The Huntress
Date: 2006-01-07 05:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Paranormal; Paranormal Romance; Romance; Vampires; Fiction; Erotica; Fantasy; Short Stories; Shapeshifters; Religion
Description: Her husband had been gone for weeks and she knew he would never return. Alone and scared Rachel knew she had to do something. Her small village was being terrorized by monsters. But what could one scared, lonely woman do? Her life had taken a terrible turn and it was about to get worse. Was the man at her door really her husband? Where had he been? And just what had he become...a story of strength, bravery and the incredible risks a woman will take for love. Every hero has a past. Every legend has a beginning. This book has been previously published and has been repackaged.
Publisher: Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

The Hunters Series

By

Shiloh Walker

Includes:

Declan and Tori

Eli and Sarel

Byron and Kit

Jonathan and Lori

Ben and Shadow

Hunter's Choice

Hunt Me

Copyright © 2014 by Shiloh Walker

All Rights Reserved.

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy. If you did not legally obtain a copy of this book, then you should purchase your own copy.

Please note that if you purchased this from an auction site or blog, it's stolen property. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. Your support is what makes it possible for authors to continue to provide the stories you enjoy.

Warning: This book contains an old-fashioned master vampire, a stubborn werewolf, sex, misunderstandings, sex, unrequited love, and sex. Did I mention the sex? Don't say you weren't warned…

Table of Contents

Declan and Tori

Eli and Sarel

Byron and Kit

Jonathan and Lori

Ben and Shadow

Hunter's Choice

Hunt Me

The Hunters: Declan and Tori

By

Shiloh Walker

First digital printing 2003

Please note: This is the original 2003 version—it has been edited, but no new material has been added.

The Hunters: Declan and Tori © Copyright Shiloh Walker, 2003.

Cover Art Angela Waters

Chapter One

Tori McAdams was a sensible woman. She didn’t believe in hocus-pocus, she didn’t believe that crossing a black cat’s path was bad luck. She had broken more mirrors than she cared to count and couldn’t remember ever wishing on a star.

And she didn’t believe in vampires.

But the petite little blonde in front of her obviously did. Her eyes were wide and frightened, and from time to time, got that oddly unfocused look of true fear. As a private investigator, Tori had learned to smell bullshit a mile away.

This girl truly believed somebody was stalking her, trying to turn her into a vampire.

Some sick fuck had done a real number on her. No telling what the back-story was, because the girl was getting more incoherent by the second. Jeez, what was she—all of nineteen?

Twenty-eight-year-old Tori suddenly felt very old.

And it wasn’t getting any better as she sat up and took a closer look at the mark on the girl’s neck—revealed as her head fell forward—the pixie-like cut of her hair falling away from the ragged gash.

Gash? Or teeth marks? Shit, now she was losing her mind.

But they really did look like teeth marks.

Tori knew she couldn’t turn this poor kid out onto the streets—and young Dani Mitchell was too scared to go home. “He can get me there,” she whispered, over and over again, when Tori had offered to take her.

So, reluctantly, knowing she had no other choice, Tori made up the little sofa bed in the small room beyond her office. God knew she had spent enough nights here after a late night stake out.

And she doubted the little thing in front of her was a danger. Dani looked about as dangerous as a wet kitten. It took a lot of soothing and hand holding before the girl would stretch out on the bed, but finally she fell asleep.

Tori collapsed into her chair with a sigh and rubbed her eyes with her fingertips. She yearned for a tall, cold margarita, her bed, and some aspirin.

Instead she sat up, reached for the phone, and started making calls.

The last one on her list should have been her first.

But Declan Reilly was somebody she tried to avoid whenever possible.

He made her itchy.

In the worst possible way. Hearing his voice was enough to harden her nipples, dampen her panties and have her verging on the edge of orgasm. He was sex incarnate—almost too sexy to be real, smart as a whip, and just the tiniest bit arrogant. He had wide shoulders, rounded with muscle, a powerful chest that tapered down to a flat, carved belly and narrow hips, strong legs that he covered with denim which encased them so well, showing him to perfection—especially that ass…Tori shook her head, forcing herself to concentrate.

But when Declan was in her thoughts, it was difficult.

A sexy Irish accent remained from the years he had spent growing up in Dublin and looking into his misty green eyes was almost enough to make Tori believe in leprechauns and faeries.

Almost, but not quite.

He had gone out of his way to make it clear that he found her very appealing. He flirted, he teased, he asked, he seduced. It didn’t take much though; Declan was a seduction—with thick, wavy, blond hair that grew a little too long over his collar, seductive green eyes, a clever mouth, hands with wide palms, and long narrow fingers.

But Tori refused to give in.

She was tempted. Thinking of his hands, his mouth, the way he smelled, damnation, was she tempted.

But there was a flaw.

Only one that she could think of, but it was a doozy.

He was a cop.

No way, no how was she getting involved with a cop. No matter how mouth-watering he was.

He wasn’t home. Tori blew out a breath as his lyrical voice floated over the line from his answering machine. She left a simple message, “Call me.”

He was one of the few cops she could count on to get a fair shake. If her man had any similar crimes out there, she would know. She’d also find out if Miss Dani Mitchell was a fake.

And she’d get teased and tormented until she had to relieve her frustrations with her showerhead before she went to bed.

A girl had to do what a girl had to do.

She called the station, hoping maybe he had been called in or delayed. But his cheerful partner, Cy Grady, informed her that Declan was out of town for a few days. She politely refused his offer of help and whirled in her chair to study the sleeping girl lying just beyond the doorway.

With a sigh, she rose and slid her holster back on.

Might as well see if the so-called vampire was haunting the strip joint where Dani worked.

* * * * *

Agreeing to help Dani Mitchell was a choice that Tori wasn’t certain she’d live to regret. Oh, the girl was the real deal. Her manager, well, ex-manager, had fired her a few nights earlier when she wigged out in the middle of a lap dance, screaming that the patron had bitten her, his eyes glowed, and he was a monster.

And since said patron had paid very well for that lap dance, the manager, being the gentlemen he was, had been pissed that Dani had gone stark raving mad in front of other customers.

Now, story confirmed, Tori was cornered in an alley by a man who moved faster than greased lightning.

“Where is my little dancer, won’t you tell me?” he purred, crossing the alley like some giant slinking cat, his pale blue eyes seeming to pin her in place.

A cat? she wondered fuzzily.

Not a cat. A snake, a cobra—the kind that could freeze their prey with dread and devour them on the spot, fear holding them prisoner.

And Tori was afraid.

Deeply, mortally afraid. Some thick fog seemed to cloud her brain, the way it did when you were put under at the dentist’s office. But laughing gas never made you feel so frightened or so scared.

Tori didn’t get scared easily, but she was now—for no obvious reason.

She reached up, pressed her fingers to her temples, shaking her head. The slight fog faded, and with it, the fear. All that remained was the slightly edgy feeling caused by nerves.

“I’m not sure what you mean,” she lied easily, shifting her body so that she could draw her gun without it being quite so obvious.

“My little dancer,” he repeated. “I know you’ve seen her. I can smell her on you. I want her back.” He spoke slowly, politely, with just the wisp of an accent in his voice…Spanish?

Smell her? “Can’t help you,” she said flatly. Even though the description she had gotten out of Dani had been basically worthless, she knew she was talking to the man who had been scaring her. “I really don’t know any dancers.”

“Do not lie to me,” he whispered. It sounded like snakes. Like a snake hissing—no, like dozens of snakes slithering against other snakes.

“Not lying.” She didn’t really know Dani. Just because she was trying to help her out didn’t mean she knew her.

He moved—from fifteen feet away to less than five—so quickly, in a blink. Her head was going foggy again. Fortunately, her reflexes weren’t. She stepped back—one step, two—while lifting her gun and pointing it straight at the man’s nose.

“Don’t come any closer,” she warned.

“Do you really think that silly gun can hurt me? Didn’t she warn you? Tell you what I am?”

“A bullet that will rip your head from your shoulders will hurt you, I promise.”

“Rip my head from my shoulders?” he repeated, sounding amused.

His voice sounded like honey now, sweet, addictive. He moved another gliding step closer, and she wanted it. Wanted him to touch her, to taste her. Wanted to hear his voice.

“Yes,” he purred.

The honey was poisoned. She heard it and she narrowed her eyes. Concentrated. Focused.

The man’s eyes narrowed and he cocked his head, studying her—puzzled.

“Get away from me,” she said softly. “Now.”

“No.” He said it just as softly, an evil smile curling his mouth. “I think I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want that silly little dancer now. I want you.”

A sick ball of fear curled in her belly but she only arched an eyebrow. “Sorry. Charming as the offer is, I’ll have to pass.” Her arm was starting to shake. She couldn’t keep that gun aimed at his angelic looking face much longer.

“It’ll be fun,” he promised, as if she hadn’t spoken. “You will be a fun toy, not just an appetizing snack. I bet you’re a good fuck, as well. I bet you’ve got a tight, wet little pussy. I’m going to enjoy finding out.”

Color heated her cheeks and she fell back another step.

He laughed and lunged.

The bullet tore through his nasal bones, through his brain and out the back of his skull. He fell backward.

And lay on the ground, still breathing, still bleeding. Still living—and cursing her.

Tori ran.

She holed up in her office.

Tori had food, bullets, a shower in the back and spare clothes. She also had a crazy dancer in her bed.

She could handle this.

He hadn’t actually started trying to come after her. He hadn’t really been rolling to his knees as he swore at his in his ruined voice.

He had been dead. It was just her imagination going into overtime. He had just been so eerie.

So strange.

So scary.

He had scared her. Deep, gut-wrenching, pee-in-your-pants scared her. Tori paced the small confines of her office, trying to figure out what she was going to do.

Either he was what Dani had said or Tori had killed a man.

She whirled and grabbed the phone.

Declan.

She needed to call Declan.

He could help.

Of course, why she was so certain, she didn’t know. But he could help. He would help.

She had his cell number, and she always had it with him, even on personal time. But it went to voice mail, damn it. Damn it, damn it, damn it. As the message played, she listened to the soothing melody of his voice, then left a message of her own.

“This is Tori. As soon as you get this, call me. Declan, I need you.” She marked it urgent, sent it, and slammed down the phone.

Curling in her chair, she settled down to wait, her eyes on the door.

* * * * *

Stupid, fucking bitch.

The damned bullet had almost taken his head off, and that would have killed him.

Manuel prowled the confines of his rooms, cursing the blue-eyed bitch and the pain in his head while he healed.

It was a good thing he had his rooms close. His human had been with him, watching with veiled jealousy while he searched for his little dancer. The tall, slim man had gotten him back to his rooms before sunrise, and eagerly ripped open yet another vein for him. Manuel had been tempted to drain him. He needed the blood, needed the energy to speed his healing. But the human may yet prove useful. After all, he had gotten him back here, fed him and protected him.

Which meant Manuel would live to find her.

His human watched warily from the corner. He’d forgotten this one’s name already. Not that it really mattered. He changed humans almost as often as he changed his mind.

He’d tire of this one soon. And either kill him or let him go quietly mad when Manuel left him to fend for himself. He could always feed without forcing the dependence on his humans, but it was such fun to watch the slavish devotion on their faces as he fed—as he brutalized, or loved tenderly—just depending on his moods.

Of course, when he left, the devotion stayed. And the human always went crazy without him there.

The woman—she’d been different. He didn’t know how, or why, but she had been different. Each time he had tried to beguile her with his voice—first with fear and then with seduction—she had shaken it off, shaken him off. Yes, she was different.

Manuel had been looking forward to figuring out why. Stupid bitch. He would have used a different method with her—his normal methods tended to destroy a human’s paltry mind—and he hadn’t wanted hers destroyed.

But now…now, her blood was going to flow in a red river when he was finished.

He turned and pierced his human with a fiery blue gaze. His face was disfigured for now, disgustingly so. But when he whispered, “Come,” the man rushed to him, falling to his knees to take Manuel’s now exposed cock in his mouth.

While the human suckled and ate at his Master’s cock, Manuel imagined it was her—that damnable woman, on her knees in front of him, her back bleeding from a dozen different stripes.

* * * * *

Her new roommate up and left her, after she had heard what Tori had to say. “He’ll find you,” she whispered. “I’m sorry. This is my fault.”

Then Dani was gone, like she had never been there.

Tori dozed lightly throughout the day. Her phone rang half a dozen times but she never answered it. None of the numbers on the caller ID were Declan and he was the only one she would trust right now.

She ate sparingly, drank like a fish, orange juice, tomato juice, anything in the place that was highly acidic.

“Yes…that’s it, make your blood toxic to him…”

“Oh, God. I’m as crazy as she is,” she whispered, scrubbing her hands over her face. Then she reached for more orange juice.

The gallon that had been full that morning was now in the trash.

And she was guzzling down tomato juice.

“Next thing you know I’ll be hanging garlic from the eaves and windows.”

“Garlic isn’t poisonous to vampires. It’s all about the blood…you have to alter your blood.”

Tori jumped—shit. Now she was hearing things.

“He’s coming.”

Groaning, she covered her ears with her hands, as though that would silence the insane rambling of her own thoughts.

The shadows in the room were thickening as the sun set. She refused to turn the lights on. Almost as if she were afraid it would make her easier to find.

But how could he find her?

“He will.”

“SHUT UP!” she bellowed, pressing her hands to her temples.

“Fight. If he bleeds enough, it will weaken him and take him long to recover.”

She really was hearing that voice.

“You’ve altered your blood...all the acid you’ve taken in has changed it enough that it will bother him—he won’t be able to feed from you enough to recover. You’ve poisoned your blood and he can’t drain you. You want him to take as little of your blood inside as possible. It will make his hold on you weaker.”

It felt like an old woman’s voice—like her grandmother…Alice. Alice Huntinghorse. She’d been the closest thing to magic that Tori had ever known. Alice’s father had been Navajo, and a medicine man.

But although this woman’s voice felt like Alice’s…she didn’t sound her. It was more of a feeling, a sense. That sense of wisdom. Of knowledge.

She felt like somebody wise. Like somebody ancient in more than years.

“Be ready, Tori. He comes now.”

The sun had set.

Minutes crawled by while more advice was whispered into her head.

Sunlight weakens them. If they are ill or starving or newly changed, it can kill them. It takes time for the body to adjust to tolerate even the smallest bit of sunlight in the dusk. The early morning sun and the midday sun are the most deadly, even to the full Master vamps. And it will kill the lesser vamps.

There was more…

“When you wake up, eat.”

“You won’t want to, but eat. Anything. Everything. It will keep the change from completing.”

“You will have to hide for a while.”

“Silver can hurt them. Wood cannot, unless it totally destroys the heart, not just pierces it. Destroying the heart will kill. Taking their heads will kill them. Fire will kill.”

“You may not be able to kill him now. You may want to die later. But you will live. And then you can become strong enough.”

“I’ve lost it,” Tori whispered, settling into the chair, gun in hand, making herself as small as possible while trying to block the voice in her mind.

“Use the gun. It hurt him before. Shoot his head, his heart, his throat, where the big arteries are. Bleed him. Fight him.”

“Damn right I’ll fight,” she hissed, unaware she had started to rock. “I’m not ready to die.”

A soft, sad sigh seemed to shimmer in the air. “You’re going to.”

And then the door flew open.

Tori started firing the second she saw those eerie blue eyes. Even when he took her body down, she continued to fire. Shooting with one hand until the gun was empty, while she clawed and struggled and kicked.

She hadn’t tried to run. She needed to be here.

Here.

Here…

He tore into her throat and it hurt. Agony ripped through her as he started to feast.

He tore away from her almost the second he swallowed, bellowing.

He shot to his feet and kicked her in the side.

“What did you do?” he shrieked, his voice gone hoarse.

She lay there, bleeding from the wound in her throat, her blood seeping out on the floor. Picking her up, he hurled her across the room. Already near death, it didn’t even hurt, though her blood sprayed everywhere.

All around, furniture flew and crashed, while the man, no, while the vampire bled slowly from half a dozen different wounds. Dark fog started to cloud her mind but she dragged her eyes open, unable to stop watching him.

And eventually, he stopped. Came to kneel beside her. “I cannot have you die too quickly, stupid bitch,” he whispered, stroking her hair almost tenderly. “You hurt me, you know. How did you know to do that? Turning your blood into poison in such a way? All the acid in it burned my throat. You need to suffer more than just a quick bloody death.” He mewled softly. “All that lovely blood wasted.”

He used his teeth to open a vein in his wrist, held it to her mouth with an iron grasp when she tried to turn her head. “You’ll suffer now. A newly turned vamp doesn’t do too well alone. Some die even with a Master to guide and protect them. You will be alone. You’ll suffer, and starve, and thirst, and die painfully,” he crooned after she had swallowed the thick, bitter tasting blood.

Tori remembered nothing beyond that—nothing beyond trying to make herself vomit it back up.

She came to and stared around her. Lying on the floor in the middle of her destroyed office, she tried to remember what had happened. Why she lay in a pool of dried blood, why she was holding her gun. Why she hurt, oh, she hurt.

There was a deep, throbbing, burning pain low in her belly. With every slow beat of her heart, the pain worked its way up until it was in her head as well. By the time she was able to force herself onto her hands and knees the burning, tearing agony was eating into her brain, trying to force its way outside through her skull.

Pain stiffened her neck, making it difficult to move it, and inside her body hurt. It seemed as though her very veins and arteries burned.

She couldn’t think clearly. Couldn’t remember.

But that voice. She remembered it.

Eat.

Hide.

Eat.

Hide.

Eat.

Hide.

She ate a steak. Raw. She ate half a bag of potatoes. Chocolate cake. A bag of stale Cheetos. Anything she could get her hands on, she ate, even though every bite made her want to vomit. Even though she had to force herself to swallow instead of gag.

The food rebelled in her belly.

Her blood seemed to boil and burn in her veins as she crept away from the office late that night, slinking in the shadows, keeping away from the roads. She walked and walked and walked until she came to a tiny little shack nearly fifteen miles from her office.

Her father’s little fishing shack, perched on the banks of the Ohio. She hid there, in the tiny little cellar underneath the house. She hid there and cried and ached and burned.

Chapter Two

Declan Reilly was trying desperately to get drunk.

He’d been brooding in front of the fire, drinking steadily from the bottle of good Irish whiskey, while he stared into the dancing flames. He wasn’t getting drunk quickly enough. It was hard for him to get drunk anyway, as evidenced by the two bottles he’d already put away, but he was putting up the good fight and trying his hardest.

Tori was gone.

Dead.

Tori McAdams, the sexy P.I. he had been trying to get close to for months. Everything about her drove him insane, from her tightly curled, long chestnut- brown hair to her big blue eyes. From her high rounded breasts and slim waist to her full hips and curvy ass, to the way she smelled like peaches and sex. But most of all, that stubborn, feisty spirit, and that soft heart she tried so hard to hide.

She was gone.

His eyes seemed to burn as his head fell back and he tried to block the images from his mind. Her neat, spartan little office had been destroyed, splattered with blood, human and not. He knew the scent. It had been faint and decaying, but he knew the scent. The blood of a vampire was hard to mistake, once you knew it.

There had been a good deal of it.

But even more of Tori’s. Oh, God. Tori.

His hands clenched and the glass tumbler in his hand shattered. He closed his fist over the shards of glass buried in his hand, welcoming the pain.

He had failed her.

She had called, finally. She had called him, had needed him.

And he hadn’t been here.

A weak, scrambling sound tickled his ears.

He almost ignored it, too caught up in his own grief.

But he got up, blood trickling down his fingers to fall on the floor as he walked to the front door and opened it.

She almost fell at his feet.

Declan stumbled and caught the lean brunette who tumbled into his arms, out of the pouring rain, dead-white and half unconscious.

It was Tori, who had been missing for a good week, and presumed dead after police discovered her office in a bloody mess, literally, blood and gore staining the walls, furniture smashed, filing cabinets overturned.

He hadn’t been in town last weekend. And he had cursed himself. If he had been around, he would have found her, maybe before it was too late. He would have been with her when it happened, and he could have stopped it. And he had suffered through night after sleepless night, suffered through a rage more terrible than any he had ever known.

Tori, who had a left a terse, “Call me,” on his work voicemail the night she was last seen by anybody. Followed by another, more urgent message on his personal cell phone: This is Tori. As soon as you get this, call me. Declan, I need you.

He had started lusting for flesh and blood, to find that bastard who had done this, and rip his guts out.

But by the time he had gotten back to town and been informed of what had happened, it was too late. The trail nearly cold, and all the clues he could have used were demolished under the heels of his fellow officers.

But she was here now.

It was Tori, who had rebuffed him in every way imaginable. And now she was on his doorstep, lying listless in his arms. Listless, pale and still. Humans had more movement than that, made more sounds.

Sharp hearing detected something.

Or rather, a lack of something.

Declan hissed, his eyes narrowing as he carried her to the couch and jerked her shirt open. Laying his head on her chest between her breasts, he listened.

Lub-dub.

Thirty seconds passed before he heard it again.

Lub-dub.

He leaned over, pushed her wet ringlets away from her neck.

Lub-dub.

He took a deep breath, forced himself to open his eyes and saw it.

The ragged wound, gaping and huge when fresh, now mostly healed, remnants of bruising. She had fought.

Had she been drained?

Or changed?

Draining was generally slow business. One vamp alone wasn’t likely to have drained her to the point of killing her in one feeding. A new vamp could drain a person, fairly easily, because they were so starved, so hungry when the change first came.

Had she been attacked by a newly turned vamp? If so, that would make finding him a little easier.

It was possible, though, that two or three different vamps had done this. Or perhaps one vampire, feeding from her over a period of time. Yeah, that would do it. The messy bite at her neck could have very well been made at separate times, separate feedings. Maybe two bites, not one.

But if she had been bled so much as to put her in this condition, she wouldn’t have been able to stumble to his door.

Changing usually took place over a period of time as well, the blood exchange taking place when the victim was near death, running so low on blood it gave a whole new twist on the term anemia.

His nostrils flared and he scented it along her skin now. The subtle musk of vampire. Nausea and rage roiled in his gut. Throwing his head back, he drew air into his lungs and forced it out through his nose until the blinding rage cleared a bit.

Then he lowered his head, and crouched back over her.

The clothes she wore were filthy. They were covered in blood and dirt and grime, but, with the exception of missing buttons on her shirt, relatively intact. Under her nails were tiny bits of flesh and blood—none of it her own. He blew a breath out between his teeth and tentatively reached for the zipper of her jeans. The heavy black cloth parted, revealing her ivory smooth skin, and lower, a small thatch of dark curls.

No blood there. No signs of bruising.

Then she probably hadn’t been raped prior to being bitten, which happened, unfortunately, all too often. Most of the feral vamps he had known would have fed during the rape, or before.

Not after. It takes the fun out of it when your food lay there listless and broken. Ferals liked their sex painful and rough and bloody. Of course, he had killed a good many of the ferals he had known, so he had an extensive knowledge of them.

Not that all of the vamps were evil. A good number of them were decent people, like Tori had been. But the changing warped them, all too often, robbing them of what they needed to live happily. Some of them continued to live, unhappily. A few went on to live with some semblance of happiness.

Others ended their lives.

Others, while unhappy, were filled with a sense of purpose.

Suddenly her eyes flew open and her hands latched onto his shirt while she stared up at him wildly. She started to scream and he touched her cheek.

“Tori,” he said quietly. “It’s me…it’s Declan. You’re safe.”

Would she remember him? Would she remember herself?

For a long moment, blue eyes stared into his and then she shuddered. Lashes swept down, shielding her eyes. “Declan.” Her fingers curled, clutched at his shirt for a brief second before she fell limply back on the couch. “Declan…I found you. I found you, didn’t I?”

“Yes…yes, you did.”

She was weak, very weak.

“I found you.” Her lids fluttered closed, only to fly back open as she stared up at him, her mouth all but bloodless, terror turning her eyes nearly black. “He…bit me. He bit—”

Her eyes rolled back and her head started to jerk, her body convulsing.

“Bugger,” he muttered, rolling her onto her side, uncertain what else to do. Well, what he wanted to do was panic, but that didn’t seem to be the answer. What was this?

The convulsions lasted for long, tense moments and then blood started to trickle from her mouth. A moment later, he recognized a telltale bulge from behind her lips. Her mouth was open and he could see it as it happened, as her fangs began to emerge.

Her heart rate started to kick up, erratic and broken sounding. Her skin seemed to burn.

She was dying, starving to death.

“This isn’t right,” he muttered, fear turning his heart into a stone.

She had been turned a good week, if Declan had figured right, and her fangs were just now coming? That’s what he was seeing—he’d seen it enough times to know, too.

If her fangs were just now emerging, she hadn’t fed. No wonder she was starving.

He wondered if she knew how to feed.

Her eyes closed and her head went limp, rolling toward him. He hissed and fell back. Her fangs had cut through. Pearly sharp canines on top and bottom, canines that she would learn to retract somewhat and hide.

If she lived long enough. She was sliding into an exhausted sleep, and at the rate she was going, if she didn’t feed soon, it would get worse. Of course, she was probably going to snap at some point along the way and try to feed, but she was so weak now, she might not have the strength to feed from an angry poodle.

Declan sighed, his head falling forward. Long, shaggy, blond hair fell into his eyes as he tried to convince himself he was debating what the proper course of action was to be. But he was just trying to delay the inevitable.

He had been dying for a taste of her for months.

And now she was going to get a taste of him.

He grimaced wryly as he realized he was about to become a vamp’s first meal. Lifting his wrist to his mouth, he used his own fairly sharp canines to rip his flesh before he held the bleeding wound to her mouth.

Tori was mostly unconscious and for a moment, she did nothing but lay there as his blood flowed into her mouth, down her throat. Then she gagged, choked. Swallowed. It happened again, and again. Long seconds passed before she did little else than gag and sputter and then Declan felt the sharp pain of her incisors cutting into his skin, felt her hands come up to hold his wrist greedily against her mouth. Her tongue lashed out, caressing his flesh. Her mouth felt like silk, hot wet silk, as she fed.

He knew the minute the monster inside her started to emerge. It called to the one inside of him, the animal that was part of him. His skin grew tight and itchy, his jaws started to ache.

If he’d have allowed it, in moments, the skin along his spine would have started to ripple, then pulse. Then his hair would have begun to thicken, and after that, the bones would have started to lengthen and shift before his change.

Declan forced himself to breathe slowly, steadily, forcing his body and mind into a light state of meditation as the ache spread to his shoulders, down his back.

Breathing slowly and evenly, he focused on Tori’s pale, still face.

Can’t change…

You have the control.

Wouldn’t change.

You have the power.

And he did. Declan was power, a primal, powerful force that walked around in human skin.

Well, human skin most of the time.

Slowly, the urge and the animal inside him faded and he opened eyes that gleamed only slightly in the dim room, to stare into Tori’s lovely alabaster face, once more alive and mobile.

Well, maybe alive wasn’t such a good word. And her lovely, sapphire blue eyes were empty still, full of nothing but monster and hunger and greed.

“Let go now, Tori,” he said softly, tapping her cheek with his free hand.

A low, sexy growl emerged from her throat. And her fangs slid a little deeper into his flesh. He blinked once, slowly, at that tiny, exquisite little pain.

“Let. Go.” She’d drain him dry, if he let her. The bastard who did this had known damn good and well what he had done.

A new vampire was like a loaded gun—the potential for harm was huge. If she learned control, there was little chance for harm. But if she wasn’t trained…she could be deadly.

Of course, a shifter had a better chance than the average human. With a wrench, he tore his wrist from her and got to his feet quickly, moving a pace or two away, out of reach of her seeking hands, and grabbed a discarded shirt. Tearing a strip of fabric from it, he tied a makeshift bandage around his wrist and watched her. She still reached for him, and started to slither in his direction.

“Tori.”

Her eyes were glowing brightly; swirling pools of lust and hunger and need. He felt his own hunger rising, felt his cock hardening, felt the urge to mate, wildly, mindlessly, with her. Mate while she fed from him, and he fed off of her, until they simply couldn’t do it anymore. Kinda made the idea of fucking to death sound rather appealing.

“Tori McAdams.”

Those slumberous, heavy lidded eyes blinked and her head cocked.

“Tori!”

Her lids fluttered shut, then she shot to her feet, pressed her hands to her temples and started to scream.

Oh, God. Baby, what did he do? Declan thought helplessly, his feet moving in her direction, even though he knew it wasn’t really safe. Not yet. Then the screaming stopped.

“What did he do to me?” she rasped out, touching her fingers to her mouth and gathering the drying blood. Staring at the red stain on her fingers, she keened, a low helpless sound.

“I’m sorry, Tori,” Declan whispered.

“Sorry?”

“Sorry?”

“What the hell has happened to me?” she shouted, her hands clenched into tight fists.

“You’ve been bitten,” he said softly.

Did she remember?

By the growing horror and disbelief in her eyes, most likely yes, she did remember.

“That man…” her voice trailed off and she swallowed, a loud audible sound in the silence of the room. “He was strong. Too strong. And his…he had…his eyes—” Her voice trailed off and she fell silent for long seconds. “His eyes glowed. Almost red. He was going to hurt me. And, at first, I wanted it. I wanted it.” Her voice fell to a low, awful rasp as she repeated, “I wanted it.”

So he had lulled her. A master, then.

This one had beguiled her.

“Tori, you did nothing wrong. He made you want it, hypnotism, if you will.”

“He did something to my mind,” she whispered, in a soft, almost singsong voice. “Made me afraid. Then he made me want it. Want whatever he wanted to do. And then I shot him.”

“Shot him?” This wasn’t something he had expected to hear.

“I shot him and I ran and he found me. He found me and bit me and beat me and made me drink his blood.” She said each word slowly, as if it hurt, as if the words were pulled from her throat like glass.

“I am sorry, Tori. So very sorry,” he whispered. She had shot a vamp? One who had beguiled her? Ran away and hid?

She whirled on him and shouted, “I just attacked you and you’re telling me you’re sorry?”

“You didn’t attack me. I fed you—there’s a difference. And yes. I’m sorry. Sorry this happened. Sorry it happened to you,” he said quietly, deciding she was herself. Or as close to herself as she was likely to get for quite some time. So he moved a little closer. “Do you know what has happened?” It was no surprise, of course, that the vamp had found her after she ran. Vamps could track by scent almost as well as a wolf could.

But it was surprising that she had shot it. After it had beguiled her. Or tried to.

She hugged her arms tightly around her body, staring into the distance with blind eyes. “This isn’t possible,” she whispered. “Not possible. I’m going crazy.”

“No.” Declan started to reach for her and then he let his hand fall. “You aren’t going crazy.”

“What are you? Are you…like me?”

“I’m a wolf,” he said quietly.

She laughed, a shrill painful laugh. “A wolf? The cop I’ve been lusting after for months is a wolf? Talk about a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” She whirled away and started pacing the room.

“A wolf,” she continued to mutter under her breath. “Drinking blood. I’m out of my fucking mind.”

Declan sighed. With quick, economical motions, he shed his clothes and waited until she caught a glimpse. And then a longer look, until finally she turned and stared at him, her eyes wide, shocked, and heated. Her pink tongue darted out to lick her lips. “What are you doing?”

He didn’t answer as he fell to his knees and cried out as the heat raced along his skin, followed by a flow of fur. It hurt. It always hurt at first. But it was a delicious pain, much like her fangs sinking into his flesh. His face lengthened as a muzzle grew and his longish blond hair thickened and became denser. The flow of fur raced down over his body like a waterfall as his muscles enlarged and his body changed and shifted. The rippling fur obscured much of the change from sight as his arms stretched and lengthened. His chest widened and deepened as a fine pelt of fur covered it, thinning down to a silky pelt over his belly and groin where his cock thrust out—hard and thick and full—perfectly formed.

His hips were still lean and muscled, covered with that same silky fur that started to thicken as it flowed down his thighs, thighs that were heavy with muscle. Two sickening thuds filled the room as the bones in his legs reformed beneath the fur as it raced on down to his feet, covering them—larger, longer and broader, made better to run and jump and lunge.

It only took seconds, under a minute, and he was free. The animal inside him rejoiced while the human continued to watch his companion warily. If it had been another vamp, even one of the few he called friends, he never would have shifted in front of them. It left him helpless for a few brief seconds, and he couldn’t ever let down his guard.

But this was Tori.

When he finally rose, his bulky body was just a few inches taller than it had been, but larger, more powerful, more muscled. His gait was slightly awkward. Standing on his hind legs in this form tested his balance a bit. But he could walk upright.

He cocked his head, staring at Tori.

“Holy shit. You meant a fucking werewolf.”

“Not exactly were,” he growled, forcing the words over his tongue. It felt so fucking awkward to talk in this form. “Wolf. Moon means nothing.”

Her eyes trailed lower and lower, pausing on his hard cock. Declan growled deep in his chest. He couldn’t help it. Just her scent made him hard, and the change always had a vaguely sexual feel to it.

But when she took a step in his direction, her pink tongue darting out to wet her lips again, he moved back. “Don’t,” he grunted, shaking his maned head.

“Why not?”

He closed his eyes, banished the creeping power. Changing back could be exhausting, but it was painless. Within a few heartbeats of time, he was sitting crossed legged on the floor, naked. And when he looked back at her, it was from human eyes. From human flesh. “It’s not you who wants this,” he said, staring at her while she stared at his straining penis. He closed one fist over his cock, dragging it up the thick, ruddy length slowly, his lids drooping as the rounded head was swallowed by the grip of his hand. A long, raspy sigh escaped him as he pumped his cock, staring at her for a long moment before his hand fell away. Declan rose slowly, shaking his head. “The vampirism has put something new inside you—a hunger you can’t control yet—that is what wants this. Not you.”

Dragging her eyes from his erection, she stared at him, her own eyes glowing softly, renewed vitality and life and health glowing in her face. And lust.

“You are wrong,” she said softly.

“No. You don’t want this, not with me.”

Reaching out, she closed one slim, cool hand over his cock and squeezed. He hissed, his head falling back. He was trying to be a gentleman here. She was confused, had been hurt and had had her life ripped away from her. He was too decent a guy to take advantage of her, even if he fantasized about it for a few brief seconds.

But she was making it hard.

In several ways.

“You’re wrong. I’ve always wanted you,” she whispered heatedly, dropping to her knees in front of him. Her tongue darted out and she licked him daintily before lifting her shadowed eyes to stare at him. “I always wanted you. And I wanted to live a long, healthy normal life, with a family, and a man to love me.”

“That was taken away, it seems. But I can have you. Can’t I?”

A rumbling growl erupted from his throat when her wet, pink lips closed over his cock, and took his length down her throat. One hand came up and fisted in her damp curls, holding her back when she would have swallowed him down a second time.

He felt her fangs nick him as he pulled away, jerked her to her feet and whirled, pinning her against the wall. He stared at her, gasping for breath while she smiled lazily at him.

“Always?” he repeated. “If you’ve wanted me, then why haven’t you been with me? I’ve made myself clear on the matter, haven’t I? I knew you were attracted, but you stayed so damn far away.”

She shrugged lazily. “I had a rule about not getting involved with cops,” she said, the shadows drifting back into her lovely blue eyes while she trailed her hands up and down his side. “I had a lot of rules, and look where they led me.”

