Chapter 6
Tynan woke far less pleasantly than when Lishelle had been beside him.
He stretched, grimacing when his whole body zinged with painful tingles. Definitely not like the pleasurable shivers of her touch.
He swiveled his head against the hard, unfamiliar slab under him, wistfully wishing she might be right there…
And met her accusing dark stare.
Through a transparent wall that separatedthem. But at least she was there, sitting on the floor with her bright Thorkon gown pooled on the utilitarian gray floor. The oiled ringlets of her hair were twisted into thicker plaits, as if she’d been worrying at them.
The dreadful prickle in his body dissipated as they watched each other, to be replaced by a less physical and somehow more awful pain.
“I am not the criminal you seem to believe,”he said softly.
“You look exactly like him.” She angled the screen she’d been holding on her lap, showing him the images again. She’d been studying him—accusing him, judging him, damning him—while he lay there. “Blackworm. The Thorkon nobleman who kidnapped a dozen Earth women, killed…” She cut herself off with a loud gulp. “He said he did it to win back his dead consort from the realm of thegods. And you say you’re an Avatar of the God of Beloveds—”
“No,” he said. “I am the God of Beloveds.”
“Right. I’ve been reading about Tynan, the guy you’re named after—”
“Not named after. I am he.”
She blinked at him rapidly. “What?”
“I am Tynan, God of Beloveds.”
One last blink, and then she just stared, dark eyes wide and fixed.
Then she laughed.
She laughed so hard the device slidoff her lap onto the floor with a clatter, and the images of the face that was his but not, thankfully, vanished.
The tears he’d seen before he was shot glossed her eyes, and she curled her knuckles over her lips as if to silence herself.
When her laughter eased, she dropped that tight-clenched fist into her lap, and her gaze was as hard as onyx. “A god? You weren’tthatgood in bed.”
“Wasn’tI?” he murmured. But he didn’t let his ire linger as he swung his feet to the deck and pushed himself upright on the hard platform that was serving as his prison bed.
Lishelle scrambled to her feet, obviously unwilling to let him loom over her, even if he was locked away. “We already know you were crazy, sending people into the black hole, talking about reviving ghosts from virtual particlesand quantum physics. So don’t bother trying to act even crazier by pretending to think you’re a…a god.”
He paced slowly along the barrier between them, trying to work out the last spasms in his muscles. “It’s still not fully clear to me,” he admitted. “I remember… No, not remember, exactly. It was…a sensation. As if I were sleeping, dreaming. Then coming through the wormhole, feeling the pullfrom this side. When you told me about the wedding, I knew that’s what drew me. Beloveds, in need of my blessing.”
“You aren’t the God of Beloveds!” Her tone scaled higher. “You’re Blackworm.”
He ran his hands down his chest to settle on his hips. “I do seem to have his appearance.”
Her gaze followed his gesture, then snapped to his face with a guilty purse of her lips before she pivoted away.Had she been remembering her hands on his body?
“Lishelle,” he called. “Please. I’m not what you fear.”
When she halted, he held his breath. But though she twisted her head toward him so he could see her profile, she didn’t look at him. The second prayer, denied. “I was afraid of finding another guy I could…want to spend time with, knowing I’d be making myself vulnerable again. But sinceyou’llbe doing time, I guess that won’t be a problem.”
She strode down the corridor—and though he pressed against the barrier—out of his line of sight.
“Lishelle.” He slapped his palms to the transparent wall between them, but she never looked back.
The cell was exactly three paces wide, not enough to relieve his edginess, though he walked it, repeatedly, until he was almost dizzy from the shortexpanse. Perhaps he should be grateful they hadn’t done to him what this body had apparently done to their friends. He slammed his fist into the wall again.
