Deep Deception (6 page)

Chapter Six

Adin walked in the general direction of the Seine. He was unsurprised when, fifteen minutes later, a sedan with dark-tinted windows pulled up to the curb beside him.

The driver’s window rolled down and Boaz leaned out. “Get in.”

“No,” Adin said flatly.

“Donte phoned me and told me to help you get home.
To him
. I take it you didn’t tell him what you’ve cost him.”

“That will have to come later.”

“I see.”

“Why are you here? Did you switch allegiance again?” Adin asked, still walking along while Boaz crept by the curb—not an easy feat in Parisian traffic, even that early in the day.

“I just gave Santos my notice, and I have not a single doubt that he will peel me like a grape when next we meet.
Get in
.”

Adin glanced around the chic neighborhood then shrugged. He climbed into the back seat and folded his arms. “Whose car is this?”

“Let’s hope this escapes Santos’s notice until I can return it. He has no need of it while he’s in Asia, anyway.”

“That home was remarkably free of Santos’s usual minions. I can’t help but feel I must have reacted exactly as he planned. I hope you brought my luggage. I have an Eiffel Tower pencil sharpener in there for Deana.”

“I have no idea what Santos planned. He doesn’t share his thoughts with me.”

Adin scooted forward and gripped the back of Boaz’s seat. “Well, let me share mine. If anything Santos has planned, if anything he has used me for this time harms one hair on Donte’s head you had better kill me because I
will
tear you apart, and while I may not be a vampire, I will
drink your blood
. Do you understand me?”

Adin met Boaz’s eyes in the rearview mirror and for the first time in their acquaintance, the insouciant, polite mask dropped from Boaz’s face, leaving an undisguised anger. “I understand you. Fedeltà knows where my loyalties lie. I’ve told you that. Anyway, as I’ve also told you, you’ll be answering to him this time.”

“You’ve told me a lot of things.” Adin watched the mask fall back into place on Boaz’s dark, sharp features. “The question is what do I believe.”

“Sit back and be silent.” Boaz’s eyes held their usual merry light. “
I will drink your blood
. Aren’t you simply precious?”

Adin gazed out the window. The sky was overcast; if he looked farther west it was clear they’d be getting some rain. Already he could see a certain yellow cast to the light, which probably heralded a sudden downpour. As they navigated the crowded streets, Adin sighed in contentment. “Where are we headed?”

“Back to your hotel. Donte is waiting for you there.”

“I hope you have your own room.”

“I’m certain Donte was able to make arrangements.”

“I imagine after your little performance yesterday Villiers will find you a place,” Adin remarked drily. “If you’re a carnivore.”

“I’m an
omni
vore,” Boaz informed him. “But when I’m working I try not to divide my attention.”

“Do you think we’ll ever see Bran again?”

“I couldn’t say, Dr. Tredeger.”

“For his sake, I hope not.” Adin decided that if he was going to require being driven through the streets of Paris in April just before a good spring rain, he ought to shut up and enjoy it while it lasted.

When Adin entered their new hotel room he discovered Donte hunched over the tiny writing desk, frowning in the light of a laptop. In a parody of the man himself all the window coverings were drawn and the lights were turned off. Given Donte’s fierce concentration, Adin couldn’t help but reach into the case he’d brought up from the car to draw out his reading glasses. He slipped them on as he leaned over Donte’s shoulder to glance at the screen.

“You smell like sun and rain.” Donte’s breath warmed Adin’s ear.

Adin leaned in and kissed Donte just below the jaw, resting his chin on one broad shoulder. “You smell like home. What has you frowning this fine morning?”

Donte lifted one of Adin’s hands and placed a kiss in the palm. “Your hand tastes like iron. Have you ever heard of an Emere?”

“No.” There was no second chair, so Donte gallantly relinquished his to Adin, who scrolled down to read the Wiki article. “Yoruban folklore?”

“West African peoples. They have interesting cosmology and a fascinating language, although I never learned it. An Emere is another type of changeling child.”

“Boaz talked about changelings. You think Bran is an Emere?”

“I’m just trying to get a read on all the changeling folktales. It’s my understanding that changelings are actually fairly common. Sometimes a broader picture, synthesizing an image from a number of different cultures—as many as one can get—will give a better idea of what one is dealing with.”