“So, what? You want to fuck me because life fucked you over?”

“No. Because life has fucked me over, I think maybe I’ll actually start living the way I’ve always wanted, instead of the way I always thought I should,” she replied. Leaning forward, she nipped at his lower lip before staring up at him. “And I have wanted you since the day we met.”

“Oh, well, then,” Declan said weakly as her hands closed over his ass and pulled him against her pelvis. Son of a bitch, he was no bloody saint.

Declan’s head lowered and he nuzzled at her neck, cuddled her close to him. Bending over, he tossed her weight over his shoulder and carried her upstairs. Depositing her on the toilet, he turned away and set the hot water to running in the shower.

He could feel her eyes on him as he knelt in front of her, stripping her torn, filthy clothes from her body—could hear the slightly elevated heartbeat that lust was causing—could smell the old sweat, the filth and blood on her, and the musk of the vampire that had changed her, the decaying scent of his blood.

And under it all he could smell Tori—the scent of peaches and sex, the scent that had driven him out of his mind for months.

“You have his blood on you,” he said quietly, lifting her in his arms like a child and taking her into the shower. Lowering her to her feet, he reached for shampoo and lathered her hair while the water poured over her body, draining away in a swirl of muddy brown and rust red as the dirt and blood started to slough away. “His smell.”

Her head fell back and she sighed in pleasure as his hands massaged her scalp, her neck, and her back before he rinsed the suds away. Declan smiled slightly when she jumped under his hands as he soaped her up-thrust breasts and gently curved belly.

She gasped and flinched, when he carefully cleaned the wound on her neck. He had saved it for last, soaping and rinsing it carefully before lowering his head to kiss the angry red flesh and fading bruises.

“It still hurts,” she whispered roughly. “But when he did it, I thought the pain alone was going to kill me.”

“He was angry. They usually save the pain for sex, not feeding. Most vamps, even the feral ones, will make the feeding pleasant,” he said flatly, battling the rage down when her voice broke just a little. “You bled him, didn’t you?”

Her lashes lowered and she nodded. “Not that it did me any good.” Reaching up, she touched one sharp, pearly fang. “I couldn’t stop him.”

“Shh,” Declan murmured, lowering his head and kissing her mouth. His tongue slid past her lips and caressed the fangs before going deeper to taste her. As the hot water continued to pulse down around him, he turned and backed her up against the wall, returning to kiss and nuzzle the scarred flesh at her neck before he dropped to his knees in front of her, his mouth seeking out one ruby red nipple and tugging at it with his teeth.

His other hand caressed and stroked her side, her hips and her ass. His palm glided down the length of her thigh, massaging and stroking his way down to her ankle as he started to kiss his way down her torso—to her navel and the tight curls between her thighs. He slid his tongue between her folds, and lapped at her clitoris as he lifted her ankle and draped her leg over his shoulder, opening her.

Above him, he could hear her heavy pants, the steady pace of her heart, smell the heavy scent of peaches that seemed to pour from her aroused body. Her nails dug into his flesh when he entered her vagina with his tongue. She came, hot and hard, the second he stroked his fingers between the cheeks of her ass.

Tori felt the hot, silken stroke of his tongue gliding between her labial lips, felt the caress of his fingers between her buttocks and she whimpered, burying her hands in his hair. The water pounded down on her torso, splattering her face and hair as he started to stroke, in and out, with his tongue.

She climaxed again with a tiny weak scream, her lungs begging for air, while she gasped and panted. He pulled away slowly, nibbling on her soft, tender flesh and flicking her clit a final time before he withdrew.

When he slid her leg back down, pulling away from her reluctantly, she collapsed onto his lap, his cock pressed into her belly. “You taste even better than you smell,” he whispered, his voice deep, guttural. “God, I could eat you up.”

“You just did.” She lifted her head from his shoulder, her eyes glowing and blue and deep enough to drown in. And full of hunger again. The look in her eyes was growing less rational by the moment and something not quite human was lurking just behind her face.

Declan knew he hadn’t fed her enough blood to satiate the urge inside her. He wasn’t certain her control was good enough; hell, he knew it wasn’t.

When she lowered her open mouth to his throat, he stopped her. “No,” he rasped, catching her face between his hands. “Not yet.” He wasn’t about to let her feast on him while they fucked.

“Yes,” she whispered, as her personality leaked from her eyes, replaced by the monster.

“No,” he whispered, catching her mouth with his. She tried to bite him, but he withdrew before she could, returning a second later with more soft caresses while he pinned her hands behind her. She was still weak enough that it wasn’t even a struggle to hold her still so he used his other hand to fondle her.

And eventually, lust won out over hunger. When he bent to kiss her, Declan shuddered in pleasure as she kissed him in return, her head falling back to allow him better access. When his tongue entered her mouth again she caught it and sucked it delicately, a low hum of pleasure rising from her chest. Carefully, he released her hands, ready to pin her again, but she only planted them on his shoulders and rocked her pelvis against him.

He grasped her ass in his hands and lifted her. “Do it,” he whispered against her throat. “Take me inside. Aw, fuck.” Her tight wet vagina closed over the tip of his shaft, sliding slowly down as she wound her legs around his waist. Bloody hell, she was tight and hot. How could she be that hot? Declan wondered, arching his hips and working his cock deeper inside her. The few female vamps he had been with had seemed cool until they leeched enough of his body heat to warm their blood, their body, their vaginas.

Opening his eyes, he stared into her lovely face, watched as color rushed to her cheeks. He’d wonder about that later, he knew. But for now…shit, this was Tori he was holding—Tori’s firm ass he held in his hands, her breasts pushing against his chest as he slid the rest of the way inside her.

Tori who started to ride him, gripping his cock with the muscles in her pussy and stroking him while she rode him slowly. “So pretty,” he mumbled, reaching up and shoving her wet hair from her face so he could nuzzle at her cheek and jaw, her neck and shoulders.

He stiffened when her lips brushed his throat, but she didn’t try to bite. Instead, she kissed him softly, then her head fell back and she leaned back, bracing her shoulders against the wall, her pretty round tits lifting up. He leaned forward, pinning her against the wall and taking one nipple in his mouth as he dug his cock inside her.

“Declan…oh, hell. Declan, please, please, please.” He bit down on her nipple as he drove inside her harder, riding her, listening to her moan and loving it. At the touch of his teeth closing on her flesh, she started to shudder and clamp down around his cock, her hot, wet tissues gripping him in a silken, steel caress that sent him tumbling over the edge. As she came, she milked him tighter, tighter…driving Declan just a little more with each rhythmic pulse.

Moments later, she started to laugh.

A little hysterically.

“Son of a bitch,” she said on a giggle. “What an unbelievable week. I get bitten by a vampire, which logically cannot have happened. Since logically vampires can’t possibly exist. I start hearing voices in my head. And I’m having my fantasy fuck with you; you just happen to turn into a wolf on occasion.”

Declan smiled, a little sadly. Yeah, a bad week, he was figuring. He shifted, reached and turned off the shower, turning to lift her into his lap. The water drying on his flesh didn’t bother him. He figured it shouldn’t have bothered her either. Being a vamp, she wasn’t likely to notice heat or cold any more.

So when she started to shiver, Declan’s eyes narrowed. Conversationally, he said, “Your fantasy fuck, hmm? Aye, I like that, seeing as how you’re mine as well.” All the while he was trailing his fingers up and down her arm, before coming to rest on her brachial pulse.

Oh, he could hear her heart beating well enough. But he didn’t quite trust his ears right now. How could he? When they were telling him that her heart was easily beating a good forty times a minute? It shouldn’t be beating more than twenty or thirty, or even less, considering they had just fucked themselves into a stupor.

A vamp’s heart tended to beat no more than ten to twenty times a minute—even when excited. And after expending energy, it tended to slow down to even less. Hell, he knew vamps that could go nearly an hour between heartbeats. Older vamps had hearts that would slow and stop completely, until feeding again.

So why was hers beating at a steady forty-six beats a minute? And she was actually breathing. He could hear the air moving in and out of her lungs, little things he had missed earlier, in his shock.

“What voices?” he asked, wanting a little more time to try puzzling this out.

But since she was cold—and shaking with it now—he rose, holding her in his arms like he’d hold a child.

While he was drying her body off, she said, “A woman. She reminded me of my grandmother. Grandma Alice was Native American, the granddaughter of an old medicine man. She was…wise, spiritual. Special. And the voice I heard reminded me of her.”

“When did you hear this?”

“After I called you the last time. While I was waiting for him to find me.”

His head flew up and he stopped drying her long, lovely legs—stopped imagining them around his waist while he took her against the wall again. Eyes narrowed, he repeated softly, “Waitin’ for him to find you? Ya knew he was coming, ya idiot girl, and ya didn’t go hide?”

One black brow lifted and she said, “Your Irish really comes out when you’re angry, you know, Declan?” And then she shrugged. “He would have found me. I wouldn’t have been safe, so why bother?”

He bit down a dozen nasty curses and asked tersely, “What exactly was this voice telling you while you were waiting for death to come knocking?”

“Orange juice. Acid. Bleed.” Her eyes had darkened and become haunted. Then she shook her head and looked back at him, shaking off the memories he knew were returning. “The voice was whispering all sorts of things. Whispering them inside my head…poison my blood…drink as much acidic stuff as I could. Drink acidic juices. The acid upsets their metabolism somehow. It told me it would change my blood and the vampire wouldn’t be able to ingest it. Make the vampire bleed. Don’t let him get much of my blood inside him. That the sun will hurt or kill weaker vamps and lesser vamps. Lesser vamps? To make him bleed, even if it wouldn’t kill him. To hide.”

Then her eyes narrowed. “And eat. She kept telling me when it was over, I had to eat. Had to. And when I—” Her voice faltered and she stopped, closing her eyes and forcing herself to breathe steadily. “And when I woke up, she said it again. Loudly, until I finally did it. I ate, and ate, and ate, and ate. And then I hid.”

She lifted confused looking eyes to Declan and asked, “Why would she tell me to eat?”

Declan worried his lip with his teeth while listening to her speak. Eat, eh? Why the bloody hell is that so important?

While he was pondering this, she absently rubbed her belly and said, “Speaking of food, can I get hungry? I am hungry. I want food. Can I want food?”

Declan had heard bits and pieces of such things, but he had always attributed them to legend. Stories of vampires who were aided by forces not of this world, of a special sort of vampire immune to the dangers of the sun, who could walk among humans and convince all that they were human—eating, drinking, taking the sun.

Vampires didn’t eat. They could drink, as long as they avoided dairy—the proteins in any sort of dairy or even that soy shit made them sick as hell, but other than that, they could drink whatever they wanted. But he’d never met a vampire who could eat.

And new vampires simply couldn’t walk in daylight. It was one of the few things that helped control them, natural selection to keep the stronger, more vicious species under control.

Of course, sometime nature needed extra help. And that would explain Tori.

The pieces of the puzzle were falling into place. He roughly guessed it was nearing sunrise. And figured this was the only way to know for certain. “Do you trust me, Tori McAdams?” he asked, taking a shirt from the back of the door and buttoning her into it.

“Trust you?”

“Aye. Do you trust me?”

A tiny smile curved her mouth, sad and bittersweet, as she lifted her hands, palms up, asking, “If I didn’t trust you, why would I have come here? I knew that if I could get to you, you could help me. Would protect me.”

“I will. Come with me now. We’ve something we need to be doing,” he said, guiding her down the stairs and to the large eastern window.

She sensed what he was doing and she hesitated. “I’m newly changed, Declan. She said the sun could kill the newly changed. And even if I’m not happy with my new diet, I’m not ready to die yet.”

Stroking a reassuring hand down her back, he held her in place. “It takes more than a few seconds, darlin’ girl. It takes being thrown out into the sunlight and chained in place while the sun chars the flesh from your bones over a period of time—it takes hours, not seconds. If this hurts even a bit, I’ll get you away.”

“Declan, what…”

He shushed her, pressing his lips to her mouth, and cuddling her against him. “You’re going to be fine.”

“You mean, you don’t think the sun is going to hurt me?” she asked, fear in her voice. Her neat nails bit into his arm while she stared out the window into the lightening horizon.

“No,” he said honestly. “Most vamps, even a Master, are in their lairs by now, tired, ready to rest. You don’t look weakened or in need of rest.”

“So no need to rush out and buy a coffin, huh?” she quipped. “This doesn’t make any sense. He bit me, and he made me drink. After that, my body felt like it was going to explode every time my heart beat. If Masters need to take their rest by now—whatever a Master is—then why am I still awake? Why don’t I need to crawl into a pile of graveyard dirt and sleep?”

Resting his chin on her crown, Declan laughed. “A myth. They don’t need graveyard dirt or a coffin. Just someplace safe from sunlight. And they can cross running water, and they have a reflection.”

“So I can still see what I look like on a bad hair day? Oh, joy,” she said, laughing a little to herself. Nerves. She was strung tightly now. Declan could feel the nerves singing in her body, feel the tension in her tautly coiled muscles.

Nuzzling said hair, Declan murmured, “You always look beautiful. Sexy. Touchable.” He stroked his hand under the shirt to cup her breasts as he lowered his head to whisper, “When the sun rises, I’m going to make love to you here, with the sun shining down around us. I’ve wanted to see you like that, with the sun painting your skin gold. I want to taste you again.” Her nipples, hard and hot, stabbed into his palms as he rolled and pinched them. Her ass was pressing back against Declan’s cock and her hips were rocking in a hungry, fevered motion.

She whimpered, hardly aware that the sun had started to make an appearance on the horizon. The lavender light slowly shifted to pink, the clouds going gold while he whispered about how it had felt with his cock snug inside her body. Trailing one hand down to her center, Declan continued to eye the horizon while he started to slide his fingers in and out of her body. She gripped him tightly as he pushed back inside her channel and sought the little notch that would make her come.

And the sun was indeed painting her skin gold. Urging her forward, he guided her hands to the broad windowsill and forced her to bend over, bracing her weight on her hands. The shadowed cleft opened a little, revealing a tight, pink rosette, and lower, dark curls that surrounded her sex, her lips pink and swollen and gleaming wet. Taking his cock in hand, he guided it inside her tight, swollen passage as he groaned with a mixture of relief and pleasure.

Pleasure that he was inside her again.

Relief that he wasn’t going to lose her to the darkness.

And then he started to pump inside her, his hands gripping her hips and pulling her ass back to meet him. The pink rosette beckoned and he slid one hand around, catching some of her moisture before pressing the pad of his thumb against her anus. The tight ring of muscle resisted as he slowly worked it in, listening to her startled gasp, feeling the tightening in her sheath as he started to push a little inside her.

The tight hole closed over him like silk and Declan shuddered, feeling Tori trembling under his hand, her butt quivering against his thighs as he pushed back inside her. “Do ya like that, now?”

Tori moaned in answer, feeling the flared head of his cock as it pulsed deep inside her, as he pushed down and shifted so that it was rubbing against that spot inside her with every stroke. She clenched down around it and mewled, a hot hungry little sound. She quivered when Declan eased the tip of his thumb inside her virgin ass, his own breaths leaving his body in ragged pants. The tight hot walls of her ass closed around him like a silken glove and he groaned in pleasure as the sensation triggered an early orgasm in her body.

Declan needed her too much, had needed her for too long. The feel of her going into spasms around his invading cock was incredible and he thrust himself inside her in short, furious digs as he started to come. She spasmed around his cock, her entire vagina clenching and quivering, as Declan flooded her with the heavy, warm wash of his semen.

They collapsed—Declan catching their weight and guiding them to the window seat—so they could catch their breath. And watch the sun rise.

“Fuck me,” he said, winded. “At some point, I’m going to be able to last more than five minutes inside you.”

She laughed weakly. “I’m not sure I could take it. But I’m game if you are,” she said willingly.

“Not right now,” he chided her, smoothing her tumbled ringlets from her face. “We’ve got some work to do.”

“Work?” she repeated.

“Hmm. Work,” he replied. “To find who did this to you, and kill him—slowly, painfully, and with great pleasure.” He was growling by the time he finished.

“Sounds good. What else?” she said, lifting her face to study him.

Looking down at her, he smiled. “Find out exactly what you are now, I’m thinking. But, for now we just need to watch the sun rise.”

So they did. “Does it hurt at all?” he asked after five or ten minutes. By now, the sun was riding high in the sky and her cheeks were a little pink.

“No,” she said slowly. “It…it itches. Like I’ve spent too much time in the sun, like sunburn feels after you’ve finally figured out you’re burned.”

“I have a friend. He’s a vampire—one who was changed against his will. Like you. He’s more than three hundred years old. Now he can tolerate small amounts of the evening sun—enough to watch the sun set again after three centuries of darkness—and it makes him itch. You already have the tolerance of a centuries old vampire.”

“This is a friend?” she said, stiffening.

“Yes. A good man, he is. He was friends with my grandfather, almost two hundred and fifty years ago. Not all vampires are like the one who changed you, Tori. I think you should meet him. His name is Elijah Crawford. If anybody has answers, it’s him.

“And I trust him. He’s a friend, a good one. Eli has saved my life and my ass a time or two. It will be all right, Tori, I promise.”

Chapter Three

A couple of hours later she was eyeing the massive amount of food in front of her. “Should I really try to eat all of this?”

He laughed. “Half of it is mine. I spent too much energy last night shifting back and forth so quickly. And I require more than the average human. A shifter tends to have a high metabolism. Vamps have slowed metabolism. I imagine yours will be somewhere in between.

“Just eat what appeals to you. We don’t have any answers yet. But your body already knows what it can and can’t tolerate. And you said you wanted food. Food—not blood.”

Her cheeks flushed. Watching him move around the kitchen—relaxing the way you can only relax after good, hard sex with somebody you care about—she had started to forget. A little. And now she remembered. “I wasn’t trying to get you to feed me,” she said flatly. “I didn’t ask last night and wasn’t asking now.”

“I know. But we need to know what your body needs to be at your strongest. If food will do the trick, which I doubt, it makes your existence easier.”

“Easier?” she said through gritted teeth. “You call this easier?”

“Aye. Easier than it will be if you require blood for sustenance. Do you know what that will do to you, preying on others to survive? I know,” he told her, turning and pinning her with glinting green eyes. “You’ve a soft heart, Tori McAdams, even if you keep it well hidden under that tough hide you show the world. Seeing other people as food will tear at you, and destroy you. Have you thought of that?”

Yes. And that was why she felt so raw all of a sudden.

Deflated, she asked, “Am I a monster now?”

“Oh, Tori, you don’t have a monstrous bone in you.” Then he crossed over and hugged her from behind, resting his chin on her shoulder, cuddling his larger body against hers to comfort. “But don’t you think we should find out exactly what is in you?”

She ate.

A normal sized meal.

But she still felt hungry.

Her body didn’t want food though.

She could smell him, sitting across the table, warm, sexy male. His blood throbbed in his veins and she could hear it, could hear the steady pounding of his heart, the soft whooshing as blood flowed through his body. Her eyesight— sonofabitch—had improved as well. She could have done without seeing the large vein in his neck that pulsed and fluttered and beckoned.

Lifting the glass of water to her mouth, she sipped, desperate to wet her dry mouth.

“What about orange juice?” she asked suddenly. Lowering the glass, she stared at him with a puzzled frown. “If the acid in it is what made my blood so distasteful, will it hurt me?”

“Not likely—it was just altering the pH of your blood.” He shrugged, a thoughtful look on his face. “It’s possible if you gorged on it, it could bother you some, but I think your body would tell you to stop before that. Do you want to make sure?”

She hesitated, wrinkling her nose and asked, “You sure it won’t hurt me?”

“If I thought it would, I wouldn’t offer.” Then he grinned and said, “It’s just juice, Tori. It’s not holy water.”

Horror rushed across her face. “Am I damned now?”

Declan shook his head, his smile fading. “If you truly believe in God, then how can you ask? You didn’t ask for this, didn’t court it. You’ve done no evil, Tori. Would God punish somebody who is innocent, because of something that was forced on him?”

She slumped in her chair. Rubbing her fingers across her brow, she said wearily, “This is too much. Too much has happened, too many things have changed.”

“All right. I can always add some vodka to the orange juice,” he offered.

A tired laugh escaped her lips. “A screwdriver sounds rather tempting,” she said. “Come on. Let’s get it over with.”

It didn’t hurt. The juice slid down her throat easily, and she savored the sweet taste on her tongue. “Why is everything so much more vivid now?” she asked, draining the glass.

“Vampires have enhanced senses,” he replied. “But that’s not what you want either.”

She flushed. “You noticed.”

“When you’re eyeing me like a bedtime snack, it’s hard not to notice,” he said, shrugging. “If it were only in the hedonistic sense, it would be flattering. Right now, it just is. We’ll handle it.

“Can you sleep?”

She frowned, trying to follow his rapid change of topic while she adjusted to just how well he could read her.

Uncomfortable, she realized he’d probably always been able to read her that well. Without answering, she asked a question of her own. “Are your senses as heightened?”

“Some are even more so,” he answered, a bit cautiously it seemed. “Why?”

“Which ones?”

“Ah, smell. Hearing. You, well, most vamps are a little stronger, but I am faster, more agile.”

“Smell?”

“Why are you asking?”

Meeting his eyes, she said, “You read me a too little well for my own comfort. How?”

He lifted his shoulders slowly. “Your expressions. Your heart rate picks up when you’re nervous. I know you are still hungry, because of the way you keep looking at me, then away. And you keep licking your lips, like you always did when I stopped by with something from Cinnabon,” he said, grinning faintly, the dimples in his cheeks deepening to slashes as his mouth curved up. “Your scent changes a little with your nerves, your anger, and your emotions.”

“Changes?” Her voice squeaked a little. Clearing her throat, she asked, “Changes how?”

Now his grin was wider, and wicked. He had figured out why she was asking. His soft green eyes didn’t look so soft now; more wild and dark and green—hungry and hot.

“Changes.” He paced around her, much like a wolf circling his prey. Each circle brought him closer, until he was brushing her body with his every time he moved. “When you’re aroused, you smell…hot. I know that scent. I’ve smelled it on you nearly every time we seen each other. I heard it every time your breath caught in your throat, every time your heart kicked up, how you’d grow wet with wanting. I’ve wanted nothing more at times than to bury my face between your pretty legs and eat. But you always pushed me away.

“It drove me mad, knowing you wanted me, knowing you didn’t want to.” Moving behind her, he gripped her hips and rocked his rigid cock against her ass—naked under the shirt.

“It made me want to howl, made me want to take you down to the floor and fuck you until you couldn’t see straight. Until we collapsed—both of us.”

His hands came up and caressed her aching breasts, fondling and tweaking the nipples while she whimpered and moved against him, thrusting her tits into his hands, and her bottom against his shaft. “And the nerves. When you are turned on and wanting me—like I want you—you get nervous, worried that I will see. And it smells sweet, and innocent, like rain in the spring. That was what kept me from pushing, knowing how nervous you were, how torn. I knew something kept you from letting me close, even though you wanted me.

“And it hurt you, confused you. So I made myself not push,” he finished, jerking her shirt up and baring her ass. He smoothed his hands down the round curve, squeezing and stroking, feeling the tense muscles just below her skin. They quivered under his touch. Then he turned her around and lifted her naked butt onto the edge of the counter, moved between her thighs and freed his cock.

“Look at you,” he muttered thickly while he spread her legs wide, exposing the wet folds of her body—pink and damp—the curls that covered her mound, her long torso, her breasts covered by the shirt and one button. With a jerk, the button popped off and her heaving chest was revealed—her white tits with dark pink nipples, already erect. “Such a pretty sight. You’re so wet,” he mused as he slid his hands behind her ankles, up her calves to her knees.

Declan hooked her knees over his elbows, and forced her weight back. Tori fell back, catching her weight on her palms while he spread the lips of her pussy and slowly slid in, working the thick, hard length of his cock inside her swollen, wet tissues. She watched—watched as the flared head speared her entrance, cleaving through her sheath until he was lodged in, the head of his cock nudging against her womb. He pulled out until just the head rested inside her before he drove it back into her.

She could hear herself whimpering, panting, as she watched him slide his flesh inside her. The thick column of flesh was ruddy, wet from her, smooth and perfectly formed. He surged back inside and Tori sobbed as she watched him, her belly and womb going into spasms at the erotic sight.

Listened while he whispered about the scent her body gave off while he was inside her, and she felt the tension already coiling. He continued to whisper and croon to her as he buried himself to the hilt—the head of his penis, lodged against the mouth of her womb.

“I’ve wondered, darlin’, how it would feel to be inside of your sweet body. No fantasy comes close, you’re so tight, and hot, and wet,” he crooned as he trailed one hand down the back of her thigh, lifting her hips just a little more and forcing her torso further back.

She flinched when she felt his thumb probing her ass. And she flushed, remembering how fucking good it had felt when he had slid it just a little inside her earlier.

“I know you like that,” he whispered. “Your heart rate just kicked up, and your scent changed even more. It keeps getting stronger the hotter you get. Like this.” And he buried his thumb inside, the lubrication that had slid from her vagina downward easing his way past the tight ring of muscle.

Shocked, surprised at the abrupt, deeper penetration, she cried out. A lightning bolt seemed to streak from her ass, to her clit, to her womb and she bore down, and came around him in the span of seconds, and then started moving and whimpering and pleading for more.

He shifted, pulled and they traded positions, her kneeling astride him, facing away, her ass open and exposed while he set her to rocking on his cock. He then gathered more of her slick moisture from her pussy and slid his index finger inside her anus. She heard him curse roughly and mutter, “So fucking tight. And soft. Soft as silk.”

But she couldn’t concentrate. She rode him hard, forcing all her weight down on his cock with all her strength, until they were fucking each other with bruising force and she gloried in it. A second climax tore through her and he grunted, sliding a second finger inside her clinging ass while gripping her hip with his other hand, grinding his cock inside her every time she slid down.

He cried out and bucked beneath her, lifting both their bodies from the cool tile floor, clenching his hand on her hip when she reached down to cup his balls. Tori rolled the warm, furred sac in her hand, before trailing her fingers down and stroking the bare, sensitive patch of skin just below his balls.

His hands slid up her torso, closing over her waist, holding her still, and he pushed up into her as she stroked his sac again. Tori heard him moan and felt his cock jerk inside her, and she squeezed gently. He moved under her like lightning, shifting her onto her knees, him gripping her hips and pummeling into her, panting and swearing hoarsely, the rounded head of his cock passing over the bed of nerves buried by the mouth of her womb.

He started to come, filling her with hot wet spurts of semen, and she went into spasms around his cock seconds later, drawing his climax out until they both thought it would kill them.

Moments later, he collapsed against her back and eased to the floor, rolling them to their sides. Declan whispered into her hair, “When you come, with me inside you, your body gives off another scent and it marks you—marks me. We belong together, Tori. And I’m keeping you.”

She had every intention of keeping him as well.

He had ushered her into bed, drawing the curtains and cutting off the light that seemed unbearably harsh so close to mid-morning. For a while, he would sleep next to her, he had promised. So she drifted into a sleep deeper than any she had ever known, her belly, head and heart full.

And the hunger inside was briefly sated.

She could feed off the energy from sex as well.

Not for long. It wouldn’t hold her the way a kill would. Or even a good steady feeding.

But it had sated the monster inside her. Declan could scent it on her skin as she slid into slumber—the scent of deep, complete satisfaction—and he could see it in the small replete smile on her lovely face.

Declan took some comfort in knowing there was yet another way to help hold the hunger at bay. Vampires were psychic creatures—it was the energy they took from the blood that kept them going, as much as the blood itself. Some could feed from emotion almost as if it were blood. All vamps required some blood to be at optimum and Declan was sure Tori would as well, no matter how different she was proving to be.

She was tolerating the sunlight, food, taking sex without taking blood, and being sated with it.

Different than other vampires. Aye, she was different. He had been friends with Elijah Crawford for years, and had met a number of vamps through Elijah who were just trying to live as peacefully as one who lusted for blood could. Damnation knows he had fucked a number of the ladies. It wasn’t an easy thing to admit, but he liked lovers who were other than human. Declan liked knowing that his strength and hunger for sex wouldn’t hurt his partner.

And of those women, not one of them had ever been able to come without taking blood.

That was one of the things he loved about a human lover. Though he had to be a little more careful, they had simple basic hungers. Sex. Well, the commitment word, but a smart man knew to avoid those women unless he was serious.

Human lovers only wanted sex, a night of lovemaking, some companionship. Another shifter—especially another wolf—tended to start trying to lead him down the path of packdom. And vampires always wanted to feed.

A guy only had so much blood.

Tori still seemed a little human, though. She had been able to come without the taste of blood, had been able to shake off the bloodlust easier than a newly turned vamp could have managed.

It wasn’t a big thing, not really. Hell, Declan didn’t mind spilling a little blood if the woman he was with was worth it. There was very little that could compare to a vampire lover, outside of another like himself.

And he was a loner for a reason. Few of the other wolves he knew would dare risk their leader’s wrath by sharing his bed. It had been nearly four years since he had been with another shifter and that had been only one night, a werewolf from a pack out west. A true were—one who couldn’t fight the call of the moon.

Alana had been one of the Alpha females, in a pack where the dominant females outnumbered the dominant males. The pack leader was a little nervous about letting too many strong men into his pack, fearful of any challenges that might come.

He had known and trusted—to an extent—Declan for some time, and knew he wouldn’t make a challenge. So Declan hadn’t been the least bit concerned when Alana had leaped through his window in her silvery wolfen form, joining him in bed.

Not concerned until Alana had started whispering what an extraordinary pair they would make. It would be easy to dispatch the pack leader. Or they could find another territory.

Everybody feared an Inherent. They could rule as they chose, live as they chose, where they chose.

Declan hated pack politics.

Hated the werewolves and natural shifters who thought they could live by their own rules, hunt whom they chose, and never pay the price. There were far too many monsters among the shifters.

Hated the stupid, primitive rules some Alphas expected their packs to live by. Hated how the stronger wolves had treated those weaker than themselves.

He had his reasons for not running with a pack.

Reasons he had walked away from his own.

He made a call and spoke with Cy. Requested—and after much bullying—was granted some personal time. It had taken bribing his boss with his season tickets to the last of the upcoming basketball games. March Madness was very effective, when it came to getting the week he had requested.

Seeing as how the Cards were winning, Cy had just about started crying with joy when Declan offered that bribe.

He wasn’t leaving Tori, not until this was good and solved.

It was far too early for Eli to be awake.

And he couldn’t leave.

Not with the feral still out there. If he decided to start looking for his new offspring, Declan had to be here when the sun set.

She woke way before sunset, climbing from bed and yawning, rubbing the side of her neck, feeling smooth flesh where there had been scarred tissue only hours earlier.

“Awake already?”

She had known he was there. She woke smelling his flesh—that sweet male scent—and the spice of his blood that flowed beneath his smooth skin.

Slowly, she turned and met his eyes. “Looks like. I feel…good. Well, as good as you can expect for somebody who has been dead for a few days,” she said, rubbing her arms.

He smiled. “You are not dead, Tori. You’re just a little more than human now.”

“And the man who did this?”

“He’s not exactly dead either. But he’s no longer human.” He moved closer, grabbing a soft chenille throw from the foot of the bed and draping it over her shoulders. “A true, full vampire doesn’t feel the cold of a late evening in early spring. Or the heat of a sultry night in August,” he told her, using the warmth of his hands to chase the goose bumps from her body. “They cannot eat food, even though the older ones can tolerate liquids. They cannot take sun as you did, not so soon, although the stronger ones can do it as they age.” Reaching up, he laid the pad of his thumb against her neck and said, “And a vampire’s heart can only beat so many times. It takes too much energy, and would drain him, if it beat as steadily as yours.”

“So if I am not a full vampire, but a little more than human, exactly what am I?” she asked, reaching up and covering his hand with hers.

“I imagine you are a bit like me,” he mused. Lifting his eyes, he met hers and said, “A hybrid.”

He watched as her brows lowered over her eyes, as her mouth pursed briefly before she repeated, “A hybrid. Exactly what would make me a hybrid? And what makes you one?”

“There are different kinds of shapeshifters…weres…those who rely on the power of the moon. And natural shifters. The strongest of those natural shifters are called Inherents. My mother had the blood of both werewolf and Inherent in her blood, but she was human—the gifts were dormant. She never did learn to change. My father was a werewolf born—the virus was passed to him through his father’s side. He was strong, able to control his form from the time he was thirteen. His father had been a were and the pack leader. When my grandfather died, that passed to my father.”

Declan paused, his gaze taking on a far-off look as he stared at nothing in particular, lost to his memories. “He led them for many years, alone. And then he came to America on business, and met my mother. They fell in love and married within one week of meeting each other. She went to Ireland with him, was taken rather reluctantly into the pack. I was born three years later.

“We left Ireland when I was ten. Ireland was too small for the pack. It was growing—even as rare as our kind are—it was growing. And Ireland still believes in myths and magic. It was getting too challenging to remain hidden. And too many people had gone missing. Da had a few ferals in the pack and he executed them. They had started hunting humans again—something that’s been forbidden for hundreds of years.”

“After the execution, he felt it was wiser to move the pack. The pack was given the choice to go, or stay. The majority went with him. But one of his seconds decided after we left Ireland that we should have stayed and gone back to the old ways—hunting whom we choose, trying to infect as many as we could. His name was William. He was a smart son of a bitch, and he kept his wishes quiet. All the while, he worked on the others, trying to change their minds, telling them how Da wanted to make them all human…make them weak. Cursing him because he’d married a woman who was little more than human, and how they’d had a useless mongrel child. And one night, some of them ambushed my father.”

Now he turned his head, staring at Tori with eyes that glowed.

“They killed him because he wouldn’t live as an animal, because he took a human as his wife, and because I wasn’t a shifter. They thought.

“The night they killed him, he was ambushed by men he thought were loyal to him. They also killed my mother that night. Broke her neck and left her lying in bed, like she wasn’t worthy of anything more.

“I was sixteen, and I went to the pack’s hunting grounds to go camping with a friend. They sent only three of the younger Alphas to take care of us. I was just human, you know. No true danger—not against three fully grown weres. Two went after Cy, and one came after me.

“Cy? Your partner, Cy? He knows?”

Declan smiled gently. “Of course he knows…he’s one of us. They gutted him…Cy spent much of the summer recovering.” He paused, reflecting. “He managed to kill them, but they tore him apart in the process. And he lay there bleeding, and listening to a boy a scream.”

“Oh, shit.” Tori covered her face with her hands.

“Yeah.”

“It was you.”

Declan nodded. “It was me. One of the werewolves bit me. That’s how it happens, you see. It’s a virus, and it’s rare. All that time, I had it in me, but it was trapped. And when the werewolf bit me, it came tearing to the surface.”

He sighed, stroking his hands down her arms. “Usually, the first few changes are slow, and hard. But the pack’s doctor thinks I’d been living in a state near shift for most of my teen years and that one bite was all I needed.”

“There I was, going through my first change while Cy lay bleeding on the ground next to me and my mother was dead, my father was dead…I was completely alone and suddenly I was going wolf.”

“Why do I get the feeling that’s more complicated than it sounds?” she asked warily.

“Because it was.” He skimmed a hand back through his hair and shrugged. “I was alone, I was weak from the change, even though I was stronger than I probably should have been, and in just a matter of time, if any traitors in the pack realized what I was, they would come gunning for me.”

