“I have questions, too,” Mencheres said coolly.
Take a number and get in line! I thought. Ian seemed to agree. “Mine take precedence, Mencheres, but neither of us is asking her anything here. Too many ears.”
I seized on that. “You’re right, we need to leave and I have places to be. Text me. This time, I swear I’ll reply—”
His laughter cut me off. “You have a better chance of convincing me to stake myself, and I’m not even joking.”
But I can’t be around you! I wanted to scream. It’s killing me, and if I don’t leave you soon, it will really kill you!
I forced those emotions back, wishing I could draw on my other nature to erase them entirely. But if I let that half take control, I’d be unfeeling, yes, to the point of being a mass-murdering sociopath. That would hardly do.
No, I’d have to see this through. “Fine. I’ll go with you, but first, I have to stop by my room to retrieve something.”
“I’ll have one of my men pick it up,” Ian said, nodding at the three vampires who silently followed us.
“No.” I was so emphatic, his brows went up. “Only I can get this, and that’s nonnegotiable.”
He shrugged. “As you wish, but then I’m coming, too.”
“As am I,” Mencheres said.
“Of course you are,” I muttered. “Helicopter mom.”
Ian laughed. Mencheres gave me a dark look that I ignored as I put some much-needed distance between me and Ian on our descent down the mount. Even still, I could feel Ian’s aura enveloping me like a hidden embrace while the weight from his gaze settled into my back as if it were a supernatural anchor.
It hurt so much being near Ian when he wasn’t fully Ian. He might look, sound, and act similar, but this Ian hadn’t shared his secrets with me while also getting me to share my deepest secrets with him. This Ian hadn’t faced Dagon with me, and this Ian hadn’t sacrificed himself for me in what should have been his final act because he’d—almost—fallen in love with me.
No, this Ian’s interest in me boiled down to bruised pride and a determination to obtain knowledge that would put him in more danger than he was already in. If Ian knew that the demon he’d only heard of in passing had killed him . . . he’d never rest until he settled that score. And Ian couldn’t beat Dagon. I wasn’t even sure I could unless I accessed power that might turn me into something worse than Dagon.
That’s why I had to get away from Ian as fast as I could, and I already had a way to do that. For now, I’d let Ian believe he’d won. Men were so much easier to manipulate when they thought they had the upper hand.
Besides, this night might have turned out spectacularly bad for me, but it was about to get a lot better for someone else.
Chapter 5
Silver mobbed me in his usual way when I came through the door of the villa I’d rented. When he saw Ian behind me, the Simargl’s feathers nearly burst off his body from joy.
“Don’t worry, he’s friendly,” I said when Silver dove at Ian, yipping uncontrollably.
Mencheres was nonplussed to see a winged, doglike creature flying around Ian. Ian didn’t appear surprised. He pet Silver during the Simargl’s wild aerial circles, then caught him and hugged him when Silver launched himself at Ian’s chest.
“Who’s a good little lad?” Ian asked, then chuckled when feathers flew as Silver’s wings beat frantically in response.
“You remember him?” I asked in a neutral tone.
He gave me a sardonic look. “I remember killing several vampires to rescue him. Didn’t know why until this moment. He’s the source of the Red Dragon from that night, isn’t he?”
“What else do you remember?” It flew out before I could stop myself. Just as quickly, I regretted it.
Ian’s gaze gleamed. “Wouldn’t you like to know? But it’s my turn to ask questions, and I don’t fancy asking them here. We’ve probably been followed by one of the council’s many pawns.”
“Probably,” I agreed, saying a few quick words over Silver. By the time I was finished, his downy feathers now looked like fur, his wings were nowhere to be seen, and he had a new tail where there had only been a smooth rump before. The dog collar he already wore completed his “normal pet” disguise.
Ian watched, a slight smirk curling his mouth. Did he remember that I was only speaking the spell for Mencheres’s benefit since I didn’t need to say anything in order to practice magic? Or was that one of the memories he no longer had?
It didn’t matter. Time to go. “I know a private place where we can talk,” I said, heading toward the door. “Come.”
Ian blocked my way, moving faster than I thought him capable of. “Déjà vu,” he said in amusement. “Not the first time you’ve spoken to me the same way you’d command your pet, is it? Did you have better results back then? If so, you’re about to be disappointed.”
I closed my eyes. Now Ian wasn’t the only one experiencing déjà vu, though mine came with a stab of pain. Still, he was right. Snapping out commands might give me some much-needed emotional distance, but it wouldn’t work with him. It never had.
“Fine. I’d like you to accompany me to a place I know where we can talk,” I amended. Anything to get across the threshold.
“No.” Ian’s easygoing tone was at odds with the new hardness in his gaze. “You lost your right to pick the spot when you forced me to sue the council to make you stop ignoring me.”
“I didn’t know you’d remembered anything,” I began.
“If you’d read one text or listened to one voicemail, you would have!”
His snarl caught me by surprise. Then it made me angry. True, ignoring him might not have been brave or noble, but I’d earned a little selfish cowardice after sacrificing over four thousand years of vengeance to bring him back to life!
“Who do you think you’re speaking to?” I demanded.
Ian dropped to his knees. At first I thought he was mocking me, then I was alarmed by the way he grabbed his head. That wasn’t mockery. It was agony.
Mencheres shoved me aside to kneel next to Ian. Blood trickled from Ian’s nose, ears, and eyes. Panic froze me. The last time I’d seen Ian bleed from his eyes, he’d died.
“What’s wrong?” I rasped, trying not to scream with fear.
Mencheres didn’t glance up. “Do you even care?”
Only his devotion to Ian kept me from ripping all the water out of him right then. “Yes,” I said, forcing my panic back so I could kneel next to Ian, too. “I care far more than our short time together accounts for,” I admitted.
“When are emotions ever ruled by something as trivial as time?” Mencheres muttered. Then his dark gaze lasered on mine. “From what Bones told me, a creature did this to Ian.”
“A creature?” Whatever it was, I would kill it.
“Bones called it the angel of death,” Mencheres said, stunning me. Now I knew who the “creature” was. “Ian said it was the Grim Reaper. Whatever it was, it told Ian that it could restore part of Ian’s memories, but those memories could break his mind. Nevertheless, Ian insisted.”