SEVENTEEN
I was right about my reception at the emergency room. I once again had the delightful experience of being ignored when I claimed I was all right, and though I understood why, I couldn’t help getting crankier as time went on. I wanted to get the hell out of there. I wanted a little quiet time in which I could try to process everything I’d just gone through. And I was so bone tired, I wanted a little time to sleep it off, too. None of which I was getting.
I put my foot down when they started talking about skull X-rays and an MRI. If they started ordering tests where I’d have to wait my turn to get in and then wait for the results, I was going to be in there all day. I had a right to refuse medical treatment, and I asserted it with a vengeance.
I swear every person in the entire ER tried to talk me out of checking myself out. It felt like I had to repeat myself to about twenty people, everyone from the attending physician to the freaking janitor, before I was finally given some papers to fill out that basically said it wasn’t their fault if I died a horrible death due to leaving the hospital against medical advice. If I’d been merely human, they might have scared me so much with their warnings and predictions that I’d have caved.
I was mere moments from escape when the police caught up with me.
For a little while there, I’d almost forgotten that I’d been found bound in duct tape in the trunk of a car. Naturally, the police wanted to know how I’d gotten there. The authorities had caught on to the fact that I was a common denominator between three separate fires—thanks to the Glasses’ insurance company, no doubt. I’d never been a direct target, and the first fire had been declared an accident, but it didn’t exactly lead them to believe my abduction was a random act by some wandering psycho.
I saw no reason not to tell them the truth about the abduction, with a few errors and omissions. Like how I never mentioned being hit in the head with a tire iron, which would be completely unbelievable when I didn’t have any obvious wounds on my head. I knew there was some blood in my hair, because everyone had been looking for its source, but the wound itself was gone. I didn’t know how anyone was going to explain away the blood, and frankly, I didn’t care.
The policemen shared a couple of significant looks as I told them about my abduction. Maybe they thought I was too shaken up to notice. I knew those looks meant something about my story was striking a false note, but I didn’t know what—unless my abductor was still alive and had told all, including the stuff I was leaving out.
“Did the guy who tried to kidnap me survive the crash?” I asked, surprised that I hadn’t thought to ask before. Though maybe I’d been too preoccupied trying to get myself out of the hospital to think about anything else.
The cops looked at each other again. Then one of them, a Detective Taylor, answered me.
“A few broken bones, a lot of stitches, and even more bruises, but yeah, the lucky son of a bitch survived. He’s got a list of priors longer than my arm, and he was real eager to talk.”
Shit. That probably wasn’t good for me. The more stuff didn’t add up, the more suspicious the cops were going to be, and the more determined they were going to be to get to the truth.
“Are you sure you don’t know someone who might have a serious beef with you?” Taylor continued.
I gave him my best baffled face. “I have no idea. I’ve made enemies because of my job, but I don’t know of anyone who would hate me enough to do all this to get back at me.”
Taylor gave me a piercing look, no doubt trying to convey the message that he could see right through me. “Think hard.”
I made a show of thinking about it, furrowing my brow as if I were racking my brain. Then I shook my head. “I’m sorry, Detective, but I can’t think of anyone.”
“A woman, maybe?” he prompted, still not satisfied with my answer.
“I assume you have a reason for asking that,” I said, hoping my face had shown no reaction. If they had reason to suspect a woman was gunning for me, there was only one logical suspect on my list.
“I told you the guy was eager to talk. Said he was hired over the phone by some woman. Never met her in person, though, and of course never got a name.”
I nodded sagely and pretended to think it over some more. Then I raised my hands in a gesture of defeat and shook my head some more. “I still don’t have a clue. Sorry.”
Taylor gave me his card and asked me to call him if anything came to mind. Neither he nor his partner made much effort to hide the fact that they didn’t believe me. I was real glad I was the victim rather than the suspect, or I don’t think they would have let me off quite so easily. Even so, I felt their eyes on me as I retreated to the emergency room entrance, where I was able to borrow a cell phone and make a call.
There were lots of people I could have called to come pick me up at the hospital. I could have called Steph, although I wouldn’t have wanted to worry her. I could have called Anderson, who, once he heard that an unknown woman had hired some thug to kill me and presumably bury me, would have to finally see Emma for what she really was. Or I could have called any of my friends at the mansion who would have driven me home without any hints of drama or complication.
