Flesh Circus (6 page)

His mouth found mine, and it was no longer tossing on an ocean. It was a softness blooming, nailing me in place. My body loosened,
tingles flooding me. It was a far cleaner feeling than the scar’s sick heat. I kissed him with my heart flooding out through
the play of tongue and lips. He was purring, a rumble spreading out in waves. Each concentric circle of that purr stroked
along my skin.

I broke away to take a breath. He nuzzled down my jawline, his mouth settling lower, just over my pulse. I quieted, the instinct
of struggle sliding away.

“Saul,” I whispered.

“Hm?” He nipped, playfully, and I arched.

“I think we should take this somewhere else.”
Like a bed. Like
our
bed.

“Here’s nice.” He nuzzled again. I squirmed in a new way.

“Saul—”

“Shhh.”

I stilled. He inhaled deeply. Let out the breath in a chuff, a warm spot on my vulnerable throat. My pulse strained toward
him. I held still as long as I possibly could. Finally wriggled a little bit, and he didn’t immediately move. “What’s wrong?”
My wrists, braceleted by his fingers, both throbbed. He was holding me a little too tightly.

“Nothing,” he whispered back. “I just want to hold you.”

Goddammit. I want something else entirely.
But I breathed in, the urge retreating low in my pelvis, a dull ache spiking for a moment as bloodflow reversed itself.
I’m going to be cranky if this keeps up.
“Okay.” I swallowed, my throat moving against his lips. Another slight touch; it became very difficult to throttle my hormones
back.

Mikhail had always been on me to control my pulse. I was much better at it than I ever had been, but one whiff of my cat-boy
and the hormones started jacking me up again.

As problems went, it was a nice one.

Deep breathing. My eyes closed. The dark behind my lids was safe for once. Pushing the feeling down and away, reasserting
control.

It used to be damn near every sparring session ended with us rolling around in an entirely different way to take the edge
off. Since Saul had come back from the Rez with his hair cropped, it hadn’t happened. He wanted to be close, and wanted to
be held.

I was okay with that. But the no-sex thing was beginning to take its toll.

God, Jill, how selfish can you be? His mom’s dead. For a Were, that’s like the end of the world.
I kept my breathing slow and even. He didn’t let go. We stayed that way, knotted together. Frozen.

“I love you,” he finally said against my skin. “Jill?”

“I know that.” And I did. “I love you too, catkin. Just rest for a minute. It’s okay.” I told the persistent tension in the
bottom of my belly to go away.
I refuse to be dragged around by my clitoris, for God’s sake. Come on, Jill. Rule the body, the body doesn’t rule you.

“I…” Maddeningly, he stopped. We lay like that for another thirty seconds or so, hardwood floor holding me up but not
in the most comfortable way.

He levered himself up all in a rush, easing over to the side and ending up cross-legged, sitting and watching me. Something
flared in his dark eyes. I watched his face, alert for any sign.

“I’m sorry.” The little bottle of holy water on its silver chain around his neck shifted as he moved again, twitching, and
stilled. “I thought…”

“Don’t worry about it.” I pushed myself up on my elbows. My T-shirt was rucked up, muscle moving under my abdominal skin,
scars crisscrossing me. I’d put on a little more weight, but not a lot, and most of it more muscle. “Really.”

“Jill…” A helpless shrug. You wouldn’t think he was so much bigger than me, he looked so small and lost right now.

“Hey.” I scrambled, got my knees under me, threw my arms around him. “Hey, don’t. Please don’t. Don’t
worry
about it.”

“I just… I want to…” I’d never known him to be incoherent before. Quiet, yes. Unable to find the words?

No. That was my job, wasn’t it? To be the one who couldn’t express a single goddamn important thing. I searched for the right
thing to say. “I know, baby. Don’t worry so much. It’s only temporary.”

His face fell. “You think so?” It wasn’t like him to sound so questioning. Or so tentative.

