The Dark-Hunters, page 448
Her heart was racing with the prospect of having someone corroborate that the book was as old as Atlantis—to have them verify it was Atlantean in nature …
It would be a dream come true if he could actually read some of it.
“Is there any chance we could meet with him?” she asked breathlessly.
“Hold on a second and let me see.” He pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and dialed it.
Tory chewed her thumbnail and silently prayed to talk to the one man who held the key to her book. She’d give anything to meet him …
Julian smiled at her. “Hi, Acheron, it’s Julian Alexander. How you doing?”
She could faintly hear the voice at the other end of the phone.
Julian laughed at something the man said. “Leave it to you … look, the reason I’m calling is I have a colleague here in my office who has something we need you to take a look at—I personally have never seen anything like it, and I think from a historic point of view you’d be very interested in it, too. Any chance we can stop by?” He shook his head. “Yeah, it’s some really old shit—nice phraseology, by the way.” He paused as he listened. “Yeah, okay.”
Julian looked at her. “Can you leave right now to see him?”
“Absolutely.” She’d crawl over broken glass to meet the man!
He returned to his call. “She can do it. We’ll see you in a few.” He hung up and smiled. “He’s a little busy at present, but he’s more than happy to look at it.”
“Oh, bless you both!”
Julian returned the book to her. “Would you like to follow me over?”
“Sure. Where are we going?”
He picked his jacket up off the back of his chair and shrugged it on. “Acheron’s doing volunteer work for Habitat for Humanity. He’s over on Esplanade on a rooftop.”
Tory frowned at the image in her mind of a stodgy classics professor on top of a roof. “So his name is Acheron…?”
“Parthenopaeus.”
She laughed. “Good grief, I never thought I’d meet someone more Greek than me.” With a name like that, he had to be old. No modern parent would be so cruel.
With a strange twinkle in his eye, Julian grinned. “Yeah, he’s amazing when it comes to historical facts. Like I said, he knows ancient Greece better than anyone I’ve ever known or heard of.” He led her out of his office.
“How long has he been studying it?” she asked as he locked his office door.
“Since the moment he was born.”
She cradled her briefcase to her chest. “Poor thing, he sounds like me. I swear my father was reading the Iliad to me the instant I was conceived.”
Laughing, Julian led her out to the parking lot. She got into her white Mustang GT and followed his black Range Rover over to Esplanade. There were still a lot of homes in New Orleans that hadn’t been repaired since Katrina. It did her heart good to know that Julian’s friend would be kind enough to help out with the rebuilding. It said a lot for the man, especially given how old he must be.
She parked on the street behind Julian and grabbed her briefcase. As they neared the house that was teeming with volunteers, she tried to pick out who this incredible historian was that the leading expert in the world would consult.
There was a handsome older man handing a piece of lumber off to a younger man. He looked like he might be a historian.
Julian headed toward him. “Hey, Karl, could you tell Ash that I’m here to see him?”
“Sure.” He headed away from them and rounded a corner, out of sight.
Julian held his hand out for the book. Tory pulled it out and gave it over to him.
She scanned the area and looked up at the roof where five people were sitting. Two were women and three were young men. But it was the one off by himself who captured her attention. Wearing a black tank top, he had the best set of arms she’d ever seen. Tanned and gorgeous, every muscle was honed to perfection … and it wasn’t just his arms. The sweat from his hammering made the shirt cling to a muscled back that had been custom-made for licking.
He wore a black ball cap turned backwards and even from where she stood she could see the black earbuds that led to an iPod in the back pocket of his ragged jeans. His left foot kept time to the beat while he worked.
She sucked her breath in sharply at the sight he made. Mama, if that man had a face even remotely cute, he’d be a god among men.
Her phone started ringing. Distracted, Tory glanced at it to see her friend Kim calling. She shut it off and then looked back at the roof.
Dang, Mr. Hottie was gone. It was just as well … she didn’t have time for men anyway and a guy like that would never look at a woman like her. She glanced around again for the man they’d come to find.
She saw the one who’d gone for Acheron. He headed off to the other side of the house without saying a word. A couple of people came from around the corner and then she saw the guy from the roof …
Holy gods of Olympus. He was unbelievably tall, lean and ripped. His shirt clung to that perfect body and didn’t quite reach the waistband of his pants. Instead, it exposed a mouth-watering glimpse of a hard tanned washboard stomach. His jeans rode low on his narrow hips, dipping down so much that it made her wonder if he had on underwear. He wore a pair of dark sunglasses and was chewing gum in the sexiest manner she’d ever seen. Sweaty and gorgeous, he reached up to pull the ball cap off … and set free a mane of coal-black hair with a red stripe in the front.
No … surely this wasn’t …
Of course it was. She’d know that meticulous, sexual lope anywhere.
He slowly pulled the earbuds out as he approached them. “Hey, Julian.”
And when he looked at her, she wanted to scream.
“You fucking asshole!” she snarled, shocked at the fact that such language actually left her lips in front of Dr. Alexander. She’d very seldom in her life used such, but then she’d never hated anyone as much as she hated this guy.