“Why?”

He looked down. “Because I was my father’s son…and my mother’s. I was next in line to inherit the pack. And I’m also an Inherent.”

Tori closed her eyes. “Declan, I’m not tracking here. This isn’t making sense for me.”

“Sorry.” He gave her a faint smile. “Being my father’s son, they would assassinate me the second they saw me—they’d tried once, and failed. But being my mother’s son…that was even worse. They wouldn’t trust that part of me. Werewolves in general don’t trust natural shifters—the Inherent wolf has so few weaknesses. The animal is his to call, as he chooses. It costs him little energy to shift—whenever—as often as he chooses. He doesn’t feel the call of the moon and if an inherent chooses, he can resist the change for months on end.”

“And this is important because…?”

“To resist the siren call of the moon is the ultimate power. The werewolves struggle for control—to control their impulses as the moon draws nearer, to resist the need to hunt. The need to hunt repulses almost as much as it entices. A natural shifter doesn’t have that battle.”

“So which one are you?”

“You’ve been with me on nights of the full moon before,” he reminded. And so they had, a number of times, meeting to exchange information or running into each other by chance. And once on a stakeout.

“So you are a natural shifter—Inherent.”

“I’m both.”

“Both?”

“Aye. Ma had the blood of a natural shifter from her father, and Da was a werewolf. I feel the call of the moon, but I can answer or ignore it as I wish. I control the animal at all times. It doesn’t control me.”

“But you hadn’t ever changed before. What happened?”

Declan smiled, rather bitterly. “I was infected. I fought back, and I was stronger than they had expected me to be. I fought and they bit me and I was infected.” He shrugged and added grimly, “I hadn’t ever been fully human, despite what we all thought. I’d always had the gifts inside me, but they’d been…locked away, in a matter of speaking. When he bit me—”

“He tapped them. He set those traits loose, and you were able to shift.”

“Yes.”

“Did he see what he’d done?”

“He did…but I’d killed him about two seconds later, so it didn’t matter. The others were dead by Cy’s.”

“I was found one of my father’s seconds. His name was Aidan. He was one of my father’s friends. He’d escaped to find me and he kept me hidden until William Murphy—the one who had betrayed my father—went to take his place as pack leader. He had the proof that he had killed my father, and he was under the impression that I had been done away with.”

“Why kill you?”

“As long as I was alive William couldn’t claim that he was rightful leader. Even though I had never changed, I was the son of the leader. Tradition and pack law were things the pack lived by. If a wolf wanted the old leadership gone, he had to kill the leader’s entire blood family, from his mate down to the grandchildren.”

“Killing children, lovely,” Tori whispered, grimacing. Her skin had gone pale again, and her eyes were wide and a dark, turbulent blue—troubled. “What proof?”

“You don’t really want to know, do you?”

“I think maybe I need to. I’m trying to follow this, and I know it’s unpleasant, but I think I need to know.”

“His heart. They had torn the heart out of my father’s body. William would take it before the pack, let them smell—smell my father—and then he would eat it.”

Tori blanched, wheeling away and pressing her face to the cool pane of glass as she battled nausea. Declan stood behind her, his clenched fists shoved deep into his pockets while he breathed slowly—through his nose, out of his mouth—battling down the helpless rage.

“They met only a few days later. He wanted them under his control before the next full moon because he intended to lead a rampage. He intended to start hunting the way werewolves hunted centuries ago. Hunting humans.”

He turned away, sighing. Reaching up, he rubbed his hand over the back of his neck, rolling it in effort to relieve the tension. “I was only sixteen, but I was my father’s son. He had been a good man, an honorable one. And he did his best to raise me that way. And I was still all too human. A lot of weres lose some of their humanity when they change. I never did. The thought of hunting people for sport, when the urge to hunt can be overcome, sickened me.

“I had been in the shadows and when he started telling the pack how things would be, I wanted to go out. But Aidan kept me back. I’m not sure what he was waiting for, but he made me wait.”

“And then William’s people brought forth this little Styrofoam cooler and took this bloody pulp from it. It was the men who had led the ambush when my father was killed—they all stood around, almost smiling—they were fucking proud as they held this bloody pulp like some prize. And I smelled it, my father’s blood. I lost control, well, maybe not lost. I never tried to stop it. I shifted and charged out of the shadows where Aidan was holding me and tore through the crowd. The pack scattered, and they all cowered. I killed them, the men who had ambushed my father. I think they thought I was my father. I saved William for the last…and I changed back into my regular form before I broke his neck. I wanted him to know it was the son of the man he’d killed who had ended his life.”

His hands ached. Looking down, he flexed them. “They had killed a good man. I can’t say I regret killing them. But I think I hated them more because I had to kill them. Killing them changed something inside me. Something that even being bitten by a werewolf could not have touched. Killing them cost me more of my humanity than anything else has.” He could still feel it, still feel the hot rush of blood as he bit down through warm, struggling flesh. Feel the pop as he snapped the bones in the neck. That had started him down the road he was still walking, decades later, and though he didn’t regret the choices he had made, he often wondered what it would have been like, if he hadn’t been infected.

Two hands came down and covered his, wrapping them and lifting them upward until she could press a kiss to each palm. “If it hadn’t hurt you inside, then it would mean you were just as twisted as they were,” she said softly, wrapping her arms around him and cuddling her body to his.

“I know.” He pressed a kiss to her brow, rested his chin on her head. “Once they were all dead, I walked away.”

“Walked away?”

“I am a loner. I run with no pack. I left them there in the clearing and told Aidan I wanted no part of them. Their politics are why my father died. Da was trying to change things. And things were getting better, would have been better still. But the pack was lazy. They didn’t want to learn control, didn’t want to change.”

“Then that just means they are still more human than they want to think. Humans hate change. Hate trying the unknown.” She led him to the broken down recliner in the corner and curled up on his lap. “Why are you telling me all of this?”

Running one hand down her back, savoring the warmth of her flesh under the silk shirt she had snagged from his closet, Declan said, “I do not know what it is like to live with the monster you now have inside you. But I understand not being completely human. You’re not alone.”

He could feel her smile against his chest, feel the warm caress of her breath through the shirt he wore when she whispered, “I know.”

When her body shifted and straddled his, he thrust his hips up, rubbing his hardening length across her exposed folds. The ripening scent of her body beckoned him as he reached up and grabbed the shirt she wore, jerking until it fell from her smooth white shoulders in shreds. She laughed and stroked her hands up until she could cup her breasts, rubbing her thumbs against her reddened nipples before one hand went down to pluck and stroke her clit.

“Bloody hell,” he hissed as he watched the play of her long slim fingers on her flesh—working her body closer to climax. He could smell her—peaches, sex—growing stronger as her arousal grew. He lifted her with one hand, trapping her fingers between them as she started to slide them inside her wet vagina. She laughed as he tore his jeans open before catching the cheeks of her ass in his hands.

“What’s your hurry?” she asked, leaning forward to press her lips against his in a slow, tender kiss while she resisted the pull of his hands. “I want to taste you.”

His hands paused, hesitated and fell away as she leaned down. But it wasn’t his neck she was going for. Her hot, wet mouth trailed lower and lower until she shifted out of the chair to kneel in front of him. Wrapping one hand around the base of his shaft, she gave a low hmmm of approval before she leaned forward and daintily licked from root to tip. Taking that fat, flared head that enticed her so into her mouth, she suckled on it before pulling away to stare up at Declan. “I’ll try to do this without nicking you this time,” she murmured before she took his length down her throat, again, and again—until Declan’s hands closed over the arms of the chair and his nails tore into the fabric as he struggled not to come in the wet cave of her mouth.

His cockhead lodged down her throat, blocking her air briefly before she figured out she really didn’t need to breathe as much as she once had. Keeping him there, she rocked back and forth slightly, shuddering with pleasure as the low groan vibrated from his chest throughout his body.

Through the shield of her lashes she looked upward, staring up the length of his body, at his quivering belly, the shuddering of his chest as he struggled to breathe, the fine sheen of sweat that covered those yummy muscles, up the line of his throat to stare at his face.

His lashes were lowered to half-mast, his lips parted, a look of half bliss, half torture on his face. Sliding back down, she savored the smooth, thick length in her mouth, the salty taste of his skin, the pulse of life just underneath. Her lungs started to ache just a little and she pulled away, took a breath and lapped at the underside of his cock before taking it back into her mouth.

He hissed again when one of her canines grazed his flesh. Jerking away, she whispered, “I’m sorry.”

Declan seized her head and guided it back to his cock, to the tiny drop of blood that beaded along the shaft. “Again,” he whispered roughly, slipping his thumb inside her and opening her mouth. “Again.” When her mouth closed over his cock, he groaned in ecstasy. Her tongue sought and soothed the tiny nick while she suckled on him, eagerly lapping up the scant amount of blood before she went back to taking his length down her throat.

One hand buried and twisted itself into her tumbled hair, while his other hand went to cup his balls as she relaxed the muscles in her throat until she had taken as much of him down her throat as she could. Unable to stop, he reared up, clasped her head in both hands and pumped his hips, shoving his cock in and out as hot spurts of come pulsed from his cock into the wet silk of her throat.

His hands fell from her scalp, half numb, and she started to pull back, allowing his semi-hard cock to slip from her grasp—pausing to swab it with her tongue before she went to nibble and suckle on the head of his dick, probing the small hole at the tip with her tongue for a few seconds—then lifting her head to stare at him.

“You taste good,” she murmured, pressing a kiss to his flat belly before settling back on her heels and staring up at him, her hands pressed together between her knees.

He lifted heavy lids to stare at her as she knelt in front of him. He reached for her and drew her onto his lap, his cock starting to twitch as he smelled her. Fuck, she was even more turned on now than she had been before she started. Cupping her pussy in his hand, he discovered she was wet—wetter than she had been before she’d gone down on him.

“Ride me,” he whispered roughly, guiding her wet entrance down until the tip of his shaft was lodged at the mouth of her pussy.

Hooking her ankles behind his back, her arms around his shoulders, she obeyed, rolling and rocking against him lazily as he took the tip of her breast in his mouth, capturing the hard nub of her nipple between his teeth. Her walls clenched tightly on him, making him groan and she laughed, repeated it over and over again.

Behind her, he started to probe the entrance of her ass. She went stiff, lifting her head to stare down at him. Her eyes were foggy and slitted with lust, but Declan sensed the reluctance inside her. “What bothers you about this?” he asked, easing his index finger inside until it was seated down to the webbing of his fingers. “It’s just sex, someplace I could put my cock and have you coming like you’ve never done before.”

She started to shake her head no but then he rolled his hips as he pulled his finger back and slid it home again. “That feel good?” he purred when her eyes flew wide and then fluttered closed. “You’re so tight,” he crooned, setting his hips to a slow gentle rhythm while he finger-fucked her ass, using that stimulation to bring her to climax. “It does feel good, doesn’t it, Tori?”

“Yes,” she gasped as she climaxed around him, her vaginal walls milking his cock, while the muscles in her rectum gripped his finger.

“It could feel better,” he offered when she collapsed against him.

He was still hard inside her.

She lifted her head slowly to stare down at him. “Will it hurt?” she asked breathily while he continued to move her hips against him.

“If it does tell me, and I’ll stop,” he promised, lifting her from him. He came free from her with a soft, wet, sucking sound and deposited her in the chair before he left the room. She eyed him warily when he returned, a tube in his hand. “Turn around,” he ordered softly after he pulled her still shuddering body to her feet.

She started to hesitate but remembered—remembered how he had hesitated when she had told him she wanted to taste him. Taste his cock, not his blood. And he had let her taste both. She turned and got down on her knees when he urged her to, bending over the chair so that it supported her torso.

He warmed whatever lubricant he had retrieved between his palms before coating her anus and then his cock. She jumped when he started to probe and heard him laugh as he slid into her body, spreading her labia and driving his length into her until he was fully seated.

Into her stretched, swollen sheath while he started to spear her anus with his fingers, like he had been doing earlier. She quivered under his hands and whimpered when he leaned over to whisper in her ear.

“I’ve dreamed of this,” he told her in his low, smoky voice with its faint hint of Ireland. “Dreamed of riding you, of eating you up in three greedy bites. Dreamed of coming inside your mouth and your bottom. Push down.”

She did and gasped when he easily slid two fingers inside her bottom.

“We can stop there, for now, if that’s what you want,” he murmured, bracing one hand low on her spine while he slid those two fingers in and out of her anal passage, his cock filling her sheath.

But she panted and twisted under his hands and whispered, “More.” It wasn’t enough. It felt too good, too damn good, to stop there. “More, Declan.”

He paused and held still inside her. She squirmed and lifted her ass, silently begging. She started to quake moments later when the broad head of his cock replaced his fingers.

The dark, ruddy head stretched the tender pink opening, parting her as he pushed inside, his breath catching in his chest as her tight, virginal muscles closed over him.

Slowly.

Tori heard his quick intake of breath over her hungry little moans, but she was too caught up in her own needs to wonder at it. Too slow…He was going so damn slowly she was sweating and squirming and half mad before he was even half way inside her. Bracing her hands on the floor, she snarled and shoved back, taking his entire length inside. She cried out, half in pain, half in pleasure, as she felt his cock slicing through her tight, unused tissues. His cock was hard and hot, twitching and pulsing inside her while she shuddered and twisted, trying to relieve the intense pressure that was bordering on very real pain.

“Declan, stop, it hurts…” she gasped, trying to move forward.

Declan growled warningly when she started to pull away. “Too late for that,” he rasped, reaching around and pinching her clit, sliding his fingers in and out of her pussy, bringing her back to the edge she had been teetering at before rushing and taking him in too quickly.

She squirmed and wriggled against him, pushing at his hands. “It hurts,” she whimpered, trying to pull away from the burning, burgeoning fullness in her bottom. Tears filled her eyes, her heart pounded in her chest as a sob started to rise in her throat.

“Because you went too fast,” he murmured. “Because you won’t be still and let your body adjust.” He pinned her easily, bending over and pressing her between his chest and the seat of the chair. “Your body wants this, Tori. I can smell it, feel it. Your nipples are hard as diamonds and your heart is pounding almost as fast as mine. You’re hotter and wetter here,”—he showed her where with a clever little twist of his fingers—”than you have probably ever been. Just be still, and let me…”

He proceeded to show her, keeping his thrusts tiny and slow until her body calmed around his, the tense muscles in her ass relaxing to a silken, clinging caress around his cock.

“Feel that?” he whispered, keeping his body against hers, intentionally hampering his movement so he couldn’t ream her ass the way he wanted. The feel of those virginal muscles clenching, then relaxing around him was driving him mad. He took her hands and laid them beside her head, covering them with his, and lacing their fingers.

He pulled a little further out and thrust back in, growling in pleasure when she accepted it, accepted his cock inside her this way. “It feels good, doesn’t it?” he asked.

Her body shuddered beneath his and she moved, pushing back against him, faster, harder, and hungrier. “Yes…Declan, please.”

Declan snarled when she started to shudder and quake on his impaling cock. When she started to come, he growled in triumph, wrapping his arms around her and straightening, taking her body with him, hands looping beneath her thighs and bringing her knees to her chest, holding her writhing form open and wide for his cock. He took her hard—in deep, driving digs—and he howled when she started to come again.

Wetness slid from her, down to his shaft, easing his penetration even more. He fought his own climax, unwilling to let this end so soon. He kept her pinned against him with one iron arm banding her around the waist. The other he used to shove her hair aside, his head swooping down and raking her exposed flesh with his sharp teeth.

“More,” he ordered in a low, silken throb while he continued to ream her ass. She shook her head and pushed against him, which only drove her further and harder down. He caught her clit between his thumb and forefinger and pinched, tweaked, and tortured until she started to sob again.

“More,” he repeated, shifting, turning, shoving her body to the floor and crouching over her. He used his hands to guide hers where he wanted them—one hand stroking and pinching her nipples, the other hand between her thighs, masturbating. Then he braced his hands flat, and stretching them both out on the floor proceeded to fuck her the way he wanted.

This was his weakness. Not the yearning for the moon, nor the urge to hunt, not the need to taste warm flesh in his mouth, but Tori—spread out and open for him, wherever he wanted and however he wanted. Taking his cock down her throat, or taking his cock in her ass, as often as he wished, however he wished. The need for sex that rode his back—his own personal demon—had focused solely on this woman and he had been waiting since he had first laid eyes on her.

Sweat dripped from them as he forced her into a third, and a fourth climax. He rose back up, keeping her prone on the floor while he crouched between her thighs, spreading the cheeks of her ass with his hands and watching as she took his cock, as she took him. The tight ring of muscle relaxed and she opened to take his cock back in every time he pulled out. The smooth, satiny skin of her butt, the way her slender torso rested against the floor, the faint cries she muffled against the chair arm, all it of drove him insane.

He covered her again when he felt his climax approaching. He bit into his wrist until he felt and tasted blood, then shoved it to her mouth, “Feed,” he growled in her ear. “Suck me hard.” He wrapped his free arm around her so that she was pinned, arms against her sides, his weight keeping her thighs open and spread.

Her tongue lashed out, catching the blood as she drew on his flesh, falling into a rhythm that mimicked the one he was performing on her.

Tori couldn’t handle it, the fast, brutal digs in her ass and the hot, spicy wash of blood in her mouth as she fed. She exploded, screaming and bucking beneath him, fighting his confining grip. She bore down and climaxed around him a fifth and final time as her fangs slid out and into his flesh, as he released the bonds on his control and jetted his seed inside her.

“Son of a bitch,” Tori whispered weakly a little while later. “We’re going to kill each other.” She daintily licked his wrist one last time before snuggling against his chest.

Feeling slightly sluggish, satisfaction coursing through him with every pounding beat of his heart, he grunted in agreement. “But can you think of a better way to go?”

Chapter Four

Tori followed Declan out into the coming twilight. The sun still shone high on the western horizon, but in the east, clouds and the coming darkness were starting to gather. She paused by the car, standing still and feeling the sun on her face, warming her.

“I can’t imagine how awful it would be to live in total darkness,” she murmured as the sun started to paint the sky in vivid reds, pinks and golds as it neared the horizon.

“Neither can I,” Declan replied quietly, resting one hand on her lower back. He cuddled her against him and watched the sun set with her before urging her into the car. “We need to be going. I left a message with Eli’s people that we are coming. It will take a while to get there.”

“Where does Eli live?”

“West Virginia. I had planned on leaving earlier, but some wanton lady kept seducing me,” he said blandly, snapping his seat belt into place.

She slid him a sideways glance and shifted a bit uncomfortably on the seat. Her bottom hurt, just slightly, a vague ache of muscles never used in such a way.

And her entire pelvic area felt bruised, in a rather lovely kind of way. “Not exactly the way I remember it,” she drawled, pulling one foot under her to support her weight and relieve some of the pressure on her ass.

Declan saw it and flushed slightly. He started the car before leaning over and pulling her to the middle of the seat. He bussed her mouth sweetly before nuzzling her neck. “I can’t help it.” He stroked her back with possessive hands. “You cannot know how much I’ve been needing you. Aching for you.”

He kissed her, sliding his tongue inside her mouth and groaning with satisfaction as her taste flooded him. Moments passed before he started to pull back, nibbling at her lower lip, pressing a kiss to her jaw as he cruised up to her ear. “I’ve one true obsession,” he told her. “Since I changed that first time, sex is the one thing that rides me, the need to fuck, and do it often. But since I met you, you are the only woman I have wanted, and I haven’t touched another woman in nearly six months. I thought I was going to go mad.” He returned to her mouth and kissed her roughly, greedily, as though he feared she would disappear into the coming night.

Her fingers pressed against his head and she whimpered, straining against him, squirming against him. Only when she was panting and losing all ability to think, did Declan shove the urge to mate aside. Her safety first, that was what mattered.

He pulled back and met her eyes levelly. “I know it’s not the best of times for you right now. We need answers, and we need you to be someplace safe. But we’re needing to talk about this. I don’t think I can let you go.”

Her eyes dropped, a slow burn starting inside her heart. Curling her fingers around his healing wrist, she pressed a kiss to the scars that were already fading. “I can’t think about that right now,” she said honestly. “But I really can’t see me leaving either.”

She kissed him softly and wrapped her arms around his neck, twisting awkwardly in the seat to press her body to his. She felt a soft caress of her hair as he sighed into the tumbled brown ringlets, squeezing her tightly before releasing her. “Come. Let’s go find some answers,” he murmured, setting the car in motion.

“How are you feeling?” It was past midnight, nearly three hours had passed and they were well into the mountains of West Virginia, traveling down the interstate under the light of the quarter moon that hung in the sky.

Declan had driven like a bat out of hell, covering hundreds of miles in only a few hours.

The wonders of being a cop, she mused. If he had been pulled over, just flashing his badge would get him out of it. It wouldn’t have been the first time she had seen it.

Then she frowned, and concentrated on his question. He wasn’t asking in general, she knew. “Hungry,” she finally answered, her pale cheeks going scarlet.

She wondered if he could tell in the darkness of the car, touching one hot cheek with the tips of her fingers. Most likely. She could tell a change in her own scent and after the explicit explanation of how well he could smell…Well,

She wasn’t going to be able to hide things from her wolf.

My wolf, she mused. I kinda like the sound of that.

“Most vamps, when they are newly turned, go slightly mad with hunger at first,” Declan said quietly, his voice grim. “Something kept you from that, probably you filling your body with regular food which interfered with the purging process. I am thinking that you somehow changed your metabolism and kept the change from completing.”

“Slightly mad from hunger?”

“Hmm. They can’t control the thirst for blood, you see,” he told her, flicking a brief glance her way. “It’s aggravated because the purging process and the change going on inside drains the body of resources it really doesn’t have to spare. So when a newly turned vamp wakes, it’s not too far from starvation anyway. All it wants to do is feed.

“You changed your body’s metabolism, is what I’m thinking. But, you still have those needs.” Tori watched as he sighed in frustration. “We’re going to have to get you a heavy feeding, Tori. I can lose more blood than a human without suffering, but I’ve heard of newly turned vamps that can drain a person a night for close to a month before the urges can be controlled. Older vampires can’t even ingest that much blood, but new vamps almost need it. We have to get you fed.”

“And how am I supposed to do this?” she asked miserably. She couldn’t feed off a person. She couldn’t.

“I imagine Eli will have a solution,” he said, laying his hand on her thigh. “One of his people will be more than happy to donate some blood. That will help until we find a more permanent solution.

“Such as?”

He shrugged.

“You’ve got an idea about what can do that,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “I can tell.”

He sighed in the darkness, flexing his hands around the steering wheel while he stared hard at the road. “Some people deserve death, Tori,” he said.

“What are you saying?” she asked softly, drawing her knees to her chest and staring miserably out the window.

“We’ll get to that later,” he said obscurely, taking an exit and following a road that led high into the mountains.

“I’d rather get to it now,” she said flatly.

“Later. We’re getting close.”

Whatever Tori had been expecting, it hadn’t been this, the towering wooden construction that perched on the face of a cliff, overlooking one of the deep valleys. Right now, the many windows sparkled under the silvery moon, reflecting the white light back at them as Tori climbed from the car. In the day, it would nearly flame from all the sunlight that would pour through it.

“Ah, isn’t that a little…open?” she asked, wondering how the vampire inside managed to keep away from the sunlight in such a house.

“Eli likes keeping his people happy,” was all Declan said as he led her to the door. He had been waved through the gate nearly a hundred yards back and Tori was fairly certain she heard other people out there.

“His people,” she repeated. There were other buildings. Several smaller average sized houses, like guesthouses, scattered here and there. She could smell chlorine and suspected a pool was somewhere close as well.

And life.

She could smell the hot rich scent of life beyond those doors and a fine sweat broke out on her skin.

After the way Declan had spoken, she had expected somebody other than the mysterious Eli to answer the door. But she knew the minute it opened, this was the vampire.

She sensed great age, a bone deep weariness, and her head was spinning from all the emotions she was picking up on. Hunger, thirst, loneliness, chaotic flashes of painful, intense sex and years that stretched out in front of her forever, empty long years.

Staring into Eli’s eyes, eyes that were the color of old gold, she didn’t realize she was gasping for breath until Declan’s hands landed on her shoulders and he shook her.

His mouth was moving and she could hear his voice over a great distance but she couldn’t understand his words.

This confusion.

The brutal flood of emotions and thoughts and needs that weren’t her own.

And an urging.

An urging to break open a vein and feed it to this man in front of her while he fed her.

“Stop it, Eli! I brought her here for you to help her, not enslave her,” Declan growled as Tori fell away from his hands, her face white and her eyes going glassy while she stared at Eli.

Softly, Eli replied, “If she is strong enough, she won’t be enslaved.”

“She’s only just turned, damn it, it’s not a fair fight,” Declan snapped, struggling to leash the rage inside of him. Why hadn’t he known Eli would try this? After all, he was one of the few Masters, and he guarded his people and his territory ferociously.

“You can’t interfere, wolf. If you do, it won’t hold well for her. She has to find her own strength.” He continued to stare at the woman who was still fighting him. He intensified the strength of the mental command, waiting for her to fall to her knees and offer up her blood.

“She is mine,” Declan rasped, his hands flexing, his skin starting to burn and itch.

Turning his head, Eli smiled, his fangs glinting in the moonlight. “Really? Then she shouldn’t have any trouble resisting the call of another Master,” he said.

“I’m not her Master,” Declan said, his voice dropping and roughening. His jaws were starting to ache and he fought to pummel his rage into submission.

“I’m her lover and if you think I’ll let you take her, you’re wrong. I’ll behead you with my bare hands.”

“All she has to do is throw it off. Any full-fledged vamp of strength can do it.”

“She can’t. Damn it, she’s never fully fed and she’s different—”

A low cry tore from Tori, followed by a shriek of rage as she threw Eli’s compulsion off, her soft, mellow blue eyes glowing electric in the night, while she stared at the man in front of her. “Get out of my head,” she ordered softly, her voice trembling with strain.

“Hmm. What a fighter you’ve found, Declan. Young, strong, and—”

Fast.

Declan never saw her move. And apparently neither did Eli, for he flew back into the solid oak door, blood oozing from his mouth, his eyes wide and glowing with power. And shock.

Tori was standing only a few feet in front of him, massaging her knuckles. Her knuckles were torn and bleeding, and her breath was sawing in and out of her lungs.

Eli stared at her, his eyes glittering with shock and rage.

Declan tensed and prepared to spring, but Eli straightened slowly, staring at Tori with confused eyes. “Never fully fed?” Eli repeated, running his tongue along the inside of his cheek and lip, tasting the blood. It wasn’t the pain really, though it hurt like bloody hell. It was the surprise.

A newly turned vamp, even one of considerable strength, would never have been able to strike him. Even when he clamped it down, the compulsion a Master radiated kept the other, weaker vamps around him in a state of submission. It was that compulsion that gave a Master power over his people, what allowed him to rule, to keep the others under his control.

How could a newly turned vamp, who—according to Declan—had never fully fed, strike him?

He caught the scent of something in the air and his eyes narrowed. Before Declan realized it, Eli had moved and was seizing Tori’s hand, staring at the blood and smelling it.

“Do you mind?” Tori snapped, trying to jerk her hand away. She couldn’t. Eli might as well have been made of steel. He held her bleeding hand in an unbreakable, strong grip.

“I smell vampire,” he whispered roughly, his fangs, protruding slightly from his anticipation of battle, slid even further out as lust and hunger started to pump through him. “But I also smell woman, human woman, sex, and wolf. If you are vampire, why do I still smell woman?”

“I am a woman?” Tori offered, relief coursing through her when Declan aligned himself at her back, wrapping one arm protectively, possessively around her waist and staring at Eli with eyes that shifted and swirled and glowed.

“Not human woman, at least you shouldn’t be,” Eli whispered. He lifted her stiff hand to his lips and licked at the trickling blood, rolling it on his tongue and swallowing, a shudder of ecstasy coursing through him. “God, what a taste.”

Reluctantly, he released her hand and stared at Declan, his eyes impassive again. “It is our way, Declan. A Master will always exert his will over any vampire who enters his ground. If I hadn’t, my own people would have wondered why. But I am sorry that I caused her distress. It was most unfair, and too much to ask of one not yet at full strength.”

Tori watched in confusion as the other man’s face went cold and impassive. “The next time you try to control her, I will kill you,” Declan promised. “Friend you may be, and we have spilled blood together time after time. But this woman holds my heart.”

Eli was handsome, almost poetically so, with wavy golden hair he kept secured in a queue at his neck, and those eyes that looked like golden coins. Tori could still feel the subtle call that he silently, and probably unconsciously, exuded.

But she didn’t feel him inside her head any more.

Not him, nor the other vampires he called his. It had been their emotions she had sensed. The link Eli had tried to force on her had gone both ways without him even realizing it, and it had given her a brief insight into the troubled, lonely mind of the Master who stood before her.

Enough of an insight for her to figure out a few things…things Declan probably didn’t know.

She shouldn’t have been able to resist Eli. It was near impossible for any newly turned vamp without a master to resist the call of a true Master.

Flicking her eyes to the window, she listened with half an ear as Declan tersely explained what had happened. Tori wasn’t certain she wanted to speak to Eli again. Wasn’t certain she wanted to risk another glimpse into his rather tortured mind.

“You fed?”

Turning her head, she blinked slowly, forcing the cobwebs from her mind. She was so fucking tired, and weak.

Incredulously, the golden vamp repeated, “You fed? You ate food?”

She nodded.

“Bloody hell, that isn’t really possible,” he told her, staring from Declan to her and back again. Something akin to jealousy appeared briefly in his eyes.

Good.

“Tell that to my stomach. I ate pancakes for breakfast,” she told him with a smirk. Her eyes narrowed as something else slid through her mind and she stared into his eyes… “And I ate some strawberries.”

Eli’s eyes went to slits and his lower lip poked out just the slightest bit…my my my…the Master Vampire pouting over strawberries. Tori snickered.

“Tori,” Declan whispered warningly.

Eli had been the dominant creature in his world for too long, and his tolerance for sarcasm was thin. But Eli only asked, “Blood? When was the first time you took blood?”

“Night before last,” they both responded, meeting each other’s eyes. Heat rolled through Tori again, chasing a little more of the fatigue away.

“Yours, Declan?” Eli asked sardonically, rubbing his jaw with the tips of his fingers. When the wolf nodded, Eli laughed. “No wonder she is so bloody fast, her first meal being a shape-shifter.”

“What does that matter?” she asked, flicking Declan a glance. But he only raised his hands and shrugged.

“A vamp, particularly a strong one, can take something of his first meal into himself. Memories, abilities. When we first change, we are like a clean slate, or a sponge. And whatever we take first is one of the things that will determine how strong we are as vamps. That is why many vamps provide the first feeding for those they sire, either their own blood, or the blood of one the vamp sought out. That way, they can start the newly turned out the way they want. And you were her first meal,” Eli finished.

Rising from where he had been sprawling on a large leather chair, he circled around Tori, an odd little smile playing at his lips. “The strength of a vampire, the thoughts and morals of a human, the speed and sexual appetite of the shifters and the vamps—my, my, my, what an odd little package you make,” he mused, his low voice still carrying a faint trace of his native England. “I wonder what your strengths will be, your weaknesses.”

“She can take the morning sun.”

Eli’s disconcerting study broke as he turned to stare at Declan. The Irishman stood just a few feet away, watching over Tori. “Impossible,” Eli said, shaking his head.

“She can take it. And she stood in the light of a new dawn with a smile on her lovely face. Impossible? You can stay awake longer, my friend. Just watch and see,” Declan offered.

“A few seconds is one thing, and maybe not so surprising, considering she somehow stopped the transformation before it could complete,” Eli said, still shaking his head. “But there is no way she could possibly tolerate—”

His voice broke off and he moved until he stood toe to toe with the wolf, glaring up at the taller man. “You swear?”

“I am no liar,” Declan said softly. “Why should I lie? I stood there, ready to pull her away if it started to burn her. She held her face up to the sun, and I watched.”

“And rejoiced, I imagine,” Eli said almost soundlessly. He turned and studied Tori with a new light in his eyes. “A vampire who can withstand the sun and take sustenance from something other than a blood vessel. I had thought such things were legend.”

“So you have heard of such things,” Declan said. “Tell us.”

Tori froze under the weight of the golden eyes that landed on her. “‘Tell us,’” he repeated, mocking Declan lightly, even throwing a bit of Ireland into his English voice. “Is it ‘us’ to you as well, Tori?”

“What can you tell me?”

“Only that the ferals will fear you even more than our wolf friend. Even more than they fear me, if what I have heard is fact, and not just myth.”

“What have you heard?” she asked, her voice shaking.

But before he could answer, something seized her—black, evil, spiraling darkness that swarmed through her and blanketed her entire mind. She fell to the floor screaming, her hands to her head.

She bit down on her tongue and tasted blood and then everything went dark.

“He’s calling her,” Declan snarled, when she shot up off the floor as quickly as she fell, leaping for the glass window. He pounced and took her to the floor, pinning her struggling body.

Eli’s eyes were wide and his head thrown back. He could sense something. “I know him,” he whispered gutturally.

“Help me,” Declan said when she started to convulse underneath him.

He held her wildly struggling body, pinning her hips with his, holding her legs with his, but she was strong. Entirely too strong.

Eli’s strength joined his and they rolled to their sides, keeping her body pinioned between them. “If she cannot fight this, he will kill her for not coming to him,” Eli grunted, locking his arms with Declan’s, grinding her more tightly between them. “He will see this as disobedience. He will not see this as her not being able to come because we are stopping her. He will see it as disobedience, and he will kill her.”

Blood was starting to pour from her eyes and nose and mouth. “Fuck,” Declan rasped, lifting murderous eyes to Eli’s. Over her twitching shoulder, he shouted, “What is he doing?”

“Something only her sire could do. He gave her this life. If she is weak enough, he can end it,” Eli said through clenched teeth. “Bloody hell, she is strong.”

“Can you stop him?”

Eli closed his eyes and said, “I can try. But if it goes badly, you may wish I hadn’t.”

“Stop him,” Declan snarled.

“Hold her,” Eli ordered, pulling back slightly and then his fangs slid out and he sliced through the flesh of his wrist, and dark, dark crimson blood flowed. He held the bleeding wound to her mouth and caught her head tightly in one hand. “She needs strength. This will give her that. But if she fights him off…if she fights him, this may bind her.”

Declan pressed his face into Tori’s damp hair. “She’s bound to me,” he whispered. Over and over.

Her struggles started to slacken and he released his grip, his muscles quivering from exhaustion. “Call her,” Eli said from over her head. “Call her back, before he can snatch her again.”

The older vampire took his bleeding wrist from her mouth and licked the remaining blood away. His saliva would have it healed in minutes. “Call her, damn it. I do not open a vein for no reason,” Eli snapped.

Taking Tori’s cold face in his hands, Declan called her in the only way he could think of. He covered her slack mouth his and plunged his tongue deep inside her mouth, stroking her body with his hands and calling out to her with his mind and soul.

