“Okay, thanks, Rafe. I’ll relay that to my Deputy Director.”
“Nice talking to you Agent Biers, you too Emily,” Rafe said.
“I’ll be in touch,” Biers said. “Nice talking to you, you too, Tess.”
“Likewise,” I said keeping the derision I felt from my words. “Aunt Emily, I appreciate the call.”
“Happy to help, Tess. You two come over for dinner soon, just give us a couple hours’ notice and we’ll plan something.”
“Sure, Aunt Emily, we’d like that.”
I disconnected the call and turned to Rafe. “Now what are we going to do?”
In response, he took the nearly empty coffee cup from my hand, set both our cups on the nightstand, and slid in next to me.
“Really? This is how you want to handle serious news?” I asked as he bent to wrap his lips around my right nipple. He mumbled something as he sent shivers of electricity through me. “Ah, hell,” I said gripping his hair and pressing him to my breast.
Chapter 5
Raphael
February found us, as it finds everyone north of the equator at that time of year. We had just returned to what I was beginning to consider as home base, Joe’s cabin. We’d spent the last week in Guatemala, sorting out a creature that had started making trouble on the edge of a tourist resort. I wasn’t particularly sure what the damn thing was, but it looked a lot like The Creature from the Black Lagoon, a movie I still remembered from my early childhood. I hadn’t seen any lagoons near the site, black or any other colors, but the creature had webbed feet and hands, gills on its neck, and claws that would have made a bear proud.
Tourists had been disappearing on trips to Tikal, one of the old Mayan cities. When Verðandi had sent us the summons, only one tourist had disappeared, but another vanished before we could get there and still two more hadn’t returned to their hotels by the time we’d tracked the beast down. I didn’t know if the thing was some kind of mythical Mayan creature or if it had just happened to fall through a portal near Tikal. It really didn’t matter much to me, one way or the other.
We had staked out the pyramids and the jungle around Tikal for a couple of nights before we caught the creature attempting to grab another tourist. Since I hadn’t found the remains to the missing tourist, I thought maybe something was just carrying them off. That gave me hope that we could have located them and gotten them back. Alas, that wasn’t to be. When we saw it, the creature was making no attempt at taking its prey alive. We put a stop to its predation and then incinerated the remains. We spent a couple more days trying to locate the missing tourists, but had no luck.
It was Tess’s first summonings (if you don’t count the Garden of the Gods) and she was more upset than I expected at not being able to rescue the people the creature had taken. I tried comforting her, but it put her in a dark mood for a few days. She didn’t even want to train and just sat around the cabin brooding.
Finally, I decided I needed to get her attention on something more cheerful.
“Tess, wake up,” I said as I shook her shoulder lightly.
She blinked awake and for a moment, gave me a warm smile, then memories came back to her and her brief smile morphed into a frown. “What is it?”
“Let’s get some food in you and get going. I want to take you somewhere.”
“Where?” she asked, without moving.
“It’s a surprise, but it’ll answer a question you asked me months ago,” I said as I yanked the covers off her.
While she normally slept in the nude, the last couple of nights she’d taken to wearing a brown U.S. Army nightshirt that hung nearly to her knees.
“All right. I’m getting up. Is the coffee ready?” she asked as she swung her feet to the hardwood floor.
“It’s brewing. Come on, schnell schnell,” I said as I pushed her toward the bedroom door.
“What’s the rush, Boss?” She put an inflection on my title. It was something she only did when she was irritated with me.
“There are things that need to be done in daylight and you’re wasting it.”
I continued pushing her out the door and into the bathroom.
“Okay, okay. Stop pushing.”
I didn’t stop until we reached the toilet.
She turned to me, frowning. “Are you just going to stand there?”
Grinning, I shook my head. I turned and left the bath, pulling the door shut behind me.
When she came out of the bath, I was standing in front of the door holding a steaming mug of coffee.
Tess took the mug and managed to force a smile to her face. “Thanks, Rafe. I know I’m not pleasant company right now.”
“It’s understandable, but you’ve got to snap out of it. This won’t be the last time that we lose people. Even Wanderers can’t save everyone. God knows it’s upset me enough times over the years, but you can’t dwell on the losses.”
She stepped close and kissed me, a brief, sweet kiss. “I’ll dress. Could you fix me a couple pieces of toast with jam?”
“Sure, it’ll be ready in a jiff.”
Tess carried her coffee back into our bedroom, leaving the door open. I watched her for a few seconds as she set the mug on the dresser and slipped the nightshirt over her head. She bent to slide open the drawer where she kept her underwear. Still bent, she looked back over her shoulder at me.
“Enjoying the view?”
I grinned. “Always.”
“Just get my toast.” She turned away and started pulling clothing from the drawer.
Still grinning, I went to the kitchen pantry and took out
