Forsaken (The Netherworlde Series) (11 page)

He’s like that, he’s like Nemamiah.

Gabriel stepped outside with Sam. Jason didn’t realize he’d been holding his breath until it escaped him at that moment in a long, shuddering sigh. He also hadn’t realized that he’d picked up the pistol again, and now his palm was slick with sweat against the grip. To his surprise, he’d also tucked his finger against the trigger and settled his thumb against the safety, all unconsciously, even though the gun didn’t have any bullets in it.

He shoved the pistol beneath the waistband of his sweatpants at the small of his back as Sam came back into the building. The pool of sunlight, pale and dingy against the floor, yielded once more to shadows as she closed the door to the bar, locking a series of heavy dead bolts. She turned and regarded him as he stood in the doorway.

“Well,
that
was weird,” she remarked at last, then blushed brightly and began to laugh, as awkward and giddy as a teenager caught necking by her parents.

He laughed with her, and when he walked toward her, she didn’t shy away. He took her face between his hands and she didn’t resist as he tilted her face up and kissed her. Her fingers slid into his hair, pulling him close, and within seconds, he was aroused again. Sam could surely feel it as he backed her gently against the bar.

“Stop,” she whispered, the tip of her nose brushing his as she shook her head. He continued kissing her, letting his lips trail to the corner of her jaw, the slope of her throat. As he made his way south from here, she tilted her head back, tightening her grip on his hair, her already pounding heartbeat quickening all the more.

“Jason,” she breathed as he began to massage her breast, toying with her nipple through her T-shirt and bra. “Jason, stop.” Her fist pulled sharply, painfully against his hair, and he drew back, leaving her wide-eyed and gasping softly for breath.

“We can’t do this,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry.” She didn’t belong to him anymore. He knew this in his mind, but his heart remained stubbornly unconvinced. She didn’t belong to him, and what he’d done, what he continued to do, had crossed Christ alone knew how many boundaries. “I’m sorry, Sam,” he said again. “I just…I can’t…”

I can’t help myself,
he wanted to plead.
It’s been five years for you, but only one day to me. I can’t make myself stop loving you, not like that, not that quick.

Sam raised onto her tiptoes and startled him to silence with a sweet, gentle, lingering kiss. “I wasn’t finished,” she said with a smile. “I was going to say we can’t do this…” Reaching between them, she caught him by the hand, then began to lead him toward the hallway again. “Not
here
anyway.”

****

It was as if everything had returned to normal, at least for the afternoon. Jason and Sam had returned to the apartment and spent the next several hours making love. When the phone rang, however, interrupting them, Sam had glanced guiltily past Jason’s shoulder toward her nightstand, the cordless handset that rested there.

“I should get that.” She said this even as she reached past him.

“Leave it,” he teased, making her laugh.

“Jason, stop.” Taking the phone in hand, she leaned back again, sitting upright beside him on the bed. “Hello? Hey, Bear. What? No, no, I’m okay. I…just”—a quick glance at Jason, a nearly silent giggle—“got out of the shower, that’s all. My cell’s in the other room. I must not have heard it ring.”

Jason sat up, leaning toward her. Using his fingers, he brushed the long sheaf of her dark hair back from her shoulder to reveal her throat, then leaned forward. He didn’t kiss her exactly, instead letting the tip of his nose, his lips light ever so softly against her skin, tracing a slow path toward her ear.

“Yeah, everything’s fine.” She tried to shrug him away, but when he kissed the lobe of her ear, drawing the tip of his tongue lightly against her, her breath fluttered and her voice faltered, fading to a low, contented murmur.

He pressed her back against the bed. She tried only halfheartedly to push him away, still holding the phone to her ear. “No, I think I’m going to…to run out this afternoon.”

With a crooked smile, Jason began to kiss her right leg, beginning with the inside of her knee and working his way down the length of her inner thigh. The closer he drew to her hips, the more ragged her breathing became.

“Just some errands,” she squeaked, her voice hitching. The lean, sleek muscles in her thigh quivered beneath his lips. “No, I…I just…I…” When he reached her apex, she whimpered, her body tensing.

“I have to let you go,” she whispered in a hoarse rush, then hung up the phone, throwing it aside. After that, she didn’t say another word, not until he’d finished with her.

