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I pasted on an appropriately stern expression and threw open the ambulance doors. My partner in crime lounged on the bench seat, completely at ease, smug, and annoyingly sexy. When the term ‘handsome devil’ was coined, they were looking right at Jack. He’s hard to stay mad at, but I was determined to try my best. And remember that I was technically his boss.
Facial expressions are only window dressing around Jack, so I don’t know why I bothered. He’s half succubus and can ‘taste’ mental signatures. He swears he can’t read minds, but he is spot-on with emotions. He describes everyone’s brain as having a ‘thread,’ and he senses the vibration, flavor, and movement of them. Whenever I push for a better explanation, he says “you can’t explain blue to blind folk.”
Maintaining a strong physical and emotional front failed; my active bitch face and my righteous head of steam deserted when I needed them most. Whatever I was expecting, this wasn’t it. A nude man sat on the stretcher. He had that pretty, too-clean, waxed-chest look that shields rich frat boys and that most girls swoon over. In reality, they’re devoid of personality and survival skills. In a lifeboat situation, the sort of human you eat before they can deplete the supplies.
He wasn’t moving. Not even a blink. Eventually his chest rose and fell. My initial, very specific concern over the presence of a corpse scarpered, replaced with a generic concern about catatonic naked underwear models and why they’d be in our ambulance. And why it mattered if I was menstruating.
I had a lot of concerns.
Throughout my survey, and the ensuing internal debate over what was most concerning about tonight’s flavor of what-the-fuckery, Jack smiled at me with his whole face. He could manage little-boy excitement, big-boy ‘undress you with his thoughts’, and bad-boy ‘imminent shenanigans’ all in one look.
Time to find out which boy I had to worry about tonight.
Chapter Two
“Talk, Fero. Who’s that? Why’s he paralyzed? Why does the truck smell like sardines?”
Jack’s eyes laughed at my machine-gunned questions. He leaned forward and braced his forearms on his knees. “All excellent questions, love. Ready? You’re driving.”
I hated being called out on a night off, and I wasn't shielding my emotions. Jack is prey to the feelings of anyone around him; mine were likely threatening to eat a hole in whatever it was in his head that processed that stuff. One of the hazards of being both half succubus and of working with me.
"If you're here babysitting Naked Guy, who's manning the clinic?" My tone accused him of shirking, but my brainwaves were undoubtedly carrying my need for more information. He’d been on tonight’s duty roster.
"I switched shifts for something more important. Your continuing education awaits."
I squinted at the ambulance’s interior. "He's not even blinking."
"I told him he couldn't move except to breathe." This seemed to please him.
Jack’s other half is siren, and he’d used it on our ‘guest.’ “Why?”
“You don’t recognize him, do you?” Ah. Our game of answering questions with questions was afoot.
“Should I?” My grip on the doors tightened. He perked up even more as my mental signature shifted from exasperated to full-on curious. Jack sipped me like fine wine.
I’m almost positive he puts up with me entirely for my unique brain.
“GPS is already programmed. Try not to kill us on the way there?”
The last time I’d driven Jack's ambulance with an unwilling 'patient' on board, we’d fed a triple murderer to a giant axolotl thingy, Jack's childhood pet Spot. When he outgrew his pond, he became a free-range alien in the waterways of Austin. Why the exuberantly friendly and curious beast hadn't already spawned urban legends was a miracle surpassing understanding.
Obeying the GPS, I wound my way southeast, eventually parking in front of a disturbingly familiar boathouse. I turned in my seat to glare back into the patient compartment. This was the same place we’d disposed of the previous bad guy.
"Is this another 'let's feed Spot' outing? Why am I even here?" I knew my unasked questions were carbonating my brainwaves and pummeling him like shoppers at closed Black Friday doors.
Jack shifted his voice into a siren’s command register. "Get out."
I had long ago learned to resist, which, oddly enough, made Jack enjoy being around me more rather than less. I guess not having to worry about collateral damage was nice. But along with most creatures, the tanned and muscled human on the stretcher lacked my ability, so he climbed out and put his perfect feet onto the sandy driveway.
"Walk into the boathouse and wait at the end of the dock," Jack ordered.
Tears streamed down the man's unblinking face as he marched like an automaton into the shadowed interior of the structure encasing a wooden walkway and moored boat.
I put a hand on Jack's chest and raised one eyebrow. I tried out my ‘enough is enough’ face. He tried out his puppy dog eyes. Neither worked.
Jack said, "We're turning lead into gold. Trust me?"
"You know I do, but the secrecy’s getting old. And unnecessary. Whatever this is, I’m pretty sure it’s not something I’ll be telling anyone about.” I softened my voice a bit, and whined, “Does someone actually need our help?"
