Burning for You (Blackwater) (11 page)

I’m still in disbelief that there
actually was a job available in Blackwater for me at all.  It makes me think a
lot about my fire elemental and my ability to change things…did I make this job
happen?  Isabel thinks I did.  Ash mentioned I did when I ran into him the day
I got the job and I’ve been questioning it ever since.  The important part is
that I have a job, so I try not to look a gift horse in the mouth over it.

Gabe has tried calling once.  He
left a message on my voicemail asking about my health.  He didn’t say anything
else.  He didn’t indicate that he was upset or forgiving about what happened on
our date, and I haven’t called him back yet.  Part of me knows it’s rude not to
call, but I can’t pretend I haven’t heard the advice everyone has given me
regarding Gabe.  I’m a huge procrastinator with everything in my life.  Why do
today what I can put off until tomorrow?  Of course, I’ll use the excuse that
I’m so busy if I finally do run into him, which is actually completely true.

I am getting frustrated today,
trying to explain something to Linda that she will likely never try and
understand.  I know she’s capable, but she refuses to learn anything I have to
teach her.

“If the NDC is eleven digits, you
have to look at the pattern to verify where to put the zero,” I am saying for
possibly the sixteenth time today.  “It’s all about the format.  The 4-4-2
format means you add it in the very first position.  The 5-3-2 format means you
add in in the first part of the middle segment, which is the sixth position-“

“Can’t you just write it down?”
Linda croaks.  “Explaining it to me won’t help.  You don’t explain things very
well.”

I sigh.  “Linda, I made you a cheat
sheet right here last week.  But I’ve been checking all of the HCFA forms
you’re filling out and you’re still not adding the eleventh digit where it
belongs.”

“Maybe it would be easier,” Kelly
offers, “if the pharmacy actually printed the NDC on the prescription correctly
to begin with.  Then we wouldn’t have to figure out where the zero has to go, and
less chance of an error on our end.”

“Actually, I agree,” I say.  “But
I’m not even sure if the system can handle eleven digits yet.”

“Maybe we should find out,” Kelly decides. 
Linda has already checked out of the conversation, so Kelly lowers her voice
and whispers.  “You probably will have more luck getting pharmacy to change
their habits than Linda would anyway.  And I think you’re explaining it just
fine.”

I nod, smiling and knowing what
she’s hinting.  “Maybe I’ll run down to pharmacy right now and find out.  On
the third floor, right?”

“Yup, just take the West elevator
down to three and it’s the clear glass section to your right.  You can’t miss
it.”

“Perfect,” I say, standing up and
stretching luxuriously.  “I could use a walk, anyway.  I feel like I haven’t
stood up all day.”

“Me either,” Linda says, getting up
and taking her coat from the hook behind us.  “I’m going for a walk.”  Which
means she’s going to smoke.  Kelly and I roll our eyes and I hide our matching
smiles.  Kelly turns back to look at her screen and I leave our kiosk,
realizing that not standing up all day means I really have to pee. 

I stop in the washroom on my way to
the west elevator.  My days at my new job are flying by, considering how busy I
am.  After doing my business, I stop for a quick check in the mirror and am
horrified by how crazy I look.  My hair is uncombed, and I’m pretty sure I only
put eye shadow on one eye this morning.  I sigh and rub a wet finger on the
shadowed eye to attempt to even them out.  Then I splash my cheeks with some
cold water and comb my hair down with my fingers.  It’s managed to tangle itself
into complete disarray within the six hours I’ve been at work today.  Usually I
wash it and go, but often I’ll take the time to brush it after it dries at one
point during the day after I get to work.  I’ll add it to the list of things
I’ve forgotten to do today, along with my right eye, go to the bathroom, and
eat.  The dark circles under my eyes relay how many hours I’ve spent at the
hospital this past week.  I manage to get myself looking halfway presentable
and head on my way to the elevators to go visit the pharmacy.

Even though it’s only one floor, I
don’t feel like going down the stairs.  I’ve been warned not to use them by
Kelly, who tells me that the stairs are for doctors having extramarital affairs
with nurses and also sometimes patients who are lost and not always in the best
state of mind.  So either you’re going to bump into a sex scene or a psycho,
neither of which I care to encounter today.  Inside the elevator, I hit the “3”
button.  I lean against the wall and close my eyes, enjoying having the
elevator to myself.  When the doors open on the third floor, I must have dozed
off, because I hear a very familiar voice saying “Are you getting off or
staying on?”

