Eye of the Tempest (7 page)

Before following Nell and Trill, I moved over to Anyan’s side, peering up at him speculatively. I wasn’t so slow that I didn’t realize there was something happening between us, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t opposed to reassurance. After all, the last thing I remembered was that Anyan and I had been just a possibility. And while Anyan had had a month to think past those stumbling first steps—and leap all the way to bone-jumping, the ambitious sod—I was still lurking in a corner of square one.

The barghest, as if sensing my insecurities, reached out to cradle my jaw in his warm, dry palm. His skin was rough against my soft cheek, but that just turned me on even more.

“You have no idea how happy I am to see you upright,” Anyan’s low voice growled. Then he leaned in to kiss my forehead, before moving his lips to my ear. What he whispered next made my poor, overtaxed libido nearly faint: “But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to want you flat on your back again as soon as possible.”

His teeth nipped my ear and I whimpered, a million Anyan-related fantasies suddenly swarming through my brain like overstimulated honey bees. When I didn’t budge, my gaze turning inward to enjoy my own naughty thoughts, he chuckled before putting his hand on the nape of my neck to steer my dreamy ass away from the front door.

As we neared our friends, they turned away from Tracy to see us. When their eyes lit upon me, I felt my own prickle with tears at the joy on everyone’s face.

As usual, Grizzie broke the silence. “Jane!” came a shout, as over six feet of omnisexual goodness came darting toward me. For a second, I felt like a vole targeted by a peregrine, but then I realized that a mere falcon would never have the chutzpah to wear that tank top. It was white and sported, in effigy, a tanned body with huge boobs encased in a Confederate flag bikini.

Giggling, I allowed my friend to sweep me up in a dramatic hug. Anyan squeezed past us to get to the bar, and then the prickles turned to real tears as I felt a bunch of other arms around Griz and me. I felt like a rugby player in a scrum, but one made of love and acceptance. It was glorious.

“How was Belize?” Grizzie said, when everyone had moved a few steps back and I could breathe again.

“Um, Belize?” I frowned, looking around at the group.

Amy Nahual’s normally placid, slightly stoned expression frowned as she nodded sharply, warning me to go along with Grizzie.

“Yeah, um, Belize was great. You know Belize,” I said, my brain scrambling to recall exactly where Belize was. “Always hot?” I hazarded, smiling back at Grizzie when she grinned.

“That’s great! Although you don’t look tan at all.”

“Yes, well—” I started to say, but allowed myself to trail off with relief as Amy pulled me toward her for a hug.

“We told the humans, except for your dad, that you were in Belize. Just roll with it,” she whispered in my ear.

“Will do,” I replied, squeezing her tightly. “You doing well?”

Amy chuckled her loose-throated, laid-back laugh. “Always copacetic, sister. You know me! Glad to see you up and at ’em.”

Then she allowed me to be pulled away by first Marcus and then Sarah Vernon, the nahuals who owned the Sty. They each gave me a hug, Sarah promising to go right into the back and rustle me up the biggest burger with extra cheddar she could make. I didn’t protest as Sarah rushed off to fulfill her promise.

My big shock came when Tracy, Grizzie’s life partner, went to give me her own hug. Right before I left, Grizzie and Tracy had announced they were pregnant with twins. Tracy had already been pretty big for someone who was only three months gone, and now she was…

“Huuuuuuge,” I whispered, my wide eyes latched onto her belly, before clapping a hand over my mouth. Tracy’s being so much bigger than the last time I saw her meant I finally realized I truly
had
been out for a month.

“I see Belize didn’t improve your tact,” my friend replied, drily, before pulling me as close as she could get me in a hug.

“Um, no. But I got you some baby clothes!” I blurted out, panicked by that evening’s second mention of a country I couldn’t quite place geographically.

Shit, where am I going to get baby clothes from Belize?
I thought frantically, as Tracy’s face lit up.

