Vampire Assassin League Bundle 4 - Eternity (21 page)

“Uh...no. I don’t believe the authorities are going to believe it, either. I don’t suppose you have access to a SAT phone?” Lizbeth was a science major. That’s why she studied archeology. She had zero imagination and less belief in anything that couldn’t be proven. It showed in her words and tone, although the words shook.

“SAT phone?”

He was answering Lizbeth and at the same time sending waves of sensation at Darcy. It felt like tendrils wrapping all about her. Drawing her closer. She swore she could already feel her breasts smashed against his impressive pecs. Getting dampened by the contact and then seared by the heat. Oh dear. This was terrible.

And wonderful.

No.

Terrible.

“Yeah. SAT phone. We’ve got to report a major crime scene at a protected archeological site. Forget it. We’ll just scout out one of the missing guards and get it handled. But you might want to do a disappearing act in the interim.”

His forehead wrinkled. Something deep inside her whispered into being. Oh. This was terrible.

No.

Wonderful.

“Disappearing act?” he asked.

“Claiming vampirism is probably not going to get you out of a bit of police scrutiny over all these dead bodies. You’ll probably get some time in a cell. And I’d hate to see your valiant rescue of us repaid that way. You coming, Darcy?”

Darcy opened her mouth. He replied for her. And with words she wouldn’t have used.

“No. She is not. The Amazon is coming with me.”

Amazon?

And a moment later, she was airborne.

CHAPTER TWO

He lived in a cave. Or something akin to one. It was pitch black. Frighteningly so. It felt cavernous, too. Her breathing even echoed, when she could hear it above her heartbeat. Darcy’s boots touched solidness with a thump that jolted her knees. And then he opened his arms. Darcy almost grabbed for him as he moved away, leaving her. But that was stupid. She settled with clasping her arms about herself and hugging.

No way was she going to believe the vampire bit. Or the god stuff, although that was proof she’d spent way too much time watching and reading up on the subject of Greek mythology since that’s all Lizbeth stocked for entertainment. And since neither of those descriptions deserved merit, this guy had to be an angel. Yep. Her first impression had to be right. He was an avenging angel. Or maybe a fallen one.

Hmm
.

Getting rescued and then abducted by a fallen angel should be terrifying, not pretty damned stimulating. Her skin still ran with goose bumps from being held so tightly against him. Or perhaps it came from flying without any means of support. Like wings. Weren’t angels supposed to have wings? And if they did, wouldn’t there be a flapping motion? Honestly. Shouldn’t there be some evidence of flight other than the slight unease she’d experienced in her belly, the slip of air across her face, accompanied by tendrils of hair, and the popping of her ears?

She could’ve checked for how he’d moved.
Right, Darcy.
She didn’t even know for certain that he
had
flown. She’d been too surprised. Shocked. Stunned. Shaken. Scared. And enough of the “S” words already. She’d kept her eyes shut and continually counted, so she couldn’t be at all certain of anything. She didn’t even know how far he’d taken her, although she’d reached one thousand, four-hundred, and twelve in her count. That feat not only reiterated her OCD diagnosis from grammar school, but put a time of about twelve minutes of distance to it. That wasn’t remotely helpful, though, unless and until she added his speed of flight into the equation.

If
he really did fly.

Oh hell. She didn’t even know if this was a cave. Or just a great big void. Like death.

Wow. That thought hadn’t occurred to her until right now. Was this death, then? And just maybe instead of an escort by the grim reaper, she’d received a gorgeous angel-claiming-to-be-a-vampire instead? Was that it? Had he simply been sent to transport her to purgatory?
Purgatory?
Wasn’t that the place of temporary punishment while sins of the soul were weighed and destiny decided? Oh no. She was thinking in religious terms now? She must be really scared. The sum of everything just didn’t compute and this impenetrable blackness wasn’t remotely helpful. And she really needed to control her rampant imagination.

“Don’t move.”

The words touched her ear, making her jump slightly. They were also unnecessary. Like she needed that instruction. She hadn’t moved since he’d touched her. One thing was absolute fact, however. This guy had a fantastic voice. Full of deep tones that reached out and grabbed and then physically made her tremble. He was definitely rock solid, and all male, too. Her breasts were still tingly-feeling from where they’d been pressed right against rock-solid chest...while her arms had been wrapped about one trim waist. And...oh hell. Now her knees were wobbling.