Spearing his fingers through her hair, he arched her face up to him and kissed his mate. “Tori…damn it girl, come to me.” She was so cold…so still. Smoothing his hands down her arms, her torso and hips, Declan focused on the slow, feeble pounding he felt inside her chest as he pulled away and kissed his way from her chin to her neck, murmuring to her, “Come back to me.”

Long moments passed and she started to warm. Then her flesh started to heat and her arms twined around his neck. He could smell her through their clothes, feel her and smell her, and the sweet ripe scent of peaches was filling the air.

The pounding of her heart became stronger, steadier as Declan grabbed the edge of her shirt and tore it from her. The lace of her bra cupped her breasts and he lowered his face to the valley between, nuzzling the smooth flesh there as he felt her hands cup his head, his name falling from her lips on a sigh.

Her fingers buried in his hair and Declan trailed his mouth over to lock on her pouting nipple. He bit the soft flesh roughly, leaving a mark before drawing the engorged nipple inside his mouth and sucking. When she moaned, “Declan…please…” he became ravenous, his gentle pleading hands going hard, hungry, jerking her against him, demanding a response instead of coaxing it from her.

Tori sobbed against his mouth as he moved back up her body, wedging between her legs and driving his cock against the notch between her thighs. He caught her clutching wrists in one hand and pinned them overhead, lifting upward to stare down at her. “Mine…you’re mine. Bound to me…” His gaze moved down to stare at her upthrust breasts still framed in black lace, her pale torso quivering with each breath she took.

His hands were pulling to free her from her pants when overhead, a wry, husky voice said, “Unless you want company, Declan, I suggest you stop. I think she is herself again.”

Declan’s head lifted, his eyes dark and hot, to stare down at Tori. Her eyes had darkened to sapphire in her passion and he watched as her tongue darted out to lick at her lips, as if she were holding onto his taste.

They turned as one to stare at the vampire who still knelt just a few feet away. His fangs had slid out and beneath the loose linen trousers he wore, his cock was clearly outlined. “Of course, a wolf is going to use sex to ground you,” he said, his voice sounding tight and strained. Beneath his open shirt, his muscled chest gleamed with a fine coat of sweat, and his eyes were glowing like heated gold as he stared down at them, his fangs erect and ready—hungry.

His cock throbbed and jerked, and he absently stroked his hand against his erection through his trousers, his lids drooping as he locked his eyes on Declan’s hands which were still on Tori’s waistband.

“Go away,” Declan growled, his fingers sliding past the barrier of silk that covered Tori’s cleft. He slid inside, shuddering when her swollen tissues clenched tightly around him.

“This isn’t what she needs right now,” Eli said, watching Declan’s hand inside Tori’s pants. Tori’s head rolled to the side and she met his eyes, her mind clouded with lust, confusion, and hunger.

“It’s what I need,” Declan growled pulling her pants to her knees and diving for the sweet heat that had already started to flow.

“And if her sire calls again?”

Tori cried out, her eyes opaque. Eli was watching hungrily as Declan’s tongue elongated, a handy little knack so many shifters had, watched as he slid that tongue inside her weeping passage. Declan’s eyes met Eli’s over the expanse of her body and he growled. The vibration shuddered up through his mouth and tongue into Tori’s body and she quaked. Declan tore his mouth away and replaced his tongue with his fingers, all the while watching Eli, as Eli watched them.

“Her scent…” Eli rasped, his voice hot and smoky. He dropped to his hands and crawled closer to hover over her body as Declan’s fingers pumped in and out of her tight vagina.

“Mine,” Declan warned, his voice low and rough.

Eli reached out, quick as lightning, and Tori cried out in surprise when he flicked her clit, just quick enough to take a taste before settling back, sliding his fingers inside his mouth and watching Declan. “You started it, old friend. And I am just a man.”

Tori was hardly aware of anything over the roaring in her ears. Just Declan’s mouth, then his hands. A second, cooler hand touched her briefly and she forced her heavy eyes to focus on the men above her. Declan’s head was lowering back to between her thighs, his eyes boring into Eli’s as he started to suckle on her pulsing clit.

Her head rolled on the carpet until she was staring at Eli again. The man—that beautiful, commanding man—was watching them both with near desperation, licking his forefinger, his fangs erect and gleaming. Gold eyes met hers, and she tried to look away, but those eyes held her.

Declan’s fingers worked deep inside her and she cried out when he pushed and pressed on the little spot that drove her mad, just as he bit into her clit delicately, catching the beaded flesh and pulling it tight.

She climaxed with a scream.

Chapter Five

When a low, rough voice spoke over her head a few minutes later, she forced her eyes to open. Staring up, she could see Declan and Eli facing off over her supine body. Their voices came in low tones, Declan’s a throbbing growl, Eli’s a raspy, almost hissing kind of purr that incited both fear and passion.

She felt almost full, and she wondered why, until she caught the faint hint of blood in her mouth. Somebody had fed her. The aftereffects of climax still shuddered through her, and she’d be sure to discuss sex play in front of others once she had Declan alone, but first she had to figure it out if she had enjoyed it, or if it was verboten.

But her head…it didn’t feel right.

She could almost feel something tugging at her, but every second she ignored it, the tugging grew weaker and weaker. A slimy, curdling sensation in her belly still lingered, as well, and for some reason, the man who had bitten her came to mind.

“What happened?”

They ignored her. Rising to her feet, she took a deep breath and shouted, “What happened?”

Hard, glinting green eyes landed on her, only to soften. Declan moved closer to her and brushed her cheek. “You’re all right,” he whispered. Something that resembled fear started to fade from his eyes and he pulled her against him. “Dear God, thank You. You’re all right.”

“I don’t know if I am or not,” she said slowly, looking up at him. His hands smoothed down her arms and she flushed a little as he pulled his shirt off and buttoned her into it before stroking down her hair. “What happened?”

“Your sire tried to summon you,” Eli said, falling back and retreating to his chair. He dropped onto it, lounging like some giant feline creature, and studied her with those opaque gold eyes. “I believe if you had been in fighting form, you would have ignored it easily. But Declan is right—you haven’t fully fed. Until you do, you will remain weakened. And next time, if you are alone, he may succeed.

“You already possess a rather frightening strength of will,” he mused. “Seeing you at your full strength may be a rather frightening image.”

“If he summoned me, why am I still here? And why do I have blood all over me?” She could feel it…taste it even. She also smelled soap and suspected one of them had tried to clean her up, but the scent of blood was unmistakable.

“A Master can kill his creatures, the weaker ones easily, for disobeying him. He has a hold on you. It can be broken, but until it is, if he so desires, he can simply crush your brain and heart and wipe any traces of life from you,” Eli said quietly. “You have the strength of will to keep him from you, but not the strength to protect yourself. Yet.”

“He tried to kill me?”

“Yes.”

Tori was pretty damn glad Declan’s arms were firmly wrapped around her. She turned in his embrace, keeping his body aligned with her back so she could meet Eli’s eyes without straining her neck. “How did you feeding me stop it?”

“All you needed was a little strength. Well, actually a lot. You were resisting his call, but you couldn’t fight him. At full strength, you will fight him off easily.” Eli lifted his eyes to the ceiling, studying the painted swirls absently while his hand cupped his crotch. Tori’s eyes widened at the motion, and at the erection that still throbbed there.

“You already have a bond with Declan. I fed you to give you strength, and Declan called you, grounded you, and you were able to throw your sire’s grip off. Of course, I hadn’t realized exactly what method Declan would choose to call you,” Eli murmured, his voice becoming a low, silken purr. “You’re a rather tasty little bundle, Tori McAdams.”

She felt the warning growl rumbling up through Declan’s chest before it passed his lips. And she was all too aware of the hot sensation low in her belly. “You watched.”

“And tasted,” Eli replied with a seductive curl of his lips. “If Declan wasn’t one of only a few I call friend, I just might be tempted to keep you for myself. And he could go fuck himself.”

“And I have no say?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. She felt the hot wash of color flood her cheeks and her heart rate kicked up a bit in anger. Apparently Eli sensed it as well, because his eyes dropped to study the pulse in her throat.

“As weak as you are? Not much of one,” Eli responded slowly, still studying her pulse while he started to stroke his cock as it strained and pressed against his linen trousers. “He never completed his dominance over you, this vampire who changed you. I suspect he didn’t think you would survive the change. So many don’t, especially if they are left alone to fend for themselves. Since he didn’t expect you to survive it, he felt no need to establish himself as Master.

“It’s easy to master a newly turned vamp,” Eli finished, his odd gold eyes still fixated on her neck. Absently, almost as if he wasn’t that interested in his own arousal, he opened his pants and took his cock in hand. “So lost, so hungry. So malleable. It takes so little to establish the tiny psychic link it takes to be the Master.”

Tori couldn’t believe she was watching a man masturbate in front of her. She dragged her eyes away, but not before her mind caught a good long look at his cock, and committed it to memory; long, pale, with a fat pink head, his furry sac cupped in his other hand.

She turned around and faced Declan. “Such interesting friends you have,” she said, her voice shaking. She was humiliated to realize it wasn’t just embarrassment, but arousal.

Declan’s hands rubbed up and down her arms and she was startled to see that his nails had started to elongate, that his soft green eyes were glowing hard and bright. “He is being quite the ass tonight, love,” he said, his voice rough and tight. “I think he’s a bit upset that you’d not be pleased to stay with him. Most women are drawn to him, they can’t help it. Enough, Eli. I came here because we need help. You can jack off later.”

Eli’s head had fallen back and his eyes were closed. Tori could see his reflection in the dark pane of glass just over Declan’s shoulder. Her sharpened hearing caught a ragged sound of breathing coming from Eli—the first time she had actually noticed he breathed.

“What if I said I wouldn’t help unless I got to fuck her?”

Declan shifted. Tori jerked in startled surprise as he fell to the floor, writhing, his clothes splitting open and falling to shreds around his enlarging form. It was quicker this time, rougher, less controlled. Tori could feel and taste the violence that was pumping from him. She took a shaky breath, staring at the golden pelt in front of her as his clawed hands came up when he rose, and started to gently nudge her aside.

“Declan.”

He didn’t respond, a snarl falling from his lips as he forced the words out through his gaping mouth. “Elijah—”

“Declan!” she bellowed it out, and to her amazement, glass cracked and the house near trembled. His fanged snout whipped in her direction and he stared down at her. Eli laughed and she turned to glare at him. “If and when I ever decide to fuck you, it will be my choice. Yes or no, it is my choice, and it won’t be as payment.”

“So certain? I may end up owing you,” Eli pouted, his fist swallowing the head of his cock in short rapid strokes.

The wolf beside her tensed.

“Don’t, Declan,” she said quietly, reaching out and cautiously laying a hand on his muscled, fur-covered arm. The fur was silken there, soft, and it curled around her fingers. “Don’t. He’s pushing your buttons, Declan. Something tells me it’s a perverse pleasure of his.”

“You’ve no idea how perverse my pleasures run,” Eli said from behind her, his voice laced with laughter. And then he sighed. “I believe I’ve taken the game too far. Nina!”

Tori heard faint footsteps from far away but she never took her attention from Declan. She moved closer, until she could slide her arms under his, pressing her cheek against the wall of his chest. He was taller in this form, wider and more thickly built. And oddly, Tori felt safer than she had ever felt in her life.

She nuzzled his chest with her cheek, feeling the soft, silky fur. With a turn of her neck, she pressed a kiss to a flat nipple visible through the thinner fur that covered his chest and belly and groin. “We came here for a reason, didn’t we?” she asked softly. “We’ve already been distracted once.”

His hands closed over her arms, the claws stroking the inner part of her arm, the outer curve of her breasts, while a rumbling sigh ruffled her hair. “Do not push, Eli,” he growled over her head, his glowing eyes pinning the vampire who had risen and finally covered his massive erection.

Roughly, Eli laughed. “I’m aware, Declan, of just how much she is yours. Too fucking bad,” he sighed just as the door swung open. “Will you be needing clothes, Declan?”

Tori glanced down, remembering with some surprise, that Declan’s were in pieces and his pelt was the only thing he wore. He simply growled, “No,” while he wrapped one arm around Tori, stroking her head with a hand nearly the size of a dinner plate.

He was still too angry, Tori realized. She decided, rather quickly, she wasn’t too upset by the idea of him being so possessive. Or that he was still in this rather alien form. Interesting didn’t quite begin to describe it, she figured. She wondered what it would be like to have him like this, that silken furred body between her thighs, his larger body nearly dwarfing her.

“Very well. Nina, go out to the yard and find me a volunteer. Tori needs to feed a little before we go out,” Eli said.

“Feed?” Tori repeated, incredulous.

“Out?” Declan demanded.

“You need to feed fully,” Eli said quietly, turning away from the girl who was already darting out the door. He paced closer and when he stopped Tori could have reached out and touched him. “In your youth, it is hard to feed fully without killing. We will take the edge, so to speak, off here. And then find someone deserving of what we can bring.”

“You want me to kill somebody?”

“I want you strong enough to resist your sire the next time he summons you. And I want to see what will come of you,” Eli said, catching one fat curl in his hand and rubbing it with his thumb. Then he raised his eyes, dark and golden, to Declan’s. “I want to fuck her, as well. I cannot deny that, nor would you believe it.”

“But whether or not that happens, I will do all that I can to help you protect yours, my brother,” Eli said solemnly to the wolf.

“Excuse me, can we get back to me killing? I don’t want to kill.”

“Wait until you see who I intend for you to kill before you make that choice,” Eli advised. “I’ve had plans for him for several weeks now, but I held off, for some reason. He never made the mistake I warned him against, so I’ve been more lenient than I should have been.”

“I don’t want to kill—”Tori’s words were muffled when two clawed fingers covered her mouth. A shudder raced down her spine when Declan lowered his mouth to her ear and whispered roughly, “Wait until you see, Tori. Then, decide.”

“A good suggestion.” Eli turned as the door opened again, and revealed not one man, but two. “Why am I not surprised?” he mused as they entered, staring at Tori. “Not one snack, but two.”

Something inside Tori, something that was still far too human, revolted at the thought of treating a man as a snack. And while neither smelled as appetizing as Declan—and she doubted their blood would leave her belly filling like it was full of liquid gold like Eli’s blood had done—the scent of them, the pounding of their hearts drew her.

“She’s not fed on her own,” Eli drawled, flopping bonelessly into his chair. “Who will break her fast?”

The dark haired man with the Polynesian eyes and soft mouth reached her first, baring his throat by yanking his shirt open and tossing his dreadlocks aside. “I would be honored,” he whispered, his eyes raking over her pale face with an odd sort of yearning.

“I’d advise you not to expect more than feeding, James. The wolf guarding her back will tear out your throat before she has a chance to feed. And cold blood is revolting,” Eli said.

The heat that had sizzled in his eyes faded and he simply nodded, baring his throat to her, and Tori had the oddest image, of young, strong males, all lined up and baring their necks, while she went around sniffing them like vintage wines. She stifled the giggle, which was part hysteria, as she stepped closer. Casting Declan a nervous look, she trailed a hesitant hand down the throbbing vein in the man’s arched neck.

Then her hand fell away.

“I can’t,” she whispered weakly. Near tears, she turned her head away and said louder, “I can’t.”

Declan wrapped his arms tighter and forced her closer to the man who still stood, patiently waiting, with his neck arched. Underneath his golden skin, the vein pulsed and throbbed and beckoned, and Tori was half mad with hunger.

“I can’t.”

“Then you will die,” a voice said softly.

Lifting her eyes, she stared into Eli’s, so close to hers. He had gotten out of his chair and approached them while she was being squeamish. “He’s a human being, a person. I can’t treat him like food.”

“He is offering,” he said urgently. “It isn’t wicked, or evil. It’s just necessary. He is offering, and that is a fine gift. And I warn you, if you do not feed, completely, and fully, and soon, your sire will summon you, and you will surrender. Either that or he will kill you. And I fear that death would be a sweet release compared to what he would do.”

“Feed, Torrance McAdams.”

That low, ancient, wise voice was starting to whisper in her head again. Tori whimpered against it, against the compelling urge to bite through the lovely golden skin, and feed. She fought against the urge, the hunger. Fought that voice that rose again to whisper in her mind. “Only a fool refuses a gift offered freely. Take what is being given.”

“The hunger can drive a vampire insane,” Declan whispered. His hands—smooth and human—came around her and his voice was his own—soft, low, crooning music in her ear that sounded of Ireland, that made her think of green valleys and staggering rock walls and tumbled circles of stone. He had shifted back to his human form and his naked heat was pressed against her. “It will drive you mad, unless your sire manages to bring you to him first. If it drives you mad, you will fall upon the first person you see like a ravening beast, be it man, woman or child, and you will feed until that fire in your belly is extinguished.

“Will you risk that?” he asked against her ear, holding her tightly when she started to struggle.

She had to get away from that lovely source of blood. She had to.

“Do you hear, girl?” Declan snarled, whirling her around to face him.

“It will drive you insane and you will go feral, dying slowly inside from the guilt, while you prey night after night after night on innocents, killing them. Will you control this? Or let it control you?”

His face was livid and his eyes were full of rage and helplessness. “Ferals die quickly, Torrance. We cannot allow them to roam the streets. Will you be one of those we have to hunt? Do you know what that will do to me?”

The firelight lit his face, half in shadow, the other half painted a soft gold, his eyes stark and desperate, his hands digging into her arms tightly. He shook her slightly and she broke. Jerking away from him, she grabbed James and dove for his neck.

Instinct took over and her fangs burst from their sheaths and she struck, like a snake on a rabbit, latching on to the man’s neck, her fangs sliding through the golden, warm skin while her mouth latched on, suckling and swallowing. Distantly, she was aware of a hand on her head, of the low, humming moan that vibrated through James’ chest and up his throat. She was distantly aware of the erection that was pressed against her belly, distantly aware that the man who fed her was finding pleasure in this.

She was itching.

Deep inside.

And aching. Her hand fell back and she grabbed Declan’s hips while she swallowed more, feeling the hot blood fill her belly, feeling the glorious burst of strength. With a jerk, she pulled Declan forward until his hips cupped her bottom and she could pump her ass against him. Her nipples burned and her breasts ached. Her womb felt empty.

She wanted to fuck.

Badly.

Badly enough to do it right in front of everybody while she fed. Declan’s scent flooded her mind and she whimpered with need as a picture filled her mind’s eye, her feeding like this, while he shuttled his cock in and out of her bottom, while she rode the cock that was pressed against her belly.

“…enough… “

“…let go…”

“Tori!”

She was pulled away rather roughly and Declan held her pinned against his chest, his cock hot as a brand against her blue jean covered rear. Eli had caught James up in his arms, pulling him further back as the man lifted his hand toward her.

“Enough,” Eli said softly, taking his man to the couch.

“I want to finish it with her,” James said mournfully, staring at her with eyes that were still hot, but heavy with fatigue and blood loss.

“Finish it?” Tori whispered in horror as her sanity started to return. “Finish it?”

“He means he wants to have sex,” Declan whispered soothingly, stroking her head with his hand. “Sex, not death. This is why he does it. A vampire exudes a sexual call while he feeds, it’s like an aphrodisiac and a drug combined.”

“Finish,” James said petulantly, trying to shrug off Eli’s restraining hands.

A low whisper of something slithered through the air, and the hair on Tori’s arms stood up. Power. Magic. Something. It slithered through the air while Eli caught James’ chin in his hand and said, “Enough.” His voice was as silent as a whisper, but seemed to boom through the room.

“Enough,” he repeated, as James’ eyes started to clear and soften, while his lids drifted closed. “Sleep.”

And then he rose, eyeing Tori appraisingly. “They aren’t accustomed to feeding without sex, you see,” he said softly, lifting his shoulders in a shrug. “Nina let them know you were newly changed. The new ones tend to be brutal, and rough, and unsure how to make it more enjoyable. This should have not been a pleasant task for him. No sex, a new vamp cutting her teeth, so to speak, on him. Yet he craves more.

“I wonder how you knew to make it like that,” Eli mused, eyeing Declan and Tori. Then he turned his eyes to the other man, a slender towering blond who probably stood taller than Tori by a good two feet. “Are you ready, Caleb?”

The hot pulse of strength seemed to fill her and Tori was almost painfully aware of how much more vivid things had become. Caleb had dropped to his knees to offer his neck and it put him on level with her breasts, forcing her to bend over a little to get to his neck.

It hadn’t been quite so intense, and she had pulled away on her own, squelching the urge to turn and wrap her legs around Declan’s hips and demand sex right there.

But she wasn’t sure how much longer she could suppress it.

* * * * *

He was covered now, at least.

He had a low slung pair of jeans and a cotton shirt that he had yet to button, his sculpted chest and belly catching her eye every time he moved. His bare feet padded over the forest floor in silence—next to her—his hand linked with hers as they followed Eli.

They were walking now.

Eli had ushered them into a car after assisting Caleb, almost lovingly, like a parent, to lie down. Tori had heard his hushed orders to Nina to see them fed, to see that they drank, and that they rested. She had forced herself to approach them, even though she was still embarrassed, so uncomfortable with what she had done. But she had looked Caleb in the eye, James was still sleeping. “Thank you,” she said stiffly before turning and stalking away, her arms crossed over her pleasantly full tummy.

Shocking though, as they walked through a scraggly stand of trees, her belly was already seeming to empty.

“It’s because you haven’t gorged.”

She slid Eli a sidelong glance and lifted an eyebrow. He said, “You have to feed heavily at first. You’re developing your strength and building reserves. In time, you can learn to go a week or more between feedings. But you must first fully sate that hunger.”

His eyes flicked to the hand she had pressed against her belly, and then to the fangs that had yet to retract. “I know the signs of hunger, as I suffer them myself. And I know confusion and frustration when I see them,” he said, his voice soft with sympathy.

“I imagine, once you see what I have to show you, this feeding will be easier. After this, we can simply let you feed from a number of my people, but—”

Tori froze as a weak, pitiful whimper sounded through the dark trees, so far away, but so very clear.

Eli sighed, his handsome face grim, as he slid his eyes in the direction of the cry. “I hate the suffering of innocents. But the monsters who cause it…” His eyes started to glow and his fangs slid out, an unworldly power sliding over him.

Behind her, Declan paced alongside their back trail, his bare feet soundless on the forest floor. “This is a just thing you will do, Tori,” he murmured, his hands flexing and clenching, while his eyes gleamed with fury. “Do you smell her fear? Her blood? This is a bad one you’ve found for us, Eli.”

“What’s going on?” Tori asked.

But then that fading whimper was replaced by a scream. Next to her, Eli said coldly, “Run. And find her.”

Chapter Six

Tori ran.

The scent of blood and fear filled the air, but it brought no pleasure. Her belly roiled and rolled and clenched as she grew closer.

She ran.

And she found her.

A slim girl who would have been lovely except her face was marked with bruises and stained with blood as she crawled across the yard in a shredded T-shirt. One man stood in the door laughing, while the other stalked her, kicking at her side, and laughing when she cried out.

Eli laughed with pleasure. Dimly, she heard him say something like, “Two for one.”

But it barely made sense to her.

Instinct took her over yet again, and she lunged, not for the man who had frozen in mid-kick. But instinctively for the man who stood laughing in the door. A man who shared the girl’s soft brown eyes. A man who had her scent, the scent of her body and her blood, all over him.

He barely seemed to see her until she was sitting atop him and his struggles felt like those of a freshly hatched chick, weak and useless and pitiful. His blood filled her mouth in a hot wash of pleasure and she held his struggling body as he bucked and strained.

There was no pleasure for him.

It hurt him, and frightened him, and this gave her pleasure. His body reeked with the smells of blood, fear, and sperm. He’d raped that girl, that girl who looked like him. And passed her off to another man to do the same. Both had beaten her.

The rage inside her grew and she clutched his body harder, her hands shattering the fragile-feeling bones in his arms as he continued to struggle.

She knew there were noises in the background, a scream, a low soothing murmur, the sound of a body being taken down, and the sound of one being lifted gently. She filtered all this information and filed it away, while she savored the weakening struggles and the salty taste of blood on her tongue.

It seemed to last forever, and no time at all.

She knew instinctively when his life faded away, even without the telltale slowing of his heart. She pulled away from his body and settled back on her heels, her head spinning, her senses almost painfully heightened. Her breath sawed in and out of her lungs and Tori stifled another hysterical giggle, as she thought of the B horror movies that showed the heroine, standing in a corner, her tits half-hanging out of her bra, wearing that bra, panties and nothing else while she breathed raggedly, her breaths so loud it brought the killer to her.

Only Tori was the killer.

She dropped heavy-lidded eyes to stare at the lifeless man before her, feelingly sated and satisfied. He had been the monster, not she. She had taken pieces of his mind, unable to block the images that had filled his mind, old memories, favorite songs, the porno flick he had watched the night before.

The money he had taken from the bastard who wanted to fuck his sister.

He had taken the money and stashed it, planning to buy coke with it. He had planned to use blood money to get high while his sister was raped. He hadn’t planned to actually rape her, but when she walked out of her room in just a T- shirt, he figured the slut was just as good as any other, blood or no.

She rose, the buzzing in her ears and the swirling sensation in her head making her feel drunk.

Declan was nowhere to be seen, but she could hear him, soft shushing noises while he calmed the distraught teen. Running water, a murmured apology before the girl gasped. Cleaning her wounds, Tori imagined, while she searched the yard.

Eli had the other man, the one who had been beating the girl when they arrived. He dropped his limp body to the ground when he felt Tori’s eyes on him. Her eyes landed on the feebly moving man, a question forming in her mind. But her thought processes felt so damned slow, Tori felt like she was trying to see her way through mud, putting together a question in her fogged mind.

Eli smiled, a tiny bit of blood at the corner of his mouth, but otherwise he looked as if he had just risen from the chair he had been sprawling in earlier. His golden eyes were glowing, though, with an unholy, feral light. “I do not need to drain a person any more. It is something that comes in time.”

“He doesn’t deserve to live,” she whispered, her tongue feeling thick and awkward. Pressing a palm to her brow, she asked, “Why do I feel so strange?”

“You’ve been starving, and suddenly, you gorged yourself,” Eli said with a shrug, stepping over the inert body at his feet as if it were a pile of dog shit. “Your body has started to accustom itself and now it is suddenly full and satisfied. You are satisfied, are you not?”

Her lids drooped and she pressed a hand to her belly, which felt warm and golden. “Yes,” she drawled. “Hmm, yes.”

She was aware that Declan had moved through the house and left the girl resting on the couch. How he had gotten her to sleep, Tori couldn’t fathom, but she could hear the soft gentle snores coming from the couch.

“She sleeps,” Declan said needlessly, moving to stare out at the yard. He turned his eyes to study Tori. “You have his blood on your mouth, Tori.”

She pressed the back of her hand against her mouth and studied the red smear it came away with. Now that her belly was full, and that man was dead, the blood smelled and looked distasteful and she wiped it away with her shirt sleeve. She cast the corpse an evil look and echoed Declan’s words.

“Some people deserve death.”

Eli took the girl.

One moment he was by her side, lifting her up and then Tori felt a cool rush of air whip by her and he was gone.

“What—”

“He’ll be finding someone to look after her,” Declan promised. “And since he left so suddenly, we will have to do some housecleaning.”

“Housecleaning?”

He flicked a glance to the corpse in the yard and then the man who lay unconscious a little further out. “Can’t go leaving them to lie about in the sun all day, now can we? Pesky cops and their infernal questions,” he said with a grin.

“And who better than to erase the evidence?” she mocked lightly, looping an arm with his.

“Not erasing. Rearranging,” he corrected. “Too clean and it’ll look even more suspicious. Eli has hit this type before. The man you took had a record a mile long, I imagine. And I smell drugs. Cocaine, methadone, marijuana. I figure a little sleight of hand, so to speak, and this will look like a drug deal gone wrong.”

When she asked exactly what kind of sleighting he was talking of, he flashed a toothy smile. “Darlin’ girl, I’m not certain you’ve the stomach for what I am planning.”

“I just killed a man in cold blood,” she reminded him.

“That was heat, sweet. Not cold. Fueled by anger and hunger. Not necessity or planning.” And with that, he left her standing on the porch. She watched as he used a kerchief from his back pocket to wrap around his hand as he rummaged through the dead man’s clothes. Moments later, he pulled out a butterfly knife with a wicked six inch blade.

Tori was fast. But not fast enough.

By the time she had leaped across the porch and reached Declan’s side, he had slashed the neat puncture wounds on the wounded man’s neck and widened it. Drastically.

She knew what a killing neck wound looked like. She had seen several, well, three to be exact.

Apparently Declan knew as well.

Because he had recreated one, taken two neat puncture holes and ripped them wide, ripping the throat open until blood gushed out. It looked like Eli hadn’t taken much blood at all, because it splattered out in a fountain of deep red, forceful and pulsing. It would have been a weaker flow if he had been low on blood.

Tori instinctively stepped away as the blood flowed, eyeing Declan apprehensively.

Declan hurled the knife away, watching where it fell with satisfaction before he stood and faced Tori. “He paid her brother money so he could rape her. Rape, Tori. They both knew it was rape.” He surveyed the bloody mess at his feet before he leaped out of it, crossing a distance of ten feet with one bound, leaving the blood pattern undisturbed. “And neither of them cared. He was a monster, and we both know it. If he had lived, he would have walked away from this. Well, after spending a few days in the hospital and getting some O positive. Would you have wanted it that way?”

Reluctantly, she shook her head. “You’re a cop, Declan,” she said, her voice rusty with shock.

“Second. A cop second. I’m a Hunter first. That’s one of the things we’ll be talking about. Eli and I are both Hunters. Hunters of those who can prey on the weak, human or…not. Being a cop lets me do things the legal way, but they don’t always stay put away, Tori,” he said. “Their deaths, while definitely vigilantism, are final.”

“So you’re judge, jury and executioner?” she asked, her voice wobbling a little. This wasn’t the first time, it seemed. He had done it before.

“We do not make mistakes, not the way a jury of humans could. I’ve never killed a man who didn’t deserve the death I dealt him. And I’d wager Eli hasn’t taken an innocent life, well, not once he passed the madness of the first days after he had changed. We know the smell of evil, and even if we didn’t, such a scene as this cannot be interpreted wrong. Eli doesn’t pick his kills carelessly, and neither do I.”

He flexed his hands and Tori saw, for the first time, his long, graceful hands weren’t quite…normal. His nails had started to darken and lengthen, and as she watched, the muscles in his arms and torso started to ripple before smoothing out when he gritted his teeth and closed his eyes. “I do not like death, Tori. I do not enjoy killing, regardless of the circumstances. But I do like knowing that these men will never harm another creature.”

Tori swallowed, her throat tight and her belly hot. Tears had started to trickle down her face, but she recalled the young girl she had seen. “So do I,” she said softly, dashing one tear away. She scrubbed her face with her hands, unknowingly smearing the blood, before she met Declan’s eyes and asked, “What do you do now?”

He smiled and traced one hand down her cheek gently. “Go back to Eli’s. You need to rest, and you need to think. I will take care of this,” he told her.

She caught his hand and tugged until he turned his face back to her. “Take care of it how?”

“His body needs to be disposed of. I’ll hide the drugs, make it look like this one,” he indicated the man whose blood had finally stopped flowing from his neck, “had taken the drugs and it was all a fight over that. Eli will take care of the girl. Rescuing the innocent is his favorite pastime. All neat and tidy.”

“Tidy,” she whispered faintly.

“Go back to Eli’s.”

She did.

The buzzing had returned and Tori wondered dimly if vampires could go into shock. She wandered down the midnight dark trail, following the signs of their earlier passage easily and unconsciously, her mind in turmoil.

She stood on the porch later, staring into the night, watching as the horizon started to lighten. One of Eli’s people had panicked and attempted to drag her inside and Eli had been forced to leave the safety of his home. They had remained outside as long as Eli had been able, trying to coax Tori inside before Eli had given up and led Nina in, promising Tori would be fine.

Fine, well, that may have been pushing it. She didn’t feel fine.

“You will be fine,” that old familiar voice whispered softly.

Tori had an image of an old woman settling down in her rocker for a long chat and she suppressed the urge to scream. This? Now? “Who are you?” she thought wearily, trying to direct her thoughts down the path where she sensed the old woman.

“A friend. Just somebody trying to help.”

“Why didn’t you step in before this happened?”

“I didn’t know it was going to happen. Only after Manuel came for you did I know about you. He is the one I follow. His death is the one I need for peace.”

“Manuel. He is the one who bit me.”

“He is.” A shuddering sigh filled Tori’s mind and she felt the enormous weariness that rode the old woman. “Five centuries I have waited, Tori McAdams, five long centuries, waiting for one who would not only survive the change, but survive with her humanity intact.”

“You know what I am, knew what I would be? That’s why you came to me, isn’t it?”

“Yes. You will find him. You will kill him. And I will finally be at peace.”

“Who is he?”

A sad, mournful cry came floating along the path and the old woman said sorrowfully, “My son.”

And then her presence was gone.

Tori stood in the early morning light, struggling to find peace. She didn’t know how to handle the emotions inside her. She had killed. She had witnessed cold-blooded murder.

But she didn’t feel wrong. She didn’t feel guilty. And she was worried it was because she was becoming a monster. Her emotions hadn’t seemed to change, but she was certain that killing a man, and watching while an injured man was killed, should have been wrong, should have been evil.

But it felt right.

She forced her mind to think back to how she would have felt if she had stumbled upon the scene before she was changed. And she finally came to the conclusion that she would have killed that man just the same. With a gun, most likely, but he would be just as dead.

And the other man deserved it as well.

Men like that weren’t really men, but animals, sick animals. And Tori didn’t believe in trying to rehabilitate a sick animal. Jail wouldn’t have been good enough, even if they had been able to force such an ending. A jail term would have been too short, and too kind.

She grew aware of the lateness, or rather the earliness, of the day when her skin started to itch. Glancing down, she saw her hands were lobster red, blisters forming, and a look at the sky told her it was probably close to seven. She retreated to the soothing, cooling darkness of Eli’s home, and the wide, confused eyes of his people.

“The Master requested I care for you when you came in,” Nina said hesitantly, staring with confusion at Tori’s nearly burned face and the blisters that were starting to form. “Mistress—”

“Don’t call me that,” she said wearily, fatigue making her limbs heavy.

“Mis—ah, well. How can you take the sunlight?”

She grew aware of Declan’s presence slowly, first his scent, which was ripe and hot with anger, and then his voice, which was harsh. “She’s a hybrid, Nina. She can tolerate sunlight, but damn it, Tori, did you have to bathe in it?” he snapped, appearing in front of her, the door behind him wide open and letting in more of the sun that was becoming far too painful for her sensitized nerves.

“She’s not spoken, Mr. Reilly. Not a word since she returned and the Master said to leave her be. But how can she tolerate sun? Isn’t she newly turned?”

“Nina, I don’t have time for questions,” Declan said harshly, gently lifting Tori up, taking care not to touch her face or blistered hands and forearms. “Go run a cool bath, and find me something to treat sunburn.”

Tori giggled. “Sunburn?”

“Have you seen yourself?” he snapped, carrying her upstairs and depositing her in the bathroom where Nina was indeed running a bath in the darkened room. Tori could see herself, even in the nearly dark room. Her face was red and blistered. Studying her hands, she saw more blisters. And on her fingers, some of those blisters were turning black. “Silly little fool, what were you thinking?”

