The impact of her words sent his soul spinning like a top. For a moment he lost possession of his body, felt it slipping away from him.
Quentin was trying to take it back.
“No,” he cried. “Not yet.” He leaped away from Johanna and flung himself at the nearest wall, pounding his body against it until the pain convinced him that it remained in his power.
His body. His.
“Fenris?”
She stood by the chaise, unruffled, not even bothering to close the gap in her bodice.
Arrogant bitch. “A bargain,” he said, hating and wanting so much that his bruised body screamed with the unrequited need to hurt in turn.
“You will answer?” she asked.
“Five minutes,” he said. “And then—” He smiled and pointed at the chaise in a way she could not possibly misunderstand.
Chapter 17
Johanna let herself sag against the chaise, just enough to be sure that her body would not fail her, not enough for Fenris to sense her vulnerability.
Or her fear.
His thoughts were transparent on his altered face. She had prayed that hers remained hidden, and it seemed as if her prayers were answered. She held the advantage. Reason must always win out over savagery.
She had no doubt that Fenris was capable of savagery. That was what made the situation so remarkable, why fascination warred with fear and kept her mind racing.
For Fenris was Quentin. Not Quentin as she knew him, but another manifestation of his personality, ordinarily hidden from the world. She’d caught glimpses of him before, but now she had no further doubts.
And with his appearance came hope for the answers she had sought.
She had heard of such phenomena, read of them in books, rare though they were: incidences of two personalities sharing a single body, alternating ownership of it. In France there’d been the case of a woman named Felida. Two completely dissimilar women had existed in separate lives, total opposites in nature and ambitions. One, the original Felida, had been dull and gentle; the other, which her physician called her “second state,” was flirtatious and wild. When one held ownership of the body, the other disappeared. And only the second personality knew of the other’s existence or remembered the other’s experiences. For Felida, whole periods of time—hours, weeks, eventually months—simply vanished.
Never before had Johanna the occasion to witness this bizarre syndrome for herself. It explained so much, yet her knowledge was pathetically deficient. If she could only speak to Fenris as she did Quentin, win his trust, she might find the way to heal Quentin’s complex illness.
The key lay in this personality she confronted, in his mysterious origins—and in how much he differed from the gentle man she knew.
In at least one way he resembled Quentin. Her mention of May’s father had been an act of desperation, based upon speculation and instinct. What Quentin hated, Fenris might also hate.
As what Quentin desired, Fenris also desired, without the inhibitions. And yet Fenris had been prepared to make a bargain.
“Four minutes,” Fenris said.
She focused on him again, seeking Quentin behind that sneering mask. He was there, no matter how deeply buried he seemed.
“You were in town last night,” she said, speaking as she would to any patient.
He wasn’t fooled; his sharp white incisors flashed a predatory glint. “Yes.”
“You attacked May’s father, did you not?”
“Yes—once I got rid of Quentin.” His lips contorted in disdain. “Is that the best you can do?”
“Why did you attack him?”
“I don’t need a reason.” He stretched, cracking’the joints in his spine. “I enjoyed it.”
He was lying. He had a reason. He, or Quentin.
“You said before that you know much more than Quentin does. What did you mean?”
“Can’t you guess, Johanna?” Her name on his lips became almost an obscenity, laced with the threat of sexual perversions beyond naming.
“Quentin doesn’t realize you exist,” she said. “But you know everything he does, feels, thinks.”
“Another brilliant deduction.” Idly, he touched himself, outlining the heavy fullness of his erection. “He pretends I don’t exist, to save himself. Stupid fool. If I weren’t here, he would have died long ago. I keep him alive only for my own sake.”