So who did I end up calling? Jamaal, of course.
As far as I knew, he was the only one of Anderson’s Liberi who knew what it was like to die, having gone through the experience at least three times already. So far, I had held myself together through sheer force of will, but once I had a moment of anything resembling privacy, I was going to fall apart, and Jamaal was the only one who would truly understand why.
“Sita’s not going to like it,” he reminded me when I called.
“I died, Jamaal. I died.” There was a tremor in my voice, and for a moment I feared I was going to fall apart in front of an audience after all. Not that people in an emergency room waiting area are all that concerned with other peoples’ distress, but it would have been embarrassing to break down in tears in front of them anyway. Especially when I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get myself under control any time this century.
“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Jamaal said after a brief hesitation.
He hung up before I could thank him. I closed my eyes and tried to breathe slowly and deeply to calm myself. After my last experience with death, I should have known better.
It wasn’t truly dark when I closed my eyes. The fluorescent lighting created a golden red glow behind my closed lids that was nothing like the darkness of death. My adrenal glands didn’t appreciate the difference, however, and terror shot through me from head to toe. I gasped and opened my eyes, my heart hammering, my skin clammy with sweat.
“Are you all right, dear?” asked the nice old lady who’d loaned me her phone.
I plastered on what I was sure was a patently false smile. “I’m fine,” I told her. “Thanks for letting me use your phone.”
Her brow furrowed with concern, and I could see I had one more name I could add to the list of people who hadn’t believed me when I’d said I was fine today. Of course, I didn’t know her name, so it would be hard to add to the list.
The thought struck me as funny, and I knew that my body was trying to find another outlet for all the turmoil I was holding inside. I had successfully blocked the hysterical tears that wanted to rise up, but the inappropriate laughter almost had its way with me. A sound reminiscent of a bark escaped my lips before I changed it into a fake cough and clamped down even harder on my emotions.
“I’m going to wait for my ride outside,” I said, then turned on my heel and practically sprinted for the exit. I knew I was being rude to the little old lady, but if I hadn’t gotten myself away from her, I was sure all my walls were going to crack and I would make a fool of myself in front of everyone.
I had kind of forgotten I’d gotten such an early start to my day because of the predicted weather front coming through. One step out of the emergency room doors was all it took to remind me. My kidnapper had removed my coat so he could bind my wrists more easily, and I had no idea where that coat had ended up. My clothes were still slightly damp from the time I’d spent crumpled in the trunk with the rain beating down through the gap the crash had created, and that first blast of cold air practically took my breath away.
The temperature had dropped since I’d last been out, and the rain had changed into a light snow that so far was only sticking in patches here and there. My breath steamed, and I wrapped my arms around myself for warmth. It didn’t help, and within seconds, I was shivering.
The smart thing to do would be to go inside and wait where it was warm. However, the biting cold served two purposes: it kept me awake despite the exhaustion that dragged at me, and it made me so uncomfortable there wasn’t room in my brain to handle thoughts of death.
I stood shivering in the cold and watched as the snowfall grew heavier, until there was a dusting of white over every exposed surface. So much for the “slight chance” of snow. Exhaustion had made my knees weak, and I was leaning against the side of the building to keep myself upright when I finally saw Jamaal’s black Saab turning into the entrance. I pushed away from the wall as he pulled up to the curb, and my legs were so shaky I almost fell. I was in rough shape, and I hoped I wouldn’t need Jamaal to help me into the car.
The passenger door sprang open, and I saw that Jamaal had leaned across the seat to open it for me. He was watching me intently as I approached, I think trying to gauge whether I could make it on my own or not. If he hadn’t opened the door for me, I don’t know if I could have. I collapsed into the passenger seat in a boneless heap, shivering even more violently when the blast of heated air hit me.
Jamaal reached over me to pull the door closed. I’d kind of forgotten that little detail in the blissful glory of sitting down and feeling the warmth of the heater. Despite my fear of the darkness, my eyelids weighed about a ton each, and sleep was pressing in on me from all sides. I was so out of it I’d forgotten about the seat belt, too. I thought about trying to take over as Jamaal buckled me in, but that simple task loomed like a Herculean labor, and I couldn’t find the energy to even start.
I was asleep before the car started moving again.
