Kissed by Smoke (25 page)

I stifled a laugh by pretending to cough.
This guy was serious as a heart attack, with a complete lack of
emotion to match. ”Just why is that?”

His eyebrow cocked defiantly at me. He
clicked his key ring to the belt loop of his black jeans. “We just
do. It’s policy. How long have you been in Quicksilver?”

”A week.” I reached a hand up to touch
Bast’s toe. It was the size of my palm.

“Are you aware that between the hours of
midnight and three, you must remain inside with curtains closed and
doors locked?”

Bast’s toe felt cool to the touch. I didn’t
bother looking at him when I replied, “No, that’s news to me. Is it
like some kind of curfew?” I’d spent the last week sleeping all
night, watching TV, and making three lunchtime grocery runs. Not a
soul had mentioned a curfew.

“Yes,” he said shortly, abruptly turning and
heading away from me. I left the coolness of stone to follow him,
tripping over my Nikes in the rush. Superpowers be damned, I was a
klutz. I opened my mouth to question the curfew, but he beat me to
it.

“There is one set of keys to the Temple used
by the guards. We pass it on to each other at shift change,” he
said over his shoulder, his footsteps echoing off the tall
ceilings. “Every door in the temple has a key. You may go anywhere
in the Temple except this room,” he came to a stop before a short,
squat door the color of dried blood. “This room is off limits. It
can not be opened by anyone but Edward.”

“Why?”

He sighed. “You ask a lot of questions.”

“You evade a lot of questions,” I snapped
back, already sick of him. He sighed, pinching the bridge of his
nose in consternation. Jeez, I really had to spend the night with
this guy? And not even in the fun sense of the phrase.

“I don’t know why,” he bit out slowly, as if
speaking to a two year old. “It’s just the rules. Now if you’re
done being a pain in the ass, we’ll continue.” He resumed his
overly fast pace, and I trailed behind him, wanting to do what I
could just to anger him. Nobody had pushed my buttons quite so well
since Macy was a pre-teen.

I couldn’t believe the silence of the
building. It was like being trapped in a vault, no sounds in and
surely no sounds going out. No breezes, just stagnant albeit
fragrant air. ”It smells like jasmine.”

Jordan nodded, gesturing to a dark corner of
the temple. “We burn incense all day in honor of the goddess. Part
of your job is to keep the incense going. Generally every hour or
so, head that way and light one up.”

I laughed at his wording, but he just gave
me a dirty look. This guy had no sense of humor. We came to a small
steel door set in the west wall, where he meticulously picked
through the key ring before choosing the appropriate one and
unlocked the door. Following his broad shoulders into the room, I
felt a distinct change in temperature. It was much warmer.

“The temple is kept at a steady sixty
degrees to preserve the statues and the paint. If you want to warm
up, come in here. For no reason should you ever touch the
thermostat to the temple.” He started off on a description of the
various screens and computers, but I tuned him out.

There was a wall of ten television screens,
all showing different parts of the temple, inside and out. One
trained on each of the three goddesses; one on each of the four
darkened corners of the interior, one on the windowed tower, one on
the single exterior door, and a semi-arial view of the exterior
temple. Very high tech and slightly intimidating. I noticed with
extreme relief a computer with the lovely word GOOGLE across the
screen, decorated in fine Google fashion for the fall, all colorful
pencil drawn leaves.

Jordan cleared his throat. I shook off my
reverie and caught him staring at me in irritation. Great, he must
have asked me a question. I shuffled my feet, raising an eyebrow.
“Yes?”

“Do you think you understand?” he repeated
through his teeth.

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Then, I’m leaving.” He headed for the door
in a flash of black clothing. I followed on his heels.

”Edward said you were staying all night!” I
argued, my long legs matching stride with his as he crossed the
marble floor. Our footsteps echoed in the cavernous room, bouncing
back from the walls and giving the illusion we weren’t the only
ones walking. The torches flickered eerily, casting shadows
everywhere.