Wow.

Darcy licked her lips. She really should stop the reminiscing.

A light came on, shedding a mellow light on what looked like a big leather couch situated with a couple of ottomans. Or maybe it was a grouping of furniture that market gurus liked to call a theater set. Whichever, they were about thirty feet away. Maybe more. Another light followed, even farther away. Every bit of illumination was accompanied by the slip of shadow as the vampire/angel man moved, turning on each light source. He had old, low-wattage bulbs, or something else that shed golden light, revealing a really large space, smoothed stone walls, and all kinds of shadowed niches.

And within those niches, it looked like metal glinted as each light was lit. Well. He hadn’t said she couldn’t move her eyes...and maybe her head. Darcy craned her neck a bit to check the closest niche. It contained what looked like a shield, a really intricate, amazingly detailed shield. With an embossed depiction of a coiled snake wrapped about a sword right in the center of it.

All right.

It appeared her first impression wasn’t far off. This definitely looked like a cave. And if he lived in a cave, might that mean something?
The facts, Darcy
. She was in Greece, she’d been transported to some weird realm, and hadn’t their god Zeus been hidden in a cave when his mother replaced him with a stone, so his father Kronus could swallow it rather than yet another child? And hadn’t Zeus lived in his cave to manhood so he could release his siblings from their father’s belly and they could all fight the other Titans for control of the cosmos? And hadn’t she just spent days watching this ridiculous story from one of Lizbeth’s more entertaining research shows? And what kinds of drugs were these ancient Greeks taking when they penned that stuff anyway?

It was a confusing jumble of just-learned, useless myths and legends in her head, and she wasn’t the artifact analysis archeologist student who’d just been awarded a big enough grant she could work on a dig site to earn her Master’s Degree. That was Lizbeth. Darcy was the roommate who’d quit college in her second year and worked as the dispatch clerk at a trucking company with a lot of loud, noisy, bearded, uncouth truckers. Truckers came in three types. Really skinny which meant they chained smoked. Or really hefty, which meant they chain-ate. Or really buff, since they’d just started and thought being a long-haul trucker was the epitome of great jobs.

Wait just a minute...

What the vampire/angel man was revealing with each light he turned on looked like a trucker’s idea of heaven. This was definitely a cave...on a colossal scale. Any male she knew would be salivating. Most of the women truckers, too. Darcy hazarded a glance upward. Yep. The ceiling was high enough she couldn’t see it. About the only thing he looked to be missing was a gigantic flat screen television. And maybe surround sound.

“I apologize.”

Darcy jumped at his voice, moving a full step backward. He was right in front of her, his arms full of large catalogs and magazines, while a lock of his hair appeared to have come loose from his band to reach a shoulder. He had dark brown hair, and even though she had some light now, she still couldn’t tell what color his eyes were. They were dark. And totally deep. There was a really strange buzzing noise in the air, as well.
Oh...wow, Darcy
. She broke the gaze and the sound halted instantly. But nowhere was safe to look. The view was spectacular. He really was gorgeous. Hot. Ripped. And since all he wore was a little mini-skirt thing fashioned of leather strips, sandals that laced to his knees, a large belt scoring his chest that held his huge-ass sword against his back, and a worried look, it was hard to get her mouth to work.

“Uh...”

“You’ll overlook the clutter?”

Darcy’s brows rose.

“I wasn’t expecting...company.”

Company? She’d been relegated to company? And he was worried over clutter? What kind of nonsense was this? And how was she supposed to answer as he moved even closer, taking over her personal space again? And worse. He just stood there; holding about fifty pounds of printed material like it was nothing. He wasn’t moving. Not a muscle. Not even to breathe.

“You do speak English, yes?”

Darcy cleared her throat and gave an answer. It wasn’t much, but at least her voice worked. Finally.

“Uh...usually.”

“Usually?”

“Listen. Uh. Yes. I speak English just fine. But...I’m going to have a hard time speaking anything if I have to look at you while I do it.”

Oh great, Darcy. What idiot was in control of her mouth?