There’s no sleep quite so deep and dreamless as that which occurs after a lot of supernatural healing. I didn’t wake up when we arrived at the mansion, nor when Jamaal picked me up and carried me through the snow from the garage to the main house, nor when he carried me up to my room on the third floor. When I did wake up, it was dark outside. Someone—Jamaal, presumably—had considerately turned my bedside lamp on so that I wouldn’t wake up to a dark room. I smiled at that small act of kindness, even as my fuzzy brain realized I didn’t remember a thing since collapsing into the seat of Jamaal’s car.
My body still felt strangely heavy, and I knew that if I curled up and tried to sleep some more, I’d probably drift off again. But that effort would require me to lie there with my eyes closed for a while, and I knew from experience I’d have to face panicky memories of being dead.
Deciding I’d rather wait until the exhaustion had a mind of its own again before facing that ordeal, I pushed myself into a sitting position, and that’s when I noticed a number of things.
For one, I wasn’t wearing my clothes. I glanced down at myself and saw the straps of my bra peeking out from beneath the covers, so at least I wasn’t completely naked, but someone had undressed me.
Second, I noticed the heavenly scent of coffee. I breathed in deep, wondering if I had the strength to wander into the sitting room and fetch myself a cup.
Then, and only then, did I realize I wasn’t alone in the room.
I gave a startled little squeak when I caught sight of the shadowed form sitting quietly in an armchair in the corner. Jamaal leaned forward so that the light from my bedside lamp illuminated his face better. Not that I’d had any doubt who was there once I’d noticed him.
“Coffee?” he asked in a gruff voice, not meeting my eyes.
I wondered if he was the one who’d undressed me, and the thought made my cheeks heat with a blush. “Yes, please,” I answered, taking a page from his book and looking away. I felt almost like I was waking up on the dreaded morning after.
Jamaal walked to the sitting room without another word. I wondered if I should scurry out of bed and grab a robe or something, but that seemed both prudish and pointless. I had sheets to cover myself with, after all, and Jamaal was likely the one who’d removed my clothes in the first place.
I had the guilty thought that I wished I’d been awake for that, but I shoved it aside. Now was not the time to indulge in fantasy and wishful thinking.
Jamaal returned with coffee moments later. He handed me the steaming mug, and I wrapped my hands around it, even though I was no longer chilled to the bone. Then he stood awkwardly by the side of the bed, and I wondered if he was having trouble deciding whether to go back to his chair or sit down beside me.
“How long was I asleep?” I asked, hoping a little normal conversation would help dispel the awkwardness.
“A couple of hours,” he answered, then came to a decision and sat hesitantly on the side of my bed.
“Have you been here the whole time?”
He shook his head, making his beads rattle and click, a sound I would forever associate with him. “Maggie and I went to pick up your car before the snow got too bad. You didn’t exactly tell me the whole story when you called for a ride, did you?” There was a hint of reproach in his voice, which suggested he’d filled in some of the blanks already one way or another.
I tried to think back to what exactly I’d told him. I’d been nearly out of my mind with exhaustion and stress and leftover fear, and it would have taken more strength than I had to tell him everything that had happened. My memory felt a little hazy, but I’m pretty sure all I’d said was that I was in a car accident and that I’d been temporarily dead.
“I wasn’t in any shape for a long explanation at the time,” I told him, taking a sip of my coffee. It tasted warm and soothing, and in a little while, I’d be enjoying a caffeine kick that might help me feel less like the walking dead.
“No, I suppose not,” Jamaal said drily.
Clearly, he knew something about what had happened. “What have you heard? And where did you hear it?”
He shrugged and pulled at a loose string hanging off the edge of an artful tear in the knee of his jeans. “I figured the police would be called to the scene of an accident as bad as the one you must have been in, so I asked Leo to look up the police reports.”
“I don’t know that I’m ever going to get used to him being able to do that.” I guess that explained how Jamaal had known where my car was to go pick it up.
“They said you were found in the trunk of a car, bound in duct tape. They also said that the first responders had reported you dead.”
“Did the reports also say the guy who’d tried to kidnap me confessed he was hired by some unknown woman?”
He nodded. “Yeah. Thanks to Leo, we actually got a look at his full confession. The guy’s orders were to kill you and then get you buried within an hour of your death.”
