"That's the funny thing," Jonathan said, and stepped back. He tugged his cap more firmly in place, one hand at the back, one on the bill. "You want to survive, you need to convince Her that you're worth the favor."
"How?" I practically yelled it.
"You'll know it when you see it. But first you have to get yourself to the right place."
"Which is?"
"Someplace you've already been," he said. "Once. Neat little place, kinda quaint. You'll think of it."
"Don't do that. Don't go all vague on me just when I need—"
"Not my business to save your ass," he pointed out. "Hell, I'm kinda dead anyway. Not my problem. And you look so cute with your face all red."
"Jonathan—" I was all out of smart-ass. " Please."
He cupped an ear toward me.
"Please," I repeated. "Do you want me to beg?"
"Well, it'd be nice, but… nah. Can you sing?"
"What?"
"Sing. Notes. Usually up and down, unless you're into that rap thing, which"—he eyed me—"I wouldn't recommend. A little too much vanilla in the ice, if you know what I mean."
"Believe me, I have no ideawhat you mean!"
He sighed. "Humans. No sense of what's going on around them…"
He stopped in midcondescension. His face went blank again, but not as if he was trying to conceal anything this time—more as though he was entirely focused on something beyond the two of us.
There was a sound. It started as a kind of moaning, like a breeze beyond the window. It got louder. Stronger. Became an eerie tangle of whispers.
No, not whispers. Something… musical.
I reached for the latch on the window, suddenly desperate to hear what it was. Jonathan clapped his hands down over mine, hard. "No," he said grimly. "Do it and you're dead."
I fought him. I had to open the window. I had to know. I could feel it coming, and oh it was glorious and terrible and beautiful as liquid fire, and it was going to burn me to ash where I stood with the fire of creation and joy. Spirit moving upon the earth…
I clawed at the window latch, got hold of it, and yanked up.
Stuck. I screamed and battered at the window glass, but it didn't break, didn't even rattle…
Jonathan muttered what might have been a curse, if I'd understood Djinn, and he spun me around to face him. The whole house around us was moving, breathing. Seduced by the power of the song outside. Longing to join with it, lose itself in that joyous, terrifying chorus.
Pieces of it were whirling away. Jonathan stayed focused on my face. "You've got to leave," he said.
"Am I going to see you again?" I asked, weirdly calm now, drugged by the sound. He smiled slightly and touched his fingertips to the tip of my chin.
"Didn't see me this time," he said, and without any warning at all, gave me a right cross that snapped my head back with overwhelming force. Pain blocked out even the screaming of that song.. . .
I sailed backward into the dark, falling, lost in shrieking winds and wind that grabbed and tore at me…
The song turned into a shrill ringing in my ears.
I jerked awake on the bed in the infirmary, felt my heart racing uncontrollably, and fumbled for the clock on the table next to me. Its reassuring green glow told me that I'd been asleep for exactly six hours.
I sank back with a sigh, cradling the clock and hitting the buttons, and then realized that it wasn't the alarm going off. It was my cell phone shrilling for attention. Damn. I needed to go with a much more amusing ringtone.
I fumbled it out of my purse and flipped it open. "Yeah?" I sounded as drugged and disoriented as I felt.
"You stupid slag." I knew that rich tenor voice, sharpened now with anger. "You called the police on me."
I flopped back into the comfort of the pillow and threw an arm over my eyes. "Yes, Eamon, I called the police on you. You threatened my life, tried to kill me, and abducted my sister—"
"I saved your bloody life!" He sounded livid. I could almost see the veins pulsing in his neck. "I could've left you out in that hurricane to die, you know. I put myself out for you!"
"Yeah, you're a prince—Please tell me you're not, by the way. I mean, my opinion of British royalty isn't that high, but—"
"Shut it," he snarled. "Alerting the local constabulary isn't going to get your sister back."
"Can make your life damn inconvenient, though, I'll bet."
Silence. I could hear him breathing. I could picture him standing there, phone gripped in those long pianist's fingers. The inner Eamon didn't match the sensitive hands, though he could pretend with the best of them.
Deep down, he wasn't elegant, and he wasn't cultured. He was a total bastard, and the fact that my sister had been enthralled with him—and might still be, for all I knew—made me feel more than a little nauseated.
"Look," I said. "I know that you expect me to be your costar in this little drama you're playing, but I'm busy. Get to the point, Eamon. You going to kill me? Come on and get in line. I haven't got time to screw around with you."
Silence, for a long few beats, and then, "Is there a problem?" he asked. Which wasn't what I'd expected.
"Why do you care?"
"Because—" He paused for several long beats. "Because what I want from you is a Djinn. If there's anything happening that affects that goal, I need to know."
"You have no idea how much I wish I'd given you one back home, and gotten you the hell out of our lives," I said. I remembered the bloodstains in the conference room. Not that I wished dismemberment on anyone, but with Eamon my moral high ground was somewhere about the elevation of a sand dune, and eroding fast. "The situation has changed. I can't get my hands on a Djinn anymore. No one can."
"Won't, you mean."
"I don't have time to explain it to you, but even if I gave you a Djinn bottle, it wouldn't do you any good. The—the master agreement's been broken. They don't obey us anymore. And they damn sure wouldn't obey you."
"I see," he said slowly. "That's… very unfortunate. For your sister, at any rate."
"Where's Sarah? If you've hurt her—"
"Don't be ridiculous. Why would I hurt lovely Sarah?" That sly hint of amusement was back in his voice. "Much more rewarding to play along with her fantasies. You'd be amazed what kind of thing that woman gets up to in the privacy of her—"
"Shut up!" I shouted it, heard my heart thudding in my ears, and forced myself to relax. He liked sticking in the knife. It was part of his game. No matter what he said, I'd seen the way he'd touched her, and his hands didn't lie about that, at least. He was gentle with her. Gentler than he had any reason to be. It was even possible he really liked her, as much as he liked anyone. "Look, just let her go. There's no reason to keep her. I already told you, I can't give you a Djinn. Please. Just—let her go."
"Are you completely sure you can't give me what I want? Because if you are, there's no reason for me not to put a bullet in the head of your beautiful sister, pose her in a compromising position for the delight of the tabloid media, and be on my merry way." He listened to my furious silence. I could feel a grin coming off the phone, like radiant heat. "I was thinking something from the oeuvre of the Hillside Strangler. Nothing like the classics."
"You fucking son of a—"
" I want a Djinn. I don't care about your technical issues. You're thoroughly resourceful when you need to be—I've seen that firsthand. No, your lovely sister stays with me until you come through for me. In the meantime, she suffers whatever I see fit to make her suffer, which I promise you will get progressively worse the longer you take to satisfy me. And if I feel you haven't done your level best to get me what I want, well… you'll follow the breathless coverage about her bad, sad end on the news."