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"You may do the same," he said.
As he backed up, prepared to launch, her brow furrowed. "Do what?" she asked.
"Call me if harm threatens you."
Nodding to her, he went aloft, leaving her with Jonah's feather and that astonished look on her macabre, tragic face.
Twelve
JONAH and Anna caught a ride with a migrant worker headed toward Nevada. He explained in Spanish that he could take them to the state line. While he had no room in the cab of his small pickup because of his wife and two children, he'd thrown a mattress down in the open bed of the truck and offered them that to sit upon as they traveled.
Jonah studied the man only briefly before nodding and giving Anna a hand up onto the tailgate. When he stepped up to follow, however, he misjudged and would have toppled except Anna leaned forward and caught his arm. The worker steadied him on the other side.
"Gracias," Jonah muttered, feeling anything but gracious. But Anna smiled at the man's kindness, and tried to hide her amusement as the worker made a discreet tippling gesture to his wife, suggesting he thought one of their passengers was soused.
"You're laughing at me." Jonah settled across from her, bracing his feet on the wheel well. Her feet didn't reach that far, so she had them drawn up, her knees bent, her back resting gingerly against the truck's side.
"Just at the suggestion you're drunk, my lord. Can angels drink to excess?"
"I don't think so," he said, pinching her toes. "You're being entirely too disrespectful of my exalted status."
"Does anyone ever treat you as an equal? I mean, have you always been . . . a commander?" At his look, she hurried on. Anna had no illusions about his "exalted status," though the affection and passion he showed her in such sudden, intense bursts would have made it easy to forget what she couldn't forget in other circumstances. "Mina said you're known as a Prime Legion Commander. Second only to Full Submission Angels."
He shrugged, looked around as the landscape started to move, the pickup truck grinding to life. A young boy looked out the open back window, grinned and handed them each a soda.
Anna smiled and thanked him as she turned her attention back to Jonah. "Were you born that?" She watched for shadows, knowing she could be getting into areas he didn't want to visit. But at least for right now, Jonah seemed to have left his tension on the beach. He seemed relaxed, almost amicable.
"Sometimes it feels that way," he said wryly. "But no. Angels are like other creatures. We have a time of youth and inexperience. Even those few who are made from human souls. We must apply ourselves to determine where we will be placed. Then we mentor others, bring them along, help them find their calling."
"And your calling . . . You fight Dark Ones."
"I fight the enemies Michael commands me to fight. But yes, these past few centuries, it has been mostly Dark Ones. The ancient evils, the things that humans called demons, have been contained or placated for the most part. Though ironically, at one time anything otherworldly, including angels, was called demon."
His hair was blowing around his face, whipping the sculpted cheekbones and the distracting mouth as the truck gained speed on the highway. It seemed unreal, studying him like this, a man in jeans only, the T-shirt tied to one of the hooks in the bed to dry out further. His long legs stretched across the bed, one arm along the side of the truck, the other hand balancing a Dr. Pepper on his thigh.
"When you were talking about . . ." She made a face as they accelerated to the point that the furor of the wind forced her to raise her voice. Which meant the driver and his family might hear her.
Tucking the soda between his thigh and the truck bed, Jonah grasped one of her hands just under her knee. His fingers caressed the skin beneath the skirt as he pulled her across and tumbled her into his now mostly dry lap with one easy move. It allowed her to be balanced and upright without the uncomfortable pressure on her back the metal lip of the truck bed caused. He snugged her hips down between his thighs, legs draped over his calves.
"What?" he said, his lips close to her ear.
"Do you touch each other this easily?" she asked first. His dark eyes were warm, the warmth of darkest chocolate. Anna often touched the animals of the sea and the land, the flowers and trees. She needed to touch life, connect with it. But she touched her own kind so rarely, mermaid or human, and had never been invited to do so. She would have welcomed it from the homeliest, shyest example of either race, but this . . . Jonah not only welcomed her touch; he was willing to touch her. He almost seemed to demand it. And he was a far cry from shy or homely.
"Not like this." That glint of humor again. She liked it, wondered if it was a glimpse of the younger, more carefree angel he might have once been. "There are angels who enjoy men more than women, but I am not one of them." His brows drew down. "Now, what were you really going to ask?"
She wondered that she was bold enough to ask, but she was curious. And maybe, since he was male, it would help keep his mind away from less pleasant things.
"It was just, the other night, the way you described how you all sought pleasure for grounding. Is there a place you go? Or does each seek his own . . . source?"
She got distracted by the sensual set of his lips, particularly when he brushed hers with them, parted them, teased her with a fleeting touch of his tongue. "What are you looking for, Anna?"
"Are there--I don't know--brothels for angels? Houses of pleasure? I mean, if you need this so often . . ."
He chuckled then, and the sound shot warmth straight down to her core, which pooled into heat as his voice lowered to a husky murmur. "Am I too demanding, little one? Would you prefer me to spread my attentions out?"
"No," she said instantly, then flushed to the roots at her unsophisticated vehemence. "I mean, that's not for me to say. If I don't, if you need more--"
"It's curiosity," he realized, studying her. "What I said the other night made you curious, didn't it?" Gathering her hair in one hand, he tucked it into a twisted bun to keep it out of her face, but he left his hand at her nape. It restrained her in proximity to his mouth, allowing him those occasional maddening tastes at unexpected moments to keep her befuddled. "Tell me what you've imagined. It's going to be a long drive." He shifted, let her feel the pressure of him against her hip. "See if you can torture me with nothing more than your mind."
"It's not that. I just imagined . . ."
"Tell me, Anna."
She shook her head, smiled. "I tend to be fanciful."
"That's all right. Tell it like a story."
"Okay." She raised her attention to his forehead, finding his direct gaze a little disconcert
ing. "I'm imagining all of you in a secluded lagoon . . . with water nymphs. The trees are hanging low over the water; the banks, lush and green. Like one of those Romantic period paintings. In fact, I think it's likely some of those paintings came from an artist stumbling upon you." She stole a quick glance at him, then continued. "You made him think he was seeing men, not angels, so that's what he painted. Six or seven of you, entwined in the nymphs' arms and legs. You took the nymphs on the banks; their legs wrapped around you like slim white flower petals." She moistened her lips, encouraged by the growing heat in his gaze, the reflected heat in her own body. "Later, you went back into the water together. The nymph's hair was spilling down the front of your body, her back against your front . . . as you would take me in my mermaid form. As you entered the nymph's body, your hands clasped hers and they skimmed the top of the water in front of you both."
Just touching. The marvel of it to her being all the contact. Flesh, bone, muscle within one's grasp, living. The nymph's body pressed so generously against the angel's, so he could hear her heartbeat and she could hear his . . .
Jonah's hand, still tangled in her hair, loosened enough that he eased her head down beneath his jaw, her ear against his chest. Thump, thump, thump. Strong and steady, even over the rush of wind and roar of engine.
"Like that," she whispered. She closed her eyes as his arm tightened high around her shoulders to enclose her completely without hurting her. "Do angels always make everyone feel so safe?"
His lips pressed against her forehead. "When my wings are healed, I'll enclose you in them when you sleep. There's nowhere safer I could put you."
Smiling, she lifted her body to look at him. Reaching up, she gathered his windblown hair, pulling it from his face as he'd done for her. She tied it back with the wire bracelet she'd worn today, keeping the strands from flailing against his strong features. "So is it like that? As I described it?"
"Sometimes. When we desire Joining pleasure for grounding, we often go alone. However, I don't deny there have been times we've gone in groups to places we are welcomed. Once, when I was much younger"--he slanted her a smile that was astonishingly almost a grin--"a nunnery."