I shuddered and hugged the covers closer to me. I had come so very, very close to facing my worst nightmare. If it hadn’t been for the accident . . .
All day long, I’d been fighting to keep control of my emotions, to keep them contained inside me where they wouldn’t threaten my ability to think rationally. And all at once, I couldn’t hold them back another instant. Lord knows I tried, but after the first tears escaped, everything crumbled. I covered my face with my hands and sobbed, letting the aftermath of the terror have its way with me.
I’ve never been a big fan of crying in front of people, and if I had to name the top-ten people I didn’t want to cry in front of, Jamaal would head the list. But there are some things in life you can’t control, and this particular burst of emotion was one of them.
Covering my face with my hands didn’t seem like enough, so I bent over double, pulling my knees up and burying my face against them as I hugged them. I felt the sheets sliding away from my skin, but I was too distraught to care. I imagined a manly stoic like Jamaal was appalled enough by my outburst not to notice the expanses of skin I inadvertently revealed. These were not delicate, ladylike tears. These were wrenching, noisy, messy sobs.
I expected Jamaal to sit there and look befuddled, or maybe even to beat a hasty retreat so he didn’t have to witness my meltdown. When I felt the tentative touch of his hand on the bare skin of my back, it was almost enough to startle me into silence. However, this meltdown wasn’t about to let a sympathetic touch derail it.
Surely now Jamaal would retreat, I thought, but he remained beside me, his hand stroking gently up and down my back, more confident now that I hadn’t rebuffed him. For his sake—and yeah, okay, for the sake of my own dignity—I tried to get a handle on myself, but it seemed like the harder I fought to suppress the tears, the more determined they were to escape.
Jamaal slid closer to me on the bed. He slipped his arm around me and pulled me against his chest, one hand on my back, one on the back of my head. I resisted for all of about one and a half seconds, then melted against him, clinging to him as if he were a life raft in a stormy sea. He rocked me back and forth like a child, and he made no obvious attempt to get me to stop crying.
His acceptance of my tears, and his strong, silent support, warmed me from the inside out. And that was before he started singing to me.
I’d only heard him sing once before, but it was one of those rare moments in my life that I’d have loved to bottle up so I could experience it again. His voice was a lovely unpolished baritone, and the tune had the soothing lilt of a lullaby, though I didn’t recognize the language.
There was a part of me that felt faintly ridiculous about cuddling up in a man’s arms, being rocked like a baby while he sang me a lullaby. That part of me was drowned out by the part that was touched and moved beyond words. Jamaal was not a man from whom I expected tenderness, and that was hardly surprising in light of the horrors of his life. But it was moments like this when I knew for sure that all the years of abuse he’d endured, and all the torments of trying to control his death magic, had not destroyed the decent human being he was destined to be, no matter how hard they had tried. There was a reason I felt such a strong connection to him, a reason I felt the need to reach out to him even when he tried to hold himself aloof.
My tears ran their course, slowing to sniffles and hiccups, but Jamaal didn’t let go of me, nor did he stop singing. I took as many deep breaths as I could manage. My head felt swollen and achy, my nose was completely stuffed up, and my chest hurt from the violence of my sobs. And yet for all that, I felt almost . . . peaceful.
Finally, the song ended, and I reluctantly extricated myself from Jamaal’s arms, wiping at my eyes with the backs of my hands, unable to look into his face when I felt so raw.
“That was beautiful,” I said in a scratchy whisper I could barely recognize as my own voice.
“Matilda used to sing it to me when I was very little,” he said. “I should hate it and want to burn it out of my memory, but it’s stayed with me all these years.”
Matilda had been his owner’s wife. She’d been unable to have children of her own, and had treated Jamaal like a surrogate child—right up until the time she found out her husband was Jamaal’s father. Then she’d insisted that her husband sell both Jamaal and his mother, and both their lives had gone to hell.
“What language is it?”
Jamaal chuckled, and even brief laughter from him was so rare that I had to look up at his face after all.
“I’m not sure,” he admitted. “I think it’s Swedish or Finnish or something like that. Matilda’s family was from Scandinavia somewhere. I’m sure I’m butchering the pronunciation.”
“Whatever language it was, it was beautiful,” I told him again, still wiping at my tears.
