"Is he that scary?"
"Yes and no. Let's just say that I'd rather not test his limits when all we have to do is leave him alone."
"He's not harming anyone in the city, is he?"
"Leave it alone." He frowned. "I should have kept my big mouth shut."
I sipped my tea, enjoying the jasmine flavor, but honestly, the scent of Rhys's coffee overpowered the delicate perfume of flowers. Coffee would have been nice. I could try caffeine free.
"What are you thinking about so hard?" he asked suspiciously.
"I'm wondering if I could get caffeine-free coffee and how it would taste."
He laughed then, and leaned up to kiss my cheek. "We should clean you up."
He went to the sink again, and got a paper towel off the roll by the sink. He set his coffee down so he could get it wet. But the moment he came toward me with the towel, I smelled roses, not jasmine.
"No," I said, "we don't clean it off like this."
"What do you mean?" he asked.
I just knew the answer. "The ocean, Rhys, we clean it off in the ocean at the place where the water meets the shore."
"That's an in-between place," he said. "A place where faerie and a lot of other places meet the mundane world."
"It can be," I said.
"What do you have in mind?"
I took a deep breath and could smell jasmine again more than roses. "I'm not sure it's what I have in mind."
"All right, then what does the Goddess have in mind?"
"I don't know," I said.
"We're saying that a lot tonight. I don't like it."
"Me, either, but she's the Goddess. A real one like your nameless death deity."
"You're not going to let that go, are you?"
"No, because when I asked if he was harming people here, you wouldn't answer me."
"Fine, let's go down to the sea." He put his coffee down and held a hand out to me.
"Just like that, you'll go with me without knowing why."
"Yes."
"Because you don't want to talk about the death deity anymore," I said.
He smiled and made a wobbling motion with his head. "Partly, but the Goddess helped you save Brennan and his men. The Black Coach has chosen a new shape that will allow it to move through the war zone. The Goddess covered our bed with pink rose petals. She's never done that outside of faerie, or on nights when the wild magic is loose. Soldiers are healing people in your name. I think after all that that I'll take it on faith that she wants us down by the surf for a good reason."
I slid off the stool and put a hand in his. He grabbed his weapons as he moved past, and we went for the sliding-glass doors. He did add just before he let go of my hand to open the door, "If you get salt water on that silk robe it's ruined."
"You're right," I said, and undid the sash and let the robe fall to the floor.
He gave me the look that he'd been giving me since I was about sixteen, but now the look held knowledge and not just lust, but love. It was a good look.
"I don't think I'll need the robe," I said.
"The water's cold," he said.
I laughed. "Then I'm on top."
"There may be other problems with the cold."
"Ah, the guy problem with cold water," I said.
He nodded.
"Fertility deity, sort of. I think I can help you work around it," I said.
"Why does the Goddess want death and fertility at the water's edge?"
"She hasn't told me that part."
"Will she?"
I shrugged. "I don't know."
That made him shake his head, but he took my hand in his and we went out into the cool night air and the smell of the sea. We went out to do as the Goddess bid without knowing why, because sometimes faith is about that blind trust even if you were once worshipped as a god yourself.
Chapter Nineteen
The sand was cool under our bare feet, which didn't promise well for the water. I shivered, and Rhys put an arm across my shoulders, drawing me in against his muscled firmness. More than any of the other guards he was honed down to his essence, all muscle. He didn't have a six-pack, he had an eight-pack, which I hadn't known was possible.
He wrapped me in his arms and held me in the warmth of his embrace, though the metal of his gun was not warm against my bare back. He had the leather sheath of the short sword in the same hand, so it swung gently against my body. I clung to his warmth, wiggling a little closer and away from the hard press of the gun's lines.
"Sorry," he said, and moved the gun a little so it wouldn't dig into me. He laid his face against my hair. "I have weapons, but once we start ha**ng s*x I won't be able to use them. I'll be too busy using my favorite weapon to worry about guns and swords."
"Weapon, is it?" I said smiling.
I felt his smile just by the flexing of his lips against my head. "Well, I don't mean to brag."
I laughed and looked up at him. He was grinning down at me. His face was half in moonlight and half in shadow. It hid his good eye and left his scars painted silver, his face looking smooth and perfect except for that glimmer of scar, so that the scar simply became another part of that perfection.
"Why so solemn?" he asked.
"Kiss me and find out."
"Wait. Before we get distracted, my point was a good one."
"Why, yes it is," I said, and I traced my fingers over the firm muscles of his stomach toward lower things.
He caught my hands in his empty hand, and used the hand full of weapons to help hold me still. "No, Merry, not until you hear me on this." He moved his face so all of him was in the bright, soft moonlight. The light grayed his eye so that it was no longer blue at all.