Around midday, he roused from a light doze to find her still awake beside him, watching him as he’d slept.

“Hey,” he said with a sleepy smile and a soft groan as he stretched. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

It had actually been the first occasions of sound, dreamless, comforting sleep he’d enjoyed since he’d come to in the alley the night before, one in which he hadn’t been plagued by nightmares that felt like memories.

“That’s okay.” Sam smiled, brushing his hair back from his face. “I didn’t mind.”

“It’s not the company, I promise,” he told her, making her laugh.

She smiled again but there was something sad in her eyes, in the way her fingertips lingered against his temple, then trailed lightly down to his cheek. Concerned, he reached for her, slipping his hand against her nape.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, and she shook her head. Her eyes had grown glossy with tears, though, and he sat up now, propping himself up on his elbow. “Sam, what is it? Tell me.”

“Nothing,” she whispered. “It’s just…you don’t know how many times I’ve dreamed of this over the last five years, seeing you again, being with you, feeling you inside me.” She managed a clumsy laugh. “I’m afraid to fall asleep, to close my eyes, because when I open them, you might be gone again.”

“No.” He shook his head, then drew his other hand up to her face, making her look at him. “No, Sam, I swear. I won’t leave you again. Not ever.”

He kissed her, over and over, tangling his tongue with hers. He felt her leg slide across him beneath the sheets, the warmth of her skin against his own, her slight weight as she settled atop him, pressing him down against the mattress again.

“Make love to me again,” she breathed, kissing him in between her words, and he nodded, moving his hands from her face to her hips, raising his own so that he could steal inside her one more time, her warmth enveloping him.

When she came, she came hard, crying out breathlessly in his ear, clutching at him, her body sweat-glossed and shuddering. She crumpled against him and he slid his arms around her, cradling her to his chest, feeling the racing cadence of her heartbeat slowing against him.

I’ll never leave you again, Sam,
he thought, closing his eyes, breathing in the sweet fragrance of her hair.
I swear to God. Wherever I’ve been, whatever happened to me, it’s over now and behind me. This is all that matters, you’re all that matters. I’ll never leave you again.

She’d propped one of the windows open again, and when a car pulled up in front of the pub, they heard the well-tuned purr of its motor draw abruptly to silence.

“Someone’s here,” Jason said, even as Sam sat up astride him, her cheek flushed brightly from where she’d been resting against his heart. They both heard the sound of a car door slamming, then the crunch of footsteps against concrete on the sidewalk below.

Sam slid off him, crawled across the bed, then went to the window. She peered between the blind slats, then drew back in wide-eyed surprise. “It’s Dean.” With a frantic pirouette, she scrambled to pick her discarded clothes off the floor.

“Your Jeep’s in the alley.” Jason sat up, watching as she hopped into her jeans, one leg at a time. “He won’t know you’re here unless he goes around the side.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Without bothering with a bra, she tugged her T-shirt back over her head. “He has a key.” She flipped her dark hair out from beneath the collar, then clumsily smoothed it back behind her ears. “Wait here. Let me handle this.”

She started to walk past him but he caught her by the hand. The bedroom door was closed to keep Barton out. From beyond it, they heard the dead bolt turn on the apartment’s front door, then the happy jangling of the tags on Barton’s collar as the dog rushed forward to greet their visitor.

“Sam?” Dean called.

“Jason, let me go.” Sam tried to flap him loose, but he pulled her back down to the bed. She was anxious, nearly alarmed, and when he kissed her, she shook her head. “Jason, stop. I have to go talk to him. Okay?”

It didn’t matter to him if Dean walked in and caught them making love—a part of him
wanted
that, even, an instinctive pissing game in which he wanted Dean to know without a shadow of a doubt that Sam was his again. He’d reclaimed her, body and heart.

But five years had passed and things had changed, and it was obvious that Sam cared about Dean. She didn’t love him. She didn’t need to tell Jason this—he could see it in her eyes, feel it in the urgent way she’d kissed him, made love to him, but nonetheless, she had feelings for Dean. She didn’t want to hurt him.

“Okay,” he said, nodding, relenting and letting her go.

“Stay in here,” she whispered, and he nodded again as she stood. “I’ll be right back.”

