“What are you talking about?”
“Forget it. You need to feed again.” He offered his wrist.
Pain ramped up her nausea. “I can’t. Not yet.”
He shrugged. “You’re on your way to making a full recovery, regenerating all on your own.” He hesitated, then said, “You should’ve told me you didn’t know Nïx.”
She couldn’t read his expression. “Would it have mattered?”
“It would have, yes. What did she mean when she called you rare?”
“I have no idea,” Jo murmured. “Did you bandage me?”
“I did. And I finally got you to drink over the last two days.”
She’d fed, and didn’t even remember? Wait . . . “Two days?” She needed to get back to Thad—he was still in that woman’s power! “I’ve been gone that long?” She sat up, and the room spun. All the pain in her body grew sharper. In response, her mind went foggier. She collapsed back.
“You had a cracked skull, among other things. It’s too soon for you to rise.”
“Oh.” Recovering from bullets to the face had been easy compared to this.
“I’m going to have a hell of a time assassinating an oracle now that she’ll be clocking my every move. And she made it sound like she’d already been watching yours.”
“I guess.” Jo’s cloudy brain couldn’t recall the things Nïx said, only the ass-kicking she’d delivered.
He reached for Jo’s hand, smoothing the edge of a linen bandage. Without looking up, he said, “The male you two were fighting over. Thaddeus. You thought I was aiming at him that night.”
She nodded, then grimaced at the deep pop in her neck. Waves of dizziness washed over her. The urge to throw up grew.
“You attacked me with all your might to protect him. You must really care for him.”
Confusion. “Of course I do.”
Rune shot to his feet, starting to pace. “Who is he? What is he?”
She tried to follow his movements, but the effort was grueling. What is Thad? She didn’t know. Was he like Jo?
Thad was good. “He’s the best man I know.” Her voice sounded more and more distant.
“In our wager, you were able to resist me because you wanted to get back to him.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Won’t tell me his species? Then what is he to you?”
Everything. “I’d die for him.” Her words were slurring.
Black forked out over Rune’s eyes. “You love him?”
“Whaa?” Silly question. “More than anything.”
Rune sank down on the side of the bed again. Just as abruptly, he rose. He dipped his hand into his pocket, rolling something there over and over. The trinket? “You love him so much you drank from me? Then you gave me your body for a night? How would he feel to know you can’t get enough of my forbidden blood?”
What did that have to do with anything? “You wouldn’t understand.”
As she slipped back into sleep, he muttered, “I understand the demon in me demands his due. I’m off to service a harem of nymphs.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
Rune’s head pounded, his ears ringing.
Josephine had used him, sighing his name and coming on his tongue. She’d given him his first real kiss. But her reactions had been feigned so she could return to the one she loved.
Loved. She’d given her heart away. Lore females didn’t do that lightly. And I’d actually been worried about her getting attached to me?
The night she’d fouled his shot, she’d been dressed like a man-eater—because she’d known she was going to see Thad. The body Rune had lost himself in belonged to someone else.
He pinched his temples. He’d planned to go to the tree nymphs’ covey, but couldn’t quite bring himself to leave. His headache worsened, and an unfamiliar, churning aggression filled him. Damn it, that night with her had meant something to him.
Shared breaths, discovery, barriers broken. It’d been different; it’d been more. How much had been real for her?
He did the using. Artifice was his specialty. He gritted his fangs, pacing the room. He craved angry sex, a good hate fuck. He wanted to hurt Josephine. Needed to.
He could return to New Orleans and take down her male. From his ever-present quiver, Rune pulled a gray arrow. The eraser, they called it. A shot to the chest with this one, and there’d be too many pieces to find.
The demon in him whispered, Do it. Then piss on his grave marker.
The fey in him said, She’s too young to know what love is. She’s too young for you! Just think about this and calm yourself.
She might have a man, but Rune would keep her from him. He couldn’t allow a security risk like her to be freed—