”There’s no reason for me to be here. I am
usually safe at home before midnight. I will not change that
tonight.” At the exterior door, he turned the last key and pulled
it open. Turning back once more, he regarded me with what could
only be called arrogance. “Remember. Do not look outside. Do not
open the doors no matter what you hear. Five minutes until
midnight, turn off the exterior cameras.” He put a hand to an odd
looking light switch beside the door. “After turning off the
cameras, check the locks on this door and flick this switch.
Immediately. Do you understand?”

If this man could make a grown woman feel
like such a child, I pitied any children he might have. I glanced
at his left hand and located the—gasp—wedding ring. God bless the
soul that married him. “I’ve got it. I haven’t the faintest idea
what the hell you’ve droned on about, but I’ve got it.”

“After three, turn on the cameras and flick
the switch the other way.” He passed me the key ring, and was
gone.

Sitting before the screens in the
surveillance room, I kicked my sneakers up on the desk and clicked
the mouse to wake up the computer. It was about eleven thirty and I
was starting to feel uneasy. After I’d locked the doors behind
Jordan, I took it upon myself to locate the bathroom, replenish the
jasmine on the altar, and make my way to the internet.

The air felt charged, even as closed off as
it was in the temple. I couldn’t place the source of worry, but it
hung in the room, caressing my skin like a lover. I made the
motions of checking my email, finding advertisements guaranteed to
increase my penis size, a lengthy list of names and numbers from my
dad, and an update from Macy on her new girlfriend.

At ten ’til twelve, after glancing at the
exterior screens over and over between mouse clicks, I finally gave
in and flipped the switch. Both screens went dark.

I hurried through the main room, lit only by
the spotlights illuminating the three central giants. The torches
had at some point gone out, and I attributed that to the absence of
the man who’d lit them with a flick of his hand. At the door, I
checked each lock thoroughly, ensuring them fully functional. I
turned to the switch on the wall.

It reminded me of a kill switch you might
find on an amusement park ride. With a shrug, I gripped it and
pulled down.

The sound was terrifying. I jumped a foot in
the air, whirling to the source high above my head. It was almost
too dark to make anything out, but I could tell something was
moving to block the ambient starlight coming through the windows of
the tower. With a heavy thud, the whirring sound stopped and the
silence in the temple seemed deeper than before. If my eyes weren’t
playing tricks on me, the tower windows were covered by large
doors.

“What the hell,” I breathed into the
stillness. Standing so near the door, I could hear the wind picking
up outside, an unearthly howl moving through the night. The
familiar ping of raindrops echoed from the ceiling high above me
and a grumble of thunder made me jump. Goose bumps ran rampant on
my skin beneath the cotton sleeves of my hoodie. The hair on the
back of my neck stood like an army ready for battle as I stared at
the heavy door that separated me from the outside.

At the obvious sound of a dog braying, as
creepy as the sound of coyotes on the prowl, I backed away from the
door, startled. I felt warmth on my back, light pouring over me,
and turned to find I’d made it to the central goddess, the one
Edward had referred to as Cerridwen.

She certainly was magnificent. Her throne
was carved to resemble tree trunks, laced with green ivy and
flowers of white petals. A black cloak covered her, the hood draped
down her back, the front curling down to the ground at her bare
feet. A small “v” of space showed a tasteful green gown beneath the
ties of the cloak. The dress was shot through with gold embroidered
vines, and it draped elegantly over her knees. Her hair was black,
tinged with gray, and one long braid was tossed carelessly over her
left shoulder, imperfect.

She cradled an ebony cauldron between her
knees and clutched a brown book to her chest with one arm. The
other hand pressed gently to the head of a pure white wolf sitting
demurely beside her right leg, body pressed to her. His snout was
long, his eyes black as the night sky. Cerridwen had a mature
beauty, her cheekbones broad and her smile holding the secrets of
the universe. Her eyes were as dark as her pet’s, and knowing.

I curled up beside one of her feet, my back
to the cauldron, and closed my eyes on the howling of the wind,
picking up with a vengeance outside.

