Apocalypse Happens (19 page)

I shuddered, remembering the time I’d spent in captivity in Manhattan.

“You need to feel me?” he murmured, laying his face once again against my chest. “I must be losing my”—he flexed his lower body, and I gasped as he slid ever deeper—“touch.”

“I didn’t mean that. I just—” I shifted, tugging on one leg.

For an instant I thought he might hold me there, and I panicked a little. The last time he’d forced me to do things I didn’t want to do, I’d been his slave and he’d been the psycho master of my prison. But he let go, and my feet fell to the ground as he slid from my body.

“Don’t tell me we’re done,” he said, voice tight.

I took his hand, planning to draw him down with me onto the soft, misty ground we couldn’t see. “Not yet.”

This place was so strange. We stood on something solid, yet clouds swirled all around our feet and the sky was the shade of the earth. As I lay back, the cool mist enveloped me, shutting out everything in this world. If I hadn’t taken hold of Jimmy’s hand, I’d never have known he was there.

One tug and he followed, covering my body with his. “This is what I needed,” I whispered.

He didn’t speak; I couldn’t see. He could be anyone.
Except I knew his body, his scent, the sounds he made right before—

Jimmy tensed, the movement causing his body to rub against me just right. His breath caught; for a second I thought he might call me baby. I’d always hated the term, but now it had been so long since I’d heard the word, I held my breath too.

Instead he cursed the way he always did when he was trying to hold back, to wait for me to catch up so we could come apart together. But I didn’t need to catch up, I was already there, so I arched, taking him deeper, running my palm over his back, pulling him closer as he pulsed within.

“Jimmy,” I murmured, and in my voice I heard everything. Past happiness, present pain, future pleasures—only with this man had I ever been truly whole.

Because he knew me, body and soul, he shifted, pressing harder where I needed him to, and I came in a rush, his name again on my lips, my hips pumping. I could have sworn I felt him swell, pulse and come again. Inhuman, sure, but wasn’t he?

That thought brought me out of the moment, tore away all the magic. The interlude was over. We had to go back—to both the present problem and the real world.

His head against my chest, I tangled my fingers in the unusually long hair at the nape of his neck, opened my mouth to ask what had happened down here, how he was. But before I could say anything, he jumped lithely to his feet and disappeared into the mist. In the distance, the screaming began again, trilling through the night like a long, lonely song.

I scrambled up, cast my hands around for my clothes and knife. I didn’t like that screaming. Liked
even less being naked while it rolled around me, bristling along my bare skin, causing sharp, painful gooseflesh to rise in its wake.

When the last zipper, catch and tie were fastened, I moved toward the shrieks, knife once again held tightly in my fist.

The sound had started up again too quickly to be Jimmy, I assured myself. But the assurances were merely that. Jimmy could move quicker than a high wind when he chose to. Although why he’d choose to rush toward something that could make him scream like that—

“He wouldn’t,” I murmured. “So it can’t be him.”

My demon started to laugh. I guess it had managed to pry open the door in my mind and slip out. Swell.

“Shut up!”

The demon laughed louder, and whoever was screaming . . . they screamed louder too.

“Jimmy!” I shouted. He didn’t answer. I doubted he could hear me above the screaming.

How was I going to find him and get out of here?

The same way I’d found him and so many others in the past. My gift. The one I’d been born with.

I could touch people and know things about them, but I could also touch what they’d touched and find them. It had been a very handy talent when I’d been a cop. The power wasn’t any less useful now; I just used it a lot less because I had so many others.

I let the mist settle on me like a summer rain. Closing my eyes, I breathed in, then lifted my free hand and laid the palm over my stomach, right where Jimmy had touched me. And I saw him—in what appeared to be a cave: rock walls, the trickle of water, the flicker of a fire across his face.

“Another cave,” I muttered. “Figures.”

The last time his vampire nature had sprung free, I’d tracked Jimmy to a cave in the Ozarks. I wondered at the attraction. Caves gave me the willies.

Nevertheless, I had to find this one. I brushed my fingertips across my skin as he had, and saw the path Jimmy had taken as if he’d trailed phosphorous footsteps through the fog.

