“You can. You just choose not to see the evils that men do.”
“I don’t think choice has anything to do with it.”
“Of course, it does. You’re the reaper. You can see all things like that. You can even send them there yourself should you choose. You’ve done it before.”
“Yeah, but when I marked those men, I was in a state of heightened arousal.”
“Were you?”
“Well, not like in an aroused way. It’s just, adrenaline was dropping by the bucketsful into my nervous system. I didn’t think about it. I just marked them.”
“Ah.”
“Osh said I can unmark Uncle Bob.”
“You can.”
“That’s great. As long as he stays alive long enough for me to figure out how, we’ll be good. And what are our plans for today?”
The wicked grin that slid across his mouth made me rethink any protests I might have for missing half a day of work. Had I known what he really had in store, I would have begged off, anyway.
* * *
“You want me to put what where?”
Reyes didn’t take me to bed as I’d thought-slash-hoped. But he did take me to the next best thing: a coffee shop. Nothing screamed “I love you” like taking your blushing bride to a coffee shop. Or an ice cream parlor. Or a tractor pull, but only on special occasions.
He leaned closer, the tiny table we’d taken in a darkish corner suddenly way too big. His deep brown irises shimmered, his five-o’clock shadow, the one making an early appearance, framed his sculpted mouth to bittersweet perfection.
Then he repeated what he’d said, and the spell was broken. “I want you to put your hand through my heart.”
Oh, yeah. He’d left the station, headed for Crazyville. “Your heart. Okay, I know you’re a god and all, but won’t that kill you?”
“Most likely. It’s a lesson in control. Here, I’ll show you.”
I jumped back when he reached over the table. I trusted him with my life and my heart, but when both were in jeopardy at the same time?
Then again, he’d been doing the whole dematerialization thing much longer than I had.
“So, you’re giving me a lesson?”
“If you hold still, I will.”
I glanced around. “Should you stick your hand into my chest in a public place? Blatant murder seems more of a dark-alley kind of activity.”
“I’m willing to chance it.”
“Fine.” I took in a deep breath and clenched my hands on the table. “I’m ready. Rip out my heart.”
He laughed and took one hand. Capturing my gaze with his, he turned my hand over and leaned closer, brushing his full lips across my palm.
I felt the soft prickle of his stubble. The smoothness of his lips. The hotness of his tongue.
He had me so focused on what he was doing to my hand, it took me a moment to realize he’d put his other hand on my chest. Let it melt. Let it sink into me.
I gasped. He didn’t just pass through me like a departed would when crossing. He let his molecules separate inside me. Let his heat spill into me like warm honey. First causing a rush in my chest. Then lower. And higher. Everywhere at once.
It moved to the back of my neck, behind my ears, over my lips. At the same time, it dipped into my stomach and then my abdomen and then to the flesh between my legs.
His molecules pooled and swirled until I wrenched my hands free and gripped the table. Dug my fingernails into it. Begged for the storm to come closer. That whirlwind of pleasure. That burst of ecstasy.
I felt his arm wrap around my neck. His mouth claim mine. His tongue brush against my teeth before plunging inside. Hungry. Possessive.
But the pièce de résistance was the energy building inside my core. Like lava bubbling and boiling and ready to explode. I tried not to moan. To cry out as the energy amassed, the pressure nuclear. I failed. Which would explain the hand suddenly clamped over my mouth. The gentle shushing at my ear.
But Reyes took his time. While I almost screamed for release, he kept his strokes, his radiating heat, slow and feather light. Teasing and taunting. Coaxing me closer. Daring me to come.
Unable to sit still, I parted my legs and squirmed against the infusion of energy. I whimpered as he stimulated me from the inside out. As my center contracted and convulsed. As the friction he injected directly into my core caused tiny delightful spasms to quake through me. Until the white-hot orgasm that had started so far away rushed forward at light speed. Slammed into me. Burst inside me, dumping waves of heavenly pleasure until the wetness in my panties grew to urgent levels.
