The guy was mine. Let no woman dare to take him from me.
Wait. Really? Claiming the guy? I was being too forward.
Breaking the kiss, I stepped away, smoothing my hands down my dress. Whew! Sorry about that.
He touched his lips and shrugged. Sorry for what? I liked it. Did I do it wrong?
Not at all.
His brows fell and his mouth pouted. The puppy dog had been denied a treat.
Shame on me. Libby St. Charles was not the denial sort. Be damned this too-forward business. I tended to take what I desired, and if it made me feel good, Id overindulge.
All righty then, here goes nothing, lover boy.
This time I dashed my tongue across his, coaxing him to a sensual dance that teased at my inhibitions like a feather tracing me from head to toe. Every part of my skin craved contact with his. Clothing felt bothersome. And when I wanted him to dip me backward and make me his, the man simply took what I gave.
So I would become the teacher. He would learn, and then take the control I wanted him to own.
Sliding my hands down over his, I moved them lower on my hips. Reichardt squeezed and I moaned into his mouth. You squeeze all you like, lover.
So much of you to enjoy, he murmured, and this time he initiated the kiss.
He pressed my body against the counter and probably wasnt aware how hard he leaned into me. I didnt care. I wanted to be controlled by a man, needed it. His mouth, firm and seeking, tasted my lips and a murmur of satisfaction was my reward for this teaching session. I loved every moment of this connection, even his awkward movements as he tilted his head one way and then the other.
And when I felt his erection harden and lengthen against my monsoh, baby. Did I mention I was a master of overindulgence?
Uh... Breaking the kiss, Reichardt looked down at his groin. Im not sure...
Thats supposed to happen, I said sweetly and traced his moist lower lip with my finger. That means youre doing things right.
Its so...hard. I feel as if I want to...
I lifted a brow, waiting for him to list his fantasies about me. I could ramble off a salacious litany for him. But one step at a time. It was going to be difficult to control my urges around this man.
I need a moment to myself. Reichardt dashed out of the kitchen and through the swinging French doors.
Turning to the flower petals in the sink, I whistled a tune about two lovers finding one another. The former soul bringer had never had sex. I had myself a two-thousand-year-old virgin.
And I had so many great plans for him.
Two
While I dressed, Libby waited out in my starkly furnished living room. She was an early bird, or so Id heard that expression in the market the other morning as wed shopped for milk and bread and the apricot jam I enjoyed.
I liked to linger in bed, tucked between the sheets that smelled like cedar. If I wasnt so compelled to become a useful, working part of society, I could entirely imagine becoming a bum who slept and ate his way through life.
I noticed the blue feather lying on the floor before the bed and picked it up. When I moved my fingers over the vanes, they shivered as if liquid yet felt cold and hard like iron. It was my feather. Libby said shed found it in the pile of crystal ash that had remained after my wings had shattered and fallen away.
Wings, I murmured. Could I get them back?
I flexed my shoulders and spread out my arms, wondering what wings must have felt like. How large had they been? What purpose might they have served in the mortal realm? Had they been blue like this feather?
I overheard Libby out in the living room, on the phone with her sister, chatting about everything from cleaning solutions and getting blood stains out of vinyl couches to the latest music andme.
My ears perked, my arms dropping the imaginary wings.
Hes doing well. Still pretty weak. I wonder if hell always be so? Hes the muscles of a workhorse, but he can barely lift the vacuum.
I clasped my hands across my chest, inadvertently squeezing a bicep. The muscle was hard, and it seemed I should be stronger. It bothered Libby that I couldnt do some things? Hell, Id needed her to help me move around the sofa. Shouldnt a man be able to do that himself?
Yes, hes adjusting. CJ did that? I couldnt imagine Reichardt lifting a washing machine to let me get to the dust beneath.
I winced. Indeed, I needed to become stronger to gain Libbys admiration. Id seen the commercials on the television that featured muscle-bound men lifting heavy weights. Women swooned over them.
A man of my stature and with all these muscles shouldnt be so weak. It had to do with transforming from a soul bringer to a mortal, I felt sure. If I had once traveled from Above and Beneath, I must have had some crazy powers. And Libby had detailed how Id once lifted CJ and Vika with no more than my mind and had speared them with an invisible bolt that had left them bleeding.
