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I frowned. “Why wouldn’t it just seek out a safer hunting ground?”
“Because, as I said, it is drawn by great anger and despair. There is much of those emotions in this place.”
My fingertips were beginning to tingle with heat, a sharp sensation that wasn’t exactly pleasant. And while part of me wondered why he didn’t just flush heat and healing through me like he usually did, the sensation of his hands rubbing mine felt too good to complain. “But there are other dark clubs—why wouldn’t it just choose one of those?”
“I suspect because of the ghosts. It is their need, their anguish, that is the draw here.”
“Does that mean the other places don’t have ghosts?”
He shrugged. “They undoubtedly do, but for whatever reason, they are not as vocal or as angry.”
“But why? I mean, they’re all in the same situation—why would these ghosts be more vocal than the others?”
“Perhaps they aren’t. Perhaps the Rakshasa—for reasons we cannot understand—simply chose this club over the others.”
“So now that it knows we’re here, it may hunt in the other clubs?”
“Possibly.”
Wouldn’t that make Hunter a happy woman? I closed my eyes as the warm, prickly sensation began to spread through the rest of my hand, but I resisted the urge to pull it from his. I wanted to enjoy the press of his fingers just a little bit longer. “Do you think we should remain here until dawn?”
“No. The Rakshasa may be hungry, but it isn’t stupid. It won’t return tonight.”
I sighed in relief. “I’m glad, because I really don’t want to be here when those ghosts start up again.”
“We won’t be.” He rose, pulling me upright with him, then encircling my waist with his other arm. His face was its usual inscrutable self, but there was an odd tension in his body and Valdis flowed with a muted red fire. “Ready?”
I nodded. Energy swept around me, through me, tearing us apart and flinging us through the fields so quickly it was little more than a blur.
I gasped as we re-formed inside the hotel room. “Sorry,” he said, his hand sliding almost sensually around my waist before he stepped back. “I did not want to risk being on the fields for long. Not with the Raziq’s creatures still loose.”
I frowned. “Why aren’t they being hunted?”
“They are, but our resources are still stretched thin.” He paused. “Go shower, Risa.”
I studied him for a moment, knowing there was more to it than that, but also knowing he wouldn’t share until he was good and ready. With a half shrug of my own, I grabbed a shirt and some fresh panties and headed for the bathroom to clean up.
Twenty minutes later I felt somewhat refreshed, and though my arm was still red from the remnants of the slug glue, it didn’t look bad enough to scar. I got dressed, then finger-dried my hair, suddenly glad to be wearing my own face once more, even though I’d probably have to face-shift again when we left the hotel. The Raziq might have attacked me on the gray fields, but they hadn’t yet managed another attack on this plane. The subterfuge, as tiring as it was, appeared to be working.
I sighed softly, then jumped a little as my cell phone rang.
I dug it out of the pocket of my discarded jeans, and said, “Hello?”
“I must say,” a familiar voice drawled, “I am very disappointed.”
Lucian. Damn it, he was the last person I wanted to talk to right now, even if my hormones were suddenly saying otherwise. And what was it about this man that got to me so quickly? I hadn’t thought about him all fucking day, and yet the minute I heard his voice, I became a seething mass of need.
If I hadn’t known otherwise, I’d have said he’d put some sort of spell on me—except that Ilianna would have spotted anything like that.
“What do you want, Lucian?”
It was tersely said, but he didn’t seem to notice. His soft laugh ran across my senses as sweetly as a caress.
“What do you think I want? You, on me, under me. I want to feel your supple body, want to caress your silken skin, want to lose myself in the wonder of loving you.”
Each word had visions of our tangled bodies rising, and sweat prickled across my skin. I closed my eyes and sagged back against the bathroom wall. I could resist this. I could resist him.
“Only trouble is,” I said, the anger in my voice aimed more at myself than at him, “I don’t want to see or feel you. I’ve already told you that.”