“How exciting!” she squealed, as I cursed at myself. Luckily, before I could dig myself any more holes, my attention was riveted to the figure standing awkwardly a few feet away, waiting to be noticed.

“Iris!” I shouted, nearly choking on my overflowing emotions. I was feeling things I didn’t even know how to name. The last time I’d seen my succubus friend had been after relinquishing her to the care of strange healers. She’d been kidnapped by Jarl’s minions both because she knew me and because, in her past, she’d given birth to a halfling son. I’d been made to believe she was dead, although she’d really been kept alive as insurance. That fact was a mixed blessing. I had been so happy she was still alive, but she’d endured horrific abuse before we’d rescued her from the evil Healer’s mansion-prison.

So I loved seeing her, and I was happy that she looked much better than the emaciated, dead-eyed shell of Iris I’d left behind so many weeks ago. That said, she still didn’t look anything like the sleek indoor cat she’d been before her kidnapping. My friend was still far too thin, and her eyes were still haunted. But most telling was the way she stood back, waiting to be noticed.

Iris used to shine so brightly that every eye in the room was riveted.

A hand from behind her touched her shoulder, as if to urge her forward, and I opened my arms. I almost dropped said arms, however, when I realized that the hand on her shoulder belonged to the satyr Caleb. He was huge, with the imposing chest of a muscle-bound human, but he was all goat from the waist down. Well, except for the very human genitalia on proud display. Goat haunches made finding pants difficult, but I would never understand what was so wrong about a loincloth. Anyway, Caleb was impressive as either a man or a goat, not least because of his craggily handsome face topped by his huge ram’s horns. He was, however, also one of my former lover Ryu’s deputies and I couldn’t imagine what the satyr was doing here.

I looked around for Ryu as Iris came close, but he wasn’t lurking anywhere. Then I was hugging my friend, and nothing else mattered.

“Iris,” I mumbled, almost incoherent. Sobs were her only response.

Everyone backed away, clearly giving us space. Grizzie and Tracy seemed confused by what must have appeared to them to be Iris’s overly emotional response to my return from Belize. Little did they know that Iris and I had returned, together, from somewhere much further away: the hell that had been the Healer’s grasp.

“How are you doing?” I asked, eventually, when she’d cried herself out. I pulled the sleeve of my T-shirt down over my palm to wipe away her tears. She wasn’t wearing any make-up, making her look even younger and more vulnerable.

“Better,” she said, after sniffling for a bit. “It’s been hard. But I’m getting there.”

“You do look better,” I said, which was true.

“But I don’t look good,” she said, sadly. This was also true.

“It’s only been a month. Considering everything—”

“Yes,” she interrupted. “Considering everything.”

We stood silently together, but it wasn’t awkward. There simply weren’t words that were suitable, so we didn’t try to use any. Instead we hugged.

“Order up!” Sarah called, whisking past me with a plate full of burger, french fries,
and
fried cheese sticks. What can I say: My friends knew my vices.

For the first time since I’d clapped eyes on her this evening, Iris finally smiled at the look on my face.

“Some things never change,” she said, stroking an affectionate hand over my cheek. “Go eat, Jane.”

We walked over to the bar, where everyone was sitting and chatting. Sarah had set my food down at an empty chair between Anyan and another empty chair next to Amy, which Iris took. Nell talked quietly with Marcus, who was petting Trill as if she really were the dog she pretended to be. Meanwhile, Sarah kept one eye on the bar as she chatted with Amy, Tracy, and Grizzie. I started in on my food, Iris watching me chow down as Caleb and the barghest talked, but I felt a thrill in my belly that had nothing (or at least mostly nothing) to do with cheese sticks when Anyan put a proprietary hand on the small of my back while I ate.

Granted, he also tried to steal a fry, earning him the same sharp slap on the hand that Trill had received earlier.

“Bad puppy,” I scolded.

Just because I wish to ravage you, doesn’t mean you get to eat off my plate
, I thought, staring down his shocked expression.
Not unless you like me with ribs
.

