Yeah, whatever. That was a no-go. John shoved himself free of the guy's hold and tried to land without cursing or throwing up. With his mouth making up all kinds of f**k-oriented words, he limped past Butch, who was looking much better, and V, who'd lit up a hand-rolled.
He knew right where Xhex was: behind him, with her hand at his back like she knew he was wobbly and might go down at any minute.
Not a chance, though. Sheer grit got him to the Hummer and in the backseat on his own. Of course, by the time Qhuinn hit the gas, he had a cold sweat all over him and couldn't feel his hands or his feet.
"We did a body count," he heard Xhex say.
When he looked over, she was staring across the seat at him. Man... she was f**king beautiful in the distilled light from the dash up front. Her lean face had a smudge of black lesser blood on it, but her cheeks had high color and her eyes had a special sparkle to them. She'd gotten off on tonight, he thought. She'd enjoyed it.
Fuck him. She really was the perfect female.
And how many did we take out? he signed, trying to distract his inner nancy.
"Twelve of the sixteen new recruits as well as both of the slayers who came across the field with the ferret. Unfortunately, that new Fore-lesser was nowhere to be found--so we have to assume the little bastard bolted as soon as we infiltrated and took a handful of inductees with him. Oh, and Butch inhaled all of those downed except two."
At least one of which you dealt with.
"Actually both were mine." Her eyes held his. "Did that bother you? Seeing me... go to work like that?"
Her tone suggested she assumed it did and that she didn't blame him for feeling yucked-out. Except she was wrong.
Beating back the pain he was in, John shook his head and signed with floppy hands. It's an incredible power you have. If I looked shocked... it's because I'd never seen one of your kind in action before.
Her face tightened ever so slightly and she glanced out the window.
Tapping her on her arm, he signed, That was a compliment.
"Yeah, sorry... just the 'your kind' always throws me. I'm half-and- half, therefore I'm neither. I have no kind." She batted away her words with her hand. "Whatever. While you were passed out, V hacked into the Caldwell PD database with his phone. The police didn't find any IDs at the scene either, so we have nothing to go on except for that addy from the Civic's license plate. I'll bet that..."
As she continued talking, he let her words wash over him.
He knew all about that "no kind" thing.
Just one more way they were compatible.
Closing his eyes, he sent up a prayer to anyone who was listening, asking please, for God's sake, stop sending him signals that they were right for each other. He'd read that book, seen the movie, bought the sound track, the DVD, the T-shirt, the mug, the bobble- head, and the insider's guide. He knew every reason they could have been lock and key.
But just as he was aware of all that aligned them, he was even clearer on how they were damned to be ever apart.
"Are you all right?"
Xhex's voice was soft and closer, and when he cracked his lids, she was practically in his lap. His eyes traced her face and her coiled, leather- bound body.
Pain and a sense that time was running out for them made him toss out his filter and say what was truly on his mind.
I want to be in you when we get back to the mansion, he signed. As soon as I get a bandage on this f**king leg of mine, I want in you.
The flare of her scent in his nostrils told him she was so on board with that plan.
So at least one thing, aside from his cock, was looking up.
Chapter Fifty-seven
Up on the second floor of Eliahu Rathboone's plantation house, Gregg Winn had to open the door to his and Holly's room with two fingers and a prayer that he didn't dump hot coffee down his leg. He'd filled the pair of mugs in his hands with brew he'd made himself at the "guest" pot on the sideboard in the dining room.
So God only knew what it tasted like.
"You need help?" Holly said as she looked up from the laptop.
"Nope." He kicked the door shut and headed for the bed. "I got it."
"You are so thoughtful."
"Wait till you try it... I had to jerry-rig yours," he said, giving the pale one to her. "They didn't have whole milk, which was what you had yesterday at breakfast. So I went to the kitchen and took half-and-half and some skim, mixed them together, and tried to get the color right." He nodded to the computer's screen. "What do you think of those scans?"
Holly stared down into the mug as she held it over the Dell's keyboard. She was stretched out on the bed, propped up against the headboard, analyzing the data he'd become obsessed with... looking sexy and smart.
And as if she didn't trust what he'd given her.
"Listen," he said, "just try the coffee--if it sucks, I'll wake up that proper butler."
"Oh, it's not that." She ducked her blond head and he heard her sip. The "ahhh" that followed was more than he could have hoped for. "Perfect."
Going around the edge of the bed, he settled in beside her on top of the duvet. As he took a drink from his own mug, he decided if his career in TV went tits-up, he might have a future at a Starbucks counter. "So... come on, tell me what you think of the footage."
He nodded at the screen and what it was showing: The night before, there had been a shot of something walking through the living room and going out the front door. Now, it could have been a guest up for a midnight snack, like Gregg had just been--except for the fact that it dematerialized right through the wooden panels. The thing just disappeared.
Kind of like the shadow outside her bedroom from the first night. Not that he liked thinking of it. Or that dream of hers.
"You haven't retouched this?" Holly said.
"Nope."
"God..."
"I know, right? And the network just e-mailed me while I was downstairs. They're so on fire, apparently the Internet's gone nuts over the promos already--all we have to do is pray that thing shows up a week from now when we go live. You sure your coffee's okay?"
"Oh, yes, it's... amazing." Holly glanced up over the rim of her mug. "You know, I've never seen you like this before."
Gregg leaned back against the pillows and couldn't help but agree. Hard to know what had changed; there had been a shift inside of him, however.
Holly took another sip. "You seem really different."
Unsure what he should say, he kept it about the work. "Well, I never actually thought ghosts existed."
"You didn't?"
"Nah. You know as well as I do all the fixes I've pulled. But here in this house... I'm telling you, something is here and I'm dying to get onto the third floor. I had this crazy dream about going up there...." As a sudden headache cut off his thoughts, he rubbed his temple and decided he had eyestrain from having been on a computer for the past seventy-two hours straight. "There's something up in that attic, I'm telling you."
"The butler said it was off-limits."
"Yeah." And he didn't want to buck the guy too much. They had so much good TV to roll out, it wasn't like they needed more--and no sense pushing it. Last thing he wanted was to run into trouble with the management this close to airdate.
And it was very clear Mr. Spit and Polish didn't like them.
"Here, let me show you again... this is what really amazes me." Gregg reached forward and restarted the file so he could watch that figure disappear through the solid door again. "That's pretty damn incredible, right? I mean... did you ever think you'd see something like that?"
"No. I didn't."
Something about the sound of her voice brought his head toward her. Holly was staring at him, not the screen, while cradling her mug right to her heart.
"What?" he said, checking to see if he'd spilled on his shirt.
"Actually... it's about the coffee."
"Bad aftertaste?"
"No, not at all..." She laughed a little and drank some more. "I just never would have guessed you'd remember what kind of coffee I like, much less go to the trouble of making it for me. And you've never asked me what I thought about work before."
Jesus... she was right.
She shrugged. "And I guess I'm not surprised that you never believed in what you were doing. I'm just glad you do now."
Unable to keep the eye contact going, Gregg looked out over their two pairs of socked feet, to the windows on the far side of the room. The moon was barely visible through the lace of the curtains, nothing but a soft glow on the dark horizon.