****

“I’ve been calling and calling,” Dean said from the living room. Jason could hear him as clearly as if he stood a foot away from him. More than this, he could see Dean now, if only in his mind, as the other man stood facing Sam in the apartment living room.

Sam had left the bedroom, but Jason had followed closely behind her. At least, the Eidolon had. He’d brushed his fingertips against the floor, hanging his hand off the side of the bed, and as it had the night before, his shadow had stretched out in a thin, nearly fluid stream, slipping beneath the door and trailing down the corridor beyond to reach the living room. It might have only been a hallucination, but in that moment, with him wide-awake, clear-headed and in relative broad daylight, there had been no denying it. Like something out of
Peter Pan,
his shadow was alive. Never mind how insane that sounded.

“My cell phone’s in the kitchen,” Sam said. “And I dropped the handset in the bedroom earlier. I think I broke it. I haven’t heard it ringing.”

“I was worried,” Dean said, looking around, clearly suspicious.

“No need to be.” Sam managed an awkward laugh. Hooking her hand against his sleeve, she tried to steer him around to face the front door again. “The electrician came by this morning. He found some things with the circuit panel downstairs. Here, I’ll show you.”

“That’s okay.” Dean shrugged himself loose. “Where is he?”

She didn’t need elaboration on who he meant. “In the bedroom. He’s sleeping. I guess. I checked in on him a little while ago and he’s been out cold.” Again, she tried to guide him toward the door. “I was just about to hop in the shower, but it can wait. Why don’t we walk down the street to the Sugar Shack, grab some lunch?”

“I’ve got to get to work,” Dean said. He frowned, cutting a dark glance toward the hallway, the bedroom beyond. “I thought you said Bear was going to be here. I don’t like the idea of you here alone with that guy.”

“He had to go to work. He’ll be back this evening, he told me. And will you stop calling him that? It’s not some
guy.
”
Sam frowned, planting her hands on her hips. “It’s Jason.”

“No, Sam, you just
want
it to be Jason,” Dean said. He started to say more, opening his mouth and drawing in a sharp breath, but in the end, shook his head and flapped his hand. “You know what? Forget it.”

As he walked toward the door of his own accord, Sam caught his sleeve. “Forget what?” Dean shook his head again and her frown deepened. “No, Dean. Tell me.”

Dean looked at her for a long moment. “Bear’s right, you’ve got your hopes up. You want to believe that Jason Sullivan is back from the dead somehow—”

“He
is
, Dean. He’s in there, living proof.”

“But I’m telling you, Sam, there’s no way he could have survived the kinds of wounds he suffered.” She tried to cut him off again, and he raised his voice, sharp now and angry. “And if he did, if he somehow beat odds higher than his chances of getting struck by lightning at the exact same moment as winning the lottery, all while getting hit by a bus, then he should have catastrophic brain damage.
Catastrophic,
Sam, as in he shouldn’t remember
anything
:
how to speak, eat, walk, talk, much less where he lived, who any of us are—hell, who
he
is. He should be laying in a bed somewhere, eating through one tube and pissing out another. What’s happening here isn’t possible. There has to be some other explanation.”

“Like what?” Sam asked. “If there’s some other way to explain it, then do it. Tell me who that man is in there if it’s not Jason Sullivan. Tell me how he knows things about me. About us.”

By
us,
she didn’t mean her and Dean, and to judge by the way Dean bristled, his posture growing ramrod straight, he knew it too.

“He’s someone who looks like Jason,” he said. “Probably enough like him to have seen his picture in the paper. They settled the probate on this building, the rest of Jason’s estate just last week, right? The debts are all paid, the building’s been sold. Everything that’s left, the state pays out to any beneficiaries. So maybe they ran his picture again, some little things about his life, enough so that this guy got the idea in his head to try to be him.”

“Why?” Sam asked.

“My guess is to try to sue the hospital,” Dean said. “Why pretend to be a beneficiary for chump change when you can go after the deep pockets?”

“That’s ridiculous,” Sam began.

“No, what’s ridiculous is that we’re even standing here discussing this,” Dean cut in. “More ridiculous yet, you’re letting him stay with you here. He could be a psycho for all you know. A rapist, a serial killer.”