Golden Anidae (A Blushing Death Novel) (6 page)

Nodding, I raced to the passenger side of the truck’s cab.

“My name’s Dahlia, by the way,” I said as he closed his own door and fired up the engine.

He shifted the old truck into drive with a grind of worn gears and hit the gas.

“Yes, Ma’am, I know. Every supernatural in this city knows who you are,” he said with a quick glance my way.

“Perfect,” I said, sliding down in the seat and crossing my arms. So much for going unnoticed. “I’m staying on the west side of town,” I huffed.

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Ma’am,” he said, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye.

I turned full toward him and leaned my back against the door. “Look,” I snapped. “That’s the second time in an hour that someone’s called me ‘ma’am’. I don’t like it.”

“Well, Ma—” Raiden started but never managed to finish. Clearing his throat, he said, “I’m sorry, Ms. Sabin. For some of us, it’s an old habit to break.”

“I bet,” I snapped. The onramp for I-15 N loomed ahead and I bristled at the thought of disappearing into the desert with this guy. Everybody knew there were plenty of holes in the desert and I didn’t want to be in one of them.

Where the hell is he taking me?

“So,” I started in a more compliant, softer and less aggressive, tone. I did
not
want to be taken out into the desert. No way, no how. “When you said that it wasn’t a good idea, what did you mean?” I pushed myself as far up against the door panel as my body would allow and slid my hand behind me. Reaching for the door handle at my back, I clutched the cold metal in my grasp. I didn’t particularly want to jump from a moving vehicle at speeds of 65 miles an hour or more but I would if I had to.

“Those two boys are still following us. I didn’t think you wanted to lead them back to your house. Jarvis and his like can’t get in but those two servants can,” he said. His voice was flat and sure as he peered out into the darkness beyond the windshield, the city and its lights disappearing behind us.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked with my hand still clutching the door handle.

His eyes darted over at me with an expression in his gaze that made me feel like a frightened animal boxed into a canyon. I swallowed hard and gripped the handle tighter, making my knuckles ache. The metal gave just a bit under my fingers and my strength.

“Someplace they can’t follow,” he answered, returning his eyes to the road. Tapping his index fingers absently on the steering wheel, he drove. Tension percolated in the cab of the truck as the air became static and charged with my desire to run, to get the hell out.

“I’m not going to hurt you but jumping from a moving vehicle might, Ms. Sabin. Relax. We’ll be there soon enough.”

“Where’s there?” I asked.

“Moapa River Indian Reservation,” he answered. “We’ll be there in about an hour. Relax and enjoy the ride.”

I backed away from the door panel and eased into the bench seat. Fastening my seatbelt, I relaxed. Raiden was right. I was pretty sure I could take him one on one but the damage done from jumping might be too much, even for me.

The desert stretched out in front of us, around us, and behind us in an endless sea of nothingness as far as the eyes could see. The rattling hum of the engine lulled me into a fuzzy dreariness. The soft rumble felt soothing with its constant rhythm and the knock in the engine every ten seconds.

I tried to keep my eyes open, knowing it was dangerous to close them. No matter what I did, the quiet in the cab and the rough sound of the engine made my eyes heavy. I tried to convince my brain that I was in danger, but couldn’t convince myself, or the soft familiar voice in my head as her warmth filled my body. I closed my eyes only for a second.

His hands were so warm against my skin. Nearly covering the whole side of my face, he brushed a salty tear from my cheek.

“I missed you,” his deep baritone whispered in my ear as his arms wrapped around me, squeezing tight like a python. I slid my hands up his back and hooked my hands over his shoulders, clutching him to me. His broad, firm chest rubbed against mine, a wonderful weight pressing down on me.

“I didn’t think I would miss you as much as I did,” I whispered as another tear slipped down my cheek. “I’m so sorry.”

“Doesn’t matter,” his husky voice rumbled, curling my toes as he brushed a strand of hair from my face. “You’re here now.” He cupped my face in his large hands, the warmth of his body engulfed me, seeping into my core.

My mind spiraled into a frenzy of desire and lust, growing warm with the heat of hunger. Leaning into me, his full lips brushed against mine in a soft kiss that left me weak-kneed and panting. The soft delicacy of his kiss, the smell of his body filling my nose, and the familiar warmth of his skin were just as I remembered.

