Free Blood Passage (Dark Caravan Cycle #2) by Heather Demetrios Page B

palace?”
    She shook her head. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t think.
    â€œI might be a good guy, Nalia,” he said. “But I never claimed to be well behaved.”
    He pulled the fabric down and smiled—a devilish upturn of the mouth that made Nalia bite her lip. He laughed softly, then brought his mouth back down to her skin. Faint wisps of chiaan slipped from her fingers, coating Raif in liquid gold. He shuddered as her power seeped into him and then there was just warmth, gods so much warmth, and light and breath and she let go of everything except the delicious release that was pulsing through her, this unexpected grace of weightlessness.
    Nalia gasped, her body filling with light. Raif’s fingers twined with hers and his lips moved to her inner thigh, then her knee. She looked down at him, eyes wide, and he laughed softly against her skin.
    â€œFeel better?” he asked.
    All she could do was nod. Raif crawled over the blankets and lay beside her, then pulled her to him.
    There was a soft knock on the door. “You guys?” Zanari called. “I hate to do this, but the car’s outside waiting for us. Time to go.”
    Raif groaned. “Five minutes,” he called.
    His eyes traveled down Nalia’s body. She dropped her forehead to his chest and kissed the skin over his heart. She wanted this dream to be her reality, to pretend the past didn’t matter.
    To pretend she deserved him.

8
    MALEK SAT IN THE FRONT SEAT OF THE RANGE ROVER, directing the driver to get as close to the souks outside the Djemaa el-Fna as the narrow streets would allow. They’d have to go on foot the rest of the way, but luckily he could make it to Saranya’s shop in his sleep. His jinni contact had been practicing her magic in the same location for hundreds of years. Malek couldn’t count how many times he’d been in her home, drinking mint tea and talking for hours. But it’d been a while since he’d had the guts to knock on her door.
    He stared out the window, frowning. The streets were filled with peddlers selling spices, elaborately embroidered slippers, and cone-shaped tagines. Ancient palaces and souks surrounded the Djemaa like the petals of a tightly packed rose. Malek held an unlit cigarette between his fingers, tapping out a nervous beatagainst his knee. Going to Saranya was a terrible idea, he knew, but there was no one else who could help them. Even if there were, he wouldn’t know if he could trust another jinni. Saranya would help, whether she wanted to or not.
    Three years, he thought. It was hard to believe it’d already been that long. Every morning he woke up and the remembering would happen right away, the wound still fresh. Malek had told himself he’d never go back—how could he, after the terrible choice he’d made?—but he couldn’t risk losing his chance at the ring, and the sooner they got out of Marrakech and into the desert, the better.
    But that wasn’t the truth, not really. He could lie to himself all he wanted, but the real reason he was willing to endure Saranya was that even now, after everything she’d done to him, he couldn’t bear the thought of Nalia being captured by the Ifrit. They would kill her and Malek wasn’t sure he wanted to live in a world where Nalia didn’t exist. After she’d betrayed him, he’d told himself Nalia deserved to suffer, that he would make her suffer. But after sitting up all night watching her toss and turn in her sleep, having one nightmare after the other, the resolve to punish her had crumbled.
    Khatem l-hekma, he chanted to himself. Khatem l-hekma. It was what the Moroccans called Solomon’s sigil, a ring described time and again in their ancient texts, most of which filled the shelves of the study in his Hollywood Hills mansion. Though he’d combed Earth in search of the ring, Malek had always believed it would be somewhere in Morocco. The