Chapter
Thirty-five
Jim watched the sun rise up through the budding trees outside of Sissy’s window. He’d been sitting in the same position for hours, his back braced against a couple of pillows, his legs stretched out in front of him, Sissy’s head in his lap. He couldn’t feel his ass, and his feet were tingling, but he didn’t give a shit.
The fact that the illumination in the sky was a glorious peach and gold didn’t uplift him. Actually, the beauty of the dawn just pissed him off: Instead of wasting a miracle on something so everyday and commonplace, so anonymous, why couldn’t the Creator, just once, bless the woman who was lying beside him?
What the hell would it cost Him, really? Just rip some storm clouds out over the horizon and shield the magnificence for this one morning—and give Sissy a miracle.
One right after another, all the bad news and bad breaks Sissy had had hit him as if they were his own tragedies—and with each impact to the chest, all he could think of was . . .
Finding Devina and killing her with his bare hands. Just squeezing the life out of her. Making her suffer and then lighting her corpse on fire—
“Will you do it?”
He shook himself out of his murder fantasies. And reinserted his consciousness back in the real-life nightmare. “Yeah,” he said gruffly. “I will.”
She lifted her head and looked up at him. “And there’s no other way, right?”
“Not that we know of. No.”
“Okay. Then we go ahead.”
He closed his eyes for a moment, feeling like he’d been hit by a car and was in the process of being dragged across rough pavement. “All right.”
When he cracked his lids again, she was still staring at him. “I wouldn’t trust anyone but you.”
“And I’m not going to let you down.”
“Make love to me.” Not a question. A statement of desperation—and he felt exactly the way she did.
Moving himself down on the mattress, he took her face between his hands and kissed her as he rolled over on top of her. Their clothes seemed to melt away, any barriers that were between them evaporating until they were skin-to-skin. With every caress and each sigh, with all the arching and the soft moans, he was at once completely with her . . . and somewhere else.
All he could think of was that the two of them were going into the jaws of destiny, and there was no telling what was going to be left of either one of them when it was over. Because if he failed her again?
Insanity wasn’t going to be the half of it.
Positioning himself at her core, he pressed in slowly and oh, God, the sensation was so good that it shut even his spinning head down. Letting himself go with the rhythm of retreats and penetrations, he rode her with care, giving her all the time in the world to find her pleasure and go flying.
That he orgasmed eventually wasn’t the point, although he supposed it did bring them even closer together. But his release was secondary. This was all about her.
When he finally went limp, his head falling face-first into a pillow, his body so satiated he couldn’t muster the energy to prop himself up and ease free of her—in fact, he wanted to stay there forever. That wasn’t where they were at, though.
Forcing himself to shift to the side, he wasn’t surprised to find her crying.
But she did shock the shit out of him.
Reaching her hand up, she touched his face and whispered, “I want you to promise me something.”
“Name it.”
“Don’t blame yourself. If this doesn’t work, I don’t want you to think for one second you did anything wrong. Sometimes . . . sometimes people get dealt a bad hand and that’s just luck. There’s nothing you or I could do about anything of this.”
Not so sure of that, he thought. He was absolutely going to make Devina pay.
In ways even that demon couldn’t imagine.
“Promise me,” Sissy said.
He nodded his head once and lied. “I promise.”
She stared up at him as the sun rose ever further and the birds began to sing and life across this little part of the world got to its feet and stretched its arms, working its own after-sleep kinks out.
“I love you,” she said.
His heart stopped. Then began to thud. Except . . . “You don’t have to say it just because I—”
“No, I have to. Because I want you to know in case . . . you know, I lose my chance to. I love you, and thank you—thank you for everything you’ve done for me. I said it once and I’ll say it again. You are my angel.”
He dropped his head and kissed her—because he wanted to, but also because he didn’t want her to see what was in his expression and she was probably smart enough to recognize what the shit was.
“I love you, too,” he murmured against her mouth.