She made an attempt to tug her clothes off, craving the soothing, cool water, but her vision grayed, and then darkened.

And she was out, unable to resist the heavy pull of sleep with the sun riding higher and higher in the sky.

In sleep, she bore more resemblance to the vampires Declan knew. Her heart slowed and her breathing was minimal. But the sleep and the nourishment she had finally taken were working magic and her reddened, blistered skin was clearing and smoothing with every slow beat of her heart.

He shouldn’t have used the methods he had used. Tori hadn’t been ready and he knew damn good and well it had been shock and confusion that had caused this. He should have had Eli deal with cleaning up the mess and brought Tori back here.

Hindsight, after all, was twenty-twenty. Grimly, he hoped her hunger had been sated. He wasn’t certain he could get her to feed again tonight. He was also certain that tonight she was going to be full of questions. And he doubted he had the right answers.

It was nearing twilight when he heard Eli wake.

A great shuddering sigh left the old vampire as he climbed from his bed, his current companion still snuggling there, snoring softly. Declan could hear the woman’s soft, sighing breaths, and even her heartbeat, beyond the sounds of rushing water as Eli showered.

Later, the vampire appeared in the room, padding on silent feet to stare down at Tori. “Nina and I tried to bring her in before the sun rose, Declan. But she wouldn’t leave. I was worried that she might remain out there but I couldn’t stay any longer. And I did not think she would let herself burn to ashes.” He traced a gentle finger over a nearly healed blister and said with a sigh, “I should have forced her to come in.”

“She has had a little too much forced on her of late,” Declan said, shaking his head. “Do not blame yourself. I should have come back with her, but I went about cleaning up as usual and didn’t think ahead to what it would do to Tori.”

“She is still human in her heart,” Eli said softly. “I do not know if that is a weakness, or a strength.”

“Neither do I.” Declan stared at his friend. “I do not look forward to the coming night. She will have questions, and she may be angry.”

“Ah, I wouldn’t count on it,” Eli said, stifling a smile. “And…well, her mind was troubled when I first went to her outside. I sensed none of that turbulence when she crossed my threshold, only weariness. And then pain. I couldn’t understand that, but now I do. I would dare say that she was working this out in her mind. It would have been less painful if she hadn’t chosen the early morning sun as her confidant, but I believe she is at peace with last night.”

“Maybe with her feeding, but not with me killing a man who was unconscious,” Declan muttered.

“Hmm. Well, that aside, I recall when I was younger, after gorging, there was only one thing I wanted.”

“More blood?” Declan drawled sardonically. “It may be mine she’s after.”

“Well, she will be after you. But it is fucking she will want, not feeding. She is starting to wake. A word of advice—she is going to want to dominate. If you were human, you’d have no choice. But to let a vampire near mad with the urge to fuck dominate isn’t going to set a good precedent for your relationship. If I were you, and I rather wish I were, I’d do the dominating tonight.”

“I don’t relish the master and servant role, Eli,” Declan said, watching Tori’s still face. How could the vampire sense she was waking?

“It isn’t a role you need to play, and I am not suggesting a new lifestyle. But do not let her take you, Declan. These first nights are integral for who she will become. No matter how human her heart is, she is vampire, and her ways will be that of a vampire. If she gets used to taking and taking and taking, it will not be easy to change that.”

Declan arched a blond brow at Eli and reminded him, “I am familiar with the vampire, Eli. You made certain of that, remember?”

“Then you should know I am right,” Eli replied, his voice aggravated. He shoved a hand through his hair. “You are in love with her; I see it. But you will never be happy as anything other than her equal. She will be a Master, Declan. And the vampire Master cannot help but try to control everything around him. Can you tell me, old friend, that you would be happy under her control, for all your long years?”

Declan sighed, pressing his thumb and forefinger to his eye sockets, trying to relieve the headache that was building. “I’ve no wish to dominate Tori. I do love her, and she will not be happy under anybody’s control, no more than you or I would be.”

“For pity’s sake, Declan, I’m not suggesting you bring out the whips and handcuffs. But do not tell me you are sexually passive, or submissive. Do not tell me you haven’t taken control while you’re fucking her. I will not believe it, I know you too well.”

Declan’s lids drooped and his mouth curled in an unconscious smile as he recalled the previous day. No whips or handcuffs, certainly. Not that the handcuffs didn’t hold some appeal.

“There’s a difference between dominating her for this, and dominating her. You aren’t trying to control her, Declan. I doubt you could. Even her sire is having difficulty with that.”

“Will her sire try for her tonight?”

“I imagine so,” Eli said broodingly. “All the more reason for you to climb in that bed and take her. Your bond with her is proving to be as strong as the bond between sire and offspring. I would suggest you take advantage of that. She wakes.”

Eli whirled, his open shirt and hair swirling around him as he left the room in swift silence. Declan remained seated a few moments longer, and then he shot to his feet, following Eli. He found him a floor down, with Nina caught up in his arms, intent on freeing the tiny redhead from her dress and shoving her hair aside.

“A minute, Eli?” he asked as the vampire started to slide her skirt up.

“Fuck, Declan, can you go away?” Eli muttered, glaring at him as he stroked the silky strands of hair from Nina’s neck. “I haven’t even had breakfast.”

Leaning against the wall, Declan said, “Is breakfast the only thing you want right now?” He slid his eyes up the stairs, following the scent and sound of Tori.

Eli’s eyes narrowed and he straightened. Smoothing Nina’s dress into place, he lifted her chin and kissed her softly before whispering in her ear. Nina left, not quite pouting, but very unhappy.

“What did you have in mind?” Eli asked, cocking his head and staring at Declan with narrowed eyes.

They parted a few minutes later and Declan returned to the room. Watching Tori’s still and silent face he settled back to wait, his mind running in circles.

If her sire tried to call, Tori had to be protected. Take advantage of it, Eli had suggested.

Aye, he’d take advantage, all right. Of her, of Eli, of every weapon he had in his arsenal, so long as it kept Tori safe.

Chapter Seven

Some five minutes later, Tori’s eyes started to move behind her eyelids. Her face grew more animated and her heart rate picked up. Several moments later she started to breathe steadily and finally her lids lifted and she stared at Declan, wide awake and alert.

“How do you feel?” he asked, slumping lower in his chair and staring at her face. Only a faint redness remained and Declan imagined that would fade after she fed.

Pressing one finger to her flushed cheek she winced and answered, “Sore. And silly. I never even paid attention to the sun.”

“You’re lucky you didn’t kill yourself, Torrance. You can tolerate sunlight, yes, but that it was uncomfortable after a few moments tells me that you cannot walk in it as you once did. At least not yet.”

“I figured that out.” She sat up, the sheets pooling in her lap. Declan’s eyes landed on her full breasts and rosy pink nipples and his mouth started to water, his jaws aching. “I needed to think.”

“And…?” he asked with only half a mind. The other half had fixated on her naked torso, and with some reluctant curiosity, on the conversation with Eli.

“They deserved it,” she said, lifting one smooth, pale shoulder. “Some people deserve death, you told me. I understand that, and they did deserve it.”

A soft knock sounded at the door and Declan’s eyes closed as he whispered a silent prayer of thanks. “Come in,” Tori called, drawing her knees to her chest and arranging the sheets to cover her body.

“We’ve brought some food,” Nina said softly, wheeling in a cart. “We will be leaving shortly and didn’t want you to go hungry. The Master said we should ask if you, ah, wanted food or…ah, hmm.” Her voice trailed off while she stared at Tori, obviously trying to understand this additional peculiarity, a vampire who could eat.

“If you wanted food or me,” a soft baritone said from the doorway.

Declan’s lids lifted minutely and he studied the tall man in the doorway. Well, man might not be accurate. A wolf. “Watch yourself, pup,” he said quietly, not straightening from his slouch as he watched the man cross the threshold.

“I only seek to please the lady, Inherent,” this new shifter responded, instantly dropping his eyes. Inherent. A respectful, proper title, a polite way of letting Declan know that the new wolf was aware of their differences, and that he was the weaker.

“Her pleasure is my concern,” Declan said. “But if she is hungry, then by all means.”

Tori’s eyes were wide, and Declan could see the slight bulge behind her upper lip as her fangs started to emerge. The wolf, a muscled brunette with the strong, sculpted physique of a weightlifter, asked quietly, “May I, lady?”

Tori’s eyes flitted to Declan and he shrugged. “You’re hungry, you may as well.”

The shifter didn’t so much as wait for her to open her mouth but crossed the floor and dropped to his knees beside the bed, facing away. His face was just a few feet from Declan’s but the man kept his eyes averted. “What’s your name, pup?” Declan asked.

“Jonathan,” he responded as Tori shifted behind him, drawing the sheet and wrapping it around her before sliding to the edge of the bed. With him kneeling, she was right at his shoulder level. Licking her lips, she trailed her fingers over his neck.

Jonathan shuddered, his eyes—a soft warm brown—were glowing gold and his cock was pressing firmly against his low-slung jeans. Tori flushed and Declan knew just when she had caught scent of the wolf’s arousal and he smiled when her own scent started to flare. Feeding was nearly a sexual thing for many vampires, and Tori wasn’t going to be much different on that.

He was half aware of Nina setting up the food on the table—he smelled bacon, eggs, steak, potatoes—and though his belly growled insistently, he ignored it. He didn’t bother telling the girl not to mess with it, because he’d need to eat later.

Tori threw her hair over her shoulder with one hand, the other gripping Jonathan’s arm and curling her fingers into his bicep. Declan watched as she struck, Jonathan flinched just slightly before his eyes closed in pleasure, his heart pounding heavily in his chest.

Declan could smell the blood in the air, mingled with the scent of hot, hungry bodies. Nina stood just behind him, panting slightly, her body becoming damp and ready as she watched. Before Tori had come into his life, the little redhead might have tempted him. But Tori changed everything.

“Enough, Tori,” Declan said a few moments later when she showed no signs of pulling away.

Her eyes rolled up and met his over Jonathan’s body and he saw a slight pout forming there. Lifting a brow, he reminded, “He’s still able to bleed to death, Tori, werewolf or not.”

“I wouldn’t mind…” Jonathan whispered, sulking when Tori pulled away, a tiny bit of blood on her lips. She daintily licked away the few drops that beaded from the puncture wounds before settling back with a pleased sigh.

Jonathan’s hands flexed and Declan was reminded the full moon was only a few days away. Power strummed through the werewolf’s body, augmented by lust. “She’s done with you, pup,” Declan warned when Jonathan half turned to stare at Tori. “If you’ve a need, go fuck Nina. Eli wouldn’t care and she’s needing it anyway.”

“But do not dare to touch my lady,” he said, slowly sliding up in his chair and rising to his feet in a lazy, controlled movement, his eyes glowing hot and green as he stared at the werewolf.

“I meant no disrespect, Inherent,” Jonathan murmured, rising to his feet and backing away quickly, his eyes downcast.

“Get out, pup, now,” Declan said with a snarl. Then he turned and dismissed them both. Before either of them had even cleared the door, Declan had Tori’s arms in his hands and he was lifting her to her feet, stripping the sheet away and staring at her naked body with possessive eyes. Her face was glowing with life and vitality, her eyes warm and electric blue, gleaming in the dimness of the room. Her breasts rose full and round, topped with nipples that hardened as he watched, darkening and drawing tight. Trailing his eyes down her length, he took one nipple between finger and thumb, pinching lightly, as he continued to admire. Her long torso curved in slightly before flaring into a pair of full, rounded hips, her cleft covered by a tiny patch of dark curls.

“Now that your hunger is eased, let’s take care of mine,” he said roughly, freeing his cock from his jeans with one hand while the other wrapped itself in Tori’s hair. “I want you to take my cock in your mouth again, and down your throat. Later, I’m going to put it in that tight, hot little ass of yours.”

She fell to her knees under his urging hand, staring up at him with wide, somewhat apprehensive eyes. Then she focused on the throbbing shaft in front of her, ruddy and pulsing with every beat of his heart. Leaning forward she took in the flared head, letting it slide across her tongue and down her throat, relaxing her muscles and taking more of his length inside her.

Her nipples felt hard and pinched and she absently reached up to stroke them, staring up into Declan’s eyes over the length of his body. His harsh voice cut her off, “No. When you get touched tonight, I’ll be doing the touching.” She paused in the act of taking his length back down her throat, pulling off slowly, the corners of her mouth lifting in a tiny smile as she stared up at him.

One brow lifted and a slight smirk settled on her face as she slid her hand down her torso and plunged two fingers into her wet passage. Her lids fluttered before she opened them wide, staring up at Declan, his large cock throbbing just in front of her mouth, while she started to slide her fingers in and out.

Declan dropped to his heels in front of her, staring at her soberly, never once glancing at her busy little hand. “I suppose, in the name of fairness, I should tell you one more time. Stop it. The only thing you can touch tonight is me.”

With her free hand, she reached up and caught his nape, trying to pull his mouth within range as her breathing picked up. He acquiesced, for a brief moment, plunging his tongue deep into her mouth, withdrawing to nibble on her lip before he snatched her up and tossed her on the four-poster bed.

Tori laughed and resumed masturbating, her fingers stroking her throbbing clit before delving back inside. She felt powerful and greedy, wanted to control everything in her and around her. Even him. She opened her eyes, searching him out, following the rustling noises beyond the bed. When Declan appeared back at the bedside, she stared up at him tauntingly, circling her fingers around her clit rapidly as orgasm rushed closer. It was fun, much more fun, to give herself an orgasm while somebody else watched and wanted.

She was still panting, her heart rate slowing to normal, when Declan flipped her onto her belly, grabbed her hands, and snapped them into the handcuffs. “Hey!” she yelped, glaring over her shoulder at him. He smiled angelically and shrugged before lifting her back up and depositing her on her knees.

“I did try to warn you, darlin’ girl,” he said, spearing his hands through her hair and guiding her resistant mouth back to his cock. “And by the way, those are reinforced cuffs, sweet. Made special, at my request, by a friend. Seeing as how I never know when I’ll run into a non-human on the job.”

The flexing of her shoulders stopped as she realized—new strength or not—those cuffs weren’t breaking. Glaring up at him, a sulk turning her mouth down, she said, “Take ‘em off, Declan.” She resisted the pull of his hand, even though that lovely cock bobbed and pulsed in front of her, beckoning her.

“You’ll have to earn it now,” he told her with a shrug. Wrapping one hand around his shaft, he started to stroke, watching her with heavy-lidded eyes. His tanned fist swallowed the head of his shaft, once, twice, and he hummed under his breath and then sighed dramatically. “I’d rather it be your mouth. Hot and softer than silk.” He pumped again and used his other hand to cup his sac as he watched her with hot, gleaming eyes.

She leaned forward, intent on nipping him, but he caught her head with his free hand, wrapping his hand in her hair and holding her still. “Take it in your mouth, but be nice about it,” he warned. “Otherwise, I’ll paddle your ass.”

“You’re being a jackass,” she muttered but the heat in her belly was spreading and overriding her indignation. She caught his long, thick length in her mouth, flexing against the cuffs on her wrists before she started to slide her head up and down. His hands caught in her hair and he ordered in a low rasp, “Deeper, all the way back.” He started to thrust in, through her mouth, down her throat. “All of it.”

His voice was breathy and rough and his hands holding her felt like iron. But Tori relaxed her throat as much as she could, taking his length in, inch after inch, until her airway was blocked. She suckled and caressed his steely, silken flesh, relishing the hot salty taste of him, the life that flowed just under his smooth skin.

With his hands buried in her hair, he guided her, switching from short shallow thrusts, to deep hard ones that bruised her throat. He cupped his balls with one hand, grunting with pleasure as Tori slowed her pace, swirling her tongue across the head of his cock before sliding down his length again, her mouth stretched tight around his width as his long shaft pushed down her throat.

She stared up at him through the veil of her lashes, his long powerful torso gleaming with a fine coat of sweat as he pumped his hips, moving his cock in and out of her mouth, his eyes closed, his face a mask of agonized pleasure. The muscles in his belly contracted and a rough groan rumbled out of his throat, his cock jerking roughly in the tight embrace of her mouth.

Tori shuddered when he started to come in thick, heavy pulses—his climax long and drawn out. Eyes watering, lungs burning, she swallowed the semen down and pulled back, lifting her damp eyes to stare up at him. Licking her lips, she whispered, “That was good.”

“I’ll say,” a familiar voice said from by the door.

She whirled and fell, ever so gracefully, onto her naked ass, staring at Eli.

“Get out,” she hissed from her side, drawing her knees up to cover her body, unaware that doing so exposed her wet, plump folds to Eli’s greedy gaze.

Eli shrugged, staring at Declan. “Did that feel as good as it looked?” he asked conversationally as he started to shed his clothes.

“Better,” Declan replied over Tori’s sputtering curses. He wrapped her in his arms and caught her muttered, “Son of bitch—” in his mouth, driving his tongue down her throat as he walked her backward until she fell onto the bed, her hands pinned beneath her.

He shifted, pinning her down with his weight across her torso before kissing his way to murmur in her ear, “I can smell it, how hot you’re getting, how much you want this. Do you think I didn’t notice it earlier? He’s already watched, and you both enjoyed it. Let’s enjoy a little more.”

Tori shrieked when she felt Eli’s hands spreading her thighs, but it fell to a weak, tortured moan when he opened her cleft with one swipe of his tongue before he sought out her clit and caught it between his teeth. One hand held her rump while the fingers of the other hand started to spear her depths.

Declan’s mouth closed over her nipple when she started to gasp. Behind him, Eli suckled on her clit in tandem with Declan’s movement on her breast, his fingers stroking her skillfully before starting to slide downward. When his thumb pressed against her anus, Tori bucked and whimpered.

“Been here, Declan?” Eli asked, lifting his head to watch as his thumb penetrated the tight ring of muscle.

Declan’s only answer was a faint grunt as he worked his way back up to kiss Tori’s open mouth. His cock was hard and aching and he was ready to bury it in her snug vagina, in her ass, but he continued to play and pluck her nipples, glancing downward when Eli went back to lapping at her exposed folds.

Declan whispered against her hair, “You’re so damn tasty. I may have to pry him away; maybe I should have kept you all to myself.”

“Fat chance,” Eli muttered, lifting her hips more with his free hand, spreading more of her lubrication to ease the tight fit of his thumb in her bottom.

“Can I have her ass first? She’s tight. I don’t know if I’ve ever sodomized a hole that damned tight before.”

“Mine,” Declan growled, shooting Eli a narrowed glance.

Tori erupted with a cry when Eli drove his tongue deep inside her folds just as he slipped his thumb all the way inside her ass.

She gasped, shuddered and whimpered, hardly aware Declan had rolled her to her side and removed the cuffs. Her body was lifted, shifted, and she was straddling a man’s lap while her body and mind tried to reunite once more. When her lids lifted, she was staring into Eli’s angelic looking face, his cock probing at her entrance. It was bizarre, staring into that face that she had only just seen the first time a day ago, and feeling his cock, fatter than Declan’s, though not quite as long, work inside her.

She quivered when she felt Declan come up behind her, spreading lubricant on her anus, coating his fingers with it and sliding them inside. Then the flared head started to bump against her hole and she froze. Eli’s hand slid between them and he started to circle her clit lazily as he took her mouth. Their fangs had emerged and Tori felt him nip her lip and suckle at the beaded drop of blood before he pushed his tongue inside her mouth.

In her head. She could feel him inside her head, whispering and crooning to her just as Declan was doing in her ear. Relax, Tori. Declan would never do anything to cause you true pain, he promised, his mind-voice a silken-purring echo of his normal voice.

As he slid his tongue between her fangs, to tangle with hers, Declan’s hands went to her bottom and pulled her cheeks apart, easing his slow penetration a bit. “We need this,” he murmured against her ear. “All of us. Take it inside you, Tori. You’ve done so before.”

Her head fell back as Eli released her mouth to nuzzle her neck. She cried out in shock when she felt his fangs break her skin and slide home. Declan’s cock slid in to his balls at the same time and she convulsed, straining between them, and screaming at the mind shattering pleasure. Her clit was caught between thumb and forefinger, pinched and plucked at before somebody started to circle it with fast steady strokes. Her orgasm ripped through her like a volcano, hot molten lava pouring from her womb as she fell back to rest against Declan’s body, her muscles clenching and clutching at the invading cocks. She was stretched too tight, penetrated far too deeply, hanging just between pleasure and pain while they thrust inside in tandem.

Eli’s body was shuddering and he fed at her throat like a man starved, while Declan and he plunged their cocks inside her body in unison. He wrenched his mouth away with a tortured moan, his eyes glowing hot and wild as he caught her mouth, smearing her own blood on her lips as he sought more of her taste.

A hand buried in her hair moments later, pulling her from the kiss and guiding her mouth to Eli’s neck. “Feed,” Declan whispered gutturally, pulling out and sinking back home inside her rump.

Unable to resist, she struck, hearing Eli’s ragged cry when she bit him, when her fangs pierced his skin as his cock pierced her pussy. None of them were truly aware of the lurking presence that had started to coalesce outside the windows of the house, though Declan and Eli had been expecting this. Her body and mind writhing under the pleasure, the call that had seized her the night before barely even touched her awareness, and had no effect.

But the malevolent force gathered and grew.

Tori lifted her mouth from Eli’s neck and stared down at him with a slumberous, heavy gaze as Declan pulled out of her body, his cock still hard, wet and gleaming from lubricant.

Eli remained inside her, using his hands to lift her weight up and down on his cock. Moments later, though, he pulled out and lifted her, standing beside the bed with her weight in his arms as Declan returned—his body was wet and he smelled of sap as he lay down and reached for her.

“Come here,” he whispered, pulling her body against him, cuddling her and stroking her gently, his eyes glowing and hot with adoration and need. She straddled him, grasping his cock and holding it steady while she slid home, his longer length slicing through her already sensitized tissues with a sensation that bordered on pain. She felt Eli’s hand on her back once she had slid home, and he urged her forward, positioning her knees and hips so that he had access to her wet, gleaming rosette—using more lubricant, coating her anus with it, and then his thick cock before he took her hips in his hand and started to work the smooth, round thickness of his penis inside.

Tori cried out, feeling stretched too tight, the burning sensation of that fat cock parting her swollen flesh too much. She whimpered and bucked against their restraining hands, Declan’s whispered endearments and pleas falling on deaf ears.

She felt something, dark and evil, swirling in her mind, trying to take hold. Instinctively, she threw it off and struck out, catching Declan’s neck and piercing his skin—his hot, sweet blood filling her mouth before sliding down her throat to her belly and leaving fire in its wake, to spread and creep through her body until every vein seemed to fill with the hot liquid gold.

The dim light danced over their damp, gleaming bodies as Declan pushed upward inside her tight, swollen pussy, while Eli braced his hands low on her spine and surged deep into the firm clasp of her ass, groaning under his breath.

Tori whimpered, unable to focus on anything beyond the pleasure and the hot liquid gold of Declan’s blood in her belly and veins. A warm, pulsing, magical sensation formed deep inside her chest as Declan whispered and crooned against her damp skin.

She shuddered as Eli spread the cheeks of her ass and drove home, burying his thick cock completely inside her ass, before pulling out and working it back in against the clinging, resistant pull of her muscles.

Declan groaned as she contracted around them, her hot, tight body clenching and gripping his cock with a velvet fist. He could feel how tightly stretched she was, could feel Eli’s movements picking up as her body started to open and relax and clamor for more. He felt it as her fangs slid from his flesh, her tongue laving over the neat holes, catching the tiny trickle of blood and swallowing it down. He reached up, and caught her face between his hands.

“Forever,” he rasped before he shuddered and bowed underneath her, fighting the urge to shift, and throw her to the floor and rut on her like an animal. His teeth lengthened and he caught her head, brushing her hair aside before he sought and found and pierced the fading marks left from when Eli had fed.

The moment her blood flooded his mouth, she climaxed with a scream, muffled against his chest, while Eli pounded into her ass and Declan rolled his hips against hers, driving his cock in to the balls, lodging it against the mouth of her womb as he tasted her blood.

He understood, now, why Eli’s eyes started to go half mad the moment he had first tasted Tori’s blood. It was neither vampire, nor human, but something else, something exotic and hot, tasting of life and death, sex and love, intoxicating and addicting.

Outside, a howl ripped the air.

Inside, Eli bellowed out as he climaxed, while Tori screamed—black explosions of light blocking her vision—and inside her mind, something that had been weak and withered to begin with, snapped and shriveled and faded away, taking with it the last lingering darkness that had plagued her mind since the night she’d had this change forced upon her.

There was a powerful force gathering inside her, as that darkness faded, something inexplicable, something beyond light, beyond strength, beyond the evil that had tried to claim her.

Declan came, bucking beneath her as he growled against her throat, one hand cupping and molding her breast, while he jack-hammered his cock inside her, riding his orgasm to the very last drop.

Tori’s body seemed to dissolve and her soul exploded, hot, darting lightning-bolts of pleasure coursing through her before it all started to fade. As she collapsed, she felt two strong pairs of arms surround her, and a soft brushing stroke of her mind that felt and smelled of Declan.

With a sigh, she succumbed to the call of sleep, her mind, belly and heart full.

She lay cupped between their bodies, quivering, and unconscious.

Eli, still nestled snug in her bottom, murmured softly, “It’s been an age since I was able to fuck a woman into a stupor. I must always take more care with my humans.”

Declan stroked his hand over Tori’s flesh, feeling the rough touch of goose bumps chilling her skin. Though Eli’s body was warm now, it would eventually cool, and it would leech away whatever heat Tori had. Declan snagged a blanket and covered them before saying quietly, “Something inside her is gone. I’ve sensed it before, but I thought it was because of the change. But it was her sire. His hold on her is gone. That taint is gone, I can’t smell it, or feel it, or sense it.”

“I know. I recognized his touch, though it took me some time to place a face to that feel, I recognized his taint the moment she entered my territory,” Eli said, resting one hand on her hip, stroking his thumb absently over her flesh. “That is why I forced that confrontation on Tori when she first came. Not for form, but because I needed to make certain she was not feral.

“I do not follow the rules that so many of my kind cling to. Unless, of course, those rules suit my purposes. Any may enter my territory, so long as they pose no threat to me or mine, so long as they follow my rules.” He met Declan’s gaze, his golden gaze sad and lonely and sighed, saying, “He cannot call her, cannot claim her, cannot control her. Her soul is her own again. Her heart, however, belongs to you.

“She is yours, now. God, how I envy you.”

Declan’s lids slid down, shielding his eyes from his friend. He also still rested inside Tori, his semi-erect cock twitching occasionally. He hadn’t intended to hurt Eli, but he realized it had happened. Declan had found something that Eli had been searching for centuries to attain. And not only had Declan found it, he had asked Eli to help him keep it, he had allowed Eli to take her body and taste her, taste them both.

But soon they would leave.

And the vampire would be alone, again.

Eli sighed and murmured, “Do not do this to yourself, pup. She was always yours, and though I may yearn, she isn’t for me.” With a soft laugh, he added, “But I hope, if she is willing, you may find it in yourself to share her again.”

Rolling his head, Eli stared out the window into the night. “He has been here, his essence. I can feel it. Will you take the fight to him, or let him bring it here?”

“Tori’s call. Her fight, her call.”

“Urge her to remain here. Though she is not in his thrall any more, he is centuries old and will not be easy to defeat. On my territory, I can offer defense to whom I will. And if she starts to falter, I will aid her.” Eli snuggled closer to her and murmured, “I am weary. Do you know how long it has been since I’ve done this?”

Declan remained silent, his hand curved possessively over Tori’s hip.

He kept it silent, but he could feel Tori’s every heartbeat, like an echo in his chest. He had felt the orgasm that had rocked her, the breaking of that insidious hold, and wondered if she would feel it as well.

Eli had caught the backlash of the bonding, Declan was certain. But he hoped it was something that would fade from him. While he may not have any problems sharing Tori from time to time with his friend, he had no intention of sharing her completely and indefinitely.

“We will stay here,” Declan said, shifting and moving until he could rest his head on Tori’s chest, feeling her soft, shallow breaths. “He is near anyway.”

Stupid bitch.

Foolish bitch.

Traitorous bitch.

Fleeing and hiding and surviving when she had been meant to die, slowly and painfully and alone.

Worse, she had found a protector, a bloody shifter. One who had the look and smell of a Hunter about him.

And the English fop of a bastard.

Oh, Manuel hadn’t forgotten Eli, hadn’t forgotten slipping from the bastard’s grasp nearly two centuries past. Elijah Crawford, one who hunted and destroyed his own kind. Instead of bathing in blood and relishing the power of being immortal, the fool clung to the ways of his human life, spouting harm-no-one shit and protecting the humans.

They were all going to die.

Fucking in that bed, feeding off each other, using the body that he had thrown aside.

She shouldn’t have lived. But since she had, she belonged to him.

The shadow, an extension of himself, hovered by the window, watching with wide eyes that missed nothing. Manuel paced the confines of his resting place and plotted while the shadow watched. The shadow was supposed to lure the bitch out of Eli’s stronghold and seize her mind, holding her until Manuel could arrive.

Instead, she had thrown off his summons again, while she let the two men fuck her in unison.

The fact that watching them had aroused Manuel beyond all reason, beyond any hope of satisfaction, infuriated him even more.

Oh, they were all going to die.

The shifter first.

He’d seize the bitch first, and hold her, while he killed the shifter in front of her. Then Elijah Crawford. His human, a little less handsome now after several brutal beatings, wasn’t quite so human anymore. Manuel had lost control and fed too much, letting the man hover too near death, leaving Manuel with no immediate servant at hand. Manuel was left with no choice but to force a bond on him.

Now the man was a true slave, inhumanly strong, his mind receptive to his master’s every whim, his will and mind all eradicated under the lash of Manuel’s power. He could feed off of blood, off of food, but mostly he would prefer flesh.

His slave would take care of the vampire—he had silver for just that purpose, and while Eli lay wounded, Manuel would behead him in front of the bitch.

She would be last.

And she would pay for defying him, for refusing his summons.

Maybe he’d allow his slave some pussy, or a piece of ass, before they killed her and fed. Between the two of them, they could feast on her blood while they fucked her raw and ripped her apart.

But first, Manuel had to wait for his slave to return with dinner.

After fighting half the night to bring her to his side, Manuel’s reserves were wearing thin. Not that she was too strong for him. It was simply the distance. Yes, the distance. And the men that surrounded her would block much of his summons.

Once he was there, he was certain he would control her again.

Of course, his shadow was already there, had been there half the night.

And she still slept on, cuddled between the two men like she hadn’t a care in the world.

Manuel snarled, his fangs gleaming like ivory in the darkened room. The shadow seemed to flinch from his wrath and when the door opened, the slave hesitated.

Manuel stared at the pale blonde dancer and laughed. “My little dancer,” he crooned before launching himself at her.

She went down screaming.

Chapter Eight

Tori awoke at dawn, right as Eli was sliding into slumber. There was an eerie prickling awareness of him in the back of her mind. She knew he was aware of her waking, and jealous of it. She knew he was aware of her, her scent, her warmth, the blood in her veins.

“What’s going on?” Tori asked quietly. So much of the past night was a blur. She remembered it vaguely, and that miffed her a bit. She wanted to remember in great detail. And she was tempted to kick Declan’s ass for springing it on her.

But, like that eerie prickling awareness of Eli, she was aware that Declan hadn’t put her up for a three-way fuck just for doing so.

She could feel his words in her mind before he even replied. “We helped you break your sire’s hold,” he murmured against her chest. The puff of air from him speaking caressed her skin and her nipples drew tight.

“What else? Why can I feel Eli in the back of my mind? And why are you in mine? It feels like you are inside me, and I don’t mean your cock,” she said, pulling back and looking down at him.

He arched his neck, propping his chin between her breasts, and staring up at her. His eyes shone with love, lust, adoration and need, sending hot little tingles of pleasure down her spine. “I’ve always loved you,” he murmured. “Always.”

Tori’s face heated slightly at that bald, unconditional exclamation. But she wasn’t surprised. She had always known, but hadn’t accepted it. Fool. What woman didn’t want to have all that focused solely on her? “I know that. I love you, too.”

He smiled slowly, a pleased, smug, totally male smile as he rubbed his chin back and forth on her skin, caressing her roughly. “I know that. We belong together. You know that, don’t you, girl?”

The rough, husky words, with that lilt of Ireland, rolled around her, caressing her just as surely as his hands were starting to. Weakly, she replied, “I do.”

“We bonded last night,” Declan rasped against her flesh, pulling her underneath him and spreading her thighs. “Bonded—body, mind and soul. I’ll know your every emotion, and you’ll know mine.”

Tori gasped, her lids fluttered down as he reached down and trailed his fingers against her opening—she was already wet but swollen and sore. “I know you’re sore. I feel it as well. But I want to make love to you, and I can feel that you want it, too.”

Her eyes drifted toward Eli, who slept deeply, that awareness stretched thin and taut. But he was still dimly aware of them. And she felt his hunger for this as well. If this had happened yesterday, she couldn’t have.

No way could she have made love to Declan while somebody else was in the room, sleeping or not. But this wasn’t somebody, this was Eli. And he felt like he was a part of her now.

“He is. We’re linked, the three of us.” Declan kissed his way down her body, nipping gently at one nipple, rolling the other between his fingers, before he continued to trail his mouth down her body. “Will you let him be with us again?”

“You want to share me with him?” she asked, her eyes clouded with lust and confusion. His mouth was creeping ever lower and he was expecting her to carry on a conversation?

“Not share,” he argued softly just before he spread the swollen lips of her sex and blew a cool puff of air on her inflamed, sensitive flesh. “Be with. And not for always. You liked it, didn’t you?” Just then, he stroked her open, from bottom to top, with one wet swipe of his tongue.

Tori shuddered and whimpered, the words, “I can’t even lie to you about it. You know I liked it, why ask?”

“Enough to do it again?” he asked, nuzzling her clit with his nose before catching it between his teeth, gently, and laving it with his tongue.

“Hell, yes.” The two of them, inside her body at one time? Images swirled in her mind, her taking Declan in her mouth while Eli drank from her vagina. Declan’s tongue stroking in and out, like he was doing now, while Eli nipped and fondled her aching breasts.

“We will do that,” Declan whispered as he trailed one finger from her wet clit to her bottom, pressing against the sensitive flesh of her anus.

“Ohhhh,” Tori whimpered as he repeatedly pressed against her rosette while he flicked his tongue against her clit and suckled on it. “Just how…ah, how far inside…mmm, my head can you go?”

“Only as far as you want me to,” he murmured. “You can feel me, too—inside your head—and you inside mine. “ He propped himself up, taking two fingers and sliding in and out of her wet passage. “Close your eyes,” he urged. “Concentrate on me.”

“How can I not?” she asked wryly, her hips rising unconsciously to meet the strokes of his hand. But her eyes fluttered closed and she shuddered, that dim awareness of Declan in the back of her mind rushing to the forefront, and she could feel the way her own body felt to him—could taste the way she tasted to him, could feel the tight, pulsing, pounding sensation that was his cock—feel it as if she was actually inside his body.

She could feel his emotions, his fears, his wants.

She could feel him covering her body while he was wearing nothing but the pelt that covered him after he shifted, taking her like that, underneath the full moon, in the woods. She could feel the intense, insatiable need for sex that rode his back and feel the hunger that he had focused solely on her from day one.