It was hard not to think of home. The smell
of Mom’s meatloaf and Dad’s absent minded voice yelling, “Peach, I
can’t find my glasses!” Theresa’s secret smile and head shake as
she plucked them from the coffee table where he left them only an
hour before, depositing them on the desk beside him. We would watch
Jeopardy before dinner, the four of us, and then chatter about the
day while we ate. Dane would update us on his progress in his most
recent book, Theresa would tell us about the crazy things her
students said in class, and I’d keep the frustration of idiot
Wal-Mart customers to myself. Macy would throw a fit every time she
guessed a Jeopardy question wrong.

I thought of the nights Macy would slip into
my bed when I was a teenager, during bad weather or scary dreams,
and the strawberry smell of her hair pressed under my chin. She’d
curl her little body into mine, her hands gripping just one of my
own. I used to press my other hand to her collar bone and count her
heartbeats, an amazingly life-affirming feeling.

Sitting at the feet of a massive stone
goddess, I counted my own heartbeats, each light and quick beneath
my bare palm, like the flutter of a bird’s wings. I crossed my
legs, using the cadence to enter a meditative state, tuning out the
world.

At three, the uneasiness wore off like a bad
perfume, along with the steady pour of rain. Three hours had drug
on in a haze of eerie sounds from beyond the walls and leaving the
warmth of the statue to light a stick of jasmine incense every
hour, still clinging to the half-trance I’d found. I’d chewed a
rough patch into my bottom lip. I raised my head from Cerridwen’s
leg, eying the door warily. I touched her, and could swear it felt
like skin. “Well, Cerri, I don’t know what the hell that was about,
but it wasn’t any fun.”

I slid from Cerridwen’s throne, my feet
slapping to the floor. The tower windows made just as much noise
opening as they did when they closed, the kind of sounds the Hydra
must have made when Hercules killed it. I could see clouds and
stars outside the distant windows.

I hadn’t paid any attention to Freya,
sitting seductively to the left of Cerridwen. To be honest, caught
in the warmth of the central goddess through the wee hours of the
morning, I’d forgotten she was there.

Boy oh boy, was she there in all her
feminine glory. She was colored the lightest of the three women,
her porcelain skin almost shining in the spotlight. Her head was
tilted, hands lifted to brush her fingers through her strawberry
blonde hair, the waves of which cascaded from her fingertips
halfway to the floor. Bright blue eyes dominated her elfish face,
gazing out with an authority that didn’t mesh with her child-like
appearance. Her chest was bare, her breasts perfect round globes
with obscenely painted nipples, like blush on her skin. A white
cloth draped her lap, keeping her opened knees just this side of
indecent. A cloak of white feathers draped down her back, a
falcon’s head resting on her own. The only other ornament on her
body was a ruby and amber necklace. A metallic colored blob between
her feet proved to be a suit of mail, a sword stuck into the
pedestal beside it.

The three of them made quite a trio: demure,
sarcastic, and saucy. With another glance at Cerridwen, I headed
for the office to wile away another hour.

At four o’clock on the dot, I watched my
relief come walking up the lawn to the exterior door. It occurred
to me I’d wasted the entire night instead of getting to know the
various areas of the temple. Hopefully there wouldn’t be a
quiz.

The jarring buzz of the doorbell followed as
I watched him press the button to the right of the entrance.
Grabbing the five pound key ring, I headed to let him in, vowing to
explore tomorrow.

He was stunning. His hair was a mass of rich
brown that slanted sideways into his eyes and brushed the collar of
his black polo. I was thrown by his eyes, black as the night around
him, but twinkling with good humor. He wasn’t much taller than I,
putting us almost eye to eye, and his long, lean body was something
I’d be writing home about. The air behind him smelled like ozone,
and I couldn’t tell if the storm was coming or going.

Lifting his hand, he displayed a white paper
bag. “I brought coffee and doughnuts,” he offered, his voice strong
but not too deep. When he smiled, his teeth were white and straight
in his tanned face.

I laughed, putting a hand to my forehead in
mock swoon. “Oh, god, I think I might be in love!”

With a sheepish grin, he stepped into the
temple and closed the door behind him. I started the ritual of
locking the doors, still trying to learn which key did what. “It’s
an apology,” he told me. Finishing the door, I turned to him with a
confused look, keys dangling from my hand.