“Look at you getting all research-y. Sexy.” Adin tilted his head to kiss his lover, slanting his mouth over Donte’s, teasing it open to taste him. Donte yielded and they stroked each other with lips and tongue, until between them they could taste the pleasure of homecoming and imminent sex. Donte broke away first.

“So, an Emere,” Donte hinted, clearing his throat. “This is a child who can move between heaven and earth at will. They’re seen as not quite nice, really, as they are greedy for heaven, even while they experience the joys of earth.”

Adin considered this. “I have to wonder if Bran is special somehow even among his kind. The fact that he has some kind of power, but not the first clue what it all means, indicates to me…that perhaps his ignorance is important. I don’t know, an idea is playing hide-and-seek somewhere in my imagination. Boaz said the changeling process turns a supernatural child into a human. What if it isn’t the original nature of Bran that’s at issue, for example, he isn’t valuable because he’s a specific otherworldly entity or a changeling human, but maybe…”

“His value lies in the fact that he’s neither.” Donte frowned. “You realize you said otherworldly entity with no hesitation at all?”

“He isn’t human.” Adin turned to find Donte gazing at him thoughtfully. “Oh, you mean it’s odd that I don’t question it anymore?”

Donte rubbed his hand across Adin’s back. “That saddens me somewhat. As if I’ve taken your innocence.”

“I only wish I knew why he’s so valuable. What do you suppose Harwiche believed Bran could do for him?”

“I don’t know. What does he do?” Donte asked. “Have you seen anything out of the ordinary?”

Adin chuckled. “The little prick was in my head all the time, but I hardly think anyone would pay for that. Vampires can do that. He could see my dreams, comment in my thoughts. At the time I thought it was as if he…” Adin frowned.

“What?” Donte skimmed his hand over Adin’s shoulder and down his chest.

“This morning I had the rather fanciful notion that maybe he could search my memories and play them for me. As if I were a jukebox and he could line up my greatest hits.”

“Yes?”

“He screened them for me with intense clarity. It was almost as if I could relive them. He seemed to be searching my ‘face file’ this morning when I woke up. They were all flashing past like—”

“Adin.” Donte’s hand stopped moving. “Is there a reason anything you know—
anyone
you know—could be harmful to you?”

“Me?” Adin switched off the computer and stood, enfolding Donte in his arms. “There is nothing in my past that Ned Harwiche would pay to find out, if that’s what you’re thinking. Certainly anyone who wanted to hurt me could find an addict to do it for a few hundred bucks. I think Bran just wanted to get to know me. Whatever it was, he’s gone now, and he’s Santos’s headache, or Harwiche’s or yours, but I refuse to tell you about that until later…” Adin fished around his case for his toiletry kit and tossed it between the pillows on the bed.

“About that? About what?”

“About the fact that after today you will probably, in Boaz’s words, want to have me flogged. As if that was anything new.” Adin crawled onto the bed.

“You said my headache, Adin.” Donte followed him. “What headache?”

“Later.” Adin helped slide the jacket off Donte’s shoulders and unbuttoned his crisp cotton shirt. “No tie today, how very informal. Were you heading out for a swim?”

“Very funny, I was relaxing at home.”

“Ah. And you didn’t pack the dressing gowns. Didn’t want to sit around in your shirtsleeves like a wanton?”

“Stop making me sound like the hero of a gothic novel,” Donte told him.

Adin located Donte’s belt buckle and undid it without taking his eyes from Donte’s. “Don’t knock it. Fully half the reason I love you is because of your tailor.”

Donte’s expression softened. “You still love me?”

Something about the way Donte asked made Adin’s breath hitch. “You must know I do.”

“When you’re next to me, I can feel it.” Donte pulled him close. Adin didn’t resist. “I can see it in your eyes and smell it on your skin.”

“Donte.” Adin smiled into Donte’s neck.

“Then you leave and it’s complicated by time and distance and mortality and—”

“I’m here now,” Adin breathed, pulling his shirt off over his head. Donte’s fingers worked the fastenings on Adin’s jeans and soon they were naked, skin-to-skin, and tumbling into the narrow bed together. “And you’re magnificent.”

