“Are you okay?” Azriel asked softly.
His breath tickled the top of my head and stirred a sense of well-being deep inside. Or maybe well-being wasn’t the right word—it was more a sense of safety. Of being right.
Which was dangerous thinking—things would never be safe or right while the Aedh, the reapers, and Hunter were all such fixtures in my life.
I pulled out of his warm embrace and took a step back. The big living room felt so much colder without the cocoon of his warmth.
“I’m going to bed.”
“Once you are safely asleep, I will return to the fields and see what additional information I can uncover about ensnaring the Rakshasa.”
I frowned. “I thought they were best caught in their lair.”
“Yes, but to trace this Rakshasa back to her lair, we first have to watch her dismember and eat her chosen victim. I don’t think either of us could sit through that nightmare easily.”
He had that right. I hesitated, then leaned forward and dropped a kiss on his lips. “Night, then.”
Surprise and something deeper—something that was desire and yet a whole lot more—flitted across his expression before he got control of himself again. “What was that for?”
“A kiss good night is something of a custom here on earth,” I said, my lips still tingling with the warmth of his. “Don’t tell me the woman who showed you the delights of human procreation never kissed you good night like that?”
“No.” His expression gave little away, but there was a decidedly devilish twinkle in his eyes. “It is, however, a custom I could grow used to.”
I smiled, but resisted the temptation to kiss him again, and backed away instead. I might be bone-weary and aching, but I had a suspicion if I did it again, the desire to rest would be overwhelmed by another sort of desire entirely.
“Night, Azriel.”
He nodded and winked out of existence. He was still near; I knew that because his heat swirled around me. I resolutely turned and made my way to the bedroom, stripping off clothes and letting them drop to the floor as I went. I’d pick them up later, when I had more energy. I pulled back the covers, crawled underneath them, and was asleep before I could even smile in pleasure.
The sharp ringing of the telephone woke me sometime later. I opened an eye and glared blearily at the object making all the noise, but it didn’t catch the hint and stop. After several more seconds of the incessant sound, I groped blindly for the handset and croaked, “Hello?”
“Well, you sound like crap,” Stane said, all too cheerfully.
“That’s how I feel, so it’s really no surprise.” I rubbed my free hand across gritty eyes, then glanced at the clock. It was just after six, meaning I’d had a whole five and a half hours’ sleep. “You’d better have a good reason for waking me, because otherwise I’m going to send Azriel over there to beat you up.”
Stane laughed. “No, you wouldn’t. You’re too much of a softie to do something like that to your friends. Besides, you need my hacking skills.”
His hacking skills wouldn’t be impaired by a little beating or two, I thought grumpily. “Stane, what do you want?”
“A night out at the Red Iris, no expense spared.”
I sat up abruptly, and bit back a groan as my head just about exploded. “You found Nadler?” I said, the words little more than a hiss through gritted teeth.
“Well, I’ve found the version currently striding around as Nadler. He has a little beach house down at Portsea. I’ve just sent you the address.”
Portsea being the sort of place where even the littlest of houses meant big prices. “Don’t suppose there’s any way you can check if he’s down there?”
After all, according to his neighbors, he hadn’t been sighted at his Brighton home for some time, so there was no guarantee he’d be in Portsea, either.
“There’s no handy-dandy traffic cameras nearby, so I had to resort to more underhanded tactics. In this case, that meant digging up his cell phone number. Which, I might add, was not an easy thing to do. Phone companies are fierce when it comes to protecting the private numbers of their customers.”
But not fierce enough, obviously. Although it did have to be said that Stane was one of the best when it came to hacking.
“So, the dinner will include the finest bottle of champagne the Red Iris has,” I replied dryly. “Just get on with it.”
He chuckled softly. “Our Mr. Elusive is, according to the GPS tracker on his phone, at his Portsea house right this moment.”
Finally, we’d caught a break. I closed my eyes in relief. “For that, you can have two bottles of their finest.”
“Excellent,” he said. “Let me know how it goes.”
“Will do.” I hung up, then twisted around as the surge of energy told me Azriel had appeared. “You heard?”
He dropped my purse and bag of clothes onto the bed—obviously he’d been back to the hotel room to collect them. For a reaper, he was pretty damn considerate. Sometimes, anyway.
