s face verified it. Man, was she pissed.

She started to run to the guy, but he couldn’t let her do that. Too much explaining. She’d demand he apologize; many lies would follow. Best to make a clean break. So before she’d taken two steps, he hauled her back, erased the guy’s memory of them, and popped them to another part of the store.

Jerking away as fast as she could, she turned on him and said in an angry whisper, “Why did you do that? Smith is a friend! A nice guy!”

“He kissed you.”

“So? It’s not like you own me! And it wasn’t a kiss. It’s just how he says hello.”

“Are you in love with him?”

Rolling her eyes, she turned to the display of socks next to them and said to a pair of argyles, “Jax, I’ve known him since I was four years old and started preschool at St. Michael’s. He’s like a brother or something. I would have liked to see him, to visit a little. Why’d you have to go and shove him like that?”

“Too hard, huh?” “You shouldn’t have shoved him at all.” “But he kissed you.” She shot him a look, then sai
d to the argyles, “When I start
school tomorrow, if I meet somebody and he asks me out, if he touches me, are you going to be there shoving him across the floor? ”

Just the idea made his stomach hurt. “I hated that, Sasha. A lot.”

Her sigh was heartfelt. She turned to face him and said in a really sad voice, “Don’t worry too much about it happening in Telluride. Guys don’t like me. I mean, I’ve always had guy friends, but none of them have ever liked me. Not liked me, liked me.”

“You’re wrong. You have to be wrong. You’re so beautiful, such an incredible person, how did you not have a million boyfriends?”

“I don’t know. It’s not as if I didn’t try. But it’s like I’m a nun or something. Like I’m untouchable.”

“Maybe because you’re Anabo. Maybe human guys can sense
it, and they know you’re never
gonna be easy. I don’t know a whole lot about humans, but I do know guys, and they’re all about easy. You get what I’m saying?”

“I get it. And I guess you’d know, Mr. Gets It in the Dark with Strangers.”

“It’s not like that with you, Sasha.”

“If you say it’s because I’m Anabo, or that you respect me too much, or something stupid like that, I’ll kick you in the nuts and laugh.”

He said to the argyles, “You are Anabo, and I do respect you, but I’d still like to see you naked. In fact, I’d be working on it right now, if success didn’t mean you’d be forced to live on our mountain the rest of your life. Also, there’s that pesky problem that you think I’m repulsive.”

“Not that way. I wish it wasn’t true, because I’m really not okay with who you are, but no way do I think you’re repulsive.” “So you’d like to have yo
ur way with me, even though you
don’t respect me.” He was teasing her, but she
didn’t realize it. She blushed,
looked away, and said to the panty hose, “I just keep remembering what it was like to kiss you. I’ve never felt like that before.”

He moved a little closer and touched her hair, so soft and silky. “It’s powerful stuff, Sasha. Don’t beat yourself up about it.

You can feel like that and still think I’m creepy. It doesn’t make you less of a person.”

“I don’t think you’re creepy.” “Then what’s the problem?” “I . . . I don’t know. You’r
e immortal, for one thing. What
happens if we stay together? I’d be an old lady, wearing these support hose, and you’d still be a hot eighteen-year-old.”

“Maybe you’d become immortal, too.”

Looking up quickly, she was clearly stunned. “Are you serious?”

“Well, yeah. It could happen, if you wanted.”

She stepped back, staring at him with wide eyes. “No, I wouldn’t want that! Live forever? It’s not right. It’s weird. And what would I do for all eternity? Sit around and wait for you to get home from killing people?”

Jax was tired. She was never going to go for this, so why the hell did he try? “If you were immortal, you’d be with me when I goto...to...”

“Kill people?”

“Stop saying that! Why can’t you see them for what they are? It’s a bigger deal to step on a bug. And what would you have me do, let guys like Kasamov and Bruno stick around to trick more people into losing their souls?”

Great tears welled in her eyes and slowly rolled down her cheeks. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t know what I want you to do. I want you to be different. I want you to be normal and not from Hell. How can I do this? How can I be with you and still believe in God?”

“Do you think I don’t believe in God?”

“I know you believe there is a God, but you’re not about Heaven.”

“Only because I can’t help it. I was born this way, and maybe Heaven’s not in the cards for me, but it doesn’t mean I don’t want it.”

Swiping at her tears, she moved close and slid her arms around him. “I’m sorry, Jax. I wish it was different.”

