I sighed as she pulled open the door and motioned her father inside, her eyes catching mine with a sideways glance.
“Go on ahead, I want to talk to Frankie for a minute,” she told him.
My heart stuttered at her words. We had a lot of history, the most recent not so great. No matter where the conversation went, it would be awkward.
Longinus narrowed his eyes and looked back and forth between us a couple of times, then gave an amused chuckle.
“Good luck in your quest, Triggaltheron. I suppose we’ll know soon enough if you succeed.” He bowed shallow, and then went to the portal.
Power flickered in the room as the gate amped up and whisked him away, though I can’t say I actually saw him go. Uncomfortable about checking out Karra while her father was around-the threat of horrific death a surprisingly effective deterrent-I took full advantage of her watching him leave, her back turned to me.
Dressed in a pair of blue jeans that took form-fitting to new depths, and my imagination with it, I admired her shape in the fluttering light of the portal. Oh, what I would have done for a jar of Vaseline and a Slip N’ Slide.
Her pink T-shirt fit snug, the toned muscles of her back defined by its tightness. Her wild blond hair, the tips dyed black, ended just above the gentle curve of her neck. The pale flesh called to me and before I knew it, I had taken several unconscious steps toward her.
Longinus gone, she spun around and I shut my mouth quick, covering it with my hand to hide any drool that might have run amok. She smiled and took my other hand, leading me back to the living room. There, she pushed me down onto the couch and dropped beside me. Our thighs pressed together, mine tingled at the contact. The subtle scent of her perfume entrenched itself inside my nose and I found it hard to concentrate. I found a lot of things hard right then.
“I’m sorry we haven’t had a chance to talk since…you know, but it’s been hectic catching my father up and getting him settled. Now’s probably not a good time either, but I wanted to speak with you before you ran off, just in case…”
Even though she’d let the last part hang, the words flowed over me like a gentle breeze. Like a politician in an off-election year, I didn’t hear a single one of them. My peripheral vision combat-honed, I stared into her hazel eyes, but all I could see was the glory of her ample chest. It was a pleasure in pink.
“Yeah…busy…uh huh.”
She just laughed at me and leaned back in the couch to look over at Chatterbox. “I see you’ve kept the old boy. How you two getting along?”
“ Maaaassssstttterrrrrrrrr,” he mumbled in an airy voice, once more doing his best to bow.
My eyes suddenly focused, I looked to Chatterbox then back to Karra, the door of realization slamming into place. I’d never really thought about how Karra had managed to manipulate me in her quest to resurrect her father. She’d always been a step ahead, but there it was right in front of me; Chatterbox.
We’d chased the clues Michael had picked from his undead brain, ultimately finding the trap by following his directions. They’d all been programmed in from the start. The sudden sense of it all settled over me. I sat back and whistled low.
“You dropped Chatterbox into the grave with me on purpose.” I’d presumed Reven had set up the resurrection spell and Karra had simply triggered it by dousing Longinus in Lilith’s blood, but it never occurred to me that it was Karra’s spell to begin with. “You’re a necromancer.” It explained why Chatterbox was still animate, having survived Reven’s death.
She gave a half-nod-shrug as an easy smile graced her lips. “A useful profession when you’re trying to bring your father back to life, don’t you think?”
Couldn’t argue with the logic, but necromancy wasn’t an easy skill to master. It took a lifetime to become powerful enough to raise someone like the Anti-Christ. Things started to make sense. “Is that why you disappeared, to learn how to bring him back?”
She nodded. “Among other reasons. While he never said anything, I couldn’t imagine your uncle letting me stay close to you in Hell, after what he’d done to my father. I was scared and angry, and I wanted Lucifer to pay. At the same time, I was worried he’d sense that and come after me, maybe even hurt you in the process. There was no way I could have lived with that.” She loosed a quiet sigh, her thigh pressing harder against mine. “I fled Hell and took up with Reven to learn necromancy, but I never wanted to leave you behind.”
The past rushed up and kicked me in the balls. My chest thundered like stampeding cattle as I remembered how my uncle had dismissed my pain at losing Karra. He’d done so because he knew he was to blame. He’d chased her away as a convenience to himself. His petty revenge against Longinus had torn her from me and he had waved it off as inconsequential, as acceptable collateral damage. It had meant nothing to him, but to me, it had been my whole world. Melodramatic as it may sound, she had been everything then.
I felt my face flush as I hopped to my feet, the urge to destroy something burning at my fists. My eyes steamed with memories, fury leaking down my cheeks. In the span of an instant, my mind flittered back in time to question every decision Lucifer had made on my behalf. I couldn’t help but wonder for whose benefit they’d really been made. Had they ever been for me?
I jumped when Karra closed her hand over mine, not even realizing she’d come up behind me. She pressed hard into my back, her arm tight around my waist. Her heartbeat thudded against me, insistent in its steady thump. My breath caught in my chest as she settled her chin on my shoulder, her nose nuzzling into my ear.
Goose bumps took wing in flocks down my arms as Karra’s breath wafted over the nape of my neck.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, the words soft caresses. My anger crawled away to die, its death unnoticed in the tumultuous inferno of my thoughts.
She pulled me in even closer, gentle kisses peppering my ear, the line of my jaw, and cheek, stealing my tears away.
Rigid, in more ways than one, I couldn’t move. My arms and legs were locked in place. It was if I had been transported back in time, my dead and buried shyness reborn, excitement winding a suffocating coil around my body. My vision flickered as waves of butterfly tingles shot through me, my hands trembling. My thoughts exploded and reformed, then exploded again before they could reach coherence. The gooey corpses of logic and reason were spewed against the walls of my irrational, terrifying lust.
Then she bit me.
That was all it took.
The twin drum beats of my heart and crotch rumbled a rally and kicked the shit out of my passive inner child. The little fucker deserved it.
My own man again, at least to the extent my penis would allow, I spun on Karra and kissed her fierce, my hands entangled in her soft hair. Her insistent lips were a siren’s call, luring me ever deeper as we pressed into one another. Male directives asserting themselves, my hands drifted across her shoulders and down her arms to settle on the firm curves of her ass.
In that moment, the key of bones was forgotten, but one Heavenly gate I wanted to pry open. I already had the key for that.
So much taller than Karra, I lifted her into my arms and settled her crotch against mine, the fit electric. She ground into me as transient images of someone starting a fire flickered in the background of my mind, driven by the repetitive fwip of rubbing jeans. Shudders trembled through me as she moaned into my ear, whispering things you normally need to pay $3.95 a minute to hear. Her tongue stung my neck with wet serpent kisses.
Unable to contain myself any longer, I moved to the couch and dumped her onto it. Romance run out of town with a bullet in its ass, I yanked her boots off and tossed them over my shoulder. The tinkling crash of glass sounded behind me, but I barely noticed as I went toe-to-toe with the button on Karra’s painted-on jeans. At last, I managed to pop it free with a grunt. Her zipper barely down, I whipped her pants off and sighed at finding her panty-less. Like an altar to the god of all mans’ gods, I felt compelled to kneel and worship, to loose my tongue with flickering songs of the coming rapture. Hallelujah!