His lips curved. “Oh, I’ve gotten plenty.”
The way he said it made me think he’d had better, and I wanted to smack him. Last night had been the best sex I’d ever had. Which only made me…
Pathetic? Confused? Furious? Tempted?
“That was rape,” I lashed out.
“I didn’t force you to do anything you didn’t want to do. The ya’ lid is a Navajo herb that releases your true desires.” His voice lowered until I had to strain to hear him. “From deep down where those desires live.”
Because his words made that deep-down part of me throb, I snapped, “So you say.”
“You want to believe I raped you, believe it.” He stood and caught me by the forearms, hauling me against him. “That won’t change what happened and why.”
I struggled, but I shouldn’t have bothered. He’d let me go only when he was finished with me.
“I’m a catalyst telepath,” he said.
I stopped struggling, my brain searching for the knowledge I’d obtained long ago. “You bring out abilities in others.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
His brows lifted. “How do you think?”
Sex.
I heard the word in my head as clearly as if he’d said it.
A vague sense of disappointment washed over me, followed closely by embarrassment at my stupidity. Had I really hoped he’d drugged me because he couldn’t wait another instant to get between my legs? Apparently I did, deep down where all those secret desires lived.
“So you whore for the federation?”
I had expected him to pale, let me go, maybe slap me in the mouth. 1 did not expect him to shrug and say, “Someone has to.”
This time when I struggled, he let me go. “What ability did I need in such a great big hurry? Shape-shifting?”
He frowned, opened his mouth as if to say one thing, then shut it, shook his head and said another. “Ruthie gave you her gift, which was clairvoyance, the ability to clearly see.”
“The future? The past?”
“The identities and supernatural natures of the Nephilim. However, you were partially blocking the talent. Or maybe your innate psychometery was. Knowing by touching is your gift. But you had to be able to hear, to see another way. You needed to open yourself.”
“Sheesh, could you play a new tune?” I muttered. He ignored me.
“I’d hoped I could get you to open without sex, but you were being as stubborn now as you were when you were here the first time.”
“Excuse me if I’m no good at being open.” I made quotation marks in the air around the last word. I did have a few trust issues. Considering Sawyer, considering Jimmy, who could blame me?
“Does Jimmy know how you—” I paused, uncertain how to say it.
With his usual intuitiveness, Sawyer filled in the blank. “He knows what I do.”
I expected fury, hot and bubbling. Instead my eyes stung, shocking me. I turned toward the clear, calm waters of the mountain lake and waited until the uncommon urge to weep passed. It didn’t take long.
I thought about what had happened today, and a prickle of unease came over me. Shape-shifting was a Nephilim trait, at the least a breed. I had no idea who my parents were, but maybe Sawyer did.
“What about the shifting?” I faced him. “Where in hell did I get that?” I braced myself to hear that I was descended from a werewolf or worse. As usual, I was wrong.
“You’re an empath.”
I’d never been particularly empathetic. People’s emotions usually annoyed me. Especially my own.
“Not in the usual sense,” Sawyer continued. “True empaths have the ability to put themselves into another’s shoes. They feel what that person feels; they empathize. But you put yourself into another’s shoes literally. You can take on their supernatural abilities.”
I blinked. “Because you can shift, so can I?”
“Yes,” he said simply.
I rubbed my forehead. “This is gonna suck.”
“I’d think you’d be happy about it. You’ll be the most powerful seer on the planet.”
“Goody,” I muttered, dropping my hand. “I’m going to explode with power if I get some from every supernatural entity I see.”
He was shaking his head before I finished. “You’ll only take on a power once. If you have it already, you won’t absorb more of it. And you don’t get their power by seeing them.”
“How then?”
He lifted his eyebrows and spread his hands.
“Touching?”
He shook his head again, but the curve of his lips told me what I needed to know, and my heart thudded so loudly my chest ached.
“Fuck me,” I muttered.
“Exactly.”
Silence settled over us once again as I tried to absorb this new knowledge. I breathed deeply until my heart slowed.
“Just so I’m clear,” I said, “1 absorbed your abilities when you screwed me.”
He didn’t blink at the dual meaning to my words. “Yes.”
“And you knew this was going to happen?”
“I was fairly certain.”
“How could you be fairly certain?” My nose wrinkled, and my voice mocked on the last two words.
“I can recognize psychic talents in others.”