She looked at Julian. “You go to him for advice? He’s only what? Five years old? I swear I own older sweaters.” She whirled around to go back to her car.
“Didn’t you want me to look at something?” the man taunted with a hint of laughter in his voice.
Those words put her into a realm of pissed off the likes of which she’d never known before. Raw, unmitigated fury blinded her and before she knew what she was doing, she’d jerked a hammer off the sawhorse beside her and thrown it at his head.
Unfortunately, he ducked it … then laughed. Laughed!
Unable to stand his mockery, she rushed to her car, hoping she didn’t give into the urge she had to run them both down.
* * *
Julian turned a wide-eyed stare at Ash. “Damn, Atlantean, what did you do?”
“I apparently made a new friend.”
Laughing nervously, Julian shook his head. “I made a friend like that once. The bastard almost gutted me.”
“Yeah.” Ash felt a wave of guilt that he’d hurt her so badly. But it was nothing compared to what would be done to him if she’d succeeded in her quest. “Guess I’ll get back to my roof.”
Julian inclined his head to the street. “I have to go and find her so I can return this.”
Ash went cold as he saw the small square package in Julian’s hand. “Return what?”
“It’s a journal she found on some dig in Greece.”
“Can I see it?”
“Sure.” Julian pulled it out and handed it to him.
Ash’s hand shook as he made himself betray no emotions. But inside … inside he was raw with grief. He opened the cover and saw the handwriting he knew so well.
Today is the eighteenth anniversary of my birth. Father woke me up with a new necklace and Mother and I spent the morning in our garden. Father was always kind enough to let her visit for the anniversary of my birth.
Ash clenched his teeth as he pictured the garden that Ryssa had kept so meticulously groomed. He’d never known that she’d shared it with her mother.
“You can read it, can’t you?”
Ash nodded. “It’s an old dialect. Provincial.”
“Well, I’d say it would make her happy to know that, but after her reaction to you, I’m not so sure.”
Neither was he. Then again, he deserved her anger. “Mind if I hang on to this?”
Julian hedged. “It’s not really mine. However, I trust you to do what’s right with it.”
“Believe me, I will.”
Julian inclined his head to him, then turned to leave.
Ash stood there, holding his sister’s journal. He couldn’t believe it’d survived so well. It’d been buried under the sea since the day he’d sunk Didymos. But unlike his mother, he’d made sure that all the living people were gone before he’d obliterated it.
Now he had a piece of his past returned to him like a haunting ghost. The question was what was he going to do with it?
CHAPTER THREE
Three days later as she walked across campus, toward her office, Tory was mad enough to spit out iron nails. How dare Dr. Alexander give her journal to that … that …
One day she was going to think of a word that would adequately describe Acheron’s particular breed of low, gutter, nasty, vile … ness.
“Dr. Kafieri?”
She turned to see Kyle Peltier, one of her students, running up to her. He was a typical junior, with blond hair and a sweet face. He’d just transferred from another school this semester and was one of her better students. “Yes?”
“A friend of mine asked me to give you this.” He held out a box wrapped in kraft paper.
She stared at the unexpected gift. “I don’t understand.”
“Me, either, but when he asks for a favor, you do the favor without asking why.”
Tory frowned at his cryptic words as she took the box. Kyle immediately rushed off before she could ask him anything more. “Well, that was interesting.” The box was heavy. She shook it, but couldn’t figure out what it might contain.
Her current luck, a bomb.
Pushing the thought aside, she made her way to her small office, grabbed a cup of coffee and then set about opening it, which was easier said than done. It was like the giver had hermetically sealed it shut with tape. “I hate when people do this!”
Finally, after no less than five minutes, she was able to detach the lid from the box and pull it free. Opening it up, she froze. It contained a hammer, a handful of olive leaves, a note attached to a single red rose, and a leather pouch the same size as a small book. Her heart pounding, she picked up the brown leather pouch and opened it to find her journal.
A smile curled her lips. So the little monster had done the right thing. Now she was able to laugh about the hammer and the olive “branches” he’d put inside. She picked up his note and opened it to find a beautiful masculine script.
I’m really not the asshole you think I am. The journal’s from a young woman in an isolated part of Greece and documents her life for about eighteen months. It’s pretty much boring reading, but if you want more details, call me. 555-602-1938.
Eirini,
Ash
Eirini—Greek for peace. Tory shook her head. Not the asshole she thought—yeah, right. But it was kind of a sweet gesture and he had returned her journal.
With a rose.
Holding it up, she inhaled the sweet scent and debated whether or not she ever wanted to lay eyes on the troll again.
* * *
With his arms crossed over his chest, Urian frowned at Ash while Ash sat on his throne in Katoteros and played the guitar. Almost as tall as Ash, Urian had long white-blond hair that he wore pulled back into a ponytail. A former Daimon, Urian had been saved by Ash after Urian’s father viciously cut his throat. And like his father, Urian had a most acerbic personality that he was more than proud of.
Not willing to deal with Urian’s ill mood swings or explain himself, Ash ignored the man while he continued to sing Matchbox 20’s “Push” under his breath.
Simi lay on her stomach, watching QVC as she devoured a tub of barbecue-flavored popcorn. She was dressed in black tights and a short plaid skirt with a pink and black peasant top and corset.
