Gale Force (2 page)

I glared at him for a second, but honestly, I couldn’t stay angry at David, especially when he gave me that
look
.

But I glanced toward the fire again anyway, and I heard him sigh. ‘‘Jo. Let go. I know how hard it is for you, but you need to let other people handle their jobs. That’s why they have them.’’

‘‘Three days!’’ I said, pointing an accusatory finger toward the smoke. ‘‘Come on, you don’t think they could have been a
little
more aggressive about it?’’

‘‘You know as well as I do that sometimes managing how a fire burns is more important than putting it out,’’ he said all too reasonably, and stepped between me and my view of the conflagration. Not that he wasn’t, you know, burning hot himself. Because he definitely was, and I felt myself inevitably getting distracted.

‘‘Stop that,’’ I said, not with a lot of strength.

‘‘Stop what?’’ He reached for my hands, and I shivered as a breeze moved across my back, which was left mostly bare by my sky blue halter top. Florida had been kind to me, for a change, with lots of sun, lots of untroubled, cloud-free beaches. It was as if the Wardens themselves had conspired to make my vacation uneventful, at least on the weather front, until this fire thing had popped up.

And that had been okay for the first couple days. And then it had just kept on coming. I know it sounds crazy, but I’d gotten a little bit too rested.

Not that David couldn’t make that haunting feeling of uselessness go away; he was promising to, just with the gentle pressure of his fingers moving up my bare arms.

‘‘Stop making me want you,’’ I said. That got the eyebrows again, and a slightly wounded frown.

‘‘
Making
you?’’

‘‘You know what I mean.’’

‘‘No, I don’t, actually. You think I’m manipulating you?’’

‘‘You’re Djinn,’’ I said. ‘‘Manipulating people is basically built into your DNA. I’m not really sure you can help it. But—I didn’t mean that. I’m just—I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’m thinking. I just—’’

‘‘You want to be taking action,’’ he said. ‘‘Yes. I know. You really do need to learn how to let go.’’

‘‘What I
don’t
need is even more vacation.’’ I stepped back from David and dropped grumpily into a deck chair, stretching my long, bare legs out in front of me. The tan was coming along nicely.
Great accomplishment. Everybody else is saving the world; you’re golden-browning.

‘‘Oh, I think you definitely do,’’ David said, and draped himself over the other chair, chin propped on his fist. ‘‘I have never met anyone who needed to learn to relax more than you do.’’

And that was saying a lot; he’d met a lot of people—millions, probably. I still didn’t have any clear idea of how old David really was, only that his birth date was so far back in history that the idea of calendars had been newfangled. He’d been around, my lover. The fact that he was hanging around here, letting me be bitchy to him, was kind of amazing.

Before I could apologize to him, the phone rang again. I picked up the cordless extension, pressed the button, and said, ‘‘Paul, I swear, I’m not—’’

A businesslike voice on the other end said, ‘‘May I speak with Joanne Baldwin?’’

‘‘Speaking.’’ I rolled my eyes at David. Another attempt to sell me flood insurance or steel hurricane shutters. I readied the I’m-in-an-apartment speech, which usually served to put a stop to these things.

‘‘Ms. Baldwin, hello, my name is Phil Garrett. I’m an investigative reporter with the
New York Times
. I’d like to speak with you about the organization known as the Wardens. I believe you’re one of its senior members. Could I have your title?’’

I blinked, and my expression must have been something to behold, because David slowly straightened up in his chair, leaning forward. ‘‘You—sorry, what? What did you say?’’

‘‘Phil Garrett.
New York Times.
Calling about the Wardens. I have some questions for you.’’

‘‘I’’—my voice locked tight in my throat—‘‘got another call, hold on.’’ In a panic, I hit the END CALL button and put the phone down on the table, staring at it as if it had grown eight legs and was about to scuttle off. ‘‘Oh my God.’’

‘‘What?’’ David asked. He looked interested, not alarmed. Apparently, I was amusing when panicked.

The phone rang again. I didn’t move to pick it up. David took it and said, pleasantly, ‘‘Yes?’’ There was a pause while he listened. ‘‘I see. Mr. Garrett, I’m very sorry, but Ms. Baldwin can’t speak to you right now. What’s your deadline?’’ His mouth compressed into a thin line, clearly trying not to smile at whatever my face was doing now. I could hardly breathe, I felt so cold. ‘‘I see. That’s fairly soon. Ms. Baldwin is actually on vacation right now. Maybe there’s someone else you can—’’ Another pause, and his gaze darted toward mine. ‘‘You were given her number.’’