His fingers stretched into my hair as his mouth forced my lips apart. He slid his tongue between my teeth, consuming me, devouring me. He kissed me as if he’d eat me whole, growling deep in his chest. I knew then that I loved him no matter if it was right or wrong. Being in love with Patrick should have stopped me from loving Dean but it didn’t. Dean was the warmth of life to Patrick’s chill of the grave. I needed him. I needed them both.

His heated hands caressed down my back, kneading my ass and digging into the soft flesh as he tugged me against the hard line of his erection. I wrapped my legs around his waist, sliding my arms around his neck as I stroked his delicious bald head. Deepening the kiss, I let him know how much I’d missed him. He knelt down, setting me on his comfortable leather club sofa and blocking out all the light from the soft bulbs in the overhead chandelier.

“Ummmm,” I groaned as his fingers slipped in-between me and my jeans, finding me wet and ready for him.

“Ma’am,” he growled deliciously in my ear.

I stared up into eyes that shone a bright Caribbean blue.

“Tre?” I whispered into Dean’s ear, using the name that drove him over the edge.

“Ma’am, we’re here.”

Dean’s lips moved with a voice that wasn’t his.

“Ma’am?”

Snapping my eyes open, fear and disorientation bubbled in my gut. I was in the cab of a truck with a man. A man in dirty jeans and jet-black hair. He had blue eyes the color of sapphires that pierced the darkness like a knife. He smiled at me in a bashful grin that made his eyes dance in the low lights of the dash. I couldn’t keep my heart from pounding out a marching band’s cadence in my chest.

Raiden. I was on my way to the Moapa Indian Reservation.

Raiden. Not Dean. Raiden.

“I thought I told you not to call me Ma’am,” I snapped, feeling the loss of Dean’s warm hands from my body and hating it. God, it had felt so real. So good.

Clearing his throat, Raiden opened his door. “I thought it would be less jarring when you woke up,” he grumbled in a gruff of suppressed laughter.

Oh my God. What had I said?
I stepped out of the cab and focused everywhere but at Raiden.

“Where are we?” I asked.

Several houses littered the desert, darkness hanging over the horizon like a weight. The single-story houses didn’t seem very big, bordering on adobe shacks with very few windows. The home in front of us seemed almost claustrophobic with a tin roof over the front door and a rickety aluminum screen door that was almost rusted through. A few outdated strings of lights were strung around the roof of the front porch, acting like a porch light with only three left on the string still lit.

Raiden strolled up to the door and knocked.

“Raiden? Where are we?” I asked again with a little more urgency in my voice.

“My house,” a man muttered from the darkness behind me.

Jumping almost through my skin, I landed several feet to the left of where I’d started, crouching low and ready to pounce.

“Jumpy,” he said, striding by me toward Raiden.

The Paiute Indian was older, I would’ve guessed in his sixties and at least fifteen years older than Raiden. His features seemed worn and haggard but sincerity lingered at the corners of his mouth as he tried to hide a smile. His long, silver hair streamed down his back, free in the wind and flowing over his broad shoulders. He appeared experienced, with kindness in his fathomless black eyes as he shook Raiden’s hand. “What have you brought me?”

“A guest,” Raiden said, turning the old Paiute to face me. “Georgie, this is Ms. Dahlia Sabin,” he said, ushering me forward.

“Georgie?” I asked.

“You expected something else?” he asked, his soft tenor jovial and light.

“Yeah, I suppose I did,” I answered. He took my outstretched hand in a firm grasp and shook like I was the first outsider he’d seen in years.

“Vampire servants were trailing her and I thought it safer to bring her here tonight. The wards surrounding the reservation will keep them out,” Raiden said, holding the front door for the old man.

“I imagine Marabelle’s servants would be up in arms if The Blushing Death was in town. I expect nothing less from her or Jarvis,” Georgie said as he patted Raiden on the shoulder and strode into the house.

Raiden waited with the door open, patient and non-assuming.

I hesitated. No weapons, no backup, and no one to miss me for a few days. Everyone seemed to know who and what I was. The safety I thought I had was gone.