He grinned. Her heart dropped again.

“I know the sensation,” he replied. “I’m having difficulty with words, as well.”

Okay. Darcy thought she’d had every pick-up line tried on her. This one was new. Her heart decided it would rather shove its way up to her throat, blocking any attempt at swallowing. Thank goodness he wasn’t watching! This was completely worrisome.

“I need to put these away. You won’t move? You’ll stay right here?”

He was really rather cute. He even appeared to flush as he asked it. Darcy nodded.

Man! The guy could move. One moment he was right in front of her, and the next he was way over on her left, opening a cabinet, shoving his stack of magazines and catalogs inside, and then slamming the door. A blink later he was back. All, without expending one bit of effort. No harsh breathing accompanied any of it. And she had a very good view of his torso. She’d be able to spot breathing. Or maybe she imagined his movement. And this cave. Flying. The death and chaos scene back at the archeological site. Maybe this was all a dream. Maybe he wasn’t even real. But that would mean the fallen angel theory was wrong. Darn. It had been a rather fun thought, too. Darcy inhaled. His entire frame seemed to tighten. Or something that made striations ripple through his pecs. And she really had to look away if she wanted to make sense when she spoke.

“Where...are we?” she asked.

“Below the acropolis.”

“We’re in Athens? You have to be joking. That’s like...miles away.” And he couldn’t have flown that far or that fast. Or could he?

His forehead wrinkled. Dang! That was cute, too.

“Why do you ask that?”

“Because the acropolis is in Athens. It’s got a complex of buildings on it called the Parthenon. And I don’t normally know this stuff, but I’ve just spent the last week or so getting a crash course on all kinds of Greek stuff, despite every inclination against it.”

His puzzlement cleared and he grinned again. He had some very nice smile lines, and really fine, straight, white teeth. And there wasn’t a fang anywhere in sight. And there went the vampire thing, too. Right out the window.

“Every city has an acropolis. It’s a term for high city.
Acro
is a root word that means high. It is in words such as acrophobia, which is fear of heights. The other part:
polis
? That means city. It’s the root of several words as well. Police. Politician.”

Oh. Great. She had to dream up a gorgeous Greek guy just so he could turn into a fountain of useless facts, too? She must’ve read too much after eating a really tainted meal and then tried to sleep. None of this was real. And that meant she could just go with it. Because sooner or later she was going to wake up. And while that would be a shame, given the view, it was still inevitable. She gave him a deadpan expression.

“So, if we’re under an acropolis, what city is above us?”

“Hephaestia.”

“Right. Hephaestia. That name sounds familiar. Is that another god?”

He nodded. “Hephaestus. Aphrodite’s husband.”

“Oh yeah. The guy in charge of fires and forges. The one tossed out of Olympia by Hera because she didn’t like his face or something. And didn’t that cripple him when he landed? But hasn’t he got an entire island named after him or something?”

“Several cities as well. Including the one above us.”

“Well. That just clears everything up, doesn’t it?”

His brows drew down and his eyes narrowed, and Darcy’s pulse decided to ramp into a staccato-type rhythm. Wow. That sort of look was enough to make any woman’s knees weak. She had to lock her legs to keep from swaying.

“Are you making fun of me?” he asked.

Darcy gulped. Okay. If this wasn’t a dream, then she was really being stupid. She’d just seen him murder a bunch of guys prior to abducting her, and now she was alone with him. And he might be the best looking thing around, but he was probably certifiably insane. The last thing she should do was piss him off.

“No,” she answered.

He grunted and his eyes came out of their ‘I-could-kill-you- and-enjoy-it’ mode. He still looked dangerous. Or maybe what he really looked was deranged. She had to keep him talking. Speech. Communication. Thought processing. That was the ticket to sanity. Or so, her Psych professor had always claimed. Maybe she should’ve stayed in college.

“Wh-what is your name?” she asked. Good. The first word was stammered, but the rest came out just fine.

“Thanos.”

Thanos? Damn! Sweet name.
Totally fitting. And her mind had to keep moving so her mouth would keep making words. “What is your last name, Thanos?” Saying his name aloud gave her worse than goose bumps. She trembled before she could halt it.