As, meanwhile, he raged inside.
“Can’t we just eat this cake? I mean, come on, Eddie.”
As Ad shoveled another huge piece of the chocolate with fake vanilla icing into his piehole—or Duncan Hines hole, as the case may be—he prayed that his buddy would just frickin’ drop the subject.
No luck. “I want to know.”
Ad took a long draw off the rim of his coffee. Eddie had made the java along with the dessert they were having for breakfast, and both were so fucking good—as was sitting across the table from the guy. It was almost like the separation had never occurred.
Almost.
“Ad? I need to know if you can fight in your condition.”
“I don’t think I’m compromised too much.” Ad put his mug down and resumed digging in. Was this his second piece? Or third? “Bit of a limp, that’s all.”
“And the eye.”
“Whatever.”
“Can I be honest?”
“Please don’t.”
Eddie’s chair creaked as he leaned back. “I’m really impressed by you.”
Ad’s brows popped and he lowered his fork. “I, ah . . .”
“Talk about unselfish.” Eddie nodded. “Respect, man. Big respect. And I gotta tell you, it’s not something I would have thought you’d do.”
“Your death changed the rules for me.”
“Yeah, I’m sorry about that.”
Ad frowned. “What are you saying?”
“I should have heard that harpy. I should have been paying more attention.”
“No, it’s my fault. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve replayed that whole thing. I let you down.” He put up his palm to stop the arguing. “No. I’m supposed to have your back, and I dropped the ball. Matter of fact, that’s the way it’s always been between you and me. I’ve dragged you into more dumb-ass shit and dangerous situations—”
“But it’s been fun. It’s been so fucking fun.”
Ad recoiled. “Okay . . . that’s not what I thought you’d say. Ever.”
Eddie finished his last bite and smiled. “Every straight arrow needs a little chaos in his life. You’re mine. We’ve had some crazy-ass adventures, and yeah, some of it was probably avoidable and very definitely dangerous, but without you? Boring. My immortal life would be very fucking boring.”
Ad ducked his eyes and smiled a little. “So this guilt I’ve been carrying around?”
“Lose it. I make my own choices, too. I could have ditched your ass centuries ago. But the truth is, I’d rather be crashing into some wall with you than going out for a Sunday stroll with anybody else.”
“You say the sweetest things.”
“Plus, let’s face it. With my colossal lack of game, I would never have gotten laid without you.”
Ad stiffened. “Yeah, about that. I’m . . . ah, I’m out of commission from now on.” As Eddie sucked in a little gasp, Ad shrugged. “But I can still get ’em for you. In fact, you say the word and I’ll go on the prowl. Hell, I can live vicariously through you.”
“Come on, it’s not like true love was in my picture anyway. Besides, there are only so many ways to pick up a penny, and I’ve done them all about a hundred and fifty thousand times at this point. Sooner or later, the shit was going to get old, and now I don’t ever have to worry about tenting up my pants over some hot piece. So there are advantages.”
There was a long silence.
Ad shifted around in his chair, making the thing creak. “Okaaaaay, it would be really great right now if you wouldn’t look at me like that. I still have all my arms and legs attached, you know. I’m fully functional, or sufficiently functional, in all other respects.”
“Of course.” Eddie cleared his throat. “Absolutely.”
Ah, hell, he could so have done without the awkwardness, but the guy was going to find out sooner or later. Might as well be now—
Jim and Sissy appeared in the doorway, the pair of them looking like they were on the way to a funeral. Clearly, the decision had been made.
“We’re ready to do this,” Jim said, putting his arm around the woman and moving her close—like maybe he wished his body were the one that was going to get metaphysically sliced open. “I guess we need a trip out for supplies.”
Eddie nodded. “Yeah, we do.”
And that was that, Ad thought as he got to his feet. They’d gotten the band back together . . . and now it was time to rock ’n’ roll, so to speak.
He just wished it wasn’t performing an exorcism. On Sissy.