and his Bodywalker looked toward the set of windows that would have allowed him a straight view into Marissa’s office, had she not dropped the blinds in an effort, he imagined, to shut him out.
He didn’t know why the psychiatrist was a cause for delay exactly. After all, she’d been within reach for the better part of two years and, other than ogling her backside and other deliciously hot curves of her body as she’d walked back and forth past his desk, he’d never felt compelled to do anything more about his attraction to her.
But then his sister had disappeared—or so he had thought—and his entire outlook on the world, including his perspective toward Marissa “Hotbody” Anderson, had changed. How much of it was her doing, his doing, or because of Menes’s hijacking of his body, mind, and soul was truly unknown to him. All he knew was that he wanted her. Bad. Really, really bad.
Menes looked through his new host’s eyes, studying the drawn shades of the good doctor’s windows. As his and Jackson’s Blending neared the finish, Menes grew more and more aware of the strong attraction his host had for the redhead beyond the glass. Jackson may not understand his sudden compulsion to sniff after the resident shrink, but Menes did. Menes did because he was encouraging it. He was fanning the flame of it.
When he had first been reborn in Jackson, he’d been drawn too quickly to the surface, had exploded with an unexpected and dangerous surge of power. He had sublimated his host in order to speak and be heard. It was not something he was in the habit of doing. He was in the habit of unifying with his host, sharing the world they now lived in symbiotically. He gave Jackson enhanced strength, retarded aging, leadership of a great people, and a power the likes of which no one else among the Politic had claim to. Jackson gave him breath and body, sight and smell, and the resurrection of life so that there may follow a resurrection of his heart … so yes, it was a perfect symbiosis. They each brought something to the table. It would be wrong for him to reward Jackson’s invitation with an internal slavery, dominating him and forcing him to his will.
But Menes knew he would be sorely tempted these first years. It was so difficult in the beginning when two strong personalities had to learn the perfect rhythm to coexisting as one. Rather like a marriage or a great love; line-height:1.4em; } div.toc_. i. The first part—the infatuation and the fascination—was easy. The second part was where all the work lay. As many marriage vows have declared, in one version or another, throughout the ages he had lived in … in prosperity and in famine, in health and in sickness, in the daily cost of living and the tribulations of every soul, that was where the difficulties and best rewards were to be found.
And he would find it. But first … first he had to find a suitable host for his beloved queen.
He had delayed his return to mortal life even after his hundred years of waiting between resurrections had passed because his love, Hatshepsut, had been reluctant to return this time. Not through any weakness of her own, but because of his. In their last lives he had … well, that was neither here nor there. What it boiled down to was that she had finally claimed to be ready and he felt he must act with haste to find her a suitable host before she wavered and changed her mind once more. He did not have the luxury of waiting for Hatshepsut to choose in her own time when time was now his enemy. Besides, who would know better what kind of host would best suit Hatshepsut than himself?
And, he considered, wouldn’t it be best if he chose someone his new host was already heavily attracted to? There was nothing wrong with stacking the deck in his favor, and he was not above it in the least. It was what marked the greatest of leaders, the ability to use whatever one could to bring harmony between two disparate worlds and make them as one in purpose.
“Time to give this pup some dinner and well-deserved rest,” Jackson said to Manheim after clearing his throat so the sudden licks of desire sliding through him at the thought of Marissa wouldn’t come out in his voice.
“No kidding. Want to