“Yes,” he said, his voice flat. “But you should—”
“Azriel—” I said, cutting him off before he could finish that sentence. “Give it up. I’m not going to be left out of this chase in any way. And if you leave without me, I’ll just chase you in Aedh form.”
I pushed the blankets off me, clambered out of bed, and went over to my huge walk-in wardrobe.
“I know all that,” he said, his tone still flat and yet oddly hitting at the annoyance that swirled like a distant storm somewhere deep inside me. “But I continue to hope you will eventually do the sensible thing. I know there is sensible in you somewhere.”
I gave him a grin as I pulled on some clothes. “I’m afraid it doesn’t appear all that often.”
“So I’ve noticed.” He’d crossed his arms and was watching me somewhat grimly, but Valdis flickered with red-gold fire and the energy that surrounded him became more heated than usual. And it echoed through me, stronger than that distant storm and far, far more alluring.
Which was not what either of us needed right now. I resolutely ignored him and concentrated on the business of getting dressed. Once I was, I walked back to the bed to grab my phone, checked the address Stane had sent me, then shoved it and my wallet into my pockets before finally turning around to meet his gaze again.
Heat still shimmered between us, and if Valdis was any indication, he seemed no more able to control or deny it than I could.
“Ready?” he asked softly.
I couldn’t help a slight smile. “Always.”
Amusement touched his lips and warmed the edges of his eyes. “I have noticed that about you.”
Then his energy swept through the two of us, and as one, we surged across the incandescent fields before finding shape once more in the shadows of a two-story building.
Still far too aware of him for my own good, I stepped quickly away from his embrace, but the sharp movement had the world doing a crazy dance around me. I locked my knees against the wobble in my legs, determined not to fall. Azriel held out a hand, not quite touching me, but obviously ready to catch me. I think it was only stubbornness that kept me upright.
After a moment I said, “Where are we?”
“We are in the front yard of the house across the road from Nadler’s,” Azriel said. “There is no one home, so there is no immediate hurry to move.”
Thankfully. I looked around, trying to get my bearings. The area we’d appeared in wasn’t what I’d expected. When Stane had said Portsea, I’d been imagining the Port Phillip Bay side near the golf club and the peninsula. This looked to be the back beach area—which meant the houses were a fraction cheaper and often older.
“What about Nadler’s? Is he—or anyone else—home?”
His house wasn’t much to look at—in fact, it was pretty much typical of the beach houses that could be found up and down the bay. It was flat-roofed, with the ground floor being brick and the first floor weatherboard, and it featured a wide balcony that jutted out from the first floor, supported on either side by steel poles. A flat-roofed carport stood on the left side, and in it sat a Toyota Land Cruiser.
“I cannot sense life inside,” Azriel commented.
I frowned. “Surely he couldn’t have up and disappeared in the few seconds it took us to get here.”
“I wouldn’t have thought so,” Azriel said. “And his vehicle is still there.”
“Maybe he’s visiting a neighbor.” I studied the houses on either side—which didn’t tell me a whole lot—then dug my phone out and called Stane.
“Hey, that was quick,” he said.
“We haven’t caught our man yet, so don’t get excited.”
“Well, damn.”
I smiled. “Can you check his location for us again?”
“Hang on.” A slight whoosh sound told me he was rolling from one desk to the other, and then he said, “He’s still at the house. Why?”
“Because Azriel’s not picking up any sign of life inside the house, that’s why.”
“Maybe he’s just left his phone there.”
“Maybe.” But somehow, I didn’t think so. Instinct was suddenly suggesting the reason was a whole lot darker than that. “Thanks, Stane. I’ll get back to you.”
I shoved the phone away and met Azriel’s gaze. “I guess we should go in there and check it out.”
He nodded, caught my hand, and tugged me toward him again. We reappeared in what looked like some sort of rumpus room. It ran the width of the house and was very shadowed, thanks to the fact that all the blinds had been pulled down. A large TV and several sofas dominated one end, while on the other, there was a Ping-Pong table, and on the wall a much-used dartboard. The faint aroma of toast lingered in the air, but there was no kitchen in this room, so it was obviously drifting down from somewhere else. But there was something else underneath that scent—something odd and unpleasant.