I mouthed, blankly,
Shit!
David lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. This could not be happening. I mouthed,
By who?
David dutifully repeated the question.

‘‘Not at liberty to divulge your sources,’’ he said, for my benefit. ‘‘I see. If you want my opinion, I think you’re being used, Mr. Garrett. And you’re wasting your time.’’

He listened. I felt my heart hammer even faster. Mr. Garrett wasn’t going down easy.

‘‘I’ll have her call you back,’’ David said, hung up, and put the phone back on the table. He leaned forward, watching me, hands folded. ‘‘You’re scared.’’

I nodded, with way too much emphasis. ‘‘Reporters. I
hate
reporters. I hate reporters from little weekly papers in One Horse, Wyoming, so how much do you think I’m going to hate somebody from the
New York Times
? Guess.’’

‘‘You don’t even know him. Maybe this is a good thing. Good publicity.’’

‘‘Are you on crack? Of course it’s not a good thing! He’s a
reporter
! And we’re a
secret organization
! Who the hell gave him his info? And my number?’’

‘‘Jo, he’s a reporter. He didn’t have to get your number from anyone inside the Wardens. He could have gotten it through simple research. As to what put him on to the whole topic . . .’’ David shrugged. He was right. With all the disasters and potentially life-destroying events that we’d had the last few years, the Wardens had been a little more public than anyone liked.

And so had I.

I grabbed for the phone and dialed Lewis’s cell. It rang to voice mail. ‘‘Lewis, call me back. I’ve got reporter troubles. Look, if this is your idea of a joke and you staked me out as the sacrificial goat for the media, I am not going to be the only one on the altar when they get out the knives—’’

David took the phone and hung it up, very calmly. ‘‘That’s enough of the metaphor,’’ he said. ‘‘Look, you don’t need to flail around. You know what to say. Deny everything. They won’t have proof. They never do. And even if they do have something, refer them to the government and the UN. It’ll go away.’’

‘‘What if it doesn’t?’’ I chewed my lip in agitation, tasting tangerine gloss. Great. Now I was destroying my makeup, too, and the whole purpose of lip gloss was to stay interestingly kissable. ‘‘Look, it’s the
Times
. This is different. I’m worried.’’

David cocked his head, looking bemused now. ‘‘I’ve seen you face down monsters, hurricanes, and tornadoes, and you’re scared of a phone call?’’

‘‘It’s bigger than that.’’ I felt it in my gut. ‘‘There was a reporter a few months ago. When I was on my way to Sedona with Venna. She knew things. It was just a matter of time, I guess, before word got around and people got to digging. Dammit! I should have known this was coming.’’

He leaned forward and took my hands. His felt warm, strong, calming. ‘‘I have a question that will scare you even more, if you want to change the subject, ’’ he said, after a long moment.

I frowned at him. ‘‘No games.’’

‘‘No. This is a serious question.’’ He slipped off the deck chair, and one knee touched the concrete balcony floor. He never looked away from my face, and he never let go of my hands. ‘‘This is a question that’s going to need a serious answer.’’

My heart froze, then skipped to catch up on its beats. ‘‘I—’’ I couldn’t begin to think of what to say. I just waited. I probably had it all wrong, anyway.

‘‘Will you marry me?’’ he asked.

Oh. I didn’t have it wrong at all.

My lips parted, and nothing, absolutely nothing, came out. Was he
serious
? He couldn’t be serious. We were comfortable together; we had love, we had partnership, we had—everything.

Everything except . . . well, this—an official kind of commitment.

Not possible,
some part of my brain reported briskly. David was a supernatural Djinn, only partly tied to the mortal world. I might have been a Warden, with extra powers over wind, water, air, earth, living things . . . but I was just human, when it came down to brass tacks. He was immortal; I wasn’t, and I was achingly aware of that, every day that passed between us.

‘‘David . . .’’ I came up against an absolute blank wall, inspirationally speaking. ‘‘I—can we talk about this later?’’

‘‘Why? So you can come up with reasons to justify your fears about me leaving you?’’ He wasn’t angry; he didn’t mean it to hurt. It was matter-of-fact and strangely even gentle. ‘‘Jo, I need to know that you feel as I do. I need to have you with me. And— it’s mortal custom.’’ He was clearly reaching on that last one.

