Jack and Djinn (The Houri Legends, #1)(46)

He voluntarily signed up for a second tour, not even coming home in between, spending the time on a base somewhere in Europe. When he finally opted out and came home after the second tour, Miriam met him at the Detroit Metro Airport, and she’d seen the difference right away. It was in his eyes, in the way he assessed her, the way he hugged her. There was a distance somehow, a gap of a million years between them, a chasm ripped in his soul by whatever he’d seen or done over there, things he refused to talk about, things that gave him nightmares.

Miriam stopped walking finally, and looked up into Ben’s eyes. She saw, for a moment, a glimpse of the Ben she had first met, and that weakened her resolve. He’d been a decent guy once. The things that had changed him hadn’t been his fault.

“Fine, Ben. You can take me to the gas station. But if you lay a hand on me, or yell at me, I swear….”

“I won’t, I promise.” He was grinning happily, and she wondered if maybe he had changed after all. He opened the passenger-side door for her and closed it behind her, slid behind the wheel, and pushed the manual gearshift into First, but didn’t release the clutch, just stared at her with a strange look on his face.

She never saw it coming. There was a flash of silver and a brief burst of pain at her temple, and then the gaping maw of unconsciousness swallowed her whole.





*





Jack sat in his apartment, idly flicking channels on the TV, a nearly empty bottle of Jameson next to him.

Empty, like his heart. The thought was melodramatic, but he didn’t care. He had tried convincing himself there were other women in the world, but it hadn’t worked. There weren’t other women in the world, not like Miriam. Not because of the thing with the fire and the healing and all that, but because of who she was. Jack lifted the bottle to his lips and drained the rest of the Jameson in a long gulp, relishing the burn in his throat. A burning throat, a wild, dizzy drunk, those were feelings he could deal with. The cracking of his heart he couldn’t.

She had just…walked away, gone with that pig, Ben. He didn’t deserve her. She was so kind and so sweet and so beautiful, and Ben was…god, so awful. Jack had trouble understanding what she’d ever seen in Ben besides his looks. Sure he was, like, six foot four and 250 pounds of solid muscle, and he wore a uniform like he was born in it. Women loved men in uniforms. Stupid. Nothing that special about a uniform. It didn’t make the guy wearing it any less of a giant dick, did it?

Right now he wanted to get on his bike and go to Ben’s apartment and lay into him, maybe bring Doyle and Jimmy with him and teach Ben a lesson. Jack stood up, wavered on his feet, and realized that maybe getting on his bike wouldn’t be the best plan just yet. And besides, his bike was still missing. He shut off the TV and stumbled to his bed, fell across it sideways, wanting to crawl the rest of the way in, but somehow he just couldn’t—his limbs wouldn’t work, and the room was spinning in crazy circles. He passed out, managing to roll over on his side in his last moment of consciousness.

Jack didn’t often dream. Or at least, he didn’t usually remember his dreams. This night, however, was different. At first he thought he’d woken up. He was standing in the doorway of his room, looking out into the living room; his stack of paintings was by the counter of his kitchen, and he turned so he could see them. That was the first hint that he was dreaming: The paintings not in their usual spot but were leaning against the adjacent wall. The next odd thing was that the painting he’d done of the candle flame was in front, when he knew for a fact it was near the back of the stack.

Jack felt drawn to the painting, pulled toward the candle flame as if he were a moth. His feet didn’t move, the flame tugging him to itself with irresistible magic, and then he was standing in front of it, and he could swear the flame was flickering and giving off heat.

He stretched a hand out and felt a breath of hot air brush his knuckles, and yes, the flame was moving, twisting and dancing on the canvas, jumping and bending in hypnotic circles, sucking him into it, closer and closer, the form of the flame looking ever more like a woman dancing, graceful curves undulating, long hair waving and skirling like Miriam’s hair.

The flame turned and grew and stood before him, taking on human form with shoulders and legs, hands and breasts, hips and eyes—glowing brilliant fiery brown eyes exactly like Miriam’s. They were not “like” her eyes but were actually hers, boring into him with the tender affection so unique that it melted him every time.

He wanted to touch her, the fire-girl, the fire-Miriam; he tried to step closer to her, but his feet were frozen, his hand was outstretched, and she shook her head, curled a finger at him, beckoning. Jack would follow her anywhere, felt his spirit drifting after her as she floated away, the canvas now empty as the Miriam-flame coruscated in the midnight dark, blowing through the window and out over the silent suburbs, Jack pulled behind as if connected to her by a string.

The image of a string refused to leave Jack’s dreaming mind, and suddenly there was a string between him and Miriam, a rope of luminous golden particles of sand stretching from his chest to hers, each speck brilliant as a miniature sun, shifting like billowing flames and radiating power. The skein of magic was a tangible thing: Jack wrapped his hands around it where it entered his chest, felt its familiar catalytic energy, brushing his soul with shades of Miriam.

The magic was Miriam, and he followed it even when she disappeared out of sight over the surrounding rooftops. His hands were coated with the magic, and before he knew what he was doing, Jack lifted his fingers to his lips and licked the magic from them. He tasted Miriam, saw her face burst into his mind and fill his thoughts, not the fire-carved creature but the real, physical person, the flesh-and-blood woman. She wasn’t looking at him in this vision; she was asleep, her face pressed against a car window, her neck contorted in an uncomfortable position. Jack focused on her image and realized she wasn’t asleep, she was unconscious, a thin trickle of blood weeping from a scabbed gouge at her temple, thick strands of brown hair escaping from her braid and sticking to the blood. Jack reached for her, needing to wipe the blood away, needing to cradle her in his arms. His fingertips neared her skin, and the vision broke.