“Of
course.
” I said it far more firmly than I felt. Maybe it wasn’t temporary. Maybe he was just having second thoughts about marrying
a hellbreed-tainted hunter. Weres don’t divorce—they just pick their mates and settle down—but Weres didn’t date hunters all
that often either, and almost never got hitched to them.

So if this distance between us wasn’t temporary, would he go back to his tribe? As far as they were concerned the fireside
ceremony with his mother officiating made me his mate. But… I was an anomaly, and a big one. If he went back to his tribe,
I couldn’t see anyone protesting.

Least of all me. I’d commence and finish quiet internal bleeding before I said a peep. He deserved that much from me. If he
really wanted to go back, I couldn’t blame him one bit.

God knows you’re not the easiest person in the world to live with, Jill. Buck up. Comfort him.

I held him, stroking his hair, touching the silver charms knotted in with red thread. Rubbed his nape just the way he liked
it, scraping with my bitten-down nails. He eased a little and purred again, in fits and starts. “It’s okay,” I repeated. “Really
and truly. It’s all okay.”

I don’t know what else I would have said if the doorbell hadn’t sounded loud enough to cut my ears in half. The thing goes
off so seldom, I always forget between times that I have it deliberately loud. I like to hear everything scuttling in the
warehouse’s walls, down to the smallest insect.

Not that I ever have many insects around, what with sorcery burning all through the paneling and studs, but you get the idea.

I straightened. There wasn’t a quiver or a peep from my hackles. My intuition was quiet, for once. “Huh.”

Which didn’t mean there wasn’t something bad at the door. It could be just a very
quiet
something bad. Then again, why would anything that valued its life and had mayhem on its mind ring my doorbell instead of
just busting in to lay some hurt on me?

“Jill—” Saul made a small movement, like he wanted to catch my wrist.

“Hang on, catkin.” I bounced to my feet and stalked for the door. A convenient table on the way gave me a gun; I checked the
magazine as I slipped cat-footed down the hall and toward the front door.

Nothing. Not even a tingle. A series of raps—
human,
I decided, since they didn’t have the odd too-light or too-heavy edge that meant something else. I slid up to the door.

Breathing. Slightly asthmatic. A human pulse, just a little elevated. I jerked the door open, the locks parting like water.

A skinny Hispanic teenager smelling of Corona and refried beans stood on my front step. He wore 51 colors, a red bandanna
knotted around one thin bicep. Beneath the edge of a hairnet keeping his dark, limp hair back, he had a face that belonged
on an Aztec codex.

Or at least, his proud, bird-beak nose did. Sallow, pitted skin and a pair of dead, empty eyes showed why he’d never be handsome.
I recognized him a split second after I realized what he was standing there for.

He had the look.

Oh, no. Not now.
“What the hell do you want?”

Gilberto Rosario Gonzalez-Ayala blinked once.
“Hola, bruja.”

“Hello,
Señor
Gonzalez-Ayala. I repeat, what the bloody blue blazes do you want?”

“Took me a while to find your house.” A ghost of good humor slid through the bottom of his dark, shark-flat eyes.

You’re not packing a .22, are you?
I eyed him, taking in the flannel shirt, the torn jeans—and there it was under the stark flatness of his expression.

I knew that look. It was hunger.

Crap. I knew I hadn’t seen the last of this kid.
“There’s a reason for that,” I said finally. Behind him, the street was empty. The warehouse is on the wrong side of the
tracks, of course. I spent the first half of my life trying to get away from the wrong side, and now it’s where I spend most
of my time. I barely have any idea what it’s like over on the decent side of town, unless I’m working a case with its tentacles
up among the rich and powerful.

I think that’s referred to as
irony.

He kept quiet, watching me. The sun was going down, dusk dyeing the west in bright pink and orange scarves. It was almost
time to get ready for the night. Which would mean racking in more ammo and dropping by Galina’s, since she had another load
of blessed silver for me. Before that, I had to do some quiet digging, starting with the file on Avery’s victim from the last
night—

“You know why I’m here,
bruja.
” His eyes were fixed on my face. “I owe you a beer. And we got business.”

