“That doesn’t seem like it would be enjoyable, yet you make it sound like it is.” Gods—what was she evensaying?
“Anything is enjoyable if I’m the one doing it.”
“That’s a very cocky thing to say.”
Darien laughed. It was a rich sound, low and deep, and she found that she liked it. She liked it a little too much.
“Call it cocky, but I know the things that I’m good at. And I am very,verygenerous, Loren Calla.” The way he said her name had desire dripping like hot honey down her spine.
“You say that as if I’m going to find out.”
“That would make you lucky,” he crooned. He tipped up an eyebrow. “But you haven’t had much luck lately, have you?”
“That’s enough,” she said, dropping her shorts string and deadpanning him. “You’re being mean now.”
He wouldn’t stop smiling. “If I’m being mean, then why do you seem to be enjoying yourself so much?”
“I’m going to take a rain cheque on this conversation.” He had been right when he’d called her out for enjoying this; having someone like him talk to her like that... Well, the heat pulsing between her thighs was evidence enough that she was enjoying herself very much, despite that she was feeling a bit testy after the last comment he’d made. Luck hadn’t been on her side at all lately.
Darien’s grin only widened, deepening that cursed dimple. “If you say so.”
She scrambled to change the subject while she had this window of opportunity, but she found herself deviating back to what he’d said a moment ago. “I don’t think that what you said is true.”
The dining room light gilded his damp hair as he cocked his head to the side. “Are we talking about the part where I said I was generous or the part where I know what I’m good at?”
What a ridiculous question. She had no doubt that he was very,verygood behind closed doors; a face like that had likely gained him plenty of practice with women who were all too willing to take a tumble with him.
“The part where you’re not a nice person,” Loren replied, crushing her maddening thoughts into nothing. “I think that’s only what you want people to believe.”
That arrogant smile faded a little. Hah! Now it washerturn to drive this conversation. “Then you think incorrectly,” he said.
“You wear a mask to keep people out but that’s all it is: it’s a mask.”
The arrogant smile was gone now; there wasn’t a trace of it left behind. “I seem to be missing how this conversation took a turn from fucking to talking about my hang-ups.”
Loren blinked. Did he just admit to having hang-ups?
There were conflicting emotions in his eyes that suggested she was correct, but she didn’t push him. Part of why she didn’t push him was because she was afraid of him; the other part was because she hadn’t exactly intended to crack through his carefully painted exterior so easily. The arms that were crossed over his chest were rigid, the hard muscles standing out beneath his tattooed skin.
Clearly, she’d struck a chord. The frown on his face said everything he was thinking: so much for the fun conversation they were having.
Loren cleared her throat. “So,” she said, scrambling for the quickest exit out of this chat that had become all kinds of awkward. “What did you see?”
Darien mercifully said nothing more about the turn of their conversation and instead said, “Not a Star-damned thing.”
“What does that mean?” His response brought her back to the here and now—to the things that were most important. The heat left her body like a window had been opened to the night.
“It means her captors are as good as I am. They’re cloaking her aura somehow, maybe the same way I’m cloaking yours.” He slumped against the backrest of his seat and pushed his hair back from his face with both of his hands. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that more people are finding out about the talismans. The best things can’t stay hidden forever.”
“Howdoestracking work? Maybe you’ll tell me now that you’re not needing to concentrate.” She gave him a cheeky smile.
One side of his mouth pulled up into a smirk. “It’s hard to explain. The best comparison I can make is to a thermal camera. A lot of colors are involved, and I need to not onlyseethem but know how to distinguish between different auras and the people they each belong to.”
“Was it a challenge to learn?”
“I had trouble at first,” he admitted. “A lot of my training involved learning what colors looked like with my eyes closed instead of open. Freezing temperatures, warm temperatures—even burns. It was a form of torture, at least in my case. I had to learn how to open my mind and see things without visually discerning them.The third eye,some people call it. My father…he had a horrible way of teaching me. His methods usually involved ice baths and saunas far hotter than any human body can handle.” He gave a dark smile, his straight white teeth flashing in the light of the chandelier. “Good thing I heal quickly.”
Loren’s throat bobbed as she swallowed. “Clearly, his methods did what they were intended to.” Her sentence held the tone of a question she knew he heard.