He shrugged, uncomfortable with the praise. And possibly with the tenderness he’d just shown me. He started plucking at the string on his jeans again. I had a feeling that the discomfort was going to get to be too much for him soon, and he would retreat, leaving me alone to recover. Maybe that would have been the best thing for me, but the last thing I wanted was to be alone.
I reached out and touched the place on his chest where my head had rested. Not surprisingly, his shirt was damp.
“I’m sorry I got your shirt wet,” I murmured as I continued to skim my fingers over the wet spot.
“Nikki . . .” There was an unmistakable warning in his voice, but I didn’t feel inclined to listen, and despite the warning, he wasn’t pulling away.
“It must feel kind of clammy against your skin. Maybe you should take it off.”
He shook his head and pulled my hand away from his chest, but he couldn’t hide the flare of heat in his eyes. I’m not a ravishing beauty under the best of circumstances, and I didn’t want to know how awful I looked after a crying jag like I’d just been through. But I knew Jamaal found me attractive anyway, and I was sitting there in front of him wearing nothing but a bra and panties. Mismatched, and not exactly pretty, but I’ve found men rarely care about such things.
“We’ve given Sita enough fuel to feed her jealousy already,” he said, fingers still wrapped around my hand even as he verbally pushed me away.
I snorted. “Sita can bite me! And probably will, if she gets a chance.”
The dirty look Jamaal gave me suggested he didn’t find my attempt at a joke all that funny. I guess I didn’t, either, because I really didn’t look forward to having his psycho tiger even more mad at me than she already was.
“You can’t let her run your life, Jamaal.”
He tried to stand up, but I anticipated it and grabbed a handful of his shirt. He could have torn away from me easily, but he settled for a halfhearted glare instead.
“The death magic has run my life ever since I first became Liberi,” he growled at me. “Whether it’s contained inside me, or in the form of a tiger, it doesn’t matter. It always wins.”
He was trying to look and sound fierce and angry, but I could hear the wealth of pain under the facade. Still holding on to my handful of shirt, I got to my knees beside him so my head could be level with his as I looked into his eyes. It would have been more effective if he hadn’t turned his face away from me.
“You’ve always been fighting it solo,” I reminded him, then cupped my hand around his face so I could turn him toward me. There was fear in his eyes when he met my gaze, but there was desire, also. “You’re not in this fight alone anymore.”
“I have to be,” he said. I caressed his face, feeling the racing of his pulse beneath my fingertips. “It’s too dangerous . . .”
“After what I faced today, I’m not intimidated by a jealous cat.” We both knew that wasn’t true, of course. Only an idiot wouldn’t be afraid of a magical tiger with a grudge. “And besides, I think you’re worth fighting for.”
Jamaal closed his eyes as if those words hurt, but he leaned forward and rested his forehead against mine, so I guess they didn’t.
“I don’t want you to get hurt because of me,” he whispered, his breath tickling against my skin.
I kissed his temple and felt the shudder of desire that ripped through him. Encouraged, I started kissing my way down the side of his face. One of his hands came to rest on my back, and one on my hip, just above the waistband of my panties. I took that as another positive sign and propped his chin on my palm so that his mouth was at the perfect angle.
His hands clamped down tighter when our lips first touched, and he held himself rigidly still, fighting his desire. But when I ran my tongue along the seam of his lips, he lost all that hard-fought control. A little moan escaped him as his mouth opened for me.
I kissed him hard and thoroughly, and he loved every minute of it. He shifted his grip so that both hands were under my butt, then effortlessly dragged me forward until I was straddling his lap, still on my knees. I pressed myself tightly against him, savoring the scent, the feel, the taste of him. When we’d kissed before, his tongue had been highly flavored by the smoke of his clove cigarettes, and I’d found it surprisingly erotic, perhaps just because clove cigarettes and Jamaal were so closely associated in my mind. I tasted them now, though the flavor was faint because he was smoking so much less.
I played with his braids while I kissed him, enjoying the coarseness of his hair contrasted with the smoothness of the beads. And all the while, I was aware of him hardening beneath me.
My hands slid out of his hair to caress the broad expanse of his back over the thin T-shirt he wore. I desperately wanted to get my hands on bare skin, but the last time we’d tried giving in to our attraction, it had all come to a screeching halt when I’d touched his scars. I didn’t want that to happen again, so I forced myself to let Jamaal set the pace.
