of physically leaving the house to go get her grub. But he couldn't explain the complex emotions coursing through him right now. Profound knowing slammed into his mind with each footstep as he crossed the great hall, and then crossed the marble foyer and opened the oak French doors. Bright early morning sunlight met him, but he knew that the darkside would never stop coming for them, and with each passing week, it would be harder and harder for Damali to hide the fact that she was pregnant-then what?
Even though he remembered what Adam and Ausar had said, the Neteru Kings telling him not to worry, how was he supposed to do anythingbut worry? The fact that he was so twisted up in knots pissed him off. Panicking was not an option; it was the best way to tip his hand, show the other side vulnerability, andthat was definitely not an option.
He had to remember that serious hallowed ground that not even daywalkers could breach protected his wife and the rest of the team. All of them had been under self-imposed house arrest since they'd returned from Greece. He had to remember that they'd reinforced the compound with silver, holy water, protective prayer barriers, and every conceivable anti-demon technology available. He had to remember that the darkside was blind to this location, as were their human helpers, courtesy of a little Divine intervention by the angels. Then it dawned on him . . . why was he worrying so much? Was he poisoned?
More than anything at the moment, however, he needed todrive, needed to move, needed to break through his own fears and reenter the world-the restored silver Bugatti was Damali's sweet, sweet thing, but the gleaming red Saleen S7 in the garage was his precious. Fuck all this lying low. That was never his style, dead or alive.
Carlos rounded the garden pathway to the garage, preferring to enter it that way rather than by going through the entire house to enter the spacious carport. His head felt like it was about to explode, and he didn't know why. Worry was one thing, but this was something much more intense.
Salt, she wanted salt. The baby was building blood volume in the first trimester. It was a fact that anyone could read online or in a parenting magazine article while sitting in a doctor's waiting room. But a very old part of him sensed it, perhaps worse, he'd literally smelled it . . . the minute changes in the hormone concentrations in her blood . . . in the baby's blood. Maybe that was what was freaking him out-if he could still smell that acutely after no longer being a full vampire, what could very old councilmen pick up in the hundredths of particles per billion coursing through his wife's veins? Lilith would know . . . her husband would know-then it would be on.
Sesame seeds.Damali had said she had a taste for sesame seeds. Carlos wrested his mind away from the brink of an outright panic attack as he walked. Sesame seeds were chockful of nutrients, especially those that fed a growing baby's brain. He punched in the code and impatiently waited for the long garage door to open.
What he couldn't understand was,where did the sudden kill-rush come from?
Carlos walked between the lines of custom-kitted parked vehicles and then opened the butterfly door on his red racer. His S7 had been put back together lovely after all the body damage she'd sustained in Death Valley, just like Damali's Bugatti had. Rider's boys from the Arizona Guardian team had done a fantastic job.
Remembering the run-in with Fallon Nuit almost made him snarl as he slid against the butter soft leather interior, yanked the door closed, and gripped the steering wheel. Yeah, now he knew why he'd wanted to kill something-just thinking about what had happened to Heather on the back of Dan's bike that night sent a chill through him. Damali couldn't miscarry again, and at the same time, as her belly grew, the harder it would be for Heather . . . maybe even for Juanita, who desperately wanted a child, too. There was so much bullshit to think about it was making his mind crazy.
"Damn!" Carlos started the engine and shifted the gears hard, peeling out of the garage. Driving with one hand, he leaned over and popped open the glove compartment to pull out his sunglasses, hurriedly put them on, and pushed them up the bridge of his