My libido whimpered at that thought.
Maybe he
does
like ribs?
it questioned, alarmed.

I looked between my half-eaten burger and the barghest.

Fuck that
, I decided, picking up my burger and greedily dipping it in ketchup. But I did pass Anyan a fry, my expression conciliatory. Then I nearly jumped
his
bones when he raised the fry to my mouth, smiling sensuously at me as I ate it from his fingers.

Not a rib lover
, my libido celebrated, noting how Anyan watched my lips with a hungry expression—his own pursed with wicked intentions. Then, using my lust as a distraction, he swiped a cheese stick, the big bastard.

As I finished eating, Caleb and Anyan resumed talking. They were discussing something that was happening around Rockabill, but I was too busy wondering why the hell the satyr was there to pay much attention. I was also too busy noticing how Iris kept one eye on Caleb, even as she told me about how far she’d come in the past weeks.

“But I owe most of it to him,” she said, as if she were admitting something difficult. She gave Caleb an almost beatific smile of affection, and I nearly choked on my burger. Partly I reacted from shock, but partly from sheer joy at seeing her eyes glow—if dimly—in that telltale succubus way. I’d wondered if Iris’s eyes would ever glow again, after what she’d experienced.

Caleb and Iris?
I thought, surprised despite my happiness for her. The satyr was so solid and Iris had always been a fairly typical succubus: flighty and a bit fluffy. The idea of serious, calm Caleb with frivolous, excitable Iris was interesting, to say the least.

“Really?” I said, around a mouthful of food. I really needed to stop talking with my mouth full.

“Yes. I know it probably seems strange. But he came down with Ryu after you were attacked. And he ended up staying.”
Because of me
was her unstated message.

“Wow,” I said, swallowing hastily.

Ryu was here?
I thought. But I didn’t say anything. This was Iris’s time to talk.

“What about, er, the mojo?” I asked hesitantly. The thing was, succubi harvested essence from bodily fluids the same as baobhan sith, like Ryu, harvested essence from blood. Only difference was that any bodily fluid would do for succubi and incubi, but they could feed only off lust—even if it was the sort of twisted, pain-filled pleasure preferred by Graeme, Phaedra’s incubus minion. This reliance on essence meant that succubi, incubi, and baobhan sith couldn’t be monogamous, long term, with another supernatural creature. Not if they wanted to keep their power. Instead, they needed to charge up with either humans or special halflings, like me, who created the right magical essence in their bodily fluids.

So what I was really asking Iris was “Who are you boffing on the side?” After all, I could feel her using a small amount of glamour to keep the humans from noticing how unhealthy she still looked, and her usual succubus juju was beating, if very faintly, against my shields. If she could use magic, she was feeding from somebody.

The succubus’s eyes glowed a bit brighter as she gave me a secret, sly smile, making Iris look like herself again.

“That’s not a problem. Caleb’s a terrible voyeur,” Iris said, pronouncing
terrible
in a way that let me know she found it anything but.

I blinked at her, sneaking a look at the satyr. His handsome, craggy face was as kind and as placid as ever. He looked like a sexy college professor in a movie, although the sandy blond hair falling down into his eyes gave him a little-boy-lost appearance that was adorably innocent. Granted, he also had goat haunches and was naked as a jaybird, but I needed to stop seeing him through my human eyes, with their human values.

Finally turning back to Iris, I tried to reconcile my established image of Caleb as utterly respectable with my new image of Caleb peeping out of a closet at a couple screwing on the bed. I would have wagered Caleb had sex while wearing an ascot, not him being a certifiable kinkster. But you know what they say about judging a book by its cover…

And yet, considering the fact that Caleb’s impressive man-janglies were one of the more startlingly prominent features of his cover, I guess I should have totally gone ahead and judged.

For a second, the human part of me worried about Iris. She seemed so smitten with Caleb, yet their relationship was hardly going to be the subject of a Hallmark made-for-TV movie.