He left her pussy with one last rough swipe of his tongue before he came up her body and spread her thighs; draping them across his while he remained upright on his haunches, pulling her pelvis lower until he could work his cock inside her while they both watched. The fat, ruddy head of his penis stretched her swollen opening and she flinched a little, Declan soothing her with gentle stroking caresses on her hips. Her breath left her lungs in a shuddering rush when she lifted herself on her elbows to watch with him as his thick cock sliced through her until he was buried inside her—the furred sac of his balls swinging against her bottom with each deep, gentle stroke. She hooked her ankles together just atop his butt, holding him deep inside her. Her body quaked as he used the flared tip of his cock to stroke that tiny spot inside her body. She wanted to feel his body against hers but before she could move, or even voice the urge, he had grasped her around her waist and drew her up, catching a tightly beaded nipple in his mouth as he aligned their bodies, her sitting astride him and rocking her hips slowly.

Lifting his head, he stared up into her eyes as he took her bottom in his hands and lifted her weight, guiding her in a slow, easy rhythm. Declan groaned and muttered under his breath as her silken sheath contracted around him, tight, hot and wet—swollen from his and Eli’s rough usage of her the past night. “So fucking sweet,” he murmured, nipping at her lip before kissing her gently, his tongue sliding inside to taste and seduce as one warm hand left her hip to cup her breast, his thumb stroking the nipple.

“Mmm,” she murmured, licking her lips after his left hers. “Tell me about it.” His taste intoxicated her—salty, spicy, so totally male, but so uniquely him. “Want another taste,” she murmured, seeking out his mouth.

His hand tightened on her ass and he drove a little harder inside her. Tori cried out, squirming on his lap, rubbing herself against him. His hand left her breast to circle around her throbbing clit and he went back to rocking slowly inside, stilling her attempts to drive herself down on his cock. “You’re too sore,” he rasped against her mouth.

“I want—”

“I know what you want,” he said with a smile as his fingers gripped one ass cheek and pulled, separating her crevice, exposing her puckered rosette to the gentle caress of air. “But you can’t have it right now. I want to love you right now. Love you, not fuck you. Ride me. Just ride. Let me take you slowly, Tori. Let’s let it last a while.”

His final words were whispered against her breast as he trailed his mouth down and closed over one nipple, raking his teeth gently against it before sucking and taking her flesh deep inside his mouth.

It built slowly this time, every time Tori sought to plunge and thrust, his hands restrained her. By the time the climax had built inside her, she was sweating and panting, tears flowing down her cheeks, her skin stretched tight and hot as though her entire body was going to explode the minute the climax rolled through her.

“Now,” he whispered against her mouth, feeling the tight, clenching caresses of her sheath as her body tightened and prepared for orgasm. She was hotter and wetter, straining and panting—pleading and crying out against him. He gripped her shoulders and forced her down, rocking inside her as she shattered against him.

Tori sobbed as it rolled through her, each wave seeming to last longer than the last. His cock pulsed inside her and she screamed weakly when she felt the hot jets of his sperm flood her. Another orgasm wracked her body as her head fell back, her body going limp while he continued to thrust and rock inside her, riding his orgasm until she had drained him dry.

He rolled them to their sides, Tori’s body pressed once more between his and Eli’s. She felt the hard pressure of Eli’s cock at her back and she flushed, realizing just how aware part of him really was. Vaguely, she grew aware of something, a dull pounding ache between her thighs. When Declan eased his semi erect shaft out of her, tears flooded her eyes and she gasped in pain. Soothing kisses dried the tears from her eyes while Declan murmured in her ear, “I’m sorry, baby. So sorry.”

She felt the rising tide of guilt and self-anger that rose in Declan and she arched up to press her lips to his mouth. “Shh,” she whispered. “I’m fine, just not going to be up to much playing for a while.”

He wrapped his arms around her and held her tightly. “I want you so much,” he muttered as shame and anger flooded his gut. Sympathy pains, or echoes of the pain Tori was feeling had his lower abdomen and groin throbbing and aching and he could only imagine how badly she was hurting now. “I’ve been told the need does lessen, in time.”

“Need?” she repeated, curling her knee up slightly, stroking one hand down his stiff side.

“Aye. You’re my mate, you see. The shifters, inherents or otherwise, have a driving need for a mate. Once you find it, you want it, always and forever and you’re overtaken by an urge to mark your mate,” he said quietly. “I’ve known you were mine since I first saw you, and I’ve controlled the urges. I’m afraid I am losing control now. All I have to do is think of you and I get hard. The need to mark you and ride you and fuck you constantly is driving me insane. I can’t control it.” He didn’t speak of how the urge to fuck had been augmented by his need to do everything to protect, until the need had near driven him insane.

But she knew.

With a smile, she kissed his chest, nipping gently at one flat nipple before she said, “I think of you and I get wet. Stop feeling bad. I heal quick, right? That’s part of this. And it was worth it.” She closed her eyes in remembered ecstasy—the feel of his cock inside her, the feel of being pressed between their two bodies. The feel of Eli thrusting that thick cock of his in her ass while Declan pummeled her vagina. Even the thought of it had tight little spirals of need spiraling through her belly, even though her aching pussy begged for a respite.

Oh, yeah. Worth it.

Declan’s shame at his lack of control faded as he felt that deep satisfaction that radiated from her. “You’re not angry, are you?”

“For what?”

“I bound us together last night. And I never gave you a chance to say no,” he said, lifting her chin and staring into her eyes. “You understand, don’t you, that you can’t go walking away from me, from us. Not now, likely not ever.”

“Can you force this bond on somebody who doesn’t want it?” she asked, a frown furrowing her brows. Part of her rebelled at anybody taking a choice from her, but another part, something inside her heart she had barely even known existed, rebelled at anything that could separate her from Declan—even her own anger. And it wasn’t like she had ever had a true choice anyway. They were meant for each other.

“No. It cannot be forced,” he said, his accent thickening into that rough brogue that had shivers running down her spine. “The bond goes both ways. It’s not a marriage, but a union, our hearts and minds and souls melding to one. That cannot be done to one who isn’t willing. But that doesn’t mean I had the right to let it happen, if I could have stopped it. Or let you know it was likely.

“I knew it would happen, if I let it. I could have stopped it, simply by not touching you.”

With a brush of her fingers against his mouth, she asked, “Is not touching me a simple thing?”

He seized her hand, pressing a kiss to her sensitive palm, stroking it with his tongue before taking one finger into the wet cave of his mouth and sucking it, his rough tongue caressing and stroking before he drew it out. “No. It’s the hardest fucking thing I’ve ever done, to not touch you. But—”

“No buts. Declan, I love you. I think I always have and while I don’t like having choices taken from me, this isn’t a choice. It would have happened, it was meant to happen. And I can’t think of being without you, when you are so much a part of me now,” she said, staring into his face, caressing his roughened cheek as she kissed his chin. “I love you.”

Chapter Nine

It was later in the day that she grew aware of the malevolent force that was battering at her mind. It was like a battering ram that was trying to get in, and the longer it fought and failed, the more the anger grew.

“He’s here, isn’t he?” she asked quietly, braving the sunlight at four in the afternoon to stare briefly out the window. The blinding light hurt her eyes, and as moments passed, it started to sting her skin, but she stared into the woods beyond the wood and glass houses, beyond the small guesthouses, wondering where he had gone to ground.

“I do not think he is on Eli’s territory yet,” Declan said, taking her hand and guiding her from the window, letting the heavy, light blocking drapes fall back down. He had carried Eli into a middle room, his bedchamber, a windowless room that was protected from any and all sunlight. It wasn’t a basement room, though. Eli had a dislike of such things, a remnant from his human days.

“He is,” she whispered, her eyes closing while her mind went drifting down a dark mental path.

“He is close,” the wise old woman whispered. “He had his slave bring him while he slept. He must hate you very much, to have traveled in his sleep to get to you. He is certain you will run, and he doesn’t want you to have the chance.”

“I’m not running,” Tori said softly, pacing the room.

“What?”

Tori ignored Declan’s voice while the old woman murmured, “I know you will not run. That is why I chose you. I need your help. Until Manuel is gone, I cannot rest.”

“Can you tell me your name? Why would you help me? I will see him dead—you know that, don’t you? Why help me when you know I will kill your son?”

“My name is Rosa, and I help you because I do know you will see him stopped, I know Manuel better than all others, and his evil, foul deeds. I help you because he must be stopped.”

“Why me?”

The old woman laughed and replied, “Why not you? You threw off his compulsions. You fought against him. You hurt him. Manuel hasn’t been hurt by a human since before he was changed.”

“How long has he been a vampire?”

Tori stumbled in her tracks and came to rest against the wall as Rosa said sadly, “More than five hundred years. Manuel was an Inquisitor before he was changed.”

“Inquisitor?” Tori thought, her mind whirling.

“The Spanish Inquisition, when Isabelle sought to purify all of Spain. Her purifying was the most foul and evil deed I had ever seen done…at the time. So much evil in the world, so many evil, terrible things I have seen. I am weary and long to rest.”

Death toll in the hundreds of thousands, people pulled from their homes and cast into fires. Tori’s mind stumbled to a halt and stared unseeingly out the window. “He was alive then?”

“He was. It was how he met the man who changed him. He took pleasure in what he did, in the suffering that he caused.” Her sad, mournful sigh brushed through Tori’s mind like a cold wind. “He was always evil, from the time he left my body.”

“Oh, God.”

“God had nothing to do with it. He was just…evil. Always evil. Five hundred years he has traveled this world, inflicting his evil and malice on others. It is time he be stopped.”

“Five hundred years? Vampires get stronger with age, don’t they?”

“They do. But you are not just a vampire. And you are not alone.”

Declan’s hands landed on her shoulders as another voice joined in. Declan’s mind was troubled and in turmoil but his mental voice was strong and clear. “She will never be alone, old woman.”

“Old woman, handsome wolf?” Rosa asked, her voice light with amusement. “Hmm. Go, Tori McAdams. Go be with your mate, but be ready. Manuel is too foolish to fear the wolf.”

Her mental touch faded and Tori fell back against Declan.

“She was his mother,” she murmured a few moments later. “I don’t know much, but I know he sought out the vampire and wanted to be changed. And then he fed from his own mother and killed her.”

“Five hundred years,” Declan whispered. “He was born about the time the Spaniards settled in Florida. Manuel will be strong.”

“She said he was an Inquisitor, as in the freaking Spanish Inquisition. Burning people, torturing people, dragging them from their homes at night and killing them,” Tori murmured, her head spinning. Too much. Too much to take in.

“She waited for me,” Tori said, her voice gruff and thick with tears. “I might have died, if she hadn’t been whispering in my head. She helped me, but it was because she thinks I can kill him.”

“She’s caught, Tori, tied to her son for always, unless somebody is able to kill him. Can you blame her for taking a chance on a strong woman?”

Shaking her head, she wiped away one tear with the back of her hand. “I don’t blame her. I pity her, I hurt for her. But what if I fail her?”

“We won’t,” Declan whispered.

Failure wasn’t an option, not to him.

Failure meant death.

Tori prowled the house, as the sun edged down lower. It was late afternoon, but sunset was still hours away. The summer brought long hours of daylight, confining the creatures of the night to their lairs.

“Stop pacing, Tori,” Declan said in exasperation. “You’re making me nervous.”

The roiling energy in her gut was begging for release. She had noticed, after feeding from yet another of Eli’s people that her body was eased and the aching between her thighs had faded.

And she recalled the euphoric, powerful strength that rolled through her after sex. She turned and propped her back against the wall, her fingers going to her shirt, watching Declan as he tried to focus on a book. She caught his attention before her shirt had opened to her navel. Peeling back the sides, she opened her bra, the lace cups falling away to frame her breasts. “Change,” she ordered in a soft voice as she flipped open the button of her jeans.

“Excuse me?” Declan asked, his eyes latched on her naked breasts as he rose from the chair.

“Change,” she ordered in a hot, smoky voice, rolling her shoulders and sending her shirt floating to the floor. “You fucked me your way last night. Now I want to fuck my wolf.”

“You’re too sore,” he rasped, his erection pressed against his jeans. Mouth dry, he stared hungrily at her naked breasts and licked his lips.

“No. I’m not. Change. Or don’t you want to?” she asked with a pout.

His head fell back, his teeth bared in a pained, silent snarl as the flow of fur started the change—his hair lengthening, thickening and spreading down his neck, back, and chest.

Fur flowed downward and his arms flexed, shifted as the muscles bulged outward and enlarged while the hair raced down his arms. His nails shot out, became longer, curved and deadly.

The ridged muscles of his chest and belly became more obscured as the fine line of hair between his nipples spread outward and became a furred pelt that covered his entire torso, spreading around his trunk and back.

His jeans fell around him in shreds moments later as his enlarged muscles tore the seams, his hide darkening and mellow gold fur spreading to cover his body. His cock rose, naked and ruddy, from the thinner hair that covered his groin. Longer and thicker, it jutted up and Tori licked her lips when Declan closed one clawed hand around it, stroking carelessly while the change completed.

His muscles shifted and bulged as he moved slowly toward her. “Suck it?” he asked, the words a soft growl as he guided her to her knees and urged her mouth open with a clawed finger. Her mouth stretched tight, too tight, around his thickness and she whimpered, her pussy wet and hot, tight and hungry. She couldn’t take him all the way down her throat like this. He was too long, and too thick; the feel of him bruised her throat as she took him inside in slow, hesitant strokes.

He pulled away a moment later and stared down at her, his hooded eyes glowing and green. “On your knees. Fuck you like that.”

She turned slowly, presenting her ass and bracing her weight on her hands. “Don’t want to hurt,” he said, his voice deep and growling, sending shivers down her spine as he dropped to his knees behind her.

“I want you to,” she said darkly, rocking back and brushing her ass against his pulsating length. “Hurt me a little. I need it.” Reaching out, she felt for him along the mental path that joined them and felt his need. “You need it, too, Declan, don’t you? I can feel it inside you, like an animal caged. You haven’t let him out once with me. Let him out now.”

In answer, his hands, big and hard, covered with fur and tipped with ebony claws, closed over her hips and he drove inside her. Halfway in, her body started to resist and he pulled out, worked his cock back in again a few more inches, then out. Back in a little deeper, out, over and over again until the tawny gold of his furred belly stroked the pale curves of her ass as he drove inside her, forcing her to take his entire length, a rough grunt falling from him as he stared down, watching his ruddy cock, wet with her cream, spear the swollen lips of her sex.

He lifted his hand and smacked her ass roughly, shuddering as her flesh pinked under his sharp slap.

Tori mewled and thrust back against him, the burning, biting pain in her pussy making her delirious. She yelped when one hand landed hard on her backside in a slap. A second one had her keening, and the third one had her bucking up.

She could feel his hot cock as it stretched her sheath almost unbearably, her flesh resisting his brutal intrusion while it held him deep each time he started to pull out. Another hard slap on her bottom, followed by another, and she pushed back, taking him inside again. “Harder,” she begged. “Deeper. Faster.”

Declan went wild, shuttling his cock in and out while she screamed and pleaded beneath him. He shoved her hips lower, angled her ass a little higher until her torso was flat on the floor and her ass was in the air, canted up so that he slid across the bundle of nerves deep inside her passage with every stroke. She closed over his cock tightly—making him growl as her passage fought it every time he plunged back inside her sweet depths. Sweet little fuck, Tori, he thought, feeling her along the mental paths, speech coming easier through their bond than it did vocally in this form.

He felt the silent pleas racing along the bond and raised his hand, spanking her again, admiring the way the cheek of her ass went pink under his blows.

“Like fucking your wolf?”

“My wolf,” she whispered, her body shuddering as he lodged himself deep inside her. She felt the silken hair of his pelt caressing her ass and wondered how it would feel to take him in this form with her on her back, him between her thighs.

“Find out,” he offered, pulling out and flipping her onto her back before she had even realized he could sense what she wanted.

But once she figured that out…He lay between her thighs and, using two claws, spread her lips gently before sliding his long tongue out of his mouth and into her sex. Tori screamed as he flicked and stroked inside her, pulling away to lick and nuzzle her clit with his nose. He grabbed her behind her knees and shoved her legs high, lifting her bottom off the floor as he pierced her vagina and pulled her onto his length roughly, forcing her thighs wide, staring down at her.

“Feel good?”

“Oh, yes,” she murmured, relishing the tight swollen fit of his body inside hers, the gentle, alien brush of his fur on the sensitive skin of her inner thighs.

“Slow?” he asked, stroking his length in and out gently.

“Or fast?” And he drove his length inside her, hot little licks of pleasure pain flooding her body.

“Fast, oh, please, Declan, fast,” she begged, her head thrashing on the floor. “I don’t want gentle right now.”

“My baby,” he purred inside her mind before lunging and driving deep inside her body, the flared head of his cock leaving her vagina before driving back in, each rough stroke dragging across her swollen engorged clit until she was panting and pleading and begging.

“Look…” his rough urging forced her eyes to their joined bodies and she sobbed as she watched him surge into her, his thick width pulling out, wet and gleaming, the dark curls at her mound caressing his length, and then he was driving back inside, as they both watched.

They both heard the door open, and both were aware of the vampire watching them, well away from the partially open blinds and the sunlight that filtered through.

Tori shuddered as Declan whispered in her mind, “He likes to watch almost as much as he likes to fuck.” The touch of his mind on hers was almost as intimate as the feel of his cock pulsing inside her, almost as arousing.

With a smile, she rolled her head until she could see the handsome blond vampire in the door. Clenching tight with her inner muscles, she smiled slowly as Declan growled and lifted her hips, cupping her ass in his hands, thrusting more deeply inside. Eli closed his eyes and muttered, “Evil little bitch,” under his breath before opening his eyes and continuing to watch.

Declan’s hands stroked up and down the back of her thighs before he pushed her knees to her chest, and fell forward onto her, driving his cock in deep, stretching her to the point of pain. He caressed her arched neck with his muzzle, nipped gently at her shoulder while he shafted her, driving her closer to orgasm, relishing each tiny plea and broken scream. Rolling his maned head, he glimpsed Eli and his mouth gaped in an evil grin, causing Eli to laugh weakly. “You’re a bloody bastard, Declan.”

Declan lifted his weight slightly off of Tori, keeping her knees hooked over his arms as he pulled out and surged slowly back into her, shuddering at the hot wet clasp of her swollen tissues around the engorged flesh of his cock. Taking her legs, he pushed them together, grunting as it caused her sheath to clasp him even tighter, and then he propped both her legs on one broad shoulder, holding them there with one hand and working the other one around until he could scrape her clit with a gentle claw.

“Scream again,” he told her, reveling in the bond that allowed their minds to meld just as fully as their bodies. One hand lifted and landed sharply on her ass and she jolted, a weak scream falling from her lips as her muscles tightened. Declan slapped her butt again and she vised down around him, her walls milking his shaft as she came, ripping his own climax from him in a long pulsating blast.

He growled in approval as he filled her wet depths with his seed, her body slowly relaxing around his. Her boneless arms fell to the floor and she lay there, panting, her legs still propped on Declan’s shoulder as he rolled his hips, rocked inside her a few more times, letting her drain him dry, before he released her legs and curled up next to her on the floor, smiling at Eli over her body. He cupped her breast in his hand, stroking her softened nipple with his furred hand. The palm was smooth and hairless, broader and longer than a human hand.

Tori felt it, sighing in pleasure, curling up against Declan’s furred chest, feeling the familiar touch of his hand on her body. Her lids lifted and she met Eli’s eyes before her gaze drifted down and encountered the thick heavy bulge behind his flowing linen trousers.

“You’re such a naughty little thing,” Eli murmured, stroking one hand down the length of his covered, throbbing cock, his back propped against the wall. “If I was still human, I think I would have died of jealousy. Or a heart attack.” He rubbed the base of his palm against his chest, drawing Tori’s attention to the slow, steady pounding of his heart.

A low ripple of power sighed through the air and she felt the fur receding from Declan’s body. Soon, he was curled around her—human, smooth, sexy—so damned sexy he made her mouth water just looking at him. Lifting himself onto his elbow, he peered at his old friend through his shaggy bangs, a smile curving his mouth as he continued to fondle and tweak Tori’s nipple.

“You cannot say you did not know what was taking place, old friend,” Declan said with a shrug. “If you didn’t want to be watching, then why watch?”

“I never said I didn’t want to watch,” Eli said, his hot eyes trailing from Tori’s glowing face and the smug smile on her mouth to where Declan held and plumped one white globe in his hand, the nipple red and hard once more. “I’d prefer to play with you, but I doubt I’ll be invited again.”

Tori’s lids drifted down slowly before lifting back up and meeting Eli’s golden gaze. “Not now, but you’ll be invited again,” she promised, her tongue wetting her lips.

Eli approached her warily, his eyes narrowed and hungry. “Again, hmm?” he murmured, dropping down to his knees and lowering his head until they were nose to nose. Slowly, he covered her mouth with his and slid his tongue inside hers, between her fangs, so that he could taste her. When he pulled away moments later, she was breathing heavily and staring at him with dazed eyes.

“A promise I hope you intend to keep,” Eli purred before sitting back on his heels. Staring at Declan, all emotion fled from his face. “Night approaches. He will be here soon. Unless you want to face him in your lovely white hide, Tori, I would suggest you clothe yourself.” He drew the air in through his nose, tasting the faint sweat that dewed her body, the scent of Declan’s body on hers, in hers. “It will infuriate him, knowing that the wolf has been touching you, marking you, fucking you.”

Declan lowered his head to hers and kissed her swollen mouth hungrily, gently. Then soothingly before he pulled away and murmured, “Loving you.”

Tori accepted the hand Eli offered and sat up, glancing out the window to where the sun hovered just on the horizon, blazing orange, the clouds around streaked with pink and silver. “Can he take daylight?”

“Not last I saw him,” Eli answered.

“You know him?”

“I’ve fought him before.”

“Can I…can I win?”

Declan rose and lifted her to her feet, cuddling her back against him, pressing a gentle reassuring kiss to her neck. Eli rose to his feet in a boneless, lazy movement, the subtle power inside him easily cloaked for now. “I’ve no doubt of it. You already have. You broke his hold. Tonight, he will learn that.”

“Is Declan his match?” she asked, looking from the vampire to the wolf.

Eli lifted a brow and said, “I would dare say, yes, he is. I don’t know for certain. But you must fight him. Not your wolf. This is your battle.”

“I know that.” She met Declan’s eyes. “Can you beat a Master?”

He smiled smugly. “I can, and have.” Then his muscled, naked shoulders lifted in a shrug. “But five hundred years…that is a powerful mark to reach. And this cannot be my battle alone. I can face him with you, but not for you.”

Tori looked back to Eli and took a deep breath. Declan hadn’t really answered her. “Are you stronger than he is?”

“A hundred-fifty years ago, I was, yes. I imagine that is still true. Manuel Rodriguez has reached his plateau and I’ve yet to reach mine.” He stroked one hand down her face and lifted her chin, staring into her haunted, frightened, blue eyes. “You’ve not even begun to rise to what you will be. He cannot defeat you, Tori. Of that, I am certain.”

With a shuddering sigh, Tori said, “The old woman, she is his mother. She’s trapped here, until he dies. I need to know that she will be able to move on, no matter what. If he ki…” Her voice trailed away and she hesitated for a long moment, her throat tight with fear. “If I can’t beat him, will you kill him? She deserves to be at peace.”

Declan growled, clutching her tightly against him. “You will not face him alone, Tori. And we will defeat him.”

Stubbornly, she said, “I need to know, that if I fail, he will still die. He can’t do this to anybody else.”

Eli met Declan’s eyes over her pale naked shoulder and said gruffly, “He does not leave here alive. That, I promise you.”

Chapter Ten

Manuel pressed through the invisible cloak that marked the edge of Crawford’s territory. The other Master had taken his bitch—that was all he could focus on.

Had taken her, saved her and fucked her.

And the wolf…Fuck, how he hated the shifters. Hated them with a passion. But this wasn’t just a wolf, not just a shifter. He was an Inherent, Manuel suspected, and most definitely one of the hated Hunters.

It was the worst sort of betrayal, letting not just another Master fuck her blind, but to let a wolf fuck her. And both of them, the Master and the Inherent, were Hunters.

She had let the wolf between her legs and into her pussy. That had been his. All of her belonged to him.

And he was going to get her back.

He hovered at the edge of the tree line, staring in fury at the brightly lit house, with all its windows and laughter. The bastard lived as though he were still human, in a house, with people he provided for. The English bastard drove a car, for pity’s sake. Served the Council of Hunters, had the authority to decide when the Hunters would strike.

Manuel couldn’t possibly admit it, but this was part of why he hated Eli. Being a Hunter, he was safer from the rest of the world than the ferals were. Nobody hunted the Hunters; nobody was a threat to them. A feral feared fighting a Hunter, not just because of the death that most always came, but because, if by chance, the feral won, the rest of the Hunters would descend upon him and tear him apart.

A slim figure passed in front of the window and Manuel’s hands curled into tight fists.

The woman.

She was the reason he was here.

He’d get her back, even if he had to kill them all to do it.

Hell, he’d prefer to kill them all anyway.

He watched, enraged, as she strolled back in front of the window and lifted it. Unaware of the light touch on his mind, he glared as she leaned out, drawing the cool, clean night air into her lungs.

With a puzzled frown replacing the fury on his face, he listened, ears pricked and eyes searching.

She hadn’t changed.

Her heart still beat.

He could hear the faint sound of air moving in and out of her lungs.

And as he watched, she lifted a fat, juicy orange to her lips, and bit down on the peeled wedge, juice trickling into her mouth, down her chin. She chewed, swallowed, took another bite.

Manuel watched, entranced as she polished the fruit off and daintily wiped her mouth. She hadn’t changed. How was this possible?

He had bitten her, watched as the blood drained from her body. He had fed her and made sure the change had started before leaving her alone to suffer and die of starvation. But she hadn’t changed.

He moved a little closer, certain she couldn’t see him with her still human eyes.

But then she propped her hands on the windowsill and grinned, right at him, moonlight gleaming off her pearly fangs. “There’s my sire, all ready to play,” she purred.

And she leaped out of the window, dropping the twenty feet to the ground and rising to the balls of her feet, staring at him with her head cocked, her eyes wide. The faint bulge of her fangs behind her upper lip betrayed the innocent expression on her face, giving voice to the hunger that was churning in her gut.

Hunger for his blood.

“Why, you look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she murmured.

A shadow separated itself from the house and Manuel watched as the wolf placed himself protectively at her back, one hand resting on her shoulder.

Another shadow slid away and shifted, a moving drift of gray fog that hovered between Manuel and the woman, hovering for brief moments, taunting Manuel. The Spaniard seethed silently at this show of power. Not all Masters attained the ability to shift to other forms—Eli had mastered them all by his first century.

The fog solidified and reformed, until Eli Crawford stood between Manuel and the bitch he had come to take.

“Do you like the monster you made, Manuel?” Eli asked, his hands in the pockets of his trousers, his pale naked chest gleaming in the bright silvery moonlight. “She walks in the sun, and she threw off my compulsion as easily as she did yours. I watched while she sat and ate a bloody steak, right in front of me. It was the damnedest thing. She washed it down with wine and chocolate. You remember chocolate, don’t you?”

“She’s still human. And weak,” Manuel spat, his body quivering with rage. “She was too weak for the change, too weak to become like one of the gods.”

Eli laughed. “Weak? Aren’t you in for a surprise,” he stated, pacing a large circle around the three of them. He stopped just beyond Declan, who had dropped to his heels, one palm resting on the earth, while he stared at Manuel with unconcealed rage. His back was arched, the muscles and bones underneath shifting restlessly as he fought to control the urge to shift and pounce—to take the vampire down and rip his throat out.

Eli paused only long enough to squat down and whisper, “Her fight,” before rising to study Manuel.

“You know about the bonds between a wolf and his mate, don’t you?” Eli asked Manuel. “You tried to break it.”

“She had no bond,” Manuel hissed. “None.”

“She’s my mate,” Declan said, his voice a low rough growl. The glinting green eyes glittered with rage and hate and fury and Manuel felt a spark of fear in his gut. “From the day we first met, I knew she was mine. You tried to break that.”

“She had no bond,” Manuel repeated. “And this involves neither of you men. I sired her, and by laws of old, she is mine. That is a bond, wolf. And you tried to interfere, tried to keep me from my property.”

Tori laughed. “Property? I am no man’s property.”

“I sired you. I own you,” Manuel said with a leer. “Body, soul, mind. Your pussy and the ass you shared between them. You will pay for that, I promise you. You think I didn’t know, didn’t see you fucking the two of them? I saw every damn time they pounded their dicks into you, and for each and every single stroke, you will pay, little puta. Now, come.”

Tori only smiled.

“Come!” Manuel ordered, inflicting his will into the word. And she did nothing.

“You protect her?” the Spaniard asked, glaring at Eli with hatred and incredulity.

“I’ve no need to, Manuel. She is not yours. She broke your hold.”

“She belongs to ME!” Manuel bellowed. The windows trembled and shook, and the birds in the forest took flight and the night around them grew silent. “Come to me, you little cunt, now.”

Declan’s lips peeled back from his teeth in a ghastly smile, his teeth lengthening just slightly, just enough to remind Manuel what he was. “Watch how you speak of my mate, vampire. Watch, and remember what we are.”

“She isn’t one of you,” Manuel hissed, unwittingly falling back a step. “I broke no Council law when I took her and she is not one of yours. I took her and I control her.”

“Then why doesn’t she come? Why don’t you try to take her mind, if you are so certain you own her?” Eli suggested. The wind picked up and threw long golden locks of his hair into his face. Absently, he brushed them aside and lifted a brow at Manuel. “Well?”

Manuel called.

She only smiled.

He threw every bit of his strength into compelling her, and she laughed.

“You protect her!”

Eli rolled his eyes. “Check for the bond, you fool. I protect no one. She stands on her own, and you’d be wise to fear the creature you made.”

Manuel did search. And the bond wasn’t there. Instead, when he reached for her through the mental paths, he was thrown into a maelstrom of blinding golden lights shot through with glittering threads of silver and blue, caught in a cage he couldn’t understand. He was trapped, caught, paralyzed.

Until he felt a warm, living hand on his cheek. The bonds that now bound him loosened enough to allow his eyes to open and he stared up at her. At some point, he had collapsed to the ground and he caught the bitter metallic taste of his own blood in his mouth.

“What are you?” he rasped. How could this fledgling vamp hold him like this? He was more than five hundred years old, and a Master.

“She is less than a week old, and already a more powerful Master than you could ever have hoped to become,” Eli said, dropping to his heels and staring at Manuel.

“How?”

“I stopped the change, and followed another path,” Tori said, her voice low and throbbing, full of some power Manuel couldn’t recognize. “An old woman showed me the way.

“Her name was Rosa. Do you have a ghost haunting you, Manuel? Someone you were bound to, someone you hurt?”

The vampire’s eyes widened and he struggled uselessly against the bonds holding him. “You lie,” he rasped, a forgotten memory rushing to the fore as she said that name. Kind eyes and a loving smile, followed by disappointment and shock and pain. The guilt he had left behind when he lost his humanity was returning, and he hated it. “She is long dead.”

“Long dead, but not forgotten,” a soft voice whispered. “You’ve kept me chained to you, with every foul, evil deed, with every young life you ended, you kept me chained. I have watched you always. And waited.”

The whisper had sounded through the night and all heard it. But only Tori kept her eyes focused on Manuel, kept her mind focused on the bonds she had wrapped around him under Rosa’s tutelage.

A rapid spate of Spanish fell from Manuel’s lips and he shook his head, staring in the air just beyond Tori. Declan watched with wonder as a white, silvery cloud shifted and formed just in front of them. Formed into the face and then body of a young noblewoman, her long hair bound up in the back, covered by a net that was strung with jewels. Her gown was long and heavily embroidered, with a low, square neck that revealed a smooth bosom, and two neat little pinprick holes in her neck.

“How could you help her, Madre? She was meant to die, she hurt me and she was meant to die,” Manuel wailed, sounding like a child.

The woman, so sweet and innocent looking, shook her head. “I gave birth to a monster. You became more of a monster as you grew. And when you were changed, it only worsened. I bore you, allowed you to become what you are now. Then you took her. And I saw my chance to make amends for the evils you have done.”

Tori said quietly, “Rosa, you are not to blame for what he did with his life.”

Sad, large eyes met Tori’s briefly. “A mother always feels guilt when her child goes astray,” she said with a shrug of her shoulders. “I must make amends, and I must know that he will cause no more evil. And then I can rest.”

Tori shifted and stood. “You do not need to see this,” she said as she started to loosen the mental bonds that held Manuel captive.

“Yes, I do,” she said with grief filling her eyes.

Tori leaped aside the moment she let the last mental rope fall, nimbly avoiding Manuel’s lunging reach for her. “Kill you,” he grunted. “When you’re dead, she will die with you.”

“She’s already dead,” Tori said. “You killed her five centuries ago.”

“Because she refused to see, I could have made her invincible and we would have lived forever, together.” Manuel fell back, circling her, wary of the strength he could now sense in her. “I could have given her the world, but she wanted to remain human and mourn the death of the cowardly bastard she whelped first, the one who took everything that should have been mine—the title, the lands, the woman I wanted. I killed him slowly, and painfully, like I will kill you.”

He dove for her, but she was gone like the wind, moving faster, with more agility than a vampire. When he turned, searching for her, he saw her standing more than a dozen yards away, smiling at him serenely.

“What else did my beloved Madre show you?” Manuel demanded. “You are a fledgling. You cannot hope to defeat me.”

Eli offered offhandedly, “Do you know what her first meal was? Aside from the steaks she loves to eat, of course…the wolf. He was the first to feed her, and he did so willingly.”

“Agile and fast, like a wolf. Sly, cunning, and strong like a vampire. Able to walk in sunlight and live as a human.”

“Don’t you know yet what she is, my son?” Rosa asked, her white form hovering above the ground, between Manuel and Tori.

“That is legend,” Manuel spat, moving to go around the ghostly form of his dead mother.

“She is legend. Legend made flesh. Only a handful of others like her have ever existed in the world. And you helped make her. Didn’t you suspect—when you couldn’t trap her mind before you sired her—didn’t you suspect she would be different?” Rosa asked, drifting away and allowing Manuel to see Tori again.

“My lady,” Eli said quietly, dropping to one knee in a courtly gesture, waiting until her eyes came to rest on his bent head. “Let them finish it. Say your good-byes to your son, and let them finish it. “

Sadly, Rosa said, “I said my good-byes long ago. He is not my son.”

And she faded into nothingness, leaving Manuel to search desperately for her. “Madre, come back!” he cried, spinning to search for the insubstantial form.

“She doesn’t want to see you now,” Tori said quietly. “She only came because she wanted you to know how you brought this upon yourself. And that she is the one who finally found a way to stop you. You swore she never would, and she swore she would.

“She was right.”

“No, Huntress, she was not,” Manuel said, turning to face Tori.

Huntress.

Not just a Hunter, but Huntress, the one all others would turn to if they failed. Tori felt the flood of knowledge hit her mind, and absorbed it, as Eli and Rosa finally let her know what she was meant to be.

