They saw it as strength.
Yeah, because feeling hurts. Maybe I should worship her, too, Rashel thought. She was finding too
many things in common with these girls.
"Lily the ice princess," another girl murmured. "It's like she's not even really from earth at all. It's like
she's from another planet."
"Hold that thought," a new voice said, a crisp, laughing, slightly insane voice. The effect it had on Rashel
was remarkable. It made her back stiffen and sent tingles up her palms. It closed her throat.
Okay, test number three, she thought, drawing on every ounce of discipline she'd learned in the martial
arts. Don't lose zanshin. Stay loose, stay frosty, and go with it. You can do this.
She turned to meet Quinn's eyes.
Chapter 10
Or not to meet them so much as graze past them, before concentrating on his chin. She didn't dare stare
directly into them for long.
"Maybe she is from another planet," Quinn was saying to the girl. "Maybe she's not human. Maybe I'm
not, either."
That's right, Rashel thought. Make fun of them by telling them a truth they won't believe.
But, she noticed, Quinn looked more as if he didn't care what they found out than as if he were mocking
them. "Maybe she's from another world. Did you ever think of that?"
Rashel was confused again. Quinn seemed to be trying to get himself killed. He appeared to be verging
on telling these girls about the Night World, and under the laws of the Night World, that was punishable
by death.
You're really slipping, Rashel thought. First the slave trade, now this. I thought you were supposed to be
such a stickler for the law.
"There are darker dimensions," Quinn was confiding to the group, "than you have ever imagined. But,
you see, it's all part of life's grand design, so it's all right. Did you know"-he put his arm around a girl's
shoulders, gesturing outward as if inviting her to look at some horizon-"that there's a certain kind of wasp
that lays its eggs in the body of a caterpillar? A live caterpillar. And it stays alive, you see, while the eggs
hatch and the little waspettes eat it from the inside out. Now, who do you think invented that?"
Rashel wondered if vampires could get drunk.
"That would probably be the most horrible way to die," Daphne chimed in, her musical voice ghoulish.
"Being eaten by insects. Or maybe being burned."
"It would probably depend on how fast you burned," Quinn said meditatively. "A flash of fire-high
enough temperature-you bum the nerves out in the first few seconds. Slow baking would be different."
"I'm writing a poem about fire," Rashel said. She was surprised to find that she was annoyed because
Quinn didn't really seem to have noticed her. On second thought, she should be annoyed; her plan
depended on him not only noticing but choosing her.
She was going to have to capture his attention.
"Do you have it with you?" Daphne was asking helpfully.
"No, but I can tell you the beginning," Rashel said. She braced herself to look at Quinn as she
recited:
"There's warmth in ice; there's cooling peace in fire,
And midnight light to show us all the way. The dancing flame becomes a funeral pyre; The Dark was
more enticing than the Day."
Quinn blinked. Then he smiled, and he looked Rashel over, dearly taking notice of the velvet jumpsuit
and ending with her face. He looked everywhere... except into her eyes.
"That's right; you've got it," he said with that same brittle exhilaration. "And there's plenty of dark out
there for everyone."
Rashel's worry that he might look too deep if he met her gaze was groundless. Quinn didn't seem to be
really seeing anybody here.
"There is plenty of darkness," Rashel said. She moved toward him, feeling strangely brave. Her instincts
sensed a weakness in him, a flaw. "It's everywhere. It's inescapable. So the only thing we can do is
embrace it." She was standing right in front of him now, looking at his mouth. "If we hold it dose, it won't
hurt so much."
"Well. Exactly." Quinn showed his teeth, but it wasn't the manic smile. It was a grimace. He didn't look
happy anymore; suddenly, for just an instant, he looked tired and sick. He was almost leaning away from
Rashel.
"I came here so I could do that," Rashel said in a sultry voice. She was scaring herself a little. In the
name of the charade, she was doing everything she could to seduce him-but it was surprisingly easy and
surprisingly enjoyable. There was a sort of tingling all over her body, as if the jumpsuit had picked up a
charge.
"I came to look for the darkness," she said. Softly.
Quinn laughed abruptly. The feverish good humor came flooding back. "And you found it," he said. He
went on laughing and laughing, and he reached out to touch Rashel's cheek.
Don't let him touch you!
The thought flashed through Rashel's mind and communicated to her muscles in an instant. Without
knowing how she knew, she was certain that if he touched her, it would all be over. It was skin-to-skin
contact that had nearly fried every circuit in her brain before.
She danced back from his fingertips and smiled teasingly, while her heart tried to pound its way out of
her chest.
"This place is so crowded," she said throatily.
"Huh? Oh. Then why don't we schedule something more private? I could pick you up tomorrow night.
Say seven o'clock in the parking lot."