Donte loomed over Adin, who lay on his back against the pillows and smiled up at him like he was a god. “No, you are.
Mio meraviglioso amore. Il mio cuore è per te, caro. Per sempre.
”
My heart belongs to you for always
.

“
Tu sei la mia vita, Donte, la mia anima.” You are my life, my soul.
Adin felt his face heat. “Which is ironic really, given that you’re undead, but there you have it.” His lips curved in a smile of welcome, and Donte hungrily found them with his own.

Adin drowned in all the things his senses told him. Donte’s skin was soft, velvety, and cool beneath his fingertips and where it pressed against his own. He smelled like cigars and croissants and coffee and tasted of lime and some elusive Middle-Eastern spice, cardamom maybe, but savory. Like a cardamom pod and onions and the bittersweet peel of oranges.

“Donte,” Adin whispered, “
lover
.”

Donte lifted Adin’s leg, nudging and bumping him until Adin could feel Donte’s cock gliding along in its own slickness over his perineum.

Adin’s eyes closed. “
Oh
.”

“Must I beg?” Donte asked, but Adin could see he was teasing. “Must I ask permission to enter, as if I were a vampire standing in the doorway of your home?”

Adin felt around over his shoulder and was only a little frustrated by the fastening on his case. He pulled out a bottle of lube and Donte pursed his lips.

“If I believed you packed this just for your trip to Paris, I’d be concerned.”

Adin nipped at Donte’s chin while Donte slid a slick finger around his puckered entry to prepare him. “I knew eventually you would lose interest in even that most exciting of all undead pastimes—gazing into the dark by yourself—and come to me.”

Donte sank into Adin with a sigh they passed between them through kisses and the soft sounds of pain and pleasure. For Adin, the challenge was always how to get closer to Donte, how to be absorbed into Donte’s skin, so he wrapped himself around Donte’s body and hung on, lurching into a kiss. Hands grasped his ass as Donte’s feet found traction, allowing him to drive into Adin again and again.

After a time, Donte’s strokes were so fast and short and hard that Adin could barely breathe around the panting half breaths of air forced out of him. He hardly had time to drag air back into his lungs while Donte drilled and held him, punished and cherished him all at once. His head spun. He wondered how he’d ever thought he could live without it—even for a short time.

“Ah, Donte
.
”

Low, throaty groans signaled Donte was on the edge of release, and Adin waited with him on the precipice, his heartbeat thundering, his nerves thrumming eagerly.

“
Donte
.” The world tilted and slipped and slid away from Adin, as if Donte rose into the air with him in his arms, taking flight, into perfect, heartbreaking, starry black skies. Adin’s cry was both strangled by emotion and smothered by Donte’s mouth, which captured his surprised gasp as his heart seemed to burst from his chest.

“
Voglio restare per sempre con te, caro, almeno puoi pensarci?”

I want to be with you forever, will you think about it
? Adin squeezed his eyes shut and clung.

Adin woke briefly to see Donte slip out of their room. He didn’t need the windows of the room unobstructed to know that it was night. Donte hadn’t fed from him since the day before, and he was no doubt going out to find sustenance. Adin rolled over, content to rest, to let the languor of their lovemaking and his sorrow at their inability to find common ground with regard to immortality, drag him back for some much-needed sleep.

Safe in his lover’s arms, Adin dreamed of his father.

“I never could understand why these numbskulls swim here at this time of day,” Adin’s father said as he set up the tripod. “Think we’ll get lucky?”

“This fog should burn off.” Adin had been more interested in the coffee his father bought him, even though he’d filled it with cream and sugar so he could drink it without making faces, than the photography part of the outing. “What is it with you and that boat? We’ve been here every weekend this summer and you still don’t have the picture you want.”

“Mind your manners, Adin. The lady is a ship,” Keene Tredeger teased. “I freely admit I’m obsessed by it.”

The Tredegers, father and son, peered through the fog at the Balclutha, the three-masted, full-rigged beauty that was part of the Maritime Museum’s collection. If the moisture burned off enough, his father would try to get a picture of her, caressed just so by the early morning sunlight. As if the sun would ever shine over San Francisco Bay in the morning. He said he knew what that picture would look like when he got it and until that day, their Saturday mornings would be spent in the aquatic park trying. Adin went with him, mostly for the coffee.