Unknown

That was exactly what Ashan had meant to do to me, in throwing me into human flesh. He didn’t need to torment me. He knew that every time I came up against the natural barriers, I would torture myself, thoroughly, with my hunger and possibilities.

It troubled me less than he’d pla

Luis was shaking, but he kept his hand on my face until I tightened my pale, thin fingers around his and pulled them away. His pulse was thundering now, and his face had gone starkly pale under its copper. He was not precisely gasping, but his breathing was more ragged, and more rapid, than I would have liked. I reached out to lay my hand flat against his chest, feeling the too-quick laboring of his heart.

“I’m okay,” he said before I could speak. He smiled, but I saw the pain underneath it. “Is that better for you now?”

I nodded, unwilling or perhaps unable to speak. My eyes were glowing, I knew it; I’d rarely been able to afford that sort of display, but it was raw nature, and I had no doubt that I looked . . . different just now, as I struggled to manage the power he had given me in such an intensive burst. I could see the change in his expression. I just could not decide what precisely it was that had created such an indescribable tension in his face . . . fear? Or desire? Something of both, perhaps.

He surprised me by saying, in a low, rough voice, “If we didn’t have someplace to be right now, I would take you inside and get down to business.”

I blinked. “I don’t understand.”

He took in a deep breath, then let it out, and finally, I recognized the waves of emotion coming off of him, resonating within me. They were just . . . unexpected.

“No,” he said. “Don’t suppose you would. You watch your back, Cassiel. I mean that.”

Our hands were still linked, fingers wound together in pure, primal need.

“And you,” I said. I didn’t know what else to say. “I will know if you need me.” Immediately, I realized that there were several likely interpretations of that, and immediately amended it to, “Need me to help.”

He laughed. It was still soft, but this time, it was lightened with considerable humor. “Yeah,” he said. “Sure. I’ll keep you on the psychic speed dial. What is that, pound 666?”

He raised my hand as if it was the most natural motion in the world, and for an instant I felt the softness of his lips burning against my skin. Then he let go, took a step back, and turned to walk back to Turner’s idling sedan.

I pressed my back to the rough, warm wall and breathed, breathed, breathed.

Then I went inside, recovered my helmet, and got on my motorcycle for the trip to Sedona.

Chapter 5

THERE IS NOTHING, in my human experience, as freeing as a fast ride on a powerful motorcycle. It’s a great deal like being a Dji

It is also loud and exhausting, and by the time I finished the long ride following Interstate 40 west to Flag-staff, I had eaten enough grime and dust to last several human lifetimes. It was now deep night, and traffic was almost nonexistent save for some long-distance trucks still plying their trade.

I stopped for a rest. I had human bodily needs; I could go without food, but water was a necessity that I found I needed both to dispose of and take in. Rest-rooms at gas stations were an unpleasant and shocking surprise; I had never considered the serious drawbacks of such lazily-cleaned rooms. I was completely unable to ignore the filth, and wasted a burst of power to turn the sinks, floors and porcelain toilet into sparkling, clean examples of their kind before using the facility. I felt that was a much less judgmental response than simply blowing the place off the face of the Earth, which was also a distinct temptation, especially when the storekeeper overcharged me for a bottle of cold water. I paid without complaint, however. I had learned from our earlier problems with law enforcement. Although I could easily overpower, or at least evade, it would be much easier to simply avoid being noticed at all.

That ship quickly sailed, however.

Outside, a whole noisy, thundering fleet of motorcycles pulled in, blocking my own vehicle against the building. Where I was wearing pale pink leather, these other riders were in battered blacks, studded with metal. Their vehicles were better kept than their persons, which were scruffy, badly washed, and—from their expressions—not especially friendly. Big, bulky men, for the most part; those who were smaller or thi

They surrounded my Victory in a ring of metal and bodies.

They were silent when I exited the store, downing the last of my water. I paid them no attention and threaded my way between the bikes until I reached my Victory, which was a calm, gleaming island in the sea of chrome and attitude.

There was no chance, once they saw me, that this was going to end well. I saw it in the predatory smiles, the shift in body language, the gleam of their eyes.

End well for them, of course.

I straddled the motorcycle, tossed the empty bottle effortlessly in the trash twenty feet away, and said, simply, “Move.”

They laughed.

“That’s a whole lot of bike for you, lady,” one of them said. “You sure you can handle it?” That woke suggestions from several about what else I could handle, or might want to.

For answer, I gave the speaker a brilliant, false smile. “Your bike is also nice,” I said. “Is it a ten speed?”

This was an insult that someone had offered me once, which I had of course ignored; Luis had been the one to explain the pointed joke to me, after the fact. Intellectually I understood why a prideful human might be offended by such a comparison, but it still meant nothing to me, really.

However, it did mean something to this man, whose entire self-image was bound up with his motorcycle, his image, and his pride.

“What’d you say, bitch?”

“I believe I said move.” Perhaps I should have added, please. I wasn’t much in the mood.

The man who’d spoken got off his motorcycle and came to walk around mine, and me. I didn’t bother to turn my head to watch him as he went behind my back; better to appear completely relaxed and unconcerned than to show an instant’s doubt with a pack like this. “I didn’t diss your bike, bitch. Why you got to go insult mine? That’s a Harley Softail Superglide, not a goddamn Schwi

That made me smile. “Oh, I doubt that,” I said, and looked him squarely in the face. “Are you going to fight with me now?”

They laughed. It was spontaneous and genuine, but there was also an edge of menace to it that might have raised hackles on anyone else.

“Oh, baby, you don’t want to go there,” he said. “You really don’t.”

I smiled.

“If you’re not man enough to fight,” I said, “I think you should get on your bike and pedal away.”

The laughter faded. The smiles died. And what was left was cold, hard, and intense as the night sky overhead.

The leader said, in a low voice, “You are a piece of work, bitch. I ought to smack the living shit out of you. Teach you not to talk back.”