His hands explored my every curve while staying maddeningly clear of my erogenous zones. I wasn’t sure if he was doing it to torture me, or if even now he was fighting what was happening between us, trying to keep the distance I so badly wanted to remove.
I was determined to let Jamaal take the lead, but it was a powerful test of my self-control. Without even meaning to, I was grinding myself against him, and I had to clench my hands into fists to resist the urge to tug at his shirt. His mouth left mine as he trailed kisses down my throat. I arched into them and moaned, wanting him more than I could ever remember wanting anyone in my life.
Jamaal put his hand under my butt again, and I thought we were finally getting somewhere when he lifted me and laid me down on the bed. His body came to rest on top of mine, a warm, solid weight that might have crushed me if he weren’t partially supporting himself with his arms.
I thought I might spontaneously combust when he nudged the cup of my bra downward and sucked my nipple into the delicious heat of his mouth. My mind short-circuited with pleasure as my back arched off the bed. I forgot all about letting him set the pace, and about keeping my hands away from his scars. In that pleasure-fogged moment of carelessness, I slid my hands under Jamaal’s shirt.
If I’d been thinking rationally—or thinking at all, more like it—I might have expected Jamaal to be so overcome by pleasure that he forgot whatever it was that made him so touchy about the scars. But either he wasn’t as lost in the pleasure as I was, or whatever emotional wound those scars triggered was far too deep to be defeated by sensual pleasure.
Whatever the reason, Jamaal’s body jerked as though I’d given him an electric shock, and every muscle in his body went tense and rigid. I desperately wanted to hold on to him, but my instincts told me that was a terrible idea, so I kept my hands to myself as he rolled off of me. He came to rest beside me on the bed, lifting his forearm to cover his eyes. His chest rose and fell with panted breaths, but the bulge in his jeans was fading before my eyes.
I had enough sexual frustration coursing through my body to set off an explosion or three, but I swallowed it down as best I could. Whatever Jamaal was going through right now was far more important than my carnal needs. I turned to face him, propping my head on my hand, but I didn’t say anything at first, giving him time to gather himself.
“I’m sorry,” he said, arm still over his eyes.
“Hey, I blubbered all over you a little while ago and you wouldn’t let me apologize for that.”
He moved his arm so he could give me a look that was both skeptical and strangely tentative. “Not exactly in the same league.”
It was hard to shrug in the position I was in, but I gave it a shot. “It’s all emotional crap neither one of us is all that comfortable letting others see.”
“Still not the same,” he said stubbornly.
My heart ached for him, for whatever trauma had happened to him to make him so sensitive about his scars. I wanted to know what was behind it, but I knew I had to tread very delicately or risk scaring him off for good. I reached out and put my hand on his chest—over his shirt, of course—and felt the continued racing of his heart. The one thing I knew I couldn’t afford to do was ask him why having me touch the scars freaked him out so much, no matter how badly I wanted to know. He would tell me when and if he was ready, and he didn’t need me pushing at him.
“I’m sorry I let myself get carried away,” I told him. “I knew better than to touch you like that, and I had every intention of keeping my hands to myself.” I smiled at him, trying to convey the message that whatever was wrong, it was no big deal to me. “Maybe next time you should put some handcuffs on me.”
He growled and sat up. “There won’t be a next time,” he said, predictably. “I’m too f*cked-up, Nikki. I can’t do . . . this.” He made a vague gesture with his hand, and I didn’t know whether his this referred to a relationship, or just sex.
“Maybe you can’t do it right now,” I said as gently as possible, “but I’m more than willing to wait.”
“You can’t fix me!”
“So you’ve said. And you’re right, I can’t. But I can be here for you whenever you decide you want to fix yourself.”
“Ain’t gonna happen.” He had closed down entirely, the expression on his face distant and almost forbidding. If I didn’t understand so thoroughly his need to protect himself from the fear and the pain that welled inside him, I might have been hurt at being shut out like that. He slid off the other side of the bed, no longer able to look me in the eye.
I wished there were magic words I could say to make all his pain go away, or at least get him to open up enough to me to let me help him. But for now, he was out of my reach once more, and I blinked away the burning sensation of another bout of tears as he walked out of my room without another word.