the book.
Angel stopped looking down her shirt and shook her head. “No, Tucker—the entrances are where you need to worry, and you got those. And besides….” She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t think you have to worry about him violating you in your sleep.”
Tucker shuddered. “I’m anxious to hear why.”
“You wore the pentacle and he saw you. It made him capable of attacking you. Outside the house. But the house has thresholds—human sanctuaries do. Ghosts often stay inside the confines of a house even if it’s burned to the ground. They recognize boundaries. They’re hungry for rules, since the basic rules of humanity have deserted them. I think he will—consciously or unconsciously—shy away from violating the rules of the world as it’s set up inside the mansion.”
Mm. “Interesting theory,” Tucker muttered as he walked to the bathroom and washed the gunk off his hand. “But he didn’t seem all that happy about rules when he was alive.”
“I disagree,” Angel said thoughtfully. “I think he was actually locked into the rules of his time. Women were believed to be inferior creatures. He subscribed to that rule. His wealth gave him privilege. He believed that too.”
Tucker grimaced at his black eyes and swollen nose in the mirror. “I guess, yeah. Even the drug use would make sense. Cocaine was a big thing back then—and not particularly illegal either. Not yet. So yeah, he was a monster. But he locked his monstrousness behind social rules. I guess I get that.” He met Angel’s eyes in the mirror, marveling at how, in the middle of that lush beauty, those eyes were still perfectly green with luminous gold flecks and still perfectly Angel’s. “So we’ll hope the old rules of hospitality don’t desert him, now that we’re supposed to be sleeping under the same roof. Still….”
He grimaced, not sure whether he felt better or worse about asking for help from a beautiful redheaded woman than from a ruggedly handsome auburn-haired man.
Maybe he just didn’t like asking for help from a potential lover, period.
“You are going to stay with me when I sleep, right?” he asked.
“Of course,” she agreed, those green eyes as wide and as earnest as they had always been. “I… I wish I didn’t have to rest as well. When Ruth was here, I’d dematerialize—float in the aether, waiting for Ruth to call me. I did not feel time there. Sometimes she wouldn’t call me for weeks.”
There was a plaintiveness, a forlornness in her voice, something that made Tucker ache.
“I’m glad you’ve been there for me,” Tucker told her, smiling gently so she’d know he meant it. “I don’t think I could go a week without hearing your voice—any of your voices—so I’m just as glad you stay with me.”
“But I need to rest too. That’s when you see me sleeping. I can’t stand eternal watch over you, Tucker. I’m not that kind of—”
“Girl?” Tucker supplied sweetly.
“Apparition,” Angel said with dignity. “All things wax and wane.”
Tucker frowned. “Hunh. Interesting. Strength and weak—” His nose dripped. “Fuck me. I’m tired of blood.”
He started to strip, throwing his clothes in the hamper, and then he turned sheepishly toward Angel. “Could you, uh, you know, milady, maybe…?”
The smile that tilted those full lips was whimsical and knowing. “Still the same person.”
“Forgive me for long-ingrained sexist mores,” Tucker replied stubbornly. “And don’t watch my naked ass, okay?”
He heard Angel’s low and womanly laugh as he hauled his sweaty, blood-crusted body into the shower. He kept the water cool, and as it sluiced down his body, he tried to imagine that sound as a manly chuckle—and failed.
Whoever—whatever—Angel was, the two genders fit her as easily as Tucker’s one gender fit him.
Tucker managed a smile, thinking that he was exceedingly lucky that being attracted to all of Angel was not going to be a problem for him.
Following through on that attraction? That was going to be a problem for both of them.
TUCKER GOT out of the shower and looked around, realizing that he was alone. “Angel?” he called.
“In the other room, Tucker. Giving you your ‘space.’”
That was sweet. “Thanks. Augh!” His nose was still dripping. He wrapped a towel around his waist, then grabbed a clean washrag from the shelf. Holding the washrag up, he bumped the door open. “Uh, Angel?” Again, this was horribly embarrassing to ask. It was one thing when Angel looked like a clueless guy his age, but right now, she was about as intimidating a woman as Tucker had ever known, and he’d had