My eyes pop open and I’m face to
face with Ash Lavanne, who seems very amused to find me standing up with my
eyes closed in an elevator.  “Getting off, now that you’re here,” I say, and
then turn beet red when I realize how dirty those words sound.  Why is it every
time I see him I’m flustered in some way?  Top it off with looking as crazy as
I do right now, and I’m just winning this whole day.  I step out of the
elevator but he doesn’t get on.  “Are you getting on?”

“Not any more, now that you’re
here,” he says, echoing my comment with about as much sass as I originally gave
him.  I feel the heat rising to my cheeks and I bite my lip.  “I find it interesting
that I would run into you here again.  Of course, I was curious to know where
you worked within the hospital so I could come and find you and harass you.”

“Well how sweet,” I say
sarcastically.  I’m secretly pleased, of course.  “Here to visit Erika?”

He nods.  He stands and leans
against the wall with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his black leather
jacket.  Today he’s wearing a white t-shirt, long and slim blue jeans and
sneakers.  On anyone else, they’d look like clothes.  On Ash, they look like
they’re designer clothing sewn custom for him.  “We had lunch.  Of course, I
would have preferred to have lunch with you, but you won’t seem to give me the
time of day, Miss Holt.”

And I’d have preferred to have you
for lunch, I think.  “That’s not true,” I protest.  Just the way he makes my
entire body stir up like I’m on fire makes me nervous, though.  “I’ve been
busy.”

“Not with Gabe, I hope?” he asks. 

“No, not with Gabe,” I say.  “Why? 
Jealous?”

He nods emphatically, making me
laugh.  “Insanely.”

“I could say the same about you
going to see Erika all of the time,” I reply. 

Ash’s eyes glitter as he smiles, his
half lidded gaze making me squirm.  “I do believe you’re actually flirting,
Miss Holt.”

“Maybe I am,” I say.  “So what is
she to you?  Really?”

He smiles and then suddenly reaches
out and snatches me by the waist with one snakelike arm and pulls my body right
up to his own.  I gasp and find myself panting as he lowers his face, pressing
his hips directly against mine.  My breasts are so close to his chest, they
feel crushed against him.  “I think we both know,” he says softly in that dark
velvet voice, “that anyone else besides you and me is completely irrelevant now
that we’ve found each other.”

I look up into his eyes and we are
locked together in a moment, oblivious to our surroundings and as he said, no
one around matters.  His full lips twitch and I want to press my own against
them, burrow my fingers in his hair and have him carry me out of here and do very
dirty things to me.  Instead I am paralyzed by him, waiting for what he will
say or do.  I wish he will read my mind and give me what I want, and what I
feel he wants.

“How can I know that?” I whisper
back.  “What if it’s all a lie?”

“It’s not,” he says, his words
making his lips brush against my own, sending a shiver of pleasure down through
me.

“Ash?” I hear a voice say.  The
bond is severed and we jump back from each other.  Erika is standing near us,
in her white pharmacist’s coat and her red framed glasses that indicate she’s
in work mode.  “I thought you’d already left.”  She doesn’t sound very upset,
but the look she’s giving us is somewhat agitated, making me uncomfortable. 

“I ran into Leah,” he says softly,
his words and voice warming me.  He always calls me “Miss Holt”. 

“I actually was coming to see you,”
I say to Erika apologetically.  “I had some questions on how your system holds
the NDC information.”

She nods.  “Fine, follow me.  Ash,
I’ll talk to you later.”  Her voice is dismissive, and Ash respectfully nods at
her and looks at me, not saying anything.  I stare after him as he walks away,
no longer heading toward the same elevator where we ran into each other.

Erika is chilly with me but not
rude, entirely businesslike and not chatty or friendly, but I’m okay with
that.  I’ve learned that Erika at work is very professional and very different
from that first night she “helped” me by kidnapping me from Gabe at Chez
George.  I learn what I can from her as quickly as possible, thank her and then
escape back to my desk.  The moment I sit down my cell phone rings.  “Hello?”

“Was she okay with you?”  It’s
Ash. 