Sometimes this worked and sometimes it didn’t. I was so damn grateful my radar was functioning now my knees wobbled. I stopped that by striding forward, letting my mind be my guide instead of my eyes, which would only deceive me in this misty Otherworld.

My shoes scratched against earth that could not be seen. I caught the scent of grass, leaves, greenery, could have sworn that a bush caught at my knee, a low-hanging branch brushed my neck.

The distant ping of water on water brought me up short, and my eyes snapped open. I took a step back. I’d nearly slammed nose first into a wall of rock.

I trailed my hand along the face, first to the right, then back to the left until I found the opening. Seconds later I found Jimmy.

His back to me, he contemplated the fire. Water trickled down the stone wall, dropping bead by bead into a tiny bowl just big enough to wash your hands. Shoulders slumped, head hanging, he worried me.

“Hey.” I came up behind him slowly. “You okay?”

When I got closer I saw the welts across his back, as if he’d been whipped with chains of gold. I was surprised I hadn’t felt them when I’d run my fingers over his skin. Though they were fading fast, already more like red lines from a minor accident than raised welts from a serious injury.

I stepped closer still and discovered similar marks
on his wrists, around his neck and waist and ankles. I drew in a shaky breath as I reached out to run a gentle finger along his shoulder. My hand trembled.

“Ah, Jimmy,” I began.

He spun around with that freaky dhampir speed, grabbing my wrist and yanking me close. His eyes flared bright red.

“Gotcha,” he said, and then he bit me.

CHAPTER 19

He went for my wrist and not my neck. The dog collar was good for more than decoration and keeping my demon on a leash. It protected my jugular from out-of-control vamps. Lucky me.

Perhaps I should have Summer bespell one of those black leather collars with spikes. That would work even better, and in truth, this bejeweled poodley thing was just embarrassing.

Jimmy latched onto the vein in my wrist and without thinking I reached over with my free hand and smacked him upside the head. I didn’t pull my punch—why would I?—and he flew a few feet. Unfortunately, he took some of my arm with him.

Blood arced through the air, decorating the dirt between where I stood and where he fell. I had an instant to wish I’d knocked him into next week, or at least into the wall, before he started to laugh.

The blood dripping down my hand, off the tips of my fingers and into the ground slowed from a torrent to a drip. A quick glance at the wound revealed it
had
begun to close, but not with the usual creepy speed, the skin growing back together between one blink and the next. Wounds made by a Nephilim always took longer to heal, and right now Jimmy was one of the bad guys.

I returned my gaze to Jimmy as he wiped the back
of his hand across his mouth, smearing red from his chin to his cheek. Wow. Attractive.

“The Dagda did what I asked,” I said.

“Did you think he wouldn’t?” Jimmy climbed to his feet, no worse for a knock in the head. If he’d been human, I’d have rattled his brains. He might not have gotten back up. Too bad he’d never been human. “You’re queen of the world, Elizabeth.”

My mouth tightened. He knew I hated it when he called me Elizabeth, but protesting would only encourage him to do it more. Besides, did I really want him calling me Lizzy or baby in that mocking evil voice?

Hell
no.

“Not queen,” I murmured, my gaze darting left, then right, hoping to catch a glimpse of a bracelet, a ring, another collar, any item the Dagda might have bespelled to control this thing. Except—

Jimmy, when he was Jimmy, would never have taken it off.

“Leader, ruler, blah, blah, blah.” Jimmy lifted one hand to his chest and rubbed my blood into his skin. I looked away again. I hated him like this.

So what, exactly, did it mean that Jimmy was evil and there was no trace of a control? No trace of the Dagda either for that matter.

“Fuck.”

Jimmy grinned and licked his lips. I caught a hint of fang. “I love it when you talk dirty. Do it some more.”

If Jimmy had killed the fairy god before he’d created a leash we had more problems than . . . Well, just about anything.

“Where’s the Dagda?” I demanded.

“You think I . . .”—he skimmed his hand over his
belly, leaving another trail of red—“have more power than a fairy god?”

“Yes.”

He laughed again. I’d always despised his vampire laugh. Cold, with not an ounce of humor, mocking and—okay, I’ll admit it—downright scary. That laugh made me want to put my hands over my ears and shriek until he stopped.

“You know I don’t have that much juice, Elizabeth. But you might.”

My eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”

“You want all his power on top of your own? Baby—”

“Shut up,” I snapped, unable to stop myself. “Don’t call me that.”

“Because he does?”

I blinked. This was the first time I could remember him referring to Dhampir Jimmy as a separate entity from Vampire Jimmy. Myself, I had to agree. They were two different beings. But when Jimmy had been evil before, he’d been completely evil, with no hint of the man who was not. In fact, when I’d tried to seduce the old Jimmy free by bringing up happy memories of our pasts, the new one had hurt me until I stopped.

“Why the seduction?” I asked.
I’d
had a good reason. He didn’t.

“I get bored with always taking what I want. Sometimes it’s fun to make them want me.”

“Them?”

“Women. Or men. Depends on my mood.”

Jimmy the vampire liked sex—any way, any time, with anyone. How could I have forgotten?

Because I’d
tried
to forget—that and everything else about this version of Sanducci.

“Getting back to my plan,” he continued. “You
fuck the Dagda—I’ll watch.” He winked. “I’ve always wanted to see you in action, but it’s a little hard when you’re on top of me. Actually”—he grabbed himself like Michael Jackson on a
Thriller
reunion tour—“it’s a lot hard when you’re on top of me.”

Vampire humor. Gotta hate it.

“Once you absorb his power, I’ll kill him”—he shrugged—“or you can. We’ll toss that stupid collar of yours into the fire and then—” He flipped his hands over in a voilà gesture that would have been more nonchalant if a few drops of blood hadn’t flown free. “Together we’ll rule every world that there is.”

“Let me ask you something.” Jimmy lifted his eyebrows as I strode closer, then I knocked on his forehead with my knuckle. “Are there more voices in there than two? Is one of them named Samyaza?”

“You think I’m the Antichrist? No, baby.” He rolled his eyes when I snarled. “I think that might be you.”

“Me?” I squeaked.

“You didn’t guess?”

“Huh?” Why was I always three steps behind? Sure, I’d been a little lax when it came to listening in church, but still—I was the leader of the light. Why didn’t I
know
anything?

“The destroyer, the beast—whatever they’re calling him these days—possesses the one who releases him.”

“So?”

“The Grigori flew free when you killed the woman of smoke.”

According to Ruthie, they’d already been freed and not by me. But I should see where he was going with this, find out what Vampire Jimmy knew.

“Again I say, so?”

“It must have been something you did.”

“Which was?”

“Got me.” He tilted his head, and one dark lock fell over his black and red eyes. The gesture was so Jimmy. The eyes were so not. “You been hearing any whispers in there?” He smirked as he repeated my own question back at me. “Are there more voices in there than two?”

“Enough.” I turned away before he could see the truth. He’d scared me. “Where’s the Dagda, Jimmy? Don’t make me beat it out of you.”

“You’d enjoy that.”

“I would.” I took a deep breath and faced him again. He was so close my breasts brushed his chest, and as usual, I’d never heard him move. I slammed the heels of my hands against him. “Back off.”

He must have been prepared for that reaction, because he didn’t move an inch. Instead his gaze lowered to what I first thought were my breasts, then realized was my neck. More specifically, my collar.

“I could take that off,” he whispered. “You and me, together, we could do some damage.”

I stepped out of his reach. “I think that’s what Ruthie has in mind. You and me. Doing some damage.”

His lip lifted, like a dog, except dogs didn’t have such pointy fangs. “I don’t take orders well. Even when I’m Stupid Jimmy.”

“Stupid?” Sanducci was a lot of things, but stupid had never been one of them.

“Wimpy, whiny. Everything this one—he slammed his palms against his chest with a solid thunk—“isn’t.”

“Keep that up and you’ll break some ribs,” I said.

His snarl became a smirk. “Worried?”

“No, I’d just rather do it myself.”

The screaming, which had continued in the background all this time, suddenly stopped.

“What
was
that?” I murmured.

“One of the Dagda’s women.”

I jolted. “What?”

“He likes it when they scream.”

“And you think I’m going to do
that
guy just to get his magic?”

His eyes when they met mine were more black than red, and when he spoke I heard the old Jimmy far more than I liked. “Sooner or later you’ll have to sleep with someone just for their power.”