The Darkest Whisper (Lords of the Underworld #4)(22)
Author: Gena Showalter

“Oh, come on! At least wait until tomorrow. Not like they’re going anywhere. I just need a little me time to recover. Like Cameo, I’ll be ready to go bright and early. Swear to the gods.”

Paris sighed. “Fine. Go.” Were Cameo and Strider a couple, then? “What about you, Amun?”

Amun nodded his assent, but the action tossed his equilibrium into the shitter and he collapsed on the bottom step of the porch with a moan.

Barely a second later, Strider was at his side and wrapping an arm around his waist. “Uncle Stridey is here, don’t you worry.” He hefted the usually stoic warrior to his feet. Would have carried him if it had been necessary, but with Strider as a crutch Amun was able to throw one foot in front of the other, only stumbling occasionally.

“I’ll help with the Hunters,” Aeron said, stepping up to Paris. The offer surprised the hell out of him, truth be told.

“What about Legion? Girl probably misses you.”

Aeron shook his head. His hair was cropped to his scalp and that scalp glistened in the sunlight. “She’d be on my shoulders right now if she were here.”

“Sorry.” No one knew better than Paris how it felt to miss a female. Though he had to admit he’d been surprised to discover the wiry little demon was a female.

“It’s for the best.” A veined hand scrubbed Aeron’s tired face. “Something’s been…watching me. A presence. Powerful. Started about a week before we left for Cairo.”

Paris’s stomach tightened in dread. “First, you have a nasty habit of keeping that kind of information to yourself. You should have told us the first time you noticed it, just as you should have told us what happened with the Titans the moment you returned from your heavenly summons all those months ago. Whoever’s watching you could have alerted the Hunters about our trip. We could have—”

“You’re right, and I’m sorry. But I don’t think it, whatever it is, works for the Hunters.”

“Why?” Paris demanded, unwilling to let it go.

“I know the feel of those hateful, judging eyes on me and this isn’t like that. This one is…curious.”

He relaxed somewhat. “Maybe it’s a god.”

“I don’t think so. Legion isn’t afraid of the gods but she’s damn afraid of whoever this is. That’s one of the reasons she’s so amenable to going to hell for Sabin’s recon work. She told me she’d return when the presence was gone.”

There was worry in the guy’s tone. Worry Paris didn’t understand. Legion might have been a tiny demon with a penchant for tiaras—which they’d discovered not long ago, when she’d stolen one of Anya’s and paraded around the fortress in it, proud as could be—but she could take care of herself.

Paris turned in a circle, intent. “Is your shadow here? Now?” Like they needed another enemy. “Maybe I can seduce whoever, whatever, it is away from you.” And kill it. No telling what it had learned already.

A single shake of Aeron’s head. “I honestly don’t think it means us harm.”

He paused, slowly released a pent-up breath. “All right, then. We’ll deal with that later. Just let me know when it returns. Right now, we’ll take care of the dungeon full of shitheads.”

“You sound more human every day, you know that?” Aeron had said that before, but for once, he didn’t sound disapproving. There was a whistle as he unsheathed a machete from the loop at his back. “Maybe the Hunters will resist.”

“Only if we’re lucky.”

TORIN, KEEPER OF DISEASE, sat at his desk, but he faced the door of his bedroom rather than the monitors that linked him to the outside world. He’d watched the SUVs pull into the driveway and had instantly grown hard. He’d watched the warriors emerge and had had to palm himself to assuage the sudden ache. Watched as one by one they’d entered the fortress. Any moment and—

Cameo slipped quietly inside his chamber and shut the entrance with a soft snick. She flipped the lock, and for several ticks of the clock, kept her back to him. Long dark hair tumbled to her waist, curling at the ends.Once, she’d allowed him to twirl a few of those ends around his gloveless finger, careful, so careful not to touch her skin. It had been his first true contact with a woman in hundreds of years. He’d almost come, just from the feel of those silky strands. But that small touch was all she’d permitted, all she could ever permit and all he could ever risk.

Actually, he was surprised they’d risked even that much. With his gloves on, sure. The chance of infecting her was nil. But tendrils against skin, silk against warmth, female against male? That required bravery and trust on her part and desperation and foolishness on his. Hair wasn’t skin, but what if he’d slipped? What if she’d fallen against him? For some reason, neither of them had been able to make the consequences matter.

Last time he’d touched a woman, an entire village had been wiped out. Black Plague, they’d called it. That’s what was inside him, swirling in his veins, laughing in his mind. For years afterward, Torin had scrubbed his skin until the black blood poured from him. Cleansing himself of the virus proved impossible, however.

Over the ensuing centuries, he’d learned to suppress the constant feeling of being dirty, tainted, hiding it with smiles and wry humor, but never had he suppressed the longing for what he couldn’t have: companionship. Cameo, at least, understood him, knew what he was dealing with, what he could and could not do, and didn’t ask for more.

He wished she would ask for more, and he hated himself for it.

Slowly she turned to him. Her lips were red and wet, as if she’d been chewing them, and her cheeks were flushed to a dusty rose. Up and down her chest lifted and fell in quick, shallow pants. His own breath blistered his throat.

“We’re back,” she said on a wispy catch of breath.

He remained seated, arching a brow as if he hadn’t a care. “You’re unharmed?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Take off your clothes.”

Since the caressing of her hair those few months ago, they’d become best friends. With benefits. Pleasuring-themselves-at-a-distance-while-watching-the-other-do-the-same benefits, but benefits all the same. It complicated the hell out of everything. The here and now…the future. One day she’d want a lover who could truly touch her, make love to her, pound in and out of her, kiss her and taste her and wrap himself around her, and Torin would have to step aside and not kill the bastard.