She wouldn’t be able to do it to herself. Endless suffering.
Hating her helplessness, she gripped the armrests until she thought her arms would splinter. She was panicking, and that was never a good thing for an Indranan. If Tallis was holding his fear response at bay—the berserker that almost certainly wanted to overrule his thinking mind—then she could.
“You threatened to strip me.” She grinned to herself, knowing Tallis would be smiling, too. “Think you can manage?”
“I’ll manage just fine.”
“A lot of experience in that department?”
“A lot more than you.”
She wanted to wipe the sweat off her brow but couldn’t find the courage to let go of the armrests. “You think you can handle seducing a virgin?”
“Seducing? We were talking about the forceful removal of your clothes.”
“That’s part of it, I’m sure,” she said with a shiver. The adrenaline, the physical anguish, the absolute terror—they were blending with their ribald conversation until her body felt molten. She was a bundles of nerves contained within too-tight skin. “But I don’t respond to violence.”
“Says you. The right kind can be amazing.”
He said that last with a gasp—sexy and breathless—as the plane righted and swerved sharply to port. Had they been any nearer to the ground, the wing on Tallis’s side would’ve shredded into the earth.
“We’re lucky to still be airborne,” he said after a hard, telling swallow.
“Every second is a victory.”
“We’re agreeing on so much, goddess. You’ll come around. I know it. Strip. Kiss. A little rough play—you’ll enjoy my definition of seduction.”
“Can a man be that assured and actually manage to be amazing?”
“Kavya, right now I’m flying a paper airplane in a turbine.” His neck was rigid with tension. “That means I can spin straw into gold and level mountains. Pick what impossible deed you want me to accomplish next.”
“Make me feel safe enough to sleep beside you.”
Where in the world had that come from?
Tallis glanced toward her, eyes aglow with hot blue fire. “Safe. With me. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Fine.” She returned her attention to the window and tried to ignore the creaking protests the plane made—and the sudden frost in Tallis’s bearing. “Just stick with calling me by my name. Not goddess. I’ll consider that miracle enough.”
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
Perhaps the Dragon wasn’t angry at them after all. Maybe he just wanted two troublemakers the hell out of the Himalayas. Fine with Tallis.
Through some combination of skill, luck, and complete idiocy, they belly flopped the Cessna in a cornfield. The stark Pir Panjal peaks had given way to less formidable hilly terrain, as well as grasslands, lakes, and abundant population centers. Kavya had navigated along the national highways until final sputters of fuel, as well as a suspiciously freaky sound coming from the port propeller, meant her goal of a landing at the Jaipur International Airport was too ambitious.
That the plane’s nose hadn’t dug a trench was a minor miracle.
As it was, Tallis’s door was jammed into the dirt. The plane was tipped sideways, with the wing on his side snapped back like a crippled bird. The temperature was sweltering and humid. Apparently they’d dropped into hell as a nod to the fate they’d courted. He shed his coat and handed it to Kavya, who padded the door frame where a jagged piece of metal waited to slice her palm. She crawled the upward angle out her door, then turned to take the pack and seaxes from Tallis. Their fingers touched. Hers were still shaking, after nearly five hours in the air. Eyes assessing each other, they must’ve made a strange tableau in the middle of that field.
Tallis blinked and Kavya turned away. After climbing out, feet back on solid ground, he leaned hard against the half-wrecked cockpit. “Any head cases coming after us?” he asked, angling his question toward where she’d taken a seat on his pack.
“No. Coast is clear. Plenty of Indranan in Jaipur, maybe ten kilometers from here. But we’ll blend in better.”
“Good.” He stood back from the plane and gave it a solid looking over. “I’m quite proud of that, you know.”
“Crashing?”
“Landing. A very creative landing.” He walked around to the ruined port side. The wing was like a hangnail—a clinging piece of something that had once been part of the whole. One of the propellers was twisted into the stripes of a candy cane. No wonder it had grated so badly. “And a lucky landing at that,” he said to himself.
“Do I want to take a look?”
Tallis emerged from around the rear of the plane and smiled. “Nope.”
“Then I won’t.”
“You’ll lose that green tinge any minute now and realize that extreme mountain aviation is a completely shite hobby. Tell me this was the one and only time you planned on giving it a go.”
“One and only time.” She stood, strapped on the pack, and arched her neck to a particularly defiant posture. “I’m never running from him again. You should know that. Whatever distance we put between us and him now is for strategy. But . . . there will be a reckoning.”
Tallis watched her with nothing short of complete fascination. Her insides should be jelly. Her mind should be some fog of pain or confusion or madness. But she was still Kavya, the Sun, the goddess who dogged him while waking, not sleeping. Her resolve made him feel invincible.
He walked toward her, slowly, just as she’d approached him when he emerged from his berserker fury. Wild animals required patience and caution. Kavya seemed like just such an animal. She was not the pristine cross between deity and politician who’d spoken on that distant altar. Only days had passed, but already that woman seemed years distant, consumed by danger and circumstance. The woman who’d shouldered his pack and stared at him eye to eye was more primal. She’d shed the constraints of her role.
After kneeling to pick up and sheath his weapons, he touched her chin. His fingers wanted to wander, so he let them—along her hairline, over her cheekbones, down to the lower lip that would never fail to arouse him to his core. “This is closer to who you used to be,” he said quietly. “Isn’t it? This adaptability and resolve. You weren’t always untouchable and perfect.”
“I’ve never claimed to be either.”
“Your followers believed otherwise.” Rather than start another argument—he really didn’t have the strength—he turned to survey where they’d landed. They were surrounded by cornstalks taller than Kavya. “Ten kilometers to . . . what was it? Jaipur? How many people are we talking? Because this doesn’t look promising.”
“I don’t know. Maybe six million?”
“Well, well. A welcome change from Bhuntar. A city means food, new clothes, a bath, shelter.”
She started walking. “You had a bath last night, if I recall.”
“If you recall?” Tallis caught up with her swift steps. “You’ll recall that particular bath for the rest of your life.” He dropped his voice an octave. “And so will I.”
“It’s best to get away from the site of the crash,” she said, apparently ignoring him. “People will come to investigate. We’ll find a little town and transportation that doesn’t involve walking.”
“You want me to steal a car?”
Kavya’s laugh was beautiful, even brushed by a hint of leftover hysteria. “No. Not a car. Never mind. You’ll see.”