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  Heath made the introductions and the woman offered her hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Rihana. I understand you work with the police to solve murders.”

  “I’m an NYPD psychic.” For once, Rihana didn’t feel self-conscious to admit that. Ever since she’d signed on with the department, along with a score of other gifted individuals, she’d battled the prejudices that still existed against people like her. Color had long since ceased to be an issue. Now it was what was on the inside that set her apart from her colleagues, the unusual structure of her mind as opposed to the shade of her skin tone. The more things changed, as the saying went, the more they stayed the same.

  “I imagine your job is difficult at the best of times,” Makena said. The sentiment surprised Rihana. Most people figured her work would be exciting and she’d learned not to tell the truth about it and shatter their illusions.

  She nodded. “You must work for the city.” She let out a faint laugh and the woman smiled. Darq gazed at his…girlfriend? wife? adoringly.

  “No, but I know what it’s like to do a job that’s a lot harder than it looks. I work in public relations for a plastics manufacturer. Why don’t you come sit down with me? Heath told us why you’re here.”

  The confession startled Rihana. She glanced at Heath. He hadn’t called his partner while they were in the car, so unless he’d planned this whole meeting previously, it didn’t make sense that Makena would know exactly why they’d come.

  “It’s a little like telepathy between them. It works over short distances. Heath contacted Darq while the two of you were in the parking garage.”

  Rihana’s gaze bounced between the two men, who both managed to look sheepish at being tattled on. “Oh…another psychic link?”

  Heath nodded. “Yes. Forged when we were children. I can contact him if he’s within a few miles of me…though he doesn’t always listen to what I say.”

  “Hmm. Distance has no bearing on that. I rarely listen to what you say.” Darq’s tone held a hint of amusement.

  Heath’s faint smile in response faded quickly enough. “We need to talk as well.”

  “I’ll take Rihana into the other room.” Makena gestured for Rihana to follow her and she obeyed reluctantly. She would have liked to listen in on Heath’s conversation with his partner. She’d probably learn a lot more about the case that way, but she weighed that against what she might learn from Makena.

  “Would you like something to drink?”

  “No. I’m fine. Your place is beautiful.” She suppressed a sigh as they settled into an overstuffed cream-colored couch in the next room. The wood accents seemed to be teak, and shades of deep salmon complemented the décor like treasures, peeking out from piles of throw pillows or hidden in the impressionist artwork on the walls. “You have quite an eye.”

  “Thank you.”

  Rihana expected more small talk, but instead Makena fell silent. She gave Rihana an appraising look. “Heath wants to give you a guardian.”

  “Yes. Apparently you know more about it than I do.”

  “He relayed his request to Darq. He wants me to explain it to you.”

  “I don’t understand what a tattoo will do for me.” She didn’t feel like mentioning those she already possessed. She’d never questioned Gramma Essie’s insistence that the symbols etched on her skin would protect her. Why should this be any different?

  “On Verakos, where Darq and Heath are from, there are people who have the ability to create…living creatures out of images. Children especially are bonded to these animals through the images and the animals act like totems. It’s similar to our Native American myths in some respects.”

  “Myths won’t protect me from a killer.”

  “No, but a guardian beast will…well, it may. I don’t think we’re dealing in absolutes here. The man who killed that reporter…used a poisonous image to do it. It’s like a guardian, only without a specific form and purpose. It’s just a tainted mass that he injected into her body. A guardian could have prevented that from happening.”

  “Is that the only way this…Gemii can kill?”

  Makena’s lips flattened and her hazel eyes seemed to darken. She looked down at her hands. “I don’t know. From what Darq tells me about the Gemii as a whole, they don’t have any particular set of rules. I don’t think this person is above doing whatever he has to in order to carry out his assignment.”

  “And that’s to kill Heath and Darq and make sure they don’t have any children running around who could take over back on Verakos?”

  “Exactly. Heath could explain all the history of their world to you better than I can, but essentially, Verakos was ruled by an extended royal family, several bloodlines merged together. They produced large numbers of children and reared them in a crèche, so they would always consider themselves a family. Darq and Heath had different fathers and mothers but they were reared as brothers and sent away together for their own protection when they were young boys, when the Gemii decided to overthrow the royal family and began killing the members of their crèche. They’ve been running for a long time, trying to preserve what little is left of the royal bloodlines.”

  “And the Gemii have finally found them.”

  Makena nodded again. She glanced at the doorway and Rihana sensed the woman’s concern for the man she obviously loved.

  “Heath said he wanted you all to leave…to go to some other planet to escape the assassin.”

  “Darq refuses to leave. He’s tired of running.”

  “Isn’t he afraid for you? If this Gemii is killing anyone who might possibly have conceived a child with Heath or Darq…” She let the question hang. Clearly, she didn’t need to ask if Makena and Darq were intimate. Even if Heath hadn’t used the word “mate” when discussing them, their relationship would have been obvious just by the way they looked at each other, the way Darq had slid his arm possessively around Makena’s waist, the way their hips touched when they stood next to each other.

  Makena’s exasperated sigh spoke of her affection for Heath’s partner. “Darq would rather fight than run. He won’t let anything happen to me.”

