“She wants to be a free-range human, prince,” Tucker translated.
Jonas’s jaw popped. “We’ll talk about this when we’re alone.”
A ding went off somewhere in the apartment. Ginny turned in a circle, searching for the source of the familiar sound. It took her a good fifteen seconds to realize it was coming from the cell phone still stowed in her dress pocket. She used it so rarely, she’d forgotten it was there, but she took it out now and tapped the button to bring up her email. “Oh!” Hot moisture pooled in her eyes. “Great news! We have a body being brought into the morgue tomorrow.”
“She’s a keeper,” Tucker said without missing a beat.
Before Ginny could respond, she found herself being carried down the hallway cradled against Jonas’s chest, moving somewhere between a sedate walk and warp speed. “I guess I should thank you for not putting me in shackles.”
He slowed outside of a door, measuring her with a look. “Did some exploring, did you?”
“More like memory gathering. You won’t get them all. It’ll be like playing a whack-a-mole.”
With a troubled brow, he shouldered open a door and turned on the light to reveal a small, clean, white-tiled bathroom. With no mirrors, of course. He set her down in the center of the floor, but kept her close. “I didn’t mean to make you feel like a prisoner.” His one-eyed, sheepish squint made him so handsome she swayed closer out of sheer necessity. “Technically, you weren’t supposed to know you’d been locked in. You were supposed to be sleeping.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t cooperate.”
“No, you went and had a little party, didn’t you?” He traced her hairline with his thumb. “I’m being irrational, aren’t I? That’s the opposite of me. I never have a hard time keeping a lid on my impulses.”
“What impulses are you having?”
“Wanting to blind anyone who looks at you,” Jonas murmured, his thumb traveling in circles in the hollow of her throat now. “Wanting to deafen anyone who hears you speak, so I’ll be the only one who gets to experience the music of your voice. You know, normal, well-adjusted impulses.”
Ginny couldn’t catch her breath enough to laugh. “I thought we couldn’t be together.”
Jonas’s expression blazed with regret, but it was no less possessive. “I’m going to guard you while you sleep and make you eggs in the morning. That’s what I know.” His lips brushed her forehead. “When I think too far into the future, I can’t focus on your safety. Here and now only.”
“Here and now only,” she repeated. “I guess that’s our only choice.” Jonas’s body vibrated against hers, those bright green eyes catching on her features, his fingertips moving in her face, neck, chin. Even while held in his thrall, though, something occurred to her. “If you can hear my heartbeat, you can probably hear me…using the ladies room for its intended function…anywhere in this apartment.”
Jonas’s brow quirked. “That bothers you?”
“I think so, yes.”
His laughter was warm as he pushed her gently toward the toilet. “I’ve got you covered.”
As soon as the bathroom door closed behind Jonas, she gathered her skirt in her hands and sat down on the toilet. Seconds later, heavy metal blared from the living room and she laughed into her cupped hands, finally relieving her full bladder.
He was waiting in the hallway when she emerged, looking sinfully attractive with his head tipped slightly forward, pieces of midnight hair brushing his brow, tongue tucked into his cheek. He signaled down the hallway to Tucker and the music cut out, then he tipped his head in the direction of his bedroom. “Ready?”
It might have been the beer, the odd situation—she was living among vampires?—or just The Jonas Effect, but she swore they glided into his bedroom, the way silk might move in water. Effortlessly and sensually, their fingers brushing, every look passed between them heightening a sense attachment, hunger, anticipation of the unknown, even though it might never come to pass.
Jonas’s hand slid on to her shoulder, guiding her to the edge of the bed and she went, enjoying the way he watched her nestling into his pile of sweaters and jackets, his clenched jaw making it clear he wanted to join her, yet refraining.
“Sleep as much as you can, Ginny,” he rasped. “We have a long night tomorrow.”
“Good night.” She yawned and watched his eyes soften. “I mean…day. Good day.”
The last thing she remembered before falling into a deep sleep was Jonas dragging the room’s single chair out into the hallway and taking up his post.
Then he shut the door without touching it at all.
CHAPTER NINE
Upon arriving at P. Lynn the following night, Ginny opened her digital calendar and her mouth dropped open when a reminder popped up.
Ginny’s birthday!
Tomorrow?
Apparently the looming date had been forgotten amongst the dramatic events of the last couple days, but tomorrow she would be twenty-five.
Jonas’s age, though, technically he was a great deal older.
Old enough to be her grandfather, really.
Best not to dwell on it too long.
After all, she had work to do. Their guest had arrived during the day and thankfully, Larissa had performed the intake paperwork and consulted with the family about their wishes. Now, while Ginny performed the chemical wash on Kristof, a hardware store owner with a mermaid tattoo in the center of his chest, Jonas sat nearby in the morgue reading a tattered copy of The Count of Monte Cristo.
Was he reading, though?
Every time she looked over, he seemed to be watching her above the black and beige book jacket. There hadn’t been many page-turning sounds, either. Her cheeks warmed when she caught him again, before his eyes zipped back to the text. The entire back half of her body was alive right now, tingling and sparking under his regard. Her focus was in ninety places at once, when it needed to be on Kristof.
Focus.
Morticians were often viewed as cold, clinical. Creepy. But there was an artfulness to the practice most people didn’t know about. Or didn’t want to know about, rather. She’d been taught by her father to make friends with the deceased. To try and understand who they’d been and where they’d come from. Now that she’d performed the chemical rinse and broken the rigor mortis through a careful massaging of the body, it was time to set her guest’s features, since the casket would be open at his wake.
Humming to herself, Ginny leaned over and consulted the family-provided picture sitting on her instrument table. In it, Kristof had one arm propped on the bow of a boat, his other hand stuffed into a rain slicker. A deluge fell around him unacknowledged. Kristof had been a stoic man, it seemed. There weren’t many smile or laugh lines around his face and eyes, so it wouldn’t do to form his lips into a subtle yet peaceful smile, as she often did. No, they would be sending off a hard-nosed fisherman and furthermore, that would be what Kristof would want those left behind to see. The real him.
Ginny was only beginning to lose herself in the setting of his features when Larissa appeared in the doorway of the morgue, holding a martini glass. “Oh, you’re here. Good. I wasn’t sure if I’d be running this place alone now.”