Urian moved to where Alexion stood off to the side, also staring at Ash as if Ash were a science experiment that had gone seriously wrong. For thousands of years, Alexion had been the only person Ash allowed in his home besides Simi. Of course that was out of profound guilt since Alexion had been Ias—one of the first Dark-Hunters Artemis created. Ash had managed to bring him back to a quasi-ghost existence by using his blood to keep Ias from being a Shade.
Too bad Savitar hadn’t explained those powers to Ash sooner. It would have saved both him and Ias a lot of grief. But at least Ias wasn’t in constant pain and misery.
“What’s the deal with the bossman?” Urian asked him.
Alexion shrugged. “I don’t know. He came in last night with a book, went to his room to read, I suppose, and then he came out here this morning and has been playing … those songs ever since.”
Those songs were ballads, which Acheron never played. Godsmack, Sex Pistols, TSOL, Judas Priest, but not …
“Is that…” Urian physically cringed before he spat out the name, “Julio Iglesias?”
“Enrique.”
Urian grimaced in horror. “I didn’t even know he knew any mellow shit. Dear gods … is he ill?”
“I don’t know. In nine thousand years, I’ve never seen him like this before.”
Urian shuddered. “I’m beginning to get scared. This has to be a sign of the Apocalypse. If he breaks out into Air Supply, I say we sneak up on him, drag him outside and beat the holy shit out of him.”
“I’ll let you and the demons do that. I personally like my semi-living state too much to jeopardize it.”
Ash looked up and pierced them both with a malevolent glare. “Don’t you two girls have something better to do, like pick out toe lint?”
Urian grinned. “Not really.”
Ash growled a low warning, but before he could really threaten them, his phone rang. Leaning his head back, he sighed in frustration. Damn phone was always going off. This time it better not be Artemis screwing with him or he’d hunt her down and—
His thoughts scattered as he saw a New Orleans area code. He didn’t recognize the number and it didn’t register a name. How weird. Flipping it open, he answered.
“Is this Ash?”
“Soteria?”
Tory’s throat went dry at the way he said her name. Because she was Greek, she’d never really thought Greek was a pretty language, but when he spoke it …
She could barely form a coherent thought. “Um, Tory. I go by Tory.”
“Oh, I didn’t know. Can I do something for you?”
Yeah, baby, get naked and …
She shook her head. She never had thoughts like that and she didn’t know why she had them now when she had business to discuss with someone she absolutely hated. “Uh, yeah, I was wondering about the journal. Is there any chance you could meet me later and tell me more about it?”
“What time?”
Grateful he wasn’t hanging up on her after she’d tossed a hammer at him, she smiled. “I’ll be home in about an hour.”
“I’ll be there.” He hung up.
It wasn’t until Tory had closed the phone that she realized something. She hadn’t told him where she lived. “Oh my God, he’s a stalker.”
Her phone rang.
She answered it to find Ash there with that deep, mesmerizing voice. “I just realized I don’t have your address.”
Laughing, she shook her head at her overactive imagination. “I’m not hard to find. I’m at 982 St. Anne down in the Quarter.”
“I shall see you later then.”
The archaic way he said that actually sent a shiver down her spine. Hanging up, she couldn’t help but smile and she didn’t even know why.
He’s a jerk. A complete and utter ass.
Who’d sent her a rose and who appeared to know how to read a language no one else could. A language she desperately needed to understand. This was business. It wasn’t a date. She could stand his pushy arrogance long enough to get what she needed and then she was going to toss him out on his butt.
* * *
Ash hesitated as he flashed himself a few houses down from Tory’s. Like the woman who owned it, it blended in with the rest of the houses on the street. Really nothing about it stood out, yet it was plainly beautiful. Painted a very pale pink and trimmed in antique white, it was a typical New Orleans turn-of-the-century shotgun rowhouse. The shutters were drawn tightly closed and as he tried to see inside to find her, he saw nothing.
Nothing.
You should probably run.
But why? All it meant was that they’d be friends of some sort. This wasn’t the first time this had happened to him.
Bullshit. Even when you were destined to be friends with someone you caught glimpses of them.
With her there was nothing …
That actually scared him and yet he found himself walking up to the door and knocking on it.
He heard what sounded like something getting knocked over inside followed by a low whispered, “Shoot!” He bit back a smile at her obvious distress. There was more scrambling about before she opened the door.
Her brown hair was down today. Thick, shiny and wavy, that hair beckoned to be touched … no, it beckoned a man to bury his face in it and breathe her in. How could he have ever thought it plain? No wonder she’d worn it up the other night. Not to mention, it made her look a lot younger when it was down around her face. Her cheeks were flushed, which made her sharp, intelligent eyes glow.
And those lips …
Plump and full, they were made for a night of kissing.
But the best part had to be her glasses, which were ever so slightly askew. As if sensing it, she straightened them and blew a stray piece of hair out of her eyes. “Sorry. I have technical difficulties making it through a room without bumping into something. Thank God my clumsiness is only restricted to the ground. I’d probably kill myself diving if I was this bad underwater.”