  Rihana wondered if it was true conviction or just blind naivety behind Makena’s words. There was no way she could imagine herself mustering either emotion for herself. She would never believe Heath could protect her from a cold-blooded killer and she would never trust anyone enough to put her life in their hands, no matter how skilled. “You have one of these guardians yourself?”

  “Yes.” Makena smiled. “When we first met, Darq gave me a temporary one. She watched over me, but eventually she faded. Now I have a permanent guardian. Would you like to see?”

  Temporary? That might work. She could agree to something painless to appease Heath’s protective nature and not have to undergo another branding. She nodded without fully realizing what she’d agreed to and sat somewhat dumbfounded when the beautiful woman before her pulled off her blouse.

  Makena stripped to the waist without a hint of self-consciousness and twisted her upper body away from Rihana. The movement revealed an image that stretched from her lower rib cage across her back. Scales of silvery lavender coalesced there to form something that looked to be half dragon and half snake. Its head rested on her shoulder, much like the hand of God rested on Rihana’s. The body of the beast curled around her as if it might be riding on her back. The creature’s sparkling sapphire eye seemed to stare at Rihana with benign curiosity.

  “Oh…my.” Shock at having a woman she’d just met disrobe before her coupled with awe at the stunning clarity of the image. The creature seemed almost three-dimensional. Its hide sparkled and shifted as if it were moving and breathing. The urge to touch it was overwhelming and Rihana feared it might actually be a desire to feel the woman’s soft skin and exceptional curves under her hand rather than the rough texture of the reptilian guardian.

  “She’s bonded to me, but she goes away sometimes…to be with Darq’s guardian.”

  Rihana ra
ised a brow, her temporary trance broken. Makena retrieved her blouse and slipped it over her head. The movement caused the muscles under her pale skin to ripple and the dragon creature to stretch languidly. The idea of a living image on her skin made her shiver. If this talk was supposed to ease her anxiety about being tattooed, it had failed. She didn’t want a dragon living on her body, all sharp claws and teeth wrapped around her naked flesh.

  “Don’t you…do you feel…”

  “It’s not painful. It’s actually amazing. I don’t know how I lived before I was bonded. I must have been a lot more lonely then than I realized. Of course, I’m not sure how I managed to survive before I met Darq either. He changed my life.”

  For some reason, that put Rihana slightly more at ease. Makena’s devotion to the man who was her “mate” seemed more natural than this guardian beast business. She understood loving someone enough to do anything they asked. It was that emotion that had kept her from ever disobeying her grandmother—the one person in her life who had always looked out for her and would have done anything, no matter how painful, in order to protect her.

  “Darq must be very special for you to trust him so much.” She hoped Makena wasn’t offended by the implication that she might not ever trust anyone that much herself.

  “He is. He’s my world and I know I’m safe with him.” Makena rose and straightened her blouse. She headed back out of the room the way she’d come and Rihana followed, strangely eager to be reunited with Heath.

  “How long have you been together?” she asked as she passed a small framed photograph of Makena and Darq together. It looked like it had been taken recently.

  The woman’s skirt swished as she turned slightly to toss her casual response over her shoulder. “We met eight days ago.”

  Chapter Eight

  Any small hope that Rihana would agree to a guardian tattoo had evaporated completely by the time they returned to Heath’s car. She’d been charming and polite to Darq and Makena, graciously accepting an invitation to share a small meal with them before leaving. They’d ridden the elevator down to the parking garage in pregnant silence. Only once she’d closed the passenger door, sealing them in a quiet bubble of Corinthian leather, did she erupt.

  “Eight days? They’ve known each other a week? You had me thinking they were married.”

  “By Verakos tradition, they are. The length of time they’ve known each other isn’t important. They have a connection.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest and tossed her head. “Where I come from that’s called control. It’s having a power over someone and it’s not normal.”

  “So you don’t believe in love at first sight?” He allowed himself a glance at her as he maneuvered the car out of the dank parking level and back into traffic. He didn’t ask her permission, merely headed instinctively toward the apartment that was his alone now, since Darq had begun spending all his free time at Makena’s.

  She raised her chin, a sure sign that some internal battle was taking place. “No, I don’t. Those kinds of relationships are all about lust. The connection isn’t real, it’s just sex.” The thready tone of her voice told him she didn’t really believe that. He didn’t need a psychic link to figure out the idea of a fairy-tale romance appealed to her. She rebelled because she didn’t think she could ever achieve that and probably because of the pragmatic influence of her grandmother as well. Heath imagined a woman who put all her faith in the supernatural and very little in the normal instincts that governed human behavior, such as the desire for physical intimacy.

  “Sex can help form a bond like that. I won’t deny it’s a chemical reaction as well as a psychological one, but it’s just as strong and real.”

  “Trust doesn’t just happen over night. I’m sorry. I don’t believe that.”

  “Back at your apartment you said you trusted me.”

  “I meant I believed you. I believe that you believe what you’re telling me. I’m still not sure I trust that it’s actually all true.”

  That stung a bit, but he did understand where she was coming from. “What about Makena’s tattoo? You saw it. It’s not a run-of-the-mill image, is it?”

