skin, and how he kissed me with delicate savageness, as if he sensed my turmoil and sought to turn it into raw need instead.
He would have succeeded. Our icy surroundings wouldn’t have stopped me. My prior resolution to keep him at emotional arm’s length wouldn’t, either—I’d already failed at that. But there was one thing stronger than even my desire for him.
“Stop,” I murmured, ducking my face away. “I told you, I have something important to show you.”
The wind snatched away his groan. “What, my sad death from a terminal case of blue balls?”
I stifled my snort. “Being celibate won’t kill you, but I don’t trust Ashael not to send you into a trap. Yes, you can handle yourself, but I’m incurably paranoid, so humor me. Plus, a new memory could drop you at the wrong moment.”
He shrugged. “Have your ghost friend tail me, then, if it’ll make you fret less. For all I know, she’s here now.”
“Leah?” I called out, sighing when there was no response. “She probably couldn’t keep up with Ashael teleporting us. Something about demons throws off ghosts, but that’s off topic. If this relic retrieval is a trap, I, ah, wanted to show you how you can summon me.”
He stared at me until more than the cold and bracing wind made me squirm. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
I shrugged as if I wasn’t revealing my most dangerous secret. “Whatever my other nature is, it can be summoned the same way demons can. Good thing the ritual isn’t as complex and dangerous as summoning my father. That’s deadly, but to summon me, you just need my blood, my true name, and these symbols.”
So saying, I pierced the tip of my finger with a fang, then drew the symbols across Ian’s palm with my blood. The cold froze them into place and Ian’s gaze drank in every curve of the symbols. When I was done, I shifted self-consciously.
“You can take a picture with your mobile, if you want.”
“No need.” His voice was thick. “I’ve memorized them.”
Now, we both knew I couldn’t run from him again. If he summoned me, I’d be pulled to his side no matter where in the world I was. But I hadn’t been able to run before anyway. Not for long. What drew me to him was stronger than any ritual.
I wasn’t ready to say that out loud, so I dragged my palm across a fang, then surrounded the falling blood with ice and shaped it into a small cylinder that I covered with magic. Now, the blood-filled ice cylinder would take weeks to melt instead of minutes. I handed it to Ian, still not meeting his eyes.
“Keep this with you.”
He bent me backward with the force of his kiss. When I was burning on the inside despite the brutal cold, he released me.
“After I get back with that relic,” he said in a tight voice. “You will be in my bed.”
I hadn’t been able to look at him before. Now, I couldn’t look away. “Why? We never used a bed before.”
The sound he made was too rough to be a groan. “Then it’s high time that we broke one.”
Chapter 19
Ian borrowed weapons from Ashael when we returned. As he picked his deadly choices, Ashael told Ian that the horn was located inside an underwater structure off Japan’s westernmost island of Yonaguni. Since that was beyond Ian’s teleporting skills from our current location, Ashael teleported us to a condo in Taipei, putting Ian in range of the ruins.
As soon as we were there, Ian gave me a quick, hard kiss, then teleported away without another word. I was usually the one who led the charges, so I’d always assumed staying behind was the easy part. Wrong. I felt each tick of the clock as if it were an enemy’s blade slicing into my most vulnerable parts.
To distract myself, I looked out at the city. Ashael’s condo had a great view of the many high-rise buildings in Taipei. Here and there, glimpses of green peeked out from the urban landscape, but more natural formations like gardens or parks were few and far between.
I doubted I’d ever outgrow my dislike of high-rises. They still felt . . . wrong, probably because for most of my life, structures hadn’t been much higher than the ziggurats that used to dot ancient Mesopotamia when I was human.
I stopped before I allowed myself to lament the other changes the industrial age had wrought, but kept pretending