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He switched on an amber-powered locator. The screen glowed, indicating the path.

Lucy made herself walk toward the entrance, bracing for the nightmares.If a ghost hunter can get through it, I can get through it.

The nightmares seared her senses between one step and the next.

She froze, shivering with raw dread. “I can’t.”

“Here, hold the locator,” Gabriel ordered.

She took the locator and looked at it, dazed and disoriented and really, really pissed off.

“Okay,” she said, “but I don’t think it’s going to help. You’ll have to go back to the surface and get medication that will knock me out.”

“I carry some emergency meds that would do the job, but it would be a bad idea to use them on top of whatever hallucinogenic substances you’ve been ingesting. No telling what the side effects might be. I don’t think such drastic steps will be necessary. Let’s try it one more time.”

Before she understood what he planned to do, she was in his arms and his mouth was on hers in a fierce kiss that shocked and overwhelmed her senses. The sensation of sensual intimacy was a million times stronger than what she had experienced when she had sipped water from his canteen.Lightning.

The hallucinations flickered. An instant later they were vaporized. Gone.

Gabriel raised his head. She came out of the trance and discovered that she was outside the chamber looking back at the quartz throne and the fountain.

Gabriel had carried her through the doorway on a rush of heat that was stronger than the psychic barrier.

He set her on her feet and watched as if waiting to see if she was going to lose it altogether. As far as she could tell, he was completely unaffected by the kiss. He had delivered it as a form of shock therapy. Nothing personal. Just doing his job.

She took a couple of deep breaths, found her balance, and managed to dredge up some attitude.

“Thanks,” she said. “Obviously I needed that.”

“Sometimes distraction works in these situations.”

“Right. Distraction.” She frowned at the doorway. “Do you think I could have escaped if I’d been strong enough to force myself to crash through the barrier?”

Am I that weak now?she wondered. It was an unnerving thought.

Gabriel shook his head. “I don’t think you could have made it through as long as you were drinking that water. There’s a good chance you would have ended up unconscious in the doorway. If that happened, the forces that were being generated would have hit you every time you started to awaken. Eventually you might have gone insane or died.”

She shuddered. “Which was probably why my intuition warned me not to try that tactic. I wonder what the chamber was designed for?”

“Who knows? That thronelike chair and the water are unusual features. I’ve never seen an underworld chamber like it. Maybe it was a place for royalty or religious ceremonies. It could have been designed to enhance dreaming or meditation. There’s just no way to know.”

“One more Underworld mystery.”

“Ready to go home?” Gabriel asked.

“Oh, yes, please.”

They followed Otis down a corridor that appeared slightly warped to the human eye.

“I’m impressed that you trusted a dust bunny to lead you through these tunnels,” Lucy said.

“A dust bunny wearing your necklace and carrying a box of pizza.” Gabriel smiled. “I figured the worst-case scenario was that I would have pizza for dinner.”

Chapter Two

An hour later they climbed a glowing spiral staircase to the surface and moved out into the ruins of the Dead City. Lucy was so relieved to see the night sky studded with stars that it was all she could do not to sob in relief. Once again she summoned some attitude. She was exhausted and still seeing fragments of the drug-induced hallucinations, but her head was clearing.

She paused to slip on her stilettos. Unlike the maze of tunnels belowground, the aboveground ruins of the Dead City were littered with green quartz rubble.