Huntress.

“Come and get me, you bastard,” she taunted, her jaws aching and empty. Her fangs slid out, longer and sharper, glinting and deadly, as Manuel rushed her.

With a strength and skill she hadn’t known she possessed, Tori caught him, spun him and flung him. She leaped and landed on his back, lashing out along the mental path and binding him. “I want you to know the fear I felt,” she crooned in his ear as she grabbed hold of his hair and jerked his head aside. “I want you to know the fear Rosa felt. The fear all your victims felt when you stole their lives.”

Rearing back, she struck, sinking her fangs into his neck and feasting. His blood, once tasting so bitter, slid down her throat like liquid gold and flooded her with a blinding light, washing through her body in caressing waves.

His fear filled the night and she gloried in it.

His heart kicked up, ten beats, forty beats, ninety. Each panicked heartbeat pulsed more blood, more strength from his body into hers, until his heart faltered and stopped altogether.

“That was…unlike anything I have ever seen,” Eli said moments later. He stood guard over Manuel. Though his energy was depleted, the vampire still lived, and could still escape, if the mental ropes Tori had on him slipped.

Eli nodded to the still body at his feet. “We need to finish this. Tori?”

She eyed the body nervously. The knowledge that ran through her brain told her she could kill him completely if she took his head. Or the sun could finish the job. She couldn’t imagine taking his head and all three of them knew it—through the mental bond they shared—one that was wide open right now.

She knew before he spoke what Eli would suggest. “If you leave the bonds on, the sun will finish it.”

She also knew it would be long and painful. She would feel it, and experience it. “No. That is too brutal. I will not be a monster, not even to kill one,” she said softly against Declan’s chest.

A shutter seemed to slide down, blocking her from him as he settled her on the ground, stroking one hand down her hair.

Eli barely glanced at Declan, his golden gaze rapt on her face. “I think perhaps I should fear you as well,” he said, half joking, “if killing a vampire puts that look on your lovely face.”

“He was evil. That was what made it so sweet,” she whispered, her lids drifting down. “The death of evil fulfills me—I think it’s part of what I am.”

A soft mental stroke had her eyes opened and she stared up into Rosa’s face. Make it quick, she pleaded, her eyes full of grief and pain. He is not my son, but he was, once.

Tori reluctantly nodded. She had started this, and it was her responsibility to see it done. But before she could figure out how to behead the vampire, Declan had returned. She watched in confusion as he doused the still body with gas.

Rosa’s body jerked with a sob, and Tori gripped her tightly in a mental hold, trying to comfort the sorrowful woman as Declan tossed the gas can aside. Manuel’s eyes flew open, but the bonds still held, and he couldn’t move.

The flaming match fell from Declan’s hand and the Spaniard went up in flames. A long, painful, hideous shriek filled the air and then all was silent. It took only a few seconds for the body to turn to dust. As soon as the flesh was consumed, the flames went out, the wind blowing the dust around.

Rosa gently shrugged Tori’s hold off. And for a moment, her ephemeral form solidified and she reached out, caught Tori’s face in her hands, rising on her toes to kiss one cheek, then the other. “My thanks, always,” she murmured.

And then she started to fade, her body becoming glittering white and sparkling, like faerie dust, Tori thought, before it drifted upward, flowing up and away from them.

“Be at peace,” Eli said softly from the safety of the porch. He had moved away from the body quickly once he realized what Declan was up to and now he moved back to them, studying the scattering pile of dust, the charred grass around, dampened by the water Declan had thrown the minute Manuel’s body went up in blazes.

“It wasn’t her fault,” Tori said softly, staring up into the sky. The glittery silver cloud was gone from her sight, but it was a sight she was certain she would never forget. For a brief moment, she had felt that light inside her, felt the peace, the warmth, the love and acceptance.

And her fears had faded. She wasn’t evil. That soft beautiful light had filled her, and soothed the lingering doubts.

She wasn’t a monster.

She was the Huntress.

Chapter Eleven

Eli stood in his chambers alone. He had sent his bedmate away after he had awoken and fed. Her sweet blood had filled his belly but he still ached.

He heard them coming. He remained by the fireplace, staring down into the deadly flames. And he wondered, not for the first time, if he would ever have the strength to touch that fire and let the flames burn him, and release him.

“It would be no release, Eli. Merely an escape, a weak one at that,” Declan said from behind him.

Tori stood in front of him, her hand linked with Declan’s.

“When do you plan to return to your home, Declan?” Eli asked, his tone bored.

“Soon enough.”

“Tori will need to mark her territory, so that the ferals know a Master Hunter now protects it.”

“I’m aware of that,” Declan said.

Eli turned back to stare into the fire. “I had planned on either training her myself, or finding another vampire Hunter to do so. Our strengths are different from yours, and I had intended she be well aware. But you already know what you need to know, don’t you, Tori? Huntress?”

“I haven’t sifted through all the information in my head, Eli. I don’t know what I know or don’t know. I certainly don’t know how that knowledge came to be there. But I know that if I need you, you will come,” she said quietly.

He heard soft muffled sounds behind him but he didn’t turn to see. “You know I will.” They had forced themselves deep inside him, inside his head, his soul, and his heart. Eli wanted to hate them for that.

It was so much easier to simply exist, to keep all others at a distance so he didn’t feel their departure so deeply when they left, or died. She was moving closer and Eli stiffened his body.

The jealousy inside his gut was a deadly thing. But it wasn’t a jealousy for her, exactly. Rather that Declan had found a mate, something Eli had been searching and hoping for. And he hadn’t ever found it.

When her hands landed on his waist, his eyes closed. “What do you want, Tori? If you’ve a need to feed, Declan can take you out. Or ask one of my people.” But go, and leave me be.

“We want to keep a promise.” Her slender feminine hands reached for his shirt, hanging loose and open over his lean belly, and drew it down his arms.

When she pressed against him, Eli knew what sounds he had heard. She was naked—he could feel the firm, warm push of her breasts against his back, the hard peaks of her nipples, pressing tightly against him. He whirled away from her and stepped back, staring at her lithe, nude body.

Declan had flopped into a chair, naked now as well, one hand cupping his balls, stroking his shaft idly while he watched. Tori stared at Eli with hot, hungry eyes. “You’re a part of us, Eli. We feel you inside us. I do not like to know you are hurting.”

“So you plan on the three of us living together, a happy threesome?” he asked mockingly.

Her lips quirked at that and she shrugged. “I love Declan. He has my heart. But we want to be with you.”

“One more time?” he queried, shaking his head. “The last thing I need is to be with you and make me want you more and more, and know I’ll never have it again.”

Declan asked roughly, “Who said you couldn’t? Tori wants it, I want it. You want it.”

“So you are willing to share her? Let me fuck her?” Eli demanded, feeling the lust build inside him, side by side with the despair.

“If we weren’t willing, we wouldn’t be here. Take what is offered, Eli,” she murmured, moving closer and trailing her hands down his smooth, muscled chest. One hand paused briefly over his heart, pounding hard and heavy against his ribs, then they moved lower, to shove his pants down, freeing his aching flesh. She caught his cock in her hands, stroking lightly as she asked, “Isn’t that what you told me?”

Eli grabbed her and whirled, pinning her between the wall and his body. Turning his head, he stared at Declan with tortured, hungry eyes. “Will you let me have her? Just me?”

Declan’s eyes glittered and narrowed. But he nodded slowly. “If Tori is willing, I will.”

“And will you stay, and watch? Suffer what I have suffered?”

Declan smiled sadly and shook his head. “I cannot suffer as you have. I have her heart. But we can share our souls, her body.” Settling in the chair, Declan started to pump his cock with his hand. “Your time will come, Eli. You will find your match. Until then…”

“Until then,” Tori repeated, catching his mouth with hers and tangling her tongue with his. The fat flared head of his cock probed her labia and she arched in invitation.

He dropped to his knees in front of her instead, staring up at her with adoring eyes. “My life, my soul is yours,” he murmured, catching her hips in his hands and pressing his mouth to between her thighs, laving the plump outer lips before spreading her and thrusting into her with his tongue, drinking her down like a man dying of thirst.

Declan stared at them with wide eyes that swirled and shifted. His cock bobbed in his fist insistently, demanding he go and take his place. He stayed seated, watching as Tori’s hands fisted in Eli’s hair. Along the path of their bond, he could feel her rising pleasure, feel phantoms of the pleasure Eli was giving her as he ate at her pussy.

Her misty dazed eyes met his across the room and he shook his head, and mouthed, “Eli,” while he stroked his cock quicker and harder.

Inside her, along that odd bond the three now shared, she had known how badly Eli hurt and how badly he needed this. She couldn’t deny him now, any more than Declan could.

And oh, the pleasure. His teeth closed over her clit and tugged lightly, and Tori lifted her hips pleadingly for more.

Her lids drifted closed and she climaxed with a scream, the pleasure that ripped through her echoing in Declan’s body and causing a tiny stream of come to jet from his shaft to land on his belly. Never breaking rhythm, he watched as Eli rose and ripped his pants away. But Tori evaded the hands that reached for her and fell to her knees in front of him, licking a trail from the base of his penis to the head, before she opened wide and took his cock inside her mouth.

“Fuck me,” Eli gasped, falling back against the wall and catching her head in his hands. He rocked his hips against her mouth, pulling back instinctively when he felt the muscles of her throat close around the head of his cock.

But she slid further down, the muscles loosening, until he was buried inside her silken mouth and throat all the way to his balls. “Damn it, she’s sweet,” he muttered as she fell into a rhythm that took his fat cock completely inside her. She would hold him close and tight for long seconds and Eli went half mad, grasping her head and pounding into her mouth.

He dimly felt the echoes of sensation that raced through her, through the bond they shared and knew he was forcing too much of his cock inside her. He started to pull back when he felt the burning of her lungs but she growled and closed her teeth around him in threat, urging him back into the rhythm.

“She doesn’t have to breathe much, Eli,” Declan said gutturally, aware of the mental tug of war. “Let her have it.”

Eli felt his control break and he dug his cock in, burying it down her throat and rocking in hard, tiny feverish movements until his come blasted from him to pulse down her throat. He held tight, letting her swallow every last drop before he pulled away.

She fell back, her lips red and swollen, her chest heaving as she gasped for air. Eli grabbed her and lifted her, bracing her back against the wall and drove his still hard shaft deep inside her body. She was wet and tight, her body resisting the abrupt invasion. “Take it,” he rasped. “Please…take it.” He felt the echo of the burning sensation in her belly and thrust again, driving his fat cock into her a little deeper each time. “You took it once…take it again.”

Her resistant tissues slowly relaxed to cling and caress his length. She stared up at him with glassy eyes as he drove in a little deeper. She could feel him deep inside, parting her, stretching her, bruising her. With a subtle flexing of her inner muscles, she clenched around him as he started to pull out and push back into her slowly.

He stilled and whispered, “Don’t.”

She did it again and smiled a smug cat’s smile as he bellowed and pulled out, ramming back into her repeatedly. Hot streaks of pleasurable pain coursed through her, tightening her muscles and her belly until she was twisting on the cock that impaled her and begging for release.

His fangs nicked her nipple as he swooped low to take her stiff peak in his mouth, suckling and nipping as he drove his cock inside her wet depths. Sweet, sweet Tori, he crooned inside her mind. Come for me, let me feel it. Let him watch it.

Her eyes went blank and she screamed when he drove in at the same time he smacked her ass with the flat of his hand. She went in spasms around him and cried out as he flooded her body with cool, soothing jets of seed.

Moments later she felt him pull out and she tried to drop to the ground, utterly weary.

But Declan’s hands gripped her waist as he forced her face down over a chair, exposing her wet folds, dripping with sperm and cream, and the tightly puckered hole of her anus. “My turn,” he growled, smearing the natural wetness around her hole, his cock already gleaming from the lubricant he had brought with him.

Tori struggled to rise, but another set of hands held her down as Eli rounded the table and dropped to his knees beside her. Covering her mouth, he took her into a drugging deep kiss, sliding one hand down to flick her clit as Declan started to press against her hole.

“Not yet,” she whispered, thrashing against their restraining hands, even while she relaxed her muscles, letting Declan ease his finger inside her. He hissed as she closed over him, tight and hot.

Eli slid inside her mind, wrapping her in a web of seduction, stroking away until she relaxed and forgot her weariness, while he made love to her mind. He ended it with a kiss as she screamed in climax and then Declan buried his pulsating, ruddy cock in her tight ass.

“A vampire is a psychic creature,” Eli purred inside her mind, using gentle bonds to hold her body still, bonds she could easily break if she chose. She whimpered under the touch of his mind on hers while Declan shuttled his length in and out of her ass. “I can fuck you with just my mind touching yours. Feel him, Tori. Feel how hot and hungry he is for you, how much he loves you. Adores you.”

His mouth took hers again and he added, “I adore you. So sweet, so hot, so female and soft.”

Tori felt a strangled gasp in her throat as Declan raked her shoulder with his teeth, urging her to straighten from the table. Doing so left her body unsupported and forced him even deeper inside. He whispered in her ear, “Tell Eli to fuck you with his body, not just his mind.”

Her head whipped back and forth before he caught her hair in his hand, holding her still. “Do it. Or I’ll stop. I can let him feed from me. And he knows how to fuck a man with his mind just as well as a woman. I’ll come all over you and let you die a little inside from the hunger.” He felt her hesitation as she eyed Eli, who was waiting and watching with hungry eyes.

“You want it, Tori.” She felt him murmuring against her hair as his hands came around and cupped her breasts, pinching and rolling her nipples. “He’s bound to us, to you. You feel it, how badly he wants you? His needs eat at me—and you. Tell him.”

“Your body,” she whispered on a sigh, reaching for him, feeling Declan’s approval. “Not just your mind.” Hell yes, she felt it. It was what woke her from a sound nap a few evenings ago. He had risen from his slumber and scented her, wanted her, and Tori had awoken hungry and needy…for Eli. All because he had awoken thinking of her, and Tori realized she was the completion of the circle.

Eli grasped her legs and lifted her hips just a little higher before he steadied his cock and let her weight fall, taking both of them deep inside with one tight caress. At the same time, he slid inside her mind, battering down the defenses she had tried to throw up, knocking them down until he held her mind with his, controlling her body, her slick vagina, her quivering ass, controlling her orgasm, holding it just out of reach.

He waited until he felt Declan start to pull out and then he thrust in, her body wet from his previous climax, taking his cock more easily this time. He felt the movement through the tissues as Declan shuttled back inside her. Falling into an opposing rhythm, they rode her hard, Eli catching one pebbled nipple in his mouth while Declan pinched and tweaked the other. Eli felt her arch and cry out, twisting in frustration before she snarled, “Damn you, let me come.”

He wrapped his web of seduction just a little tighter, until she couldn’t speak. He also took her mouth, driving his tongue half way down her throat, tasting peaches and sex, the taste and scent that had driven Declan half insane, tasting his own recent climax as he ate from her mouth.

Declan grunted and growled against her neck, his hips pounding against her ass as he took her in short brutal digs. He could feel the quaking in her body that she couldn’t control and he relished it. Declan reveled in controlling her body while Eli controlled her mind, knowing that she was willing to do anything they asked, if they would just keep fucking her.

The walls of her anal sheath quivered and caressed his cock like a silken fist and he had to throttle down the need to come. Eli slid inside his mind, just a little, to help hold off the climax that would trigger all three. “A good fuck, she is, eh, mate?” Declan growled as he reached around and pinched one nipple roughly.

“Damnation, yes,” Eli purred, rolling against her in a slow penetrating rhythm at odds with Declan’s furious pounding digs in her ass. Tori gasped for air and pleaded silently for release, damning Eli for the bonds he had placed, and herself for not simply snapping them. She flushed and heated as they spoke around her like she was a rag doll, her breath hitching as they compared what it felt like to pierce her body.

“Sweet, hot little piece of ass,” Declan crooned against her neck. “Like digging my cock into electrified silk.” He slowed his strokes to slow and gentle, shallow and easy, feeling Eli do the same.

“Tight wet sheath,” Eli added, as he drove his length into said sheath. “Soft, wet and sweet.”

Her head fell back against Declan’s shoulder, lifting her breasts while she blasted them both with heated curses through their shared bond. Her arched back lifted her breasts prominently and Eli cupped one, flicking his thumb over her nipple repeatedly while he said in a conversational tone, “Such pretty tits, as well, round and white and firm. If only I could take what I needed from them forever, I could die happy.”

Tori was going to die, or she was going to kill them. Eli still held control of her mind and both men limited her control of her own body. Declan laughed roughly when he slipped one finger inside her mouth, only to have her bite down and lick at the bleeding marks she left.

“Let her go,” Declan said gruffly, feeling the enormous pressure of his own release building behind the wall of Eli’s mental webs.

Eli released her and started to pound into her vagina roughly, hungrily, while Declan reamed her ass with his cock. They sought purchase on her body and Tori cried out when they ended up linking their arms for leverage and driving into her body with brutal, uncontrolled force. She cried out in delicious pain and felt her body break open, pleasure swamping her as wave after wave of pleasure swamped her, as climax after climax took her helpless body, still held under their faultless control.

Declan came in a hot pulsing jet in her backside just as Eli pumped the last of his seed inside Tori’s receptive pussy while another climax, longer and slower, wracked her body from head to toe.

Moments later they slid her to the floor and they all three collapsed, the men sliding from her body with soft, wet, sucking sounds. Eli rolled over just as Declan did until they cupped her body between them.

Weakly, Tori whispered, “A very pleasant way to keep a promise.”

Eli took her mouth gently, kissing her softly and deeply before pulling away to buss her cheek. Over her body, he agreeably said, “Indeed. And as long as we can have this from time to time, I think I can easily die a happy man.”

Tori laughed weakly and cuddled against Declan, feeling the solid warm strength of him surround her as she said, “We need to find your match Eli, and soon. Otherwise, I may start to crave this always.”

Tori stood in the full summer sunshine the next afternoon, basking in it while Eli slept a deep silent sleep. He was aware of her though, and he caressed her mind gently and whispered “Good-bye for now, Tori McAdams.”

Declan led her to the car, eyeing her cautiously. “Are you certain we shouldn’t wait any longer? We have hours of sunlight left.”

Her face lifted to the sun, drinking it in, delighting in the gentle caress of air over her body. “I’ve nothing to fear from the light, Declan. Not now.”

The Hunters: Eli and Sarel

By

Shiloh Walker

First digital printing 2003

Please note: This is the original 2003 version—it has been edited, but no new material has been added.

The Hunters: Eli and Sarel © Copyright Shiloh Walker, 2003.

Cover Art Angela Waters

Prologue

Elijah Crawford wasn’t on his territory the night he caught scent of a child’s terror, the stench of death, a man’s lust. Not that it stopped him. That sort of thing would never stop him…not when it came to a child.

He prowled around the ramshackle house in Mississippi, his eyes narrowed and grim as he curled his hands into fists. Ten seconds sooner…even five…and he could have saved the woman as well.

But it was too later for her now.

The child’s scream tore the air as her father stumbled out of the kitchen, drunk and laughing, staring at her. The look in his eyes was one of hot, hungry lust—the kind look a man should never have in his eyes when he looked at a child.

Eli leaped from the window to the front door in one single bound, the blood in his cool body starting to pump hotter and faster as a familiar, uncontrollable rage filled him.

Striking out, Eli kicked the door down, his fangs emerging. Taking a deep breath, Eli shoved the rage back before he looked at the screaming child who was splattered with her mama’s blood. “Sleep,” he crooned quietly, smiling gently. Her lashes fluttered and she fell in a boneless heap to the floor.

Eli smiled. “Invite me in.”

“Come inside,” he whispered, his voice thick.

The sheer, dumbstruck look on the bastard’s face had Eli’s lips curling in amusement as the thoughts ran through the man’s drunken mind…who is this…why did I invite him in?

“You did it so I could kill you.” Eli smiled, a cold, cruel smile and his eyes narrowed as the man wheeled around, fear penetrating the drunken haze.

There is an animal inside mortals, one that recognizes the bigger monster, the predator, and he knew he was staring at death in some small part of his mind.

Eli laughed as the man rallied and the fight welled up inside him. No quick death for this one…he was a blood relation to that pretty child, no doubt. A blood relation—it was in the scent of his blood, the slope of his brow, the coppery, golden color of his hair.

No–not a quick death.

Later, as he washed the blood from his face and hands, Eli stared at his grim reflection. The child still slept in the other room. He would be taking her away. Even in her sleep, she was restless, terrified…she dreamt of a sister. In those dreams, she cried out for her. But where this sister was, Eli didn’t know.

Alive and well; safe, he hoped.

But the child was lost to her. Eli would see to it that the little girl never knew pain, never knew this sort of fear again.

Poor little lost one.

Terrified screams came ripping from her throat the moment he touched her. Then she threw herself at him, wrapping her tiny arms around his neck, and he could feel brittle bones, smell her unwashed body.

Underfed, uncared for…Hot tears stung his eyes and burned a path down his cheeks as she sobbed brokenly, inconsolably.

“Shhh…” he murmured, rocking her back and forth, stroking her tangled, deep red hair. Working her back, just a little, Eli cupped her face in his hand and forced her to stare into his eyes as he whispered, “Sleep, pretty child. When you wake, things will be better.”

Once the mantle of sleep fell over her, Eli forced his way into her young mind and took the memory of the night and broke it, erased it, until it was gone forever. It had simply not happened. The child would never have any knowledge of it. Some things, even time could not heal.

Power rippled through the air.

Eli stood staring up at the moon as Tori and Declan crossed the boundaries of his territory. His heart was too heavy for this–but how could he turn her away, when he hungered for her so desperately?

But sad frightened eyes, the stench of blood and death clung to him.

He was still there nearly an hour later when Tori found him and stood waiting for him to turn to her with that slow, feline curl of his lips. When he didn’t, she started to move toward him, only to have Declan’s hands on her shoulders hold her in place.

“Rough time, Eli?”

The rich music of Ireland still rolled through the cop’s voice, danced on the air. Taking his eyes from the moon, Eli turned his head and stared at them, revealing a somber, grief ravaged face.

Misreading the look, Declan swore softly and said, “Eli, we can’t save them all.”

“I did save her, the child, that is. The one that counted most. Her mother, well, her mother kept her there.” His voice was rusty and his throat felt tight with emotion, all over a child…one child, out of how many? “I did not get there in time to save her mother. And I don’t know that I bloody care. She kept her there, Tori. Allowed her to be beaten, starved, and she would have been raped.

She died a few nights ago—and I don’t care.”

Slim, pale arms wrapped around his waist and Tori rested her head on his shoulder from behind.

Eli stood there in silence as she held him while he grieved.

* * * * *

Elijah came awake quickly, the heavy veil of sleep falling aside as though somebody had just jerked a blanket off his tousled blonde head. He didn’t immediately roll from the bed though—instead he reached down and stroked his hand over the pale, smooth arm thrown across his belly.

Behind him, Tori slept on, exhausted, and behind her, Declan shifted and moved restlessly. The shifter never slept as easily as his mate, nor as easily as Eli did. And even though his shapeshifting abilities were inherent—and not induced by the waning or waxing of the moon—the full moon did tend to increase his restlessness. That was because he was a breed—part were, part Inherent. The Inherent abilities were by far the strongest, but the moon’s call wasn’t one he could ever completely ignore.

The full moon was drawing near and Eli knew the call of the moon was strong. Eventually the shapeshifter would give in to the call, and then he’d run the night and hunt.

It may not be this moon, or even the next, but soon. The wildness in Declan’s eyes was proof enough of that for Eli.

The sun had already sunk behind the mountains and night was upon them when Eli finally pulled himself away from their sweet warmth. He brushed his fingers across Tori’s peaceful face before he stood. The faint, already healing marks on Tori’s neck made him smile.

Eli had fed from her.

That was…unfathomable, as far as Eli was concerned. She was something out of legend, not completely vampire, not completely human, but something in between. She could take food and she could walk in daylight, yet he had seen her caught in the hungers of a vampire, had seen her streak across the ground at a pace too quick for human eyes. Tori’s speed was more like that of the shifters thanks to her mate, Declan, who had been her first meal. She also shared his rather voracious hungers.

Tori’s heart was larger than the ocean and she was as sharp as a fucking whip.

Eli was half in love with her, half in awe of her. He was generally caught between wanting to worship at her feet and fuck the living daylights out of her.

Last night she had fed him, the wine-rich taste of her blood lingering in his mouth, memories of the pleasure he had taken from her body as he and Declan had taken her.

Eli felt his cock stiffen in memory and he grabbed a robe, stalking out of the room before the scent of his lust could awaken either of them.

Neither Declan nor Tori would be here if they didn’t want to be, but it wasn’t something that sat easily with Eli. Hell, they were more at peace with it than he was.

Eli was terribly afraid he was falling in love with Tori. At least with the ideal image he had created of her. He was moving past the halfway mark at a speed that terrified him.

The thought of having a warm, soft woman next to him in bed when the sun rose high in the sky, a woman who would take both his cock and his fangs and glory in the pleasures he could give her. A woman he could love.

There lay his problem.

Eli wanted a woman of his own. But the only woman who called to him in such a way belonged to his best friend.

* * * * *

Dawn was only a few hours away and he had returned to the house rather pleased with the work of the past week. He had intended to get some tedious business and financial matters out of the way—after all, a vampire had to provide for those he took into his home—but the sweet, seductive scent of aroused woman had flooded his senses as she came down the stairs, laughing and whispering to Declan. He was aroused even before Tori came up behind him.

Damn her, and damn his cock. He couldn’t think with a damn when she was around.

Declan stood in the doorway staring at them with hot green eyes. Eli saw the look Declan sent his assistant—and the resentful one Leslie sent back before she left the room—and he suppressed a sigh. Time for the assistant to go.

“Tori, is there something you wanted?” Eli teased as he turned in the circle of her arms to look down at her.

Wide blue eyes met his as she brushed the back of one hand down the front of his linen trousers—against the hard bulge there—as she slowly lowered her head and kissed his chest through the layers of his clothing. “Hmm. Wanna get naked and I’ll show you?” she asked, her nimble fingers already flying down the front of his shirt, freeing the buttons and spreading it wide over the pale, muscled wall of his chest.

Eli couldn’t help it. Even as she shoved and pulled his clothes until he stood wearing only his trousers, he glanced at Declan. Sooner or later, the wolf was going to grow tired of sharing his woman.

But the Irishman was smiling, aroused and amused. A ripple of power slid through the room and Eli watched as Declan suppressed the animal that lived inside his skin, suppressed the urge to shift and fall on Tori like a monster in rut. Eli groaned and buried his hands in Tori’s hair as she fell to her knees and took his cock inside the wet cave of her mouth.

Declan knelt behind her, reaching around pull her shirt open and cup her full breasts in his hands, rolling and pinching her nipples while he rubbed his pelvis against her ass.

When her mate pressed his hand against her wet cleft, Tori shuddered and pulled away, shooting to her feet and reaching for her jeans, only to have her hands batted and brushed aside as two pairs of male hands stripped her remaining clothes away. Eli and Declan fell to their knees before her as a unit, each taking one swollen, stiff nipple—Eli suckling deep while Declan nipped and nibbled.

Eli slid one hand around to grab her ass, trailing his fingers through the crevice between her buttocks while Declan drove two fingers deep inside her wet, tight vagina, screwing deep and hard. She moaned, shuddering against them.

The scent of the hybrid was enough to drive Eli nearly mad. He drew in the sweet perfume of her hungry body as Declan pulled Tori to the floor. Declan’s eyes were wide and glowing and green, full of unfathomable hunger. The bond the three of them shared was strong enough that Declan’s urgency frequently spilled over to Eli, along with some of the wolf’s more basic instincts—fuck, hunt, eat. Fuck, hunt, eat.

Tori screamed breathlessly as Declan pulled her over him and impaled her on his rigid cock. Eli moved behind her, taking her hips in his big hands as Declan lifted her slim body up and down. Eli pushed on her shoulders and she bent forward, presenting her rounded ass and the tight puckered hole of her ass. Eli hunched over her, rocking his cock against her, only to pull away with a rough growl of frustration. No fucking lubricant—

“Table,” Declan rasped out before Eli even had time to finish the thought.

Moments later—Eli’s cock wet and gleaming—he smeared some of the clear liquid against Tori’s entrance Tori’s entrance, working two fingers in and out while Declan shafted her.

Tori’s head fell back as Declan caught one beaded nipple in his mouth, biting down gently. She shuddered as Eli started to prod her ass with deep, slow, strokes, listening as her breath caught. Lying below them on the bed, Declan pushed up inside her and Eli groaned as he had to force his way into her tight, narrow passage.

Too much, Tori thought…too much…

Emotions that weren’t hers, sensations that weren’t hers slammed into her mind through the bond they shared and she cried out under the combined sensation of them both invading her body and the pleasure she sensed from them as they invaded her—the wet, slick heat of her vagina around Declan’s cock, the snug, silken clasp of her ass around Eli’s.

Declan’s powerful, lean body arched under hers and he purred against the mound of her breast, “Tight, so fucking tight and sweet.” A phantom touch caressed his balls, the light brush of Eli’s sac as it just barely touched Declan’s. He bit down on Tori’s breast hard enough that he tasted the sweet, tangy taste of her blood as the scent of it filled the air.

Eli’s nostrils flared as he scented her blood. But the bite on Tori’s neck hadn’t yet healed, and even as quickly as she regenerated he couldn’t feed from her twice in a day, no matter how much he wanted to. Feeding his other hunger, he gripped her hips, taking her deeper, harder. Pulling out and driving back in with bruising force. He felt the sharp bite of her pleasure-pain through their bond and grinned, pulling out and driving back into her again as she mewled weakly.

Declan growled and drove his cock upward inside her wet pussy with short, hard digs as she convulsed around him, milking his climax from him while Eli continued to ream her ass. Blood lust and sexual lust made a dangerous pair, and when teamed with the bizarre obsessive-love Eli had for Tori, they were even more so.

Pulling away, his cock still wet and gleaming, regenerated vampire blood making it ruddy, he lifted Tori from where she had collapsed against Declan and spread her out on the floor. Crouching between her thighs and lifting her helpless ass into the air Eli drove back inside her while keeping his eyes on their merged bodies. The sight of his thick cock spearing her tight little hole made his cock swell even more and he fell down against her, riding her snug little anus harder and harder and lifting his golden eyes to stare at Declan.

The other man grinned weakly at him and rolled onto his side, staring at his wife’s gleaming face as another man fucked her ass and pulled a screaming climax from her.

When his old friend didn’t protest Eli gave in and concentrated on Tori—on the hot satin sheath that held his cock, on the way she cried and screamed and bucked underneath his body as he fucked her, how her sweet little butt would lift pleadingly when he pulled out. Leaning close he whispered into her ear, “So sweet…I love fucking you, listening to you moan and beg for more. I love your taste, your blood and the cream that comes from your sweet little pussy. You stayed away too long this time.”

Moaning and squirming against him, Tori searched blindly for the climax, but his weight pinned her down and she couldn’t get the leverage she needed to take him deeper. “Eli, please,” she whimpered as his hands slid under and around her, pinning her arms tight to her body. His cock inside her ass felt huge and if he would just—”Damn it, Eli, let me come.”

Eli licked at the tiny healing holes on her neck before shifting his weight and turning her head so that she could see her husband, who still lay there, his cock semi- erect as he watched them. “He likes to watch, doesn’t he, Tori? Has he ever shared you with anybody else?”

She couldn’t speak, just lay there panting and crying out, moaning when Eli drove back inside her again. “Has he?”

Declan laughed and answered for her. “Hell, no, Eli.” He reached down, wrapping his hand around his now erect cock and stroking as he stared at them. The blond vampire hunkered low over the body of Declan’s wife, his big hands holding her slim hips as he drove his thick penis inside her ass. Declan couldn’t fathom how easily he shared her with Eli, but it didn’t bother him to do so. He didn’t question it, he just did it.

Tori screamed with frustration, clenching her muscles and trying to hold Eli’s cock inside her. In response he moved, going from lying atop her body to kneeling between her thighs, still deep inside her ass. The flat of his hand smacked against her naked bottom, a sharp stinging pain left in its wake, but before she could snarl at him in indignation he started to ride her hard and fast, driving his cock completely inside, pulling out to the flared head and then driving in with a force that stole her breath.

Three deep, hard, bruising strokes and she was screaming in release. A groan rumbled from Eli’s throat and finally, he found his own release. Declan continued to watch and pump his cock until he, too, came.

Tori stared into the dark night.

She had watched as Declan disappeared into the woods, his furred, golden hide gleaming under the light of the moon.

Somewhere out there was Eli as well, stalking his prey.

Only Tori wasn’t compelled to hunt that night. With a tiny smile, she took a moment to appreciate the fact that, being the hybrid she was, if she was actually hungering for steak and a baked potato followed by chocolate, she could indulge, and not just dream. So her belly was full of traditional food tonight, not blood, even though that had been the ticket yesterday when she, Eli and Declan had traveled to Virginia and interrupted a would-be gang rape.

Yesterday blood has been satisfying.

Today, after the fuck-fest, steak had been satisfying. Laying a hand on her belly, she decided, maybe ice cream would be coming later.

The two men she adored were out there, one tracking a deer, the other tracking the human garbage that were his favored prey, the men who beat their children or raped their wives. Eli loved taking that kind of life and ending it, loved the fear he could induce as he used his mind to hold his prey still while he fed.

Declan had the same gift.

Tori was learning it.

Both of her men could induce fear, could induce lust—either emotion—simply with a turn of his head, a blink of his eyes. With her it was always the lust, and it made their mating so much sweeter, so much more.

With the hunting—when they prowled and preyed on the scum who preyed on the less fortunate—it was made sweeter as well. The blood that poured from a man who was nearly mad with fear was as sweet as nectar, Tori had learned. And when she was feeding from a man she had just ripped from a woman he had been intent on raping, it was almost orgasmic.

You stayed away too long this time, Eli had whispered to her.

She wouldn’t admit it to him, or to Declan, but she had no choice. The need she felt for Eli didn’t shame her or bother her. Not really. Tori loved her husband, with all her heart, she loved him.

But if she allowed it, this strange need for Eli could consume them both. While she hungered for Eli and even loved him some, Declan was her heart.

The three of them shared a bond, true. But she and Declan were bond-mates, soul-bonded. Each would die without the other.

And if she wasn’t careful she feared what could happen between Eli and herself— feared it could hurt all three of them.

So she made them go months without this, out of necessity. Hell, she knew Declan craved it almost as much as she did, but she also knew part of Declan would think like the wolf. If it wasn’t hurting him now, how could it hurt him at all?

The sweet ache of sex rode her body like a fine cloak and she reveled in it. Yes, she had stayed away too long. And she knew she would continue to drag it out until the need almost overrode her common sense.

But while she was here…

Chapter One

Five Years Later

Eli felt the odd…tingle in the air as another Master entered his lands.

It wasn’t Tori. His body went on red alert any time she came within fifty miles of his boundaries. And besides, the hybrid vamp and her mate Declan had only left three weeks ago. Eli knew it would a good five months before he saw her again. Five months before he was able to ride that sweet body again, and take the oblivion she offered when she and Declan allowed him into their bed.