Yes, I do know why you’re here. You still have to say it.
“What kind of business? I’m not involved with petty gang warfare.”
No matter how useful you guys were last time I had big trouble in town.
My heart squeezed down on itself, thinking of a grave and a coffin, and a good cop laid to rest.

My fault. If I had known…

But you never do. I brought myself back to the present with a conscious effort.

The boy on my front step shrugged. “I ain’t here for Ramon. We got other business.”

“Like what, Gilberto?”
Go away while you still can.

“
Bruja
business. With what you do.”

I held his gaze for a long fifteen seconds, feeling Saul appear behind me, a silent presence. My nostrils flared. It was there,
too, the flat odorless reek of desperation with the burnt-sugar edge of wanting.

He didn’t quite break, but he did pale the slightest bit and step back, as if my mismatched eyes had somehow changed. I knew
they hadn’t—there was none of the dry burning that would tell me my blue eye was doing funny things. But even the bravest
tend to get a little weirded out when I stare at the bridge of the nose. The gaze grows piercing when you do that, especially
if you just soft-focus, and you begin to look like you’re staring through someone’s head, riffling through their most intimate
memories.

It’s a tough look to pull off while covered in dry sweat, rucked-up in a T-shirt and leather pants, and frustrated enough
to chew nails. I still managed.

“I know what you do.” Gilberto dropped his hands. They dangled loosely, reminding me of the strangler-fingered Trader. “I
want to do it, too.”

I didn’t have to put any more bitterness into my laugh. It was already bitter enough. “Go home,
poquito.
Leave the night alone and don’t darken my door again.” I swept said door to and closed it in his face.

No sound from the other side. None that you could hear with human ears, that is. I could still hear his heartbeat, pounding
a little harder and faster now. Accelerated breathing, too.

I’ll bet that didn’t go the way you thought it would.
I half-turned, and Saul stood close behind me, his hair mussed and high color blooming in his cheeks, one dark eyebrow elegantly
lifted.

I shrugged. “Hopefully he’ll go away. I’m going to hit the shower.”

“What if he rings the bell again?”

“Ignore him.” I swung past him, already planning out the rest of the night. “Want a snack before we head out again?”

His broad shoulders dropped. “I’ll make you eggs.” He even managed to make that sound tentative. His hand twitched again,
like he wanted to touch me, but he refrained.

Why?

You’ve got other problems, Jill. Just let him be. Be supportive, for once.
“Good deal. Thanks, sweetie.” I paced away, a little faster than I should have, trying not to feel like I was retreating.

Now
that
was a losing battle.

A
very’s desk always looked about to disappear under a mound of paper and ranks of liquor bottles. He’d stuck slim candles into
bottle mouths, some burned down and others pristine, though I never saw a burning one. If he ever lit them up, it was probably
when he was alone.

Cops aren’t supposed to drink on duty, but exorcists get a little bit of leeway. However, Ave didn’t immediately reach for
the mini-fridge under his desk to get me a beer, and that was odd.

The tiled passageway behind me resounded with faint echoes from the downtown jail above. Here, at the very bottom, the long
corridor terminated in Ave’s office and three rooms, each barred with cold iron. Each with a circle carved into the concrete
floor to hold victims hosting a Possessor—or those who had been cleaned out but had to be protected from the demon coming
back
to crawl right in and set up housekeeping.

He handed over the file. “This is seriously weird.”

When isn’t it?
I rolled my shoulders back in their sockets, my coat creaking a little. “What’s weird? Where’s our boy?”

“He’s the winner in Room One. Didn’t flinch at the circle or anything. Didn’t even know he was awake until I peeked in the
porthole about an hour ago, when I finally got the file all together. There’s some headshots in there too. He has a record.”