Id been a cruel man. But Id also been strong.
I wanted to win Libbys respect. I just had to figure out how.
* * *
After hanging up with my sister, I waited for Reichardt to finish dressing. The man shouldnt cover up those washboard abs, but okay, so it was autumn and raining, andstill. It hurt my sense of wanting to drool over man muscle, but Id have to deal. The man preferred all black clothes because he said putting colors together hurt his brain.
Boys. Gotta love em.
After hed gotten his souland before his memory of being a soul bringer had been completely vanquishedVika and I had quickly learned Reichardt kept an apartment in the fifth quarter, in the shadow of the Jardin des Plantes, and discovered it was empty: no furniture, no food, not even clothing. Just a few odd items sitting on windowsills and counters. The blue feather, a half-full bag of cat food, a yellow-cloth Jewish badge and a live sansevieria plant that looked well cared for.
Wed also learned the entire nineteenth-century building belonged to Reichardt. The building manager had explained their beneficent owner hadnt charged rent in over two decades. The elderly building residents, upon seeing Reichardt, had offered a bonjour, Monsieur Reichardt, and one had told me that while the stoic building owner never chatted, he always ensured the residents were well through a liaison who visited them monthly to check medical stats and ensure their bills were paid, and who also sent food when needed.
I strolled my fingers along the glossy blade leaves of the sansevieria plant now. Quite the fellow, my emotionless and uncaring soul bringer.
Wed decided Reichardt should remain at his place, because when I had suggested he move in with me, he couldnt get around the idea of it being sinful if we were not married. The mans morals were old-fashioned yet sweet, and I didnt want to rush him into the twenty-first century too quickly.
That sounded good in theory, anyway.
Ready! He looked over my black-and-white polka-dotted dress and skimmed his fingers along the fringes that hemmed the skirt.
Its my rock-star dress, I said, tilting out a hip and hooking a hand akimbo. I could work a fringe like nobodys sister.
But youre not a rock star. Or are you? Youre so talentedperhaps Ive not seen all that you can do.
No, lover boy, I am not a rock star. But sometimes you gotta put on the fringe and rock out, you know?
But youre not a rock star. Or are you? Youre so talentedperhaps Ive not seen all that you can do.
No, lover boy, I am not a rock star. But sometimes you gotta put on the fringe and rock out, you know?
No. He eyed me curiously.
Poor amnesiac man. He took everything literally. It was kind of sad and yet a little fun to know I would get to teach him everything he needed to learn.
Stick with me, Reichardt. Youll be rocking with the best of them soon enough. Did you ever figure out the cat food?
No, but perhaps there is a stray that visits on occasion?
I hope so. I love kitties. Though Salamander might be jealous if I went home smelling like another cat. Sal was Vikas cat, but since moving in with CJ, shed left him behind. She never had been a cat person. Lets go.
Outside, we slid into the white hearse I drove for our cleaning business. Id stuck a sticker that read Jiffy Clean on the trunk years ago as a joke. It annoyed Vika.
Vika and I cleaned up dead paranormals such as slain werewolves, demons and the occasional newer vampire who didnt completely ash at death. Couldnt have the mortals seeing such nightmares lying about the city. Cleaning was Vikas life. Since the rock-star thing would probably never happen and my small flower garden brought in a pitiful amount at the bazaar, I had to do something to earn a euro.
I drove down the street toward the witchs bazaar, a place I visited every other Saturday to buy and sell spellcraft items, pick up pointers, and chatter with fellow witches.
Do you have male friends? Reichardt asked out of the blue.
Of course I do. A life without men is dull and a little too clean. Why do you ask?
I have the feeling I should talk to a man, he said. To learn things that a woman cant teach me.
Like what? I asked cheerfully, excited he was asking for knowledge.
Like how to get stronger, and how to treat a woman.
Best way to learn that is from the source. Trust me on that one.
What about how to sexually fulfill a woman?
My neck grew hot yet my grin may have touched both ears. I met Reichardts sweetly wondering gaze in the rearview mirror. Again, the source would be your best bet.