He’d clamped onto me, and when I was finally able to think straight, I realized he was beside me, holding me tight as I seized underneath his expert touch.
But then he removed his hand and grabbed the padded seat at my back. I wrapped my arms around him, partly to steady him and partly to anchor me to Earth as an orgasm rocketed through him as well. It shuddered out of him in splendid, sparkling waves that almost had me coming a second time.
When his climax receded, we sat panting for a long while.
Then I remembered where we were. My eyes flew open, but I soon realized we looked simply like a couple making out in public, which I always thought was a little brash, but holy fuck. I was more than willing to put aside the Charley Davidson Book of Etiquette and Mud Wrestling if it resulted in earth-shattering orgasms.
“Fuck,” Reyes said, laying his head against my shoulder. “That wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“Which part?” I would’ve been heartily disappointed if he hadn’t wanted me to come. Not with the fact that I came, because hell, yes. But with the part where he didn’t want me to reach my maximum potential in any situation.
Still, the boy was talented. I was pretty sure he did that on purpose.
“I didn’t mean to … that was supposed to be just for you.”
“While I do appreciate the thought, I’m glad you joined me. Sex is always better with friends.”
He flashed a set of dimples and leaned up.
When I focused on him, his face inches from mine, his mouth curved most sensually, I said, “That was the best lesson ever. You should teach professionally.”
“I think that’s illegal.”
“True.”
He cleared his throat and returned to his own seat.
I sat up. Took a sip of coffee. Fought to regain my bearings.
He took a gulp of his, finishing it off, then said, “I would say it was your turn, but I’m going to have to change before we go any further.”
“Made a mess?” I asked.
He nodded.
I reached across and caressed his crotch. Felt the warmth. Moistened my panties even more.
“Yeah, I should probably change, too.”
14
Bat-shit crazy really brings out the color in my eyes.
—T-SHIRT
An hour later, we were sitting at our kitchen table, the small one that was actually in the kitchen. Not the ginormous one that seated more friends than I had.
I’d texted Amber and got the A-okay on the current sitch, except that all her friends were falling in love with her “cousin.” She didn’t know exactly what Osh was, but she did know he was a supernatural being. And that it was getting annoying. Girls who had never spoken to her were suddenly her best friends.
I looked at Reyes. Amazing how that worked.
I’d also checked on Cookie, but she did not want to be disturbed. Apparently she was onto something insane on the Fosters. Any time Cookie got that excited, I got that excited. And curious.
“Okay,” Reyes said, pulling me out of my musings and sidling up to me. “Hand through heart.”
“Um, no?”
“Dutch,” he said, trying not to grin. “How better to learn to control this than to give you dire consequences if you fail?”
Male logic at its finest, ladies and gentlemen.
“Just try it.”
“Reyes, no. I’m not risking your life so that I can control where I end up in the universe when I accidently dematerialize in a fit of rage.”
“Exactly. In the universe. What if you dematerialize on the dark side of the moon?”
“The album?”
“The round rock in the sky.”
“Oh, yeah. That glowy thing. Still not doing it.”
“Dutch, you won’t kill me. We’re gods, remember?”
“That’s something else I want to talk to you about. How does that work exactly? I mean, what if I’m thrown into a wood chipper?”
“Later. Hand through heart.”
I let out an annoyed breath and turned toward him. “This is so weird.”
“Just concentrate.”
“What if I materialize while I’m still in your chest?”
“You won’t. That would actually take more concentration than what you’ll be doing.”
I put my hand on his chest. “In what way?”
“That would be purposely taking someone’s life.”
“I thought you said—”
“Not my life. Just in general. You can only do that if that is your strongest desire. If you really and truly want to kill someone. Otherwise, you can’t materialize inside me. It’s like a built-in safety switch.”
“How do you know all this?”
“It took me a while to figure it out.”
I drew back my hand and straightened again. “You figured out how to kill someone using this ability?”
He lowered his head. “I did.”