Dirk & Steele 04 - A Dream of Stone and Shadow by Marjorie M. Liu

Author:Marjorie M. Liu
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2012-10-11T16:00:40+00:00

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Chapter Five

The winding drive from Seattle to Darrington went much faster than Aggie anticipated, but she blamed Charlie for that, because all she could think of—between preparing for her pseudo Rambo-like rescue of Emma—was his voice, his warmth, his touch.

Funny, but it was his voice that lingered heaviest in her heart. The sex he had given her—if that was what it could be called—had been past good, more than extraordinary, utterly beyond Aggie's scope of limited experience, given that she usually shut herself off before things could get too tight. Not enough trust, too much fear that her secrets would be discovered. But here, now? Her lack of inhibition was a total shock.

And yet, his voice. She missed his voice. She wanted desperately to talk with him, and not just because she needed to know more about the house Emma was being kept in, or the Kreers and their habits. She simply wished to hear him speak. To say anything.

You are so ridiculous, she chided herself. Big tough strong woman, taken down by a ghost with a magic touch and a hot, hot, voice.

Well, maybe she was being silly, but that didn't matter. Aggie missed him. The son of a bitch was growing on her. She just hadn't realized how much until his last disappearance. It bothered her, the way he left. It felt like it was against his will.

You don't know anything about him. Not really. All you're running on now is faith. Everything he's told you this far could be lies.

Maybe, but she did not believe that. Call it gut instinct, call it whatever you liked, but she trusted him. God help her, she even liked him. Maybe liked him a little more than she should. Maybe, even, that "like" was something stronger. Stronger than lust, stronger than anything she had ever felt before.

Oh, how she wanted to hear his voice.

Seattle had grown up and spread out during the years since Aggie had last been there; the suburban sprawl along I-5 as she traveled north was unrelenting, and even visions of the Cascade range on her right did little to alleviate the gray and steel and glitter of encroachment. But then she left the freeway, left behind malls and cookie cutter developments, and wended her way high and higher into a world of rock and forests. Darrington sat at the base of Whitehorse Mountain, surrounded by enough hiking trails and parks to make an outdoors-type weep for joy. Aggie thought it was all very pretty, but she kept recalling Emma locked in darkness, Emma before the camera, Emma being touched, and she had to roll down her window for some air, which was crisp, full with the clean tangy scent of wild things. Sparkling and pure.

Maybe there are gargoyles hiding up here.

Maybe shape-shifters, too. Maybe a whole host of creatures out of legend. The world fairly teemed with mystery.

But still, she wondered. Would it be possible for a gargoyle—whatever that was, since Charlie still had given

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