He crossed his arms, uncomfortable with the suggestion. Hell, the guy could have used a male friend. Just because the best information came from the source didnt mean it was easy to ask about the intimate stuff.
You remember CJ, Vikas guy?
Yes, Certainly Jones, the dark witch with the curious tattoos.
Mmm, I love a tattooed man.
Is that so? Reichardt considered that one a moment. But why is he dark?
He practices dark magic to balance the light, which is what Vika and I practice. Yin and yang. Its a karma thing.
Karma is the universe, yes?
Exactly.
Do you think I could talk to CJ? No offense, Libby, but there are things that...come up. He looked aside and was suddenly very interested in the door lock.
I recalled our embrace in the kitchen when hed gotten an erection. If the guy wanted to learn how to use that, then perhaps it was time to call in Team Man.
Ill give CJ a call once we get to the bazaar. Im sure hed love to get together with you and talk man stuff.
Thank you. I dont mind the cleaning tasks youve taught me, but I feel there are more manly things I should be learning. Like how to drive this vehicle. Shouldnt the man drive the woman?
I can teach you how to drive. But lets concentrate on getting your immediate needs met first.
Like learning how to please a woman, I thought with a sneaky curl of lip. Id have this guy eating out of my hands soon enough.
I pulled into a parking space and Reichardt got out and rushed around to my side. He opened the door, which had never once happened in my dating history. He already knew how to please a woman. What the man really needed was confidence and a sense of place in this realm.
* * *
The bazaar was indeed bizarre. I wandered the aisles in the small church basementyes, the witches gathered in a former Catholic church. How about that for irony? And I did know irony, which pleased me into a grin as I passed a table featuring Charms to Devastate and Divulge.
The room was populated with all varieties, from normal-looking women and men to those sporting outrageous clothing and hair and a few with tattooed faces. I thought the one with the tiny wings at her back was a faery, but what would she be doing here?
You want me to show you around? Libby asked as she handed me a paper cup of coffee.
I loved coffeeit was like meadand I guessed I might have drunk mead if Id come from Above. Maybe?
I think Ill just take it all in, if thats all right with you. Go and do what you must. I like watching you walk away from me.
Blowing me a kiss, Libby sashayed down the aisle, her hips swaying and the fringes bouncing. She wiggled her torso in that sexy groove that made things on me very hard. I needed to talk to CJ soon. I wanted to get my hands all over that womans bounce, yet when I did, things came up. Things that felt great yet, I knew, required further research.
I strolled past a table that sold various vials of blood in all gradients of crimson. Werewolf blood, vampire blood, faery ichor, kitsune blood and black demon blood. Mermaid blood was a tint of green. What were the uses for such things? Did I really want to know?
Sipping the last of the coffee, I turned abruptly and bumped into a tall, thin woman clad in frumpy black with snow-white hair that fell like silk about her shoulders. She spun, revealing pointed teeth and a pale face, and hissed at me.
That hiss disturbed me so much I flinched and stepped back.
She tracked me backward until my shoulders hit the wall and a tendril of dried garlic bobbed at my head. When she stuck a finger in the air before my face I felt as if Id been struck by invisible magic. Hell, who could know in a room full of witches?
Youre different, she said with a craggy voice that belonged buried under tangled tree roots. Not the same as you once were.
That summation was difficult not to question. What do you know about me?
I see it. Your aura. Its all colors. Never see that unless its an angel, dont you know.
I clamped my jaws shut before blurting out my truth. How shed guessed such a thing was beyond me. Yet I supposed it wasnt a big secret. Could those with paranormal proclivities see what I had once been?
I can feel your yearning.
Idont yearn. Yet, in fact, I did just that.
You do. And for more than what men yearn for.
Is that so? Because Id learned that most men did yearn for the red sports car.
You want what was once yours.
Damned good guess. Did she also know I desired Libby? And...just how would I get that? What was once mine.
Ha! Knew it.
I leaned in closer, lifting the coffee cup beside my cheek to shield our conversation from anyone who might hear, though the room bustled and everyone was occupied with their own doings. And what if I do yearn? Can you help me with that?
Nope.
My shoulders deflated. Just as well.
But I know someone who can. You go see her and shell read you and tell you if she can release the, uh...lingering power that dwells within you, she said with dramatic flair.