He circled her shoulders and dropped his cheek to her hair.

“I’m not really in the mood to shop, after all. Let’s just go back to Telluride.”

“You need some clothes, and we’re going to get some. We’ll just try to avoid anyone you know, deal?”

She nodded against his chest. “Deal.”

Shopping for clothes wasn’t something he did. Ever. All of their clothes were bought for them by the Luminas, or handmade by the Purgs. He’d shopped before, but always for things like books, or ski equipment, or liquor. Sometimes cigars. But shopping for clothes was a whole new thing, and hanging around in the girls’ department was an experience like no other. The scents were intriguing, the dyes and fibers from the clothes mingling with perfume and skin and assaulting his nose. Above it all, he never lost Sasha’s scent, even after she
disappeared with an armload of
clothes through a doorway to the dressing room and said she’d be right back.

She didn’t come right back. She was in there forever, until he began to worry that something was wrong. Maybe she was choking on something, or had tripped and hit her head. When he couldn’t stand waiting any longer, he cloaked himself to invisible and popped to where her scent was strongest, which was inside a tiny cubicle with a mirror.

She stood there in a pair of jeans and nothing else. Nothing. Else. He stared. Reality was so much better than imagination, he

was speechless with wonder. He saw her birthmark, just below her right breast.

Crossing her arms over her lovely breasts, she glared at him. “You can’t be in here!” she whispered. “No guys allowed.”

“No one can see me. I’m invisible.” “I can see you!” And so she could. The r
eminder of how she was changing
made him anxious, so he looked once more at the swell of her beautiful breasts, then popped out. He regretted that. A lot. The image of her soft skin and perfect pink nipples was burned into his brain, making him all the more bummed that she couldn’t get past what he was and be with him.

Finally, after another ten minutes of watching giggling girls and tired mothers wander through the racks, he was relieved when Sasha reappeared, several items in her arms. He went with her to the register and paid cash, bemused as they walked away and she was freaking about how much it cost. “It’s nothing, Sasha. We’re very rich, and this is like . . . nothing. Say thank you and stop talking about it.”

“Thank you, Jax.”

---

Jax didn’t take her back to Telluride until after dark. Before they were done, he’d bought her tons of new clothes, underwear, perfume—because a saleslady had accosted them and he decided she definitely needed to smell like what was on that little white card—a new sketchbook, a watercolor of the Golden Gate Bridge he bought from a woman on the street, and a top-of-theline MacBook with a pink carry case. His generosity was huge, and when she protested, certain he’d regret dropping so much cash, he said, “You’re fun to buy stuff for because you get so excited about everything. Let me do this. Let me have some fun. Fun isn’t something I get to have much of.”

He finally agreed to stop buying her things and they returned to Telluride, to her room, just after seven o’clock. He wanted to stay and help her clean up, but she said, “I’d rather do it myself. Thanks, but you go on home and get ready for school tomorrow.”

“Will you be okay? What about Melanie?”

“I’m going to avoid her as much as I can, but if she comes in here and hassles me, I’ll deal. Don’t worry about me.”

“You might as well tell me to stop breathing.” He looked around at the mess and shook his head. “This blows, but I’m glad
it was her, searching, and not a Skia, asking you questions.” “You’ll take good care of the painting, won’t you?” “It’ll be safe, no worries.” “Will you tell me what it is? My curiosity was killing me, but

Mom said it was starting to flake, and I was afraid if I unrolled it, tons of paint would fall off.”

“I’ll tell you. In fact, after Andres has had a chance to look it over, I’ll take you to see it.”

“You’ll give it back, won’t you?”

“Of course I will. Put it out of your mind.” He went to the desk and picked up the half of her broken laptop that contained the hard drive. “I’ll see if Brody can get the files off this, if you want.”

“That’d be awesome. My college essay is on there. Applications are due in a week, so I kinda need to get on that.”

He stood straight, and she knew he was about to disappear. She didn’t want him to. She wanted him to wrap his arms around her and kiss her again. In fact, she wasn’t sure she’d ever wanted anything so much. What was wrong with her? How could she want him like this, knowing what he was?

Almost as if he could read her thoughts, he said quietly, “The ball’s always in your court. I’m here, and ready, if you ever change your mind. Good night, Sasha. Don’t forget to call the dog.” He faded away, and she was alone.

---

“For a girl who hates you, Sasha sure hangs with you a lot.”