‘‘Have you been married before?’’ There, I’d asked it. We didn’t go into his past a lot, but I knew it was ancient, and there had been plenty of relationships— Djinn as well as human.

He raised my hands to his lips, and I shivered at the warm, intimate kiss. ‘‘Yes,’’ he said. ‘‘Ages ago. Before I knew what I was waiting to feel.’’

I stared at him. ‘‘And now you know.’’

‘‘Of course I know,’’ he said. His eyes had taken on the burning purity of newly minted copper. ‘‘I was waiting for you.’’

The phone rang. My gaze went to it; I was startled, but didn’t move to pick up. One ring, and it cut off. I wasn’t sure if the caller had thought better of it, or if David had severed the connection.

‘‘If you say no, it’s all right. I will stay with you as long as you want me to stay,’’ he said. ‘‘You won’t lose me. You don’t have to agree if this doesn’t feel right to you.’’

‘‘But it’s important to you.’’

‘‘Yes. Or I wouldn’t have brought it up.’’ David looked troubled for a second, as if he was unsure of how much—or little—to say. Then he plunged ahead. ‘‘When humans make their vows to each other, it’s the closest they can come to the depth of commitment a Djinn feels. You see? I just want—I’m afraid of losing you.’’

And it had taken him a lot to risk the question—I knew that. David’s feelings for me were fierce and constant; it was part of who the Djinn were. But human feelings were changeable, and I had no doubt he lived in fear that one day I’d wake up and be a different person, one he couldn’t reach.

Being married wouldn’t lessen that risk, but it was a symbol, a trust.

It all came down to trust. His, and mine.

‘‘This is crazy,’’ I breathed. ‘‘What the
hell
are the Djinn going to say?’’

‘‘Nothing, if they know what’s good for them.’’ There was a glimmer of coldness to his tone. David was the leader of about half of the Djinn—the good half, in my opinion, although there were exceptions. The other half was led by a Djinn named Ashan, an icy bastard who didn’t like me very much and wasn’t especially warm toward David, either. ‘‘If you’re worrying what it will do to my standing among them, don’t.’’

But I had to think about that, didn’t I? It wasn’t just the two of us. The Wardens might have a thing or two to say about a human marrying a Djinn, too. And what minister was going to bless this union, anyway? Aside from their religious beliefs, most ministers didn’t believe in the supernatural, at least not in any good kind of way. And I knew David. He’d want complete honesty in this, no matter how difficult that would be.

The day was getting darker, the sky turning from denim to indigo. On the horizon, the sun was nearly down, pulling its glorious trailing rays with it.

Black, greasy smoke drifted into my eyes, and I blinked and coughed. David glanced at it, annoyed, and the smoke disappeared—moved elsewhere. The air around us was fresh and clear.

‘‘Jo,’’ he said, ‘‘you don’t have to answer now. I just . . . had to ask the question.’’

I ought to say no. I knew that. I just
knew
.

‘‘Yes,’’ I said, and something in me broke loose with a wild, silent cry. I was off the cliff now, I realized, with a fierce joy, and that felt good. It felt free.

His eyes ignited into a color found only in the heart of the sun. ‘‘Yes?’’

‘‘Yes, already. I’ll marry you. Yes. Hell, yes. What am I, stupid?’’

The phone rang again. David let go of my hands, picked up the extension, and thumbed it on without looking away from my face. ‘‘Mr. Garrett, I’m taking my lover to bed,’’ he said. ‘‘If you know what’s good for you, you’ll reschedule your deadline.’’

And he crushed the phone as if it were made of marshmallow crème and dropped the smashed pieces on the patio table.

‘‘Oh,’’ I said faintly. ‘‘Problem solved. Good approach.’’

On the horizon, the fire in Alligator Alley continued to glow. I discovered that I didn’t care at all, as David’s hand pulled me to my feet and into his arms.

I woke up hours later to the sound of screaming sirens. The Wardens had majorly screwed up—again. My apartment complex was on fire. We were being evacuated.

That was it. I was never going on vacation again.

Chapter One

Getting married was like planning a military invasion of a distant foreign country, only instead of moving soldiers and guns, you were organizing bridesmaids and bouquets.

Of course, my bridesmaids were bound to be pretty tough chicks. I couldn’t really be sure there wouldn’t be guns.