“Can you see me or something?  I
just sat down,” I tell him, looking around the ICU in search of him.  Not as
though he’s hard to find.

“I’m stalking you, remember?” he
asks.  I smile, but it’s still creepy.  “Was Erika rude?”

“No, she was fine,” I reply.  “She
told me what I need to know.”

“She won’t interfere with us,” he
tells me.  “Not when it’s supposed to be this way.”

“You’re being cryptic,” I say. 
“But I feel like I’m the one interfering with her.”

“Not at all,” he says.  “She’s not
my catalyst.  You are, Miss Holt.”

“I liked it better when you called
me Leah,” I say quietly.  There is no one sitting near me, Kelly has gone on
break and Linda is probably still smoking, but I feel self-conscious flirting
on the phone while I’m at work.

“Leah,” he says softly, making my
insides melt and quiver with his deep, dusky voice.  “I want you to come to my
family’s house this Saturday.”

“What’s Saturday?” I ask.

“Our Halloween party,” he says. 
“It’s a masquerade ball and it happens every year.  It’s quite the Coven
event.”

“Sounds interesting,” I say.  “Do I
have to wear a costume?”

“As long as you’re wearing a mask,”
he says.  “Then yes, you should wear a costume.”

“Okay, I’ll come.  Tell me how to
get there.”

“I’ll send a car for you,” he
says.  “It’s not easy to find.”

“What time?”

“The car will be there at eight,”
he says.  “And take you to the house for the party.”

“And if I’m wearing a mask, how
will you find me?” I ask him. 

“The same way we always find each
other,” he says.  “We just do.”

Masquerade Balls are apparently a
Coven thing, I find out, when I ask my mother where I can find a mask.  She owns
several that haven’t been used in years.  All nine of them have their own silk
lined boxes and each is completely different and beautiful.  They have a paper
mache base and some have actual gemstones with gold, silver and even ivory
accents.  “Sometimes it’s easier to find the costume first and then choose the
mask,” my mother explains.  “But sometimes you build the costume around the
mask.  I still have every costume I’ve ever worn with these, but they would
never fit you.”

I sigh, knowing that this would be
more stressful than just showing to a party dressed up.  I’m almost positive
there won’t be beer in cans, either.  Why Halloween?  Why can’t it be just a
party?  “Was Halloween always a big deal for you and Dad?” I want to know. 
It’s not normal for a grown adult to have so many costumes, I think. 

She sits on her bed, next to where
she has all nine masks laid out on display.  “Yes, Halloween was special.  We
met at a Halloween party at Normandy.”

“Normandy?” I echo.

“The Lavanne estate is called
Normandy,” she explains.  “I was fifteen and it was my first party.  My mother
brought me there.  Lisette Lavanne was already on her second husband, Miles,
and only twenty one years old.  She was already pregnant with her third child. 
I was in awe of her.  Even six months pregnant she was breathtaking, and made
me feel like a gawky teenager.”

“Lisette is Ash’s mother?” I want
to confirm.  I remember my mother told me that day I broke the chandelier about
how she was also Gabe’s mother.  “What’s her story?”

“I can barely keep it all straight
myself,” my mother says.  “Lisette has stayed a Lavanne since she married
Pierre Lavanne when she was sixteen.  It’s somewhat of a Coven tradition that
if you marry into a certain family, you stay in that family.  You marry their
next oldest sibling, and so Lisette has just gone down the line of Lavanne men
until there were none left for her to marry.”

I laugh, but realize she’s dead
serious.  “So how many husbands has she had?”

“Four,” she says, and my jaw
drops.  “Let’s see, there was Pierre who died of a heart attack.  When I met
her, it was Miles, who was killed.  Everyone knows that Bo, her third husband
was the one who killed him, but Bo went on to marry Lisette, who was pregnant
with her fifth child when Miles was killed.  I’m pretty positive that Demetri
Lavanne is Bo’s son, though Lisette has always claimed that his father was
Miles.”

“Wow,” I say.  “So that’s three
husbands.  Where does Ash fall in?”

“Ash is Gerard Lavanne’s son,” my
mother continues.  “And Gerard was a seventh son and Ash is a seventh son. 
According to the Legend, to be the seventh son of a seventh son is one of the
most powerful things you can be.”