“Come on then, we won’t bite,” Raiden said with a hint of laughter in the quiet of the darkness.

I stepped inside Georgie’s house and, evidently, back in time. I glanced down. Nope. No bell-bottoms here. I breathed a sigh of relief. I didn’t look good in bell-bottoms.

Georgie’s living room was brown. The long shag carpet was shit brown. The furniture was a hard bristled fabric that appeared as if it would be painful to sit on in a shade of golden brown I hadn’t seen since
Old Yeller
. The walls were covered in dark wood paneling, making the room collapse in on itself. I chomped at the bit to get the hell out of the claustrophobic cell. On the wall, a gold starburst clock with surrounding starbursts connected together by gold chains was the only decoration.

Oh. My. God. Wow.

“Would you care for something to drink?” Georgie asked, striding down the hallway, away from the brown room.

Raiden and I followed him into the kitchen where the shag carpeting from the living room and hall continued.

Jesus!

I sat down at the kitchen table next to Raiden. The thick white plastic with bright naval orange cushions was like a time capsule to the 70’s. The padding on the chairs had lost its bounce years ago and I sunk into the support beneath as the metal rails dug into my thighs.

“No, thank you,” I said.

The old man opened the ancient fridge from the 1950’s and got out two beers. “Suit yourself,” he quipped with a shrug. He sat down at the four-person table across from me.

Georgie’s eyes were dark, rich and deep, focusing completely on me. I kept waiting for him to say something profound but he sat, didn’t move, didn’t even take a drink of his beer which bothered me more than anything else. Why open the beer if you weren’t going to drink it? He watched me with an unrelenting focus that was uncomfortable. I glanced between the beer and him, expectation thumping against my rib cage.

I cleared my throat and met Raiden’s eyes. “So,” I said in a voice that echoed in the empty silent house. “When can I go back?”

“Are you in a rush?” Georgie asked, finally bringing the sweating bottle of beer to his lips. He took a long drink. Somehow, that one swig made me feel so much better, making him seem more relaxed and me feel less on edge.

“Well, yeah,” I said. Enza was back home by now and was probably worried sick. There wasn’t anyone she could call, and once we’d crossed the desert into the reservation, my cell signal disappeared like we’d driven into a no man’s land. Not to mention that every moment I hung out in the middle of nowhere was another minute that Soraida was somewhere she didn’t want to be.

“You bear too much weight on your shoulders,” Georgie said. His gaze bore into me like he could see my soul shining through my skin. I doubted it but the expression on his face and the knowledge in his glare creeped me out nonetheless. His eyes were deep like a bottomless black ocean in a face that was etched with both laugh lines and worry lines. His hair was the silver of Christmas tinsel but he was strong. In his youth, he had probably been a very good-looking man. Now, all I saw were the lines of age and responsibility marring his face.

“What do you know of me?” I growled into the quiet kitchen, the vibration of my voice tingling down my throat.

The pressure of Georgie’s gaze fell on me like a Mack truck. His evaluation twisted and tightened the pit of my stomach until it was almost painful.

“This is a big country,” he said with a slight twitch of his lips. “But ours is a very small world.” He took another sip from the beer and set the bottle down on the table.

“Ours?” I asked. He smelled human but then again, so had I once.

“Georgie’s the tribe shaman,” Raiden answered.

A shaman? Shouldn’t he have a better name like Running Wolf or something cool like that?

“What does that mean?” I asked, having the good sense to lay off the name bit and keep my snarky comments to myself. Patrick would be so proud of my diplomatic efforts.

“It means that I am somewhere between this world and the next.” His voice was soft and comforting like my father’s had been when I’d scraped my knee or crashed my bike.
This world and the next
kept playing in my head like a broken record, gnawing at my gut with a vengeance.

“Oh,” I whispered with quiet clarity. He was like me. “You see . . .”

“I see, hear, speak, and guide those souls that are lost.”

Attempting to hold back the tears, I leaned in. I’d never met anyone like me except for my father and I’d known about him too little too late.

I gathered myself, forgetting all the pain and confusion that being alone had caused. I met his understanding expression and sat straight, my shoulders back and my chin up.