Chill Factor Page 0,79

me when," Jonathan pointed out, and when Kevin opened his mouth to rectify the mistake, Jonathan held up a single finger and waggled it.

Kevin shut up.

"Hey!" Siobhan glared, and took a step forward. She had cheap plastic high-heeled hooker shoes, but great balance, and the orange toenail polish was all that. She was too sharp in the chin, too narrow in the eyes, but the whole package was effective as hell in a knit top and low-rise jeans. "He owns you, man! You have to do what he says!"

"Siobhan," Kevin said quietly. "Don't."

"Yeah. Don't." Jonathan's tolerance for Kevin clearly didn't extend to girlfriends. "Butt out, Red, and I won't feel the need to show you the curb the hard way."

"Chill Factor"

That gave me a nice, cold shiver. When Siobhan started to fire back a retort, I shook my head. "No," I said. "He's not kidding. Just relax, okay?"

"Like you care." She had a glare identical to Kevin's. Interesting. Maybe he actually had found a soul mate, all the way out here. A soul mate with her picture plastered on call-girl cards all over the street, but hey, it wasn't like Kevin was fresh out of the Innocent Academy. Kevin would find someone more screwed up than himself to fall for. It was inevitable. Since he'd been powerless for so long, someone in worse shape than him would have a powerful appeal.

"I care," I said gently. "I'm trying to keep him alive. Just do what this guy tells you, okay? And let me handle the witty banter."

Jonathan was looking bored. When I turned my attention back to him, he did an exaggerated lift of his eyebrows to indicate just how extreme his ennui was.

"What do you want?" I asked.

His eyes flickered, and for a second I thought he really was going to swat me like a fly. And then he smiled. "Okay. Here's the truth: I want you to be careful."

"And you care because...?"

His eyes focused briefly and pointedly where the warm spark of life fluttered inside me. "Got reasons."

"I'm not naming him after you, if that's what you're thinking."

Jonathan's lips curled into a deeper smile. A real one, nothing sinister or sarcastic about it. When he looked at me like that-no, at what was in me-I felt faint. He had the same supernatural power David possessed to make women's clothes fall off; he just rarely bothered to show it. I was grateful. If he'd looked at me like that before, I might've handed over David's bottle without a fight.

Well, not really. But I would've thought about it.

Chapter Twenty-one

"Because of Imara," Jonathan said. Purred, actually. It was that kind of a word.

"Excuse me?" Before I could react, he stood up, reached over, and put his hand over my stomach. His touch was hot enough to scorch, almost painful, and I opened my mouth to yelp...

... and it ceased to hurt at all. There was a fast whirl of images that burned through me: a young woman with luxuriant black hair that fell in cascades to her waist. Laughing, talking, moving with the supernatural fury and grace of a Djinn. Her lips were David's. Her eyes... God, her eyes. Stern and burning, and the color of pure gold. She smelled of warm things, vanilla and cinnamon and woodsmoke; she was smiling and then she was gone, a whisper, a memory.

I caught my breath and felt tears run cold down my cheeks. Where Jonathan's hand had rested felt branded.

"Imara," I whispered. My child.

He was still next to me, close as a second skin, and his lips were warm at my ear. "Djinn can be born only out of death."

"So why are you keeping me alive, then?" I wiped at the tears, angry. He took a step back.

"Not human death. Not powerful enough."

I felt a cold flash, and said, "The death of a Djinn?"

No answer. Just that look from him, unexpectedly unguarded.

"And not just any Djinn."

"No," he said. "Not just any."

I felt light-headed and sick, every cut a nuclear fire, every ache another notch on the torture rack. My head throbbed hard and continuously, a strobe light of pain. I was aching and weary, and my hairline-fractured collarbone screamed every time I dared to move it, which now that adrenaline was fading I didn't even attempt.

I slowly let myself sit down again. "You mean David," I whispered. "David has to die for her to be born. God, I can't do this."

"Can't what?" he asked me. "Can't survive? Sure you can. That's what people