  “No. It seemed to breathe. Back at my place when we were…busy…I thought the snakes on your arms were gone. I swore I didn’t see them, but when I looked again after, they were back.”

  “They were protecting us.”

  “Right.” She didn’t believe that at all. He sensed by the darkening of her aura that she probably would rather assume she’d imagined it than believe her eyes had not been playing tricks on her. For someone who had the ability to see into the minds of others, she certainly was a skeptic.

  “I can give you a demonstration if you like.”

  “That’s all right.”

  “If you don’t believe the guardian beasts are alive, then what about Makena’s explanation of the way Tanesha died? Do you believe that a protective tattoo can counteract the poison used by the assassin?”

  Rihana shrugged. “I don’t know what to believe. I only know I don’t feel like going back to my place. I feel like he was there and I think he’ll come back.”

  Heath nodded. That was one point in his favor and he would take what he could get. At least at his place, Rihana would be safe, tattoo or not. He didn’t ask her where she wanted to go, just drove to his building and parked. They sat for a moment in the car, listening to the echoes of sounds in the parking garage.

  “Makena said she had a temporary tattoo first,” she said finally. “What about that?”

  Heath sighed. He’d hoped Makena wouldn’t mention that. Darq had drawn a surface image on her skin only because she hadn’t decided on a permanent image when she came into SkIntense as a client. The small guardian Darq had given her was meant only as a watcher, to help him connect with the woman who had awakened such strong emotions in him. A temporary image would not protect Rihana from the Gemii indefinitely, but at the very least it might make her more receptive to the idea of a permanent image. “We could start that way. Come up with me and we’ll talk about it.”

  She finally turned her suspicious gaze on him and there was just the faintest hint of mischief in her eyes. “Just talk?”

  “If that’s all you want to do, fine. We’ll do nothing but talk. Once I get you naked, of course.”

  * * * * *

  Rihana tried to ignore the tingle of anticipation that raced down her spine at Heath’s suggestive words. She’d struggled all afternoon to put their erotic interlude out of her mind and at every turn she’d been reminded of her indiscretion. Now here she was, alone with the man her colleagues would call “the suspect”, riding another elevator with him to another luxury apartment where God knows what would happen between them.

  She should have left, but she’d fallen under his spell as completely, it seemed, as the lovely Makena Brady had fallen under the spell of Darq Stone. Every time Rihana allowed her gaze to wander to Heath, her belly clenched, and the temperature ratcheted up a degree or two. Her pussy ached each time her mind brought up images of their fevered coupling. Already tension crawled along her nerves, drawing her shoulders up tight and prickling her skin. She wouldn’t be able to relax until she came.

  By the time they reached his apartment on the eighth floor, she was sweating under her jacket and her panties were damp. She didn’t like the feeling. It shamed her to realize how strong an effect he had on her and that she had no control over her body’s reactions. Her nipples were so tightly contracted they hurt. Her limbs felt heavy, and butterflies beat their wings against the walls of her stomach.

  She wondered if he were partially responsible for the tide of lust that threatened to drown her. Was she only reacting to his thoughts and feelings, at the mercy of the psychic link he insisted she’d initiated?

  The look he turned on her once he’d closed the front door behind her told her that might be true. His own thoughts were influencing hers. How could she fight that? Weren’t her own tattoos supposed to p
rotect her from the spirits of others?

  “Welcome to my home,” he said and showed her in through a narrow entry hall. The décor here was more traditional than at Makena’s place. Heath’s apartment sported intricate crown moldings and brocade upholstery. The furniture was massive and mostly carved of dark, highly polished wood. The walls were ecru, the carpeting uniform gray, soft pile and freshly vacuumed, judging by the lack of footprints.

  With the flip of a wall switch, he flooded the place with a current of classical music. “Come with me into the bedroom. I have some equipment in there.”

  “Convenient place to keep it.”

  He grinned. “Yes, it is.”

  She didn’t want to follow because she knew what would happen. In no time at all she’d be naked and ravenous, probably sucking him off again or on her knees for some other reason. Her feet refused to indulge her reluctance and she shuffled after him.

  The bedroom was just dark enough to be sultry. The California king-sized bed bore sheets of gunmetal satin that made it look like a block of iron sitting in the middle of the room. He adjusted the lighting to give the place a warm glow from overhead spotlights set around the perimeter of the ceiling. Behind the bed was a mirror and at its foot, a black leather bench. Her missing scarf lay across the end of the mattress.

  She blushed. “I accidentally left that at your shop.”

  “It was no accident.”

  She resented the implication. She’d been in such a hurry to escape after he’d brought her to a shuddering orgasm that she’d barely had both her shoes on when she stumbled out the back door. Acute embarrassment made her shiver.

  She jumped at the feel of his fingers on her shoulders, but she managed to keep herself calm while he slid her jacket off.

  He placed the garment on a high-backed chair in the corner of the room and returned to walk around her in a circle. “You stand like you have a stick up your ass.”

  She burst into surprised laughter. She’d expected sexual innuendo, or even an open invitation to fuck. “I knew you were charming, but wow. Way to knock a girl’s socks off.”