In the distance several other ambulances were lined up as they treated victims. They’d separated the female attackers from the males they’d raped for obvious reasons, but everyone there was a victim.
After a few moments, Morales left the goat guy in the hands of the unis and jogged over to my ambulance.
“Anything?” I asked, keeping my eyes on the med wiz, who was removing an IV from my arm.
“According to the school, the sororities were hosting some sort of charity dinner tonight. Best guess is Dionysus had this asshole pretend to be a waiter and spiked all the wine with the potion they stole from Aphrodite.”
“He say anything about how he got hooked up with Dionysus?” I asked. Talking was good. Kept my mind too busy to play the endless loop of me propositioning him.
“Dionysus has been recruiting people for a few weeks. Guess he promises them that after the Blue Moon, they’ll run the city or some shit.” He shrugged. “Classic cult tactics.”
I nodded. “That research Shadi did on the god Dionysus said he had a couple of cults. One was a group of satyrs and the other was a gang of lustful women called Maenads. They were known for frenetic sex rites. Maybe this was our Dionysus’s homage to those myths.”
“I’d say this counts.” Morales’s expression was grim.
The med wiz took the cuff from my arm. “Your blood pressure has leveled out. I’m going to release you, but promise that you’ll get plenty of fluids and rest for the next twenty-four. The saline drip should have cleared out any lingering potion, but the magic he used was pretty dirty. You need to take it easy.”
“Thanks,” I said with a nod.
He handed me a bottle of water. “Take your time. I’m going to go check on the others.” With a parting nod to us both, he ducked out of the ambulance.
Sighing, I rolled my sleeve down and swung my legs over the side of the bed. The sudden movement made blood rush to my head. Morales was at my side in an instant.
“Easy there.” He placed a steadying hand on my shoulder.
I shook him off. “Just moved too fast,” I snapped. “I got it.” My defensiveness was due partially to embarrassment, and partially to the lingering tenderness between my legs.
He grimaced like he wanted to argue but backed away.
I kept my eyes focused on my shoes so I wouldn’t have to look directly at him.
“Kate.”
“Yeah?” Eyes on the wall right behind his right shoulder.
He stayed silent until I was forced to look at him. The instant my gaze touched his face it ricocheted back to the wall. “What?”
“Look, if you’re worried that what happened let your secret out, you shouldn’t worry.”
I frowned. “What secret?”
From the corner of my eye I saw those lips curl up. “That you’re totally hot for my bod.”
My mouth fell open and, all traces of embarrassment forgotten, I rounded on him with a glare. “You fucking—”
His laughter cut through the anger and cut me off. “Gotcha!”
I punched him in the arm. “Asshole.”
“Relax. You were under the influence, right?” His mischievous eyes danced toward the gurney I’d just vacated. “Or did you want to bang right here and get it over with?”
“Bang? Really? What are you? Fourteen?”
He reached out and chucked me under the chin. “That’s some of my best material, Cupcake.”
The problem was I knew that if he ever dropped the charming rogue routine and got serious, most women—me included—would be pretty powerless to resist. Even though I didn’t harbor a secret crush on Morales, it was hard to deny he was sexy as hell. An asshole, sure, but that’s the kind of lover I preferred. Assholes were uncomplicated. They didn’t get all emotional or confuse sex with promises. I didn’t have room in my life for more feelings or complications. And somewhere deep in my gut—probably in the same spot the potion had lit up like a Roman candle—I knew that Morales would be one hell of a lot of fun in the sack.
All of these thoughts rolled through my brain while we stood in the cramped quarters of the ambulance. We were practically plastered against each other, each trying to pretend that we weren’t both suddenly wondering what it would be like to give that gurney a workout. And I was suddenly very aware of the heat coming off him and the scent of his cologne and the sheer size of him. A man like Morales could make a self-sufficient woman believe she’d like being treated like a randy wench for a couple of hours of naked fun.
A throat cleared nearby. I turned quickly, leaving Morales at my back. Mez was standing on the ground by the ambulance’s bumper. “Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“You weren’t,” I squeaked. “I mean—we were just—”
Mez shuffled his feet. “Sure, yeah. Anyway, I, uh—they’re taking the goat dude to the precinct for booking. Shadi’s going to meet them there to make sure he doesn’t get lost in the shuffle.”
A warm hand landed on my shoulder. The shit of it was I didn’t have any potions to blame for the heat the contact conjured. “Sounds good, Mez.” His deep voice was so close to my ear that hairs stood at attention on my neck. “Thanks.”
“I’ll just be going then.” Mez said.
A sudden realization hit me: If I let Mez go, I’d be stuck with getting a very awkward ride home from Morales. “Wait!” I all but leaped out of the ambulance after him. “Can you drop me?”
Mez frowned, and his gaze pinged back toward Morales. “You sure?”
“I don’t mind—” Morales began at the same instant.
I turned, looking at his shoulder again instead of his face. “It’s on Mez’s way. Besides, I’m sure you need to hang out and wait for Gardner, right?”
He was quiet for a suspicious few seconds. Long enough that I chanced a peek at his face. “Yeah.”
“And the med wiz said I needed to rest, so I’ll just go home and get some sleep so I can be back in commission later today.”
“Okay, yeah. That makes sense.” Morales cleared his throat and shoved his hands in his front pockets. “Just let me know if you need some more downtime.”
“I’m good,” I said. “Just tired.”
Mez had a pained expression on his face. “All righty, I’ll just—uh—go get my car.” With that he practically ran away.