But he knew this Master. It was the one who had freed Eli years and years ago.

Malachi.

As far as Eli knew, Malachi was just…Malachi. He had no other name and he felt older than the ages to Eli’s mind. They shared a rather uneasy friendship.

Vampires weren’t exactly commonplace, but they weren’t rare, either. A Master was more of a rarity, though. And one who wasn’t controlled by the bloodlust, rarer yet.

Ones like Malachi were the rarest of them all.

Eli owed his life to Malachi.

Eli’s maker had Changed him against his will and he’d spent the first fifty years of his existence in a cavern far below the surface of the earth. She had kept him chained, kept him half starved and Eli was certain he would have gone mad that last year if Malachi hadn’t come.

Elspeth had feared Malachi.

Bloody hell, Eli was quite certain that everybody feared Malachi. The vampire was older than any other Eli had ever known and held every unusual power a vampire was capable of. He could control a person’s very thoughts, even if that person was a vampire. He could shift from his given form to mist to hawk, maybe even more forms. He could go weeks without feeding and he needed little blood to maintain. And he could take sunlight.

How much, Eli didn’t know, but three hundred years ago, Malachi had covered Eli’s body with his own cloak and carried him away from Elspeth’s keep before the sun had set. For the past three decades Eli had been able to tolerate enough sun to watch the sunset, but he could tolerate no more than that. He knew Malachi had traveled for several hours in the sunlight to take him to safety.

Nobody was ever quite sure of all Malachi could do because he never did it unless it was necessary.

Very little was actually necessary.

All Malachi had do was simply show his face and his enemies would most likely die of fright, so why use the weapons is his rather impressive arsenal?

Many of the Masters who followed a different, darker path had only to hear Malachi’s name and they fled. Or possibly died of fright.

The vampire everybody feared was now approaching Eli’s territory. Eli rose from his chair and took the stairs at a lazy pace, shoving his own nerves aside in disgust. He often felt like Malachi’s annoying baby brother, eager to please, dying to impress, and most likely, looking like a fool.

Once in his office, he settled in the massive leather chair, the creamy leather molding itself to his frame. There he waited for Malachi.

And wondered what in the hell had caused the ancient one to seek him out.

* * * * *

Malachi was ancient, no longer certain just how old he was. Hell, he had never been certain.

A slave child growing up in Rome, he had been serving as entertainment when a lovely young vamp had sired him all those centuries ago. Big, nearly a giant back then, and he was a large man even now, over six feet. Malachi’s purpose in life had been whatever his masters wished of him, whether it was fucking the women in secret to ensure they were breeding, fighting, killing…it didn’t matter. Ancient…aye, he was ancient. He barely recalled much of his mortal life, though he did remember when he was taken from his village, his mother raped and killed, while his father was gutted and left to die slowly, watching and unable to help.

And Mal remembered Alys.

Lovely, sweet Alys. Malachi’s masters had sent him out for more wine, more food, and he was certain when he returned, he would be ordered to brawl with another slave…or worse, kill one. So he had tarried and they had forgotten him. He had taken some much needed rest, only to awaken when he felt a cool hand on his brow, followed by cool lips, tasting of sweetness on his.

She had come on him in the night like a pale misty dream—singing and humming softly, straddling his body and whispering to him in a tongue he hadn’t understood. Certain he was dreaming, especially after her voice came into his mind as well, Alys promised him a new life, new things, new pleasures, while her pretty blue eyes held a plea for forgiveness.

He had fisted his hands in her hair and held back his moans while he drove his cock into her sweet, soft pussy, wondering why she felt so cool, then forgetting it as she warmed so quickly—as they fucked under the stars while his masters slept through the night, drunk from their days of revelry.

She had ridden him well into the night then she had sung him back to sleep before sinking her teeth into him—taking the first of three bites. The next night, she had come upon him while he was bedding his mistress.

With narrowed, wary eyes he had drawn back, his wet cock going from erect to half rigid in his suspicion as the woman he was certain he had dreamed appeared at the door. He could hear but not see as she whispered, “Invite me in, lady of the house. I want to play as well.”

And she had done it.

While the rest of the household had slept, Alys had come on them like a pale whirlwind—laughing and smiling, while her eyes wept. She had whispered to the mistress, whose name Mal had long forgotten, “Sleep…” and the woman had slept. Alys turned to Mal and in a soft, almost meek voice, in his own tongue, whispered “Your forgiveness, I beg. But I need you, a warrior. He seeks me.”

And she had launched herself at him.

Strong, like the very devil.

That night, Malachi knew she was not mortal, though what she was, he did not know. He was wakeful and aware when she bit him the second time, and even though he fought her and cursed her viciously, she did it painlessly, sliding inside his mind and whispering to him, singing in a voice that even then broke his heart.

Malachi planned to kill her the third night. But as simple as she was, Alys was a warrior in her heart, if not her body. “No,” she whispered as she dodged the spear he launched at her, moving quicker than his eyes could track. He could not know how very close he came, him, a mortal. It was unthinkable. But she beat it, just barely, and hid from him—luring him farther and farther from the large sprawling village his master owned, into the forest, where he was the weaker one.

“You see, I am not the first one.” Alys spoke into his mind as she let him chase her, letting him think he might catch her, might win. But he was weak from blood loss, from sleep deprivation, and he was already too close to coming over. “You will kill him. You will stop him. You are a warrior...”

“Foul bitch,” he rasped, wheeling on his heel and snagging a thick branch from the ground, snapping it over his knee. A glimpse of white—he spun and threw the makeshift stake and heard a soft female cry, but she was gone before he could see if he had touched her.

Later he learned he had, low in her belly, but she had ripped it out and flung it aside, leaping into a tree, and waiting for him to pass by. In desperation, she had dropped down on Malachi. This was the one, she knew. The one who could free her.

The third bite drained him to the dregs, and then as Alys forced Malachi to feed from her, she sighed and murmured, “Such a pity that you will hate me. But he is coming—my Master. By the time you have changed, he will be here. And already you are stronger than us both. And you will see…

“But I wish you did not hate me.”

Her blood had tasted bitter, then sweet, but Malachi had torn his mouth away as he glared her, spiraling into a black, soft darkness, staring into her blue, glowing eyes.

“To my death, I shall hate you—”

After he had been turned, though, all that had changed. His purpose was now tiny, pretty little Alys. She hadn’t been evil—sweet Alys. She had been lonely and frightened when she had sired Malachi against his will and he had quickly lost his hatred of her once he realized just how lonely and frightened the vamp was. The bastard who had sired her years before had done so out of malice, forcing the change upon her after feeding from her and raping her for days on end.

And Jacob had indeed come upon them within two days of Malachi’s transformation. Mal had come from the dark, burning sleep full of ravenous hunger, dying to kill the woman who had changed him. And Alys had known, had been waiting with her head bowed…waiting.

Malachi had torn out of there with snarling rage and had fallen upon a deer, sating his hunger that way, unable to understand these new urges, wanting badly to return to what had been home for so long, but unable to leave the woman-child.

Then Jacob had come.

Malachi had been brooding, in a tree, his belly full of wolf blood that night, but still, a gnawing, aching hunger filled him—so badly he ached and he felt a hot, burning tingle rip through him, followed by an immediate, confusing anger, nay, a rage unlike any he had ever felt. And possessiveness.

When Alys came creeping out of the small cave where she had taken him while he went through the changing, Malachi dropped to the earth, his bare chest gleaming in the moonlight as he approached her. Possessive of her, rage of something wrong that had been done to her.

“He is coming.” Her eyes were filled with terror and hope and relief. “I do not know why you did not kill me—nay, I know why. A valiant warrior, I found indeed. Though you have much hatred of me in your heart, you cannot simply kill me. But him, you will…no… he calls me…please no…”

Then Alys fell screaming to the rocky ground, blood pouring from her mouth and nose and eyes. Malachi lifted her and shouted to her and if he hadn’t held her with all his strength, she would have gone running off into the woods, to the man Malachi felt approaching.

Malachi had killed a Master vampire—a two-hundred-year-old vampire—when he merely three days changed.

That sweet child hadn’t been broken by Jacob’s treatment of her amazed Malachi. Jacob had been brutal and cunning but not particularly bright and Malachi had enjoyed killing him. After that they had left the place of Malachi’s birth and settled in a land of mountains and green valleys and misty lakes. His purpose was here, caring for her, bedding her with all the skill he had been forced to acquire in his youth and teaching her that the touch of a man didn’t have to be painful.

Alys had blossomed, knowing at last true happiness, true kindness from Malachi. She had remained simple, of course, but she smiled and laughed instead of cringing and hiding.

Of course, Alys hadn’t lived long enough to truly enjoy her freedom.

A priest had killed her a few years later after she had been fool enough to return to his young flock to feed several times in a month. Malachi had been unaware of her visits to the village and he hadn’t arrived in time to save her.

His first true failure.

After arriving at the charred remains of their home that morning, he had become reclusive, hiding deep within the caverns in the mountains and hills of what would come to be called Scotland. Feeding from some of the more blood-thirsty men who roamed those hills and mountains, he took particular pleasure when he happened upon those men who fought and fucked with equal brutality. Taking those cruel men and draining them near to death, he would leave them with their minds shattered, simple and completely incapable of rutting on any woman.

That had been his life.

Malachi became something of a legend in those hills and after a time, fewer and fewer men found pleasure in rape.

He had been certain he would spend the centuries alone and without purpose. Over time he had learned how to shift from his mortal form to mist and back again, and had gained the ability to walk in sunlight.

When the Council had finally approached him, they had reckoned his age at more than eight hundred years. Malachi didn’t tell them that he had been able, from his first century, to walk in even mid-day sun. Nor did he tell them he could hear their thoughts, try as they might to conceal them.

That had been before the first Crusade.

There, in those first years he learned more of what he was, vampyre, nosferatu. He met others like him, many who had been forced into this life, brought over against their wills, though none seemed to have the skills he had, and none called to him or felt like a comrade in arms—in more than name any way.

But Malachi learned.

Master Vampires, ferals, Hunters, witches, wolves, so much more than just the mortals out there. The ferals, the vampires that starved and went mad, losing their sense of self and going insane, turning into little more than monster. The Master vampires who had sought vampirism, like Jacob had, evil twisted things that were sought out and killed before they could change more mortals.

Witches and wolves fought on both sides, some with the Council, some hunted by them.

And others.

Several centuries had passed before he even learned to read or write, or to count. Finally he had gotten a human servant to teach him after he had come to grips with his fate.

Malachi had been born to be a Hunter, and now he was a Hunter trained, taken into the Council in those early days, where he found others like himself. There he found a new purpose.

To protect, as he had been unconsciously doing, but this time he wasn’t preying on just those within his territory and more often than not, his prey wasn’t human.

By the time he had met Eli, he was the only one left from that early council. The shifters and witches, though long lived, weren’t as long lived as a vampire and they had died off, one by one, of old age or in battle.

The handful of vampires were gone as well, replaced by others. Several had died in battle, some had simply grown tired of their existence, and ended it.

Malachi understood that ennui. But he had those to keep him grounded. Friends…like Eli. A brother in arm.

And something was threatening that brother.

No, not just something. An enemy.

Malachi weaved in and out of the various sentinels Eli kept posted. A few vamps, but most were shifters. Inside the house, more people, humans and shifters and vampires. The sentinels could scent him, but he moved between them like a dark shadow, shifting from true form to mist and back, eluding them as they tried to track him.

He was at Eli’s door when they finally discovered his goal. They launched themselves, eerie howls coming from their human looking mouths, as they swarmed closer to the intruder.

“If you had bothered to give some warning, I could have prepared them and they would have given escort instead of chase,” Eli said from the open doorway. “My wolves do not like surprises.”

Malachi flashed Eli a grin as he asked, “And what fun is that?” But he was pleased. Most others wouldn’t have eluded the sentinels, so Eli had some protection, even in the day while he slept. The bitch who was hunting Eli was a witch, but untrained and young. She’d be a little easier to catch, as long as Eli stayed on guard. “Surprises are the only things that make life tolerable.”

Eli grinned. “Not the only, my friend. Not even the best.”

Malachi lifted a dark red brow, the same deep red of the hair he wore in a long, thick braid that nearly touched his waist. He could scent, only faintly, the lingering sweet perfume of woman. It was…different. Human, but not. Vampire, sort of. “Still enjoying that young Huntress you brought into the Council? I’m surprised her wolf allows it. Think he’d let me have a taste?”

Eli’s face went blank and he said in a flat, cold voice, “Not likely. Stay away from her, Malachi. She’s happy with Declan.”

“Then there’s no reason to stay away, is there?”

Malachi knew damn good and well there was a reason. All vampires could draw people to them—it was simply their nature, and what allowed them to feed freely and pleasurably. The older a vampire became, the stronger the call.

Eli had seen women fall prey to that call, some he never would have imagined susceptible. Nuns, grannies, gay women, and women who despised the touch of a man. Tori may well be able to ignore it, but he wouldn’t see Declan hurt. “Leave her be, Mal. I am asking as a friend.”

Malachi was eaten with curiosity to learn more of this woman, but it hadn’t come to pass. Staring into Eli’s serious, somber, golden gaze, he rolled his eyes. “Then, as a friend, I will,” Malachi said, sighing. Flashed him an evil grin, he said, “But tell me, does she taste as good as she fucking smells?”

Eli’s mouth curled in a slow smile. “Better.”

Malachi hadn’t changed.

Not in the all the years Eli had known him.

He still had a wide streak of mischief in him, and a craving for creating havoc. And he still treated their friendship the same.

Few vampires had the somewhat dubious privilege of calling Malachi ‘friend’. Dubious because Malachi was sometimes a harbinger of things to come, and rarely were they pleasant, though he also would alight on Eli’s property every few decades simply for companionship.

Of course, not tonight. I couldn’t be so lucky, Eli thought darkly. He lounged against the wall in the bathroom, as Leslie soaped and rinsed Malachi’s body. The bastard had loved the baths of medieval times, and more often than not, this was how they spent their conversations. Hell, more than once, Eli and Malachi had both ended up in that tub, either feasting on one woman, or bringing in a second so they each had one.

But Malachi wasn’t up for sex sport tonight.

“Nobody seems to know who the lass is,” Malachi said, eyes closed in pleasure as Leslie massaged his arms with talented fingers. As Eli had expected, she had fallen to Malachi’s silent call the moment she laid eyes on him. Of course, the bastard had also refused to take her with him, so on top of replacing Leslie, he was going to have to deal with the pseudo-withdrawal she would suffer when Malachi left.

That was worse than anything else.

It was unsettling to see how easily a woman succumbed to Malachi. In the early days, Eli had envied it. As he grew older, and started having some of it directed his way, he pitied the women. When Malachi left them, Eli had seen women cry as though their hearts were broken.

He used to wonder if Mal even noticed.

Now he knew the older vampire did notice, but he was weary. Too damned weary too care.

Sometimes Eli wondered why Malachi chose to continue when he was so obviously tired of his life.

Maybe, after all these centuries, it was habit.

“Are you listening to me?” Malachi asked, his voice rough with aggravation.

Eli forced his gaze back to Malachi and fought down the instinctive urge to fall to his knees in submission. “Wandering mind, so sorry,” he said, his voice clipped.

Even after all these years, he still had to fight the urge to submit.

And he was a fucking Master.

Sometimes, when Eli found himself doubting there was any kind of God or heaven or hell, he made himself think of Malachi. Somebody had once told him, when he was a child, that God’s own angels walked the earth to help those who needed it the most. To protect those who couldn’t protect themselves.

That was Malachi.

Had Malachi been born with evil inside him, being the powerful Master that he was, he would have wreaked more havoc than the Council would have been able to control. Instead, he had been born a good, decent man, even if he was somewhat demented at times.

“There’s a girl who wants ye dead,” Malachi snapped. His accent was odd, difficult, no, impossible, to place. That came from spending too much time in too many places. But when he was aggravated, the burr of Scotland came out. Even after so many centuries, Scotland was still where he called home.

“More than one, I’d wager,” Eli said with a shrug. “What of it?”

“This is a girl who can run like the wind and can hide in plain sight. I’ve tried tracking her, but she eludes me. She’s been askin’ about you, boy, and I don’t see her trying to sell you a bridge.”

“Who is she?”

Malachi dismissed Leslie with a glance and leaned forward in the water. “We don’t know, Eli. She asks, she searches and hides. But she asked the wrong person—Agnes Milcher. Agnes felt the hatred and the power. She’s a bloody powerful witch and none of ours can find her.”

“Looks?”

Malachi shrugged. “We don’t know that, either. She wears glamour like you wear your skin, Agnes says her image changed constantly while she tried to break the glamour and it never broke. Some saw a young tiny blonde who looked rather fey, others a strapping red-headed Amazon. Agnes saw both of those, plus a dozen more faces.”

Eli knew you couldn’t live as long as he had, do the things he had done, and not make enemies. But none of them had gotten to him yet, and he wasn’t going to lose sleep over it.

Chapter Two

Eli was going to die over it.

He had been out hunting, and hadn’t paid attention. His prey had been a child molesting bastard. He never made it to the pervert’s house.

As he stumbled to his knees, agony tearing through him, he decided that was his number one regret.

If he had known he’d never see another moonrise, he would have made certain Tori and Declan knew about this kill before he had left the house.

But he hadn’t been expecting this.

The warning Malachi had issued had fallen to the back of his mind.

Hell, it had been nearly a fucking year since Malachi had shown his face and not one sign of this supposed girl who wanted him dead.

Until tonight.

Now he had a thick arrow—more like a spear than anything else—piercing his chest. Tinged with the scent of human blood, soaked in garlic—it wasn’t the garlic that would do him in. No, the real problem was whatever shit she had rubbed all over the spear—something toxic.

Eli knew he was going to die. He summoned what little strength he still had and called out to his people. Hopefully some of his wolves could arrive in time. Quickly he sent a final, urgent command to Jonathan to take care of his prey and the child.

Jonathan wasn’t a true Hunter, not yet, but he would be in time and any were could handle one fucking, perverted child molester.

At least, he could die knowing the little girl would be saved.

Behind him he heard footsteps, smelled a soft, sweet perfume and the musk of woman but he was too fucking weak to turn his head and look at his killer.

Soft, pleased laughter filled the air, but a bay rent the night and the woman cursed. “Seeing as how I don’t want to die, and I know how many steps it takes to make sure a vampire is dead,” she whispered in his ear from where she knelt behind him, “I think I will have to run.

“But I will see you dead. Until that happens, I have the pleasure of knowing you will suffer.”

Eli coughed up blood, gagging, and spat it out as he fell forward, catching his weight on one hand. “Mind if I ask why you want me dead, witch?”

“Because you stole someone from me,” she purred, her voice a soft seductive caress even to his dying ears. “Five years ago, a man and child died because of you…”

God help him, if Eli had possessed the strength, and the blood, that low, sexy voice would have made his cock hard as a pike without him even seeing the woman.

That was the last thing he remembered before he tumbled into oblivion.

* * * * *

Tori awoke with a gasp, fiery pain streaking through her chest, then coursing through her veins with every beat of her heart. Declan mirrored her position and they both cried out at the agony.

When she looked down, Tori half expected to see her chest torn open. But the naked pale skin of her breasts was unmarred. Through their bond she could tell that Declan was suffering the same as she.

Tori was the one to realize why.

“Eli,” she gasped, forcing herself to concentrate and tamp down the bond she and her mate shared with the vampire. She couldn’t think through the pain and she needed to think.

Somebody had tried to kill Eli.

Somebody just may have succeeded.

Stumbling from bed she glanced at Declan. He, too, had made the connection, his thoughts mirroring hers as he climbed from bed as well.

“We have to go to him.”

His beautiful face was gaunt. Gray.

Always so golden and alive, and now Eli lay like death on his bed.

Tori approached, her eyes burning with tears.

But she already knew what to do.

Tori had spoken with some of the council, spoken with the healer at his side. He’d been poisoned, all right. With a witch’s poison. If he hadn’t been a Master, he’d be dead already.

Foxglove and sage, combined with a witch’s power, it was draining his life away.

Drawing the dagger she had taken to carrying, Tori sliced her wrist open, deep, nearly to the bone as she knelt by Eli’s head. Declan stood ready behind her, to take over feeding Eli once Tori grew too weak.

Tori held her bloodied wrist to Eli’s mouth as she asked, “Has the witch Agnes promised us called?”

From the doorway the werewolf Jonathan—the one who had fed her only seven years ago, in this same house—answered quietly, “Yes. She will be here by nightfall. And she already knows what to do.” His handsome young face looked older, angry, weary. A tiny blonde child cuddled on his shoulder and he had shrugged when Tori had sent him a seeking gaze. “Eli had been hunting her father when this happened. He sent me. I took care of her father and now I can’t get her to turn me loose. I think she thinks I’m her puppy. I can’t control her mind the way…the way Eli could. Any time I lay her down, she wakes up screaming and she needs to sleep.”

Tori had stroked the tiny blonde head and told him, “Find one of the lesser vamps, Jonathan. I know you’re getting—attached, but she doesn’t need to see this.”

His jaw had tightened and his reply was, “I am not a child, nor do I belong to you. Eli is my master, and I answer to him. The child is asleep, unconscious actually. She is fine. Now see to Eli.” The were rarely showed anything other than deference and Declan bared his teeth at him.

Tori had merely sighed. “Whatever. We need to focus on Eli. Now.”

“This witch, she can handle it?” Declan asked, his voice gone deep and rough. Brilliant green eyes dancing and swirling and glowing with his rage, only his immense willpower kept him from shifting. “The bitch will most likely come tonight or tomorrow to make certain she has finished the job. Tori won’t be able to handle her tonight and I don’t know about myself. Depends on how much blood he takes from me when he is done with her.”

“I will feed him,” Jonathan offered.

Declan forced a tight smile and shook his head. “We’ve got a bond. He needs it from us, but you will be helping. The wolves will have to do most of the guarding until that slut is caught. The vampires can’t risk it. This would certainly kill them.” Then his eyes drifted to the little girl Jonathan still held. “You do have to let the girl go, though, Jonathan.”

The were smiled, stroking the tiny blonde head. It was an amazing thing to have a child throw her arms around your neck and cling. “If it will kill them…” His large, luminous eyes drifted to Tori, unable to hide the worship there. His canines lengthened in rage and Declan felt the power ripple through the air as the werewolf fought the animal inside and contained it.

Amazing, that he could. So few of the weres could control such rage, with the full moon so close. The young man would be a Master Hunter in time.

“Tori isn’t susceptible,” Declan said, watching his wife’s face. She was focusing on the task at hand, concentrating and trying to force the life that was slipping away from Eli back inside his dying body.

Her blood wasn’t just intoxicating. Over the years they had discovered it was damn near miraculous and could heal almost anything. They had learned this after a silver bullet had torn through them both, nearly destroying his heart. Declan had lain nearly dead, while Tori wept and cried over him, her own blood seeping from the ever-shrinking hole in her belly.

As her blood flowed onto him, his own bullet wound started to heal. It finally closed nearly an hour later, after expelling the bullet that had lodged inside him. A wound that should have killed Declan instead laid him up in bed for a week while he recovered.

Whether or not it would work on Eli, they didn’t know.

The young witch looked like Pippy Longstocking, with two long fat braids that lay over her gently rounded breasts, freckles splattered across her nose. A kid…she looked like a mere kid. But her eyes, big, green-gold eyes looked world weary, and as old as the ages.

A nubby brown sweater hung to her hips and she wore clunky hiking boots on her feet. Tori stared at her with suspicion while thinking, this is the best the council has?

The witch, Kelsey, smiled at Tori and said, “Not the best, no. But the closest. I’ll do what I can, and if what I do isn’t enough, then I can buy him time until another, more powerful witch arrives.” She turned her large eyes to the blood stained clothes and the wooden arrow, the end decorated with beads, feathers, and magic.

Tori watched as Kelsey trailed her fingers lightly, almost timidly, down the shaft of the overlarge arrow, a hiss coming from her parted lips. “Hatred. So much hatred. Need for justice. Grief. And power.”

When the girl lifted her eyes, Tori saw that they glowed hot, the brown gleaming and glowing nearly red with her power. “Blood-spell. She forged this herself, cut it, shaped it, breathed her hate into it. Only her blood will completely save him.”

Kelsey’s skin was glowing like a pearl in the sunlight as she held one hand above the arrow and uttered a few words in some unrecognizable language. An orb floated from her hand, forming out of thin air, to hover over the shaft making it whirl, and then it stilled, pointing east. Another guttural word from Kelsey and the orb drifted down until it encased the arrow and she whispered, “Got you.”

Moments later she stood over Eli’s still body and said quietly, “Your blood has bought him time. But it won’t heal him. It can’t, Tori. She’s cursed him.”

Tori rubbed her wrist where the deep cut healed slowly. In a few days, it would be gone. She was weaker from the loss of so much blood. Thank God Kelsey had arrived before Declan had tried to feed Eli. He was in fighting form and not weak from blood loss. He’d be able to hunt the assassin.

“Cursed him,” Tori repeated, staring at Eli’s still face. “Curses are real?”

“As real as we are,” Kelsey murmured, staring at Eli with pity. “So handsome. He’s something of a wonder, Eli is. He’s what many of the Hunters aspire to be.”

“You?”

Kelsey laughed. “No. Not me. I’m a healer, a witch. A damn good witch, if I may say so. But I’m no warrior. I serve the council in my own way.”

“How can we break the curse?”

Kelsey shrugged. “If it wasn’t a blood-spell, I could probably do it myself. Most curses are fairly simple. But…but a blood spell can only be broken by the one who did it.”

Declan had entered in silence and now he stood behind Tori, a hot, angry presence at her back, while he listened to the witch. “So I just find this woman and …convince her to break the spell and he will be fine?” Declan asked. His voice was a low pitched growl in his anger, as it had been for the past day.

“Don’t you mean coerce?” Kelsey asked with a tiny smile, and then she shook her head. “Not that simple. She has to give back what she tried to steal. Her life essence to replace his.”

“An eye for an eye,” Tori murmured.

“Not exactly. She doesn’t have to die. Actually, the way magic works, it’s better if she doesn’t. What she has to do is feed him.”

“And if we don’t find her?”

“He’ll probably die,” Kelsey said baldly, shrugging. “She’s placed—well, think of it as a drain that only she can plug. She’s torn something open inside him that will drain his life-force away. She opened it with her blood. Only her blood can close it.”

* * * * *

Sarel stared out into the night at the brightly lit house, a fierce joy surging through her. It wouldn’t be long now.

As her blood had caused the wound that would eventually kill the vampire, her blood was linked to him. She could feel his suffering, feel his agony. But there was something missing. Sarel wanted him to curse and rage and fight his coming death.

But Elijah Crawford had accepted it.

Something was keeping him alive longer than she had expected.

The blood-spell should have killed him that day, by noon at the latest, but he still lay, lingering through the beautiful sunrise, and the gloriously bright morning when he received a sudden blast of energy. No damn reason, none, for him to have survived more than a few scant hours. She was glad she had conjured the blood-spell instead of just poisoning the arrow. If it had just been the poison, what—or whoever—had just fed the creature would have allowed him to throw off the poison.

Something odd was going on inside those walls.

Even though he was dying, that surge of power made her wonder. She dropped from the tree and stood, her long wiry body arching and tensing, forcing stiff muscles to relax as she paced back and forth, nervous as a cat, just as curious, just as mad, her eyes narrowed, hands fisted as she pondered her options.

Not that there were many.

Sarel was going to the house.

She didn’t want to use big magic and warn whoever was inside the house, which meant she had to move closer.

An odd tingle slithered down her spine as she crossed the tree line. In her hurry to check out the house, she shoved it aside. The house…she could see the people inside, and distantly hear them. But she couldn’t see them, with the sight that made her witch. If she trusted just the witch-sight, she would have said the house was void of life. But her eyes and ears told her otherwise.

People were there.

Sarel should have been able to reach out with her magic and coax the elements into aiding her. The wind would have carried their voices and the animals would have whispered their fears.

She should have been able to look through the windows and see not just the people, but what lay inside them. Evil people were always a swirling mass of gray and sickly putrid yellow. Warriors and soldiers were a strong, solid blue. She saw it almost every time she had evaded a cop after she had run away from home. The warriors, while good men, wouldn’t hesitate to detain a young teenager wandering the streets. Teachers were white, not just the school teachers, but anybody who taught, like mothers and nurses.

Children were the pale sweet green of spring, innocent and young and easily broken.

Other witches, like Sarel, tended to glow a soft, mellow gold. At least, she had once gleamed golden.

Sarel knew her aura was no longer gold.

Red was now the color of her aura.

Red for rage, red for vengeance, red for anger.

And black for death. Her aura colored everything she looked at—or maybe discolored. Explaining why the few times she caught a glimpse of Elijah Crawford, murderer, child killer, he gleamed that strong, bold blue to her witch’s sight. Her hatred had blinded her, fooled her, made her see things that weren’t there, or believe things that weren’t real. So, of course, she stopped using that sight around him. When she looked through the windows she should have seen a morass of colors, mostly likely green and sickly grays and blacks.

But she saw nothing.

It didn’t dawn on her until too late that one of those people was like her, only stronger. And that witch was blocking her.

From the window she saw a woman, long black hair in tight spiral curls. Had to be a perm. Big blue eyes. Contacts, definitely. A bandaged wrist. Some slut feeding her vampire lover. That one was the witch, Sarel figured, narrowing her eyes and trying to figure out a way past her.

Another woman. Woman, hell. A freaking teenager with two red braids and a concerned look on her young face. Another child. Like Lori had been. Others moved throughout the room, bringing water and food to the women. One tapped his wrist and gestured to the dying vampire, obviously offering to feed him.

Sarel smiled. “Feed him all you want. Only one thing will break the curse. And he can’t have it.”

“Wanna bet?”

Chapter Three

Kelsey’s back stiffened. “She’s coming,” she whispered, her eyes starting to glow with that eerie red-brown fire. In an odd, slow motion, much like a bird of prey turning to stare at a snake, she said to Declan, “Bring her here.”

“She’s a witch,” Tori said softly. “She can—”

“No. I’m stronger,” Kelsey said with certainty. “I can hold her. She may, and probably will, fight physically. But no magic, I promise.”

As Declan left, his mouth curved in a violent smile, Tori said, “If he is hurt, so are you.”

Kelsey laughed, her face lightening. “He won’t be. I’m not much of a warrior, but I’m a hell of a witch. I’ve got more ages of practice behind me. And I know my magic.”

“Ages?” The lingering doubt in Tori’s eyes and voice was clear for all to see and hear and Kelsey laughed.

Winking at Tori, the witch said, “Vamps don’t have the strong hold on the fountain of youth, Tori.”

* * * * *

“Wanna bet?”

Sarel whirled and tried to grab her gun, but the harshly whispered words were the only warning she had before something sprung out of the shadows and took her to the ground. Landing on something both hard and soft as she went down, she was rolled to her belly and pinned, two large furred hands gripping her wrists. Feeling the power ripple through the air and roll like water over her skin, the furred hands became smooth and human and male.

Gathering her focus, Sarel struck out, intending to knock the man flat on his ass, render him unconscious and do what she came for.

Instead the invisible lance of pure power was flung back at her and she writhed, shrieking in agony, certain she was going to die.

Oh, baby, I couldn’t protect you. Couldn’t avenge you either, she thought before she gave in to the pain.

Declan jerked the young woman up and flung her unconscious form over his shoulder. The little witch came through, he thought with satisfaction. He had felt something like a thunderstorm ready to hit with violent force, and then it died.

No.

Not died.

It had been redirected. Back into the woman who had sent it.

This woman’s magic was rough, much rougher than anything he’d ever he had ever seen. Powerful, though, and quite deadly, like the power of a tornado. Or maybe like the wild forest fires that sprang up out west and destroyed homes, trees, land, lives.

Generally witches had a power that was more like a laser—refined, true, powerful, and under control.

Declan strode naked into the house with the little bitch’s backside in the air. He stalked up the stairs and carried her into Eli’s room, where his best friend lay dying. With a snarl, he threw her unconscious body down onto the floor and lifted his glowing eyes to stare at Kelsey.

“Now. What.” He had to force the words out, his throat was so constricted with rage and anger and he knew his control was near shot. Declan had never fed on human flesh before, but this night it had been tempting. He had wanted, desperately, to rip her throat out and feed for what she had done. Not even in the hunt had he fed on a human before. It was a line he feared crossing. When the hunger ran too high he hunted the forest for wild game and satisfied his hunger that way. Or he would shift to his half wolf form and fuck Tori until she pleaded for mercy—another way to sate the animal.

Right now, he wanted so badly to feed that his jaws ached with it. Tori stroked his shoulders with soft, soothing hands, pressing a kiss there before wrapping her arms around his waist.

Kelsey moved closer and knelt beside the limp body, staring at the sun kissed flesh of the red-headed woman. Her skin was an odd mellow gold, almost like that of a mixed race child. And her coppery-red hair was escaping from its restraining braid to curl around her face.

To Kelsey, there was something unnervingly familiar about her. A familiar look about her, like she had seen her before, maybe regularly.

To Declan, she looked hardly more than a child, as he stared down at her, bemused.

The witch had seemed much older before he had taken her down and she had unwittingly knocked herself silly with her own magic. Now, she barely looked to be in her twenties.

Kelsey continued to crouch by the woman’s head, one hand held out, hovering merely centimeters from her still body. A gasp left her throat and her body spasmed once. Declan moved closer, ready to knock her aside and defend her, but Kelsey’s eyes opened, once more glowing. “She’s no threat to me now,” she said quietly. “Let me work.”

Sliding deeper into the woman’s sub-consciousness Kelsey absorbed the information she needed simply by sifting through the woman’s memories.

Her name was Sarel. Just Sarel. No last name that Kelsey could find.

There had been a young child, four, maybe five. Beaten and battered. The child slowly shifted to a young woman, just a teenager when she had fled a broken down ramshackle house, leaving behind a woman and a crying baby. She had always meant to go back and rescue the child. Had visited, late at night, early in the morning before the father woke.

Gave the woman what money or stolen goods she could, urged her to come away with her.

When she had gone back the final time, maybe five years ago, the woman was dead. The man was dead. A house torn apart, trashed and smeared with blood and gore, and the scent that Kelsey knew as vampire, a scent that Sarel had caught, but not known.

The baby, then a young girl, was gone.

Today would have been her fourteenth birthday.

The little girl’s name had been Lori. Lori…a sweet, red-headed little girl, wide eyed and innocent. Kelsey shook her head. Such a child had alighted on the Council’s doorstep just a few years ago, wrapped in Eli’s arms. The vampire had been reeking of blood and violence, his eyes full anguish and pain as he turned the child over to Kelsey, assuring her that the little one’s memory of the night was gone.

Kelsey had wished she could do the same for Eli but he had left in silence before she could even offer a shoulder.

A gifted child, another witch, one who would be a Healer.

The child had often asked of her sister…Sarel.

Sarel, the angry powerful young witch who was killing Eli.

A tangled path had led her to Eli’s door.

Sarel had arrived only hours after her father had killed her mother, before he had turned on his own child. The child hadn’t been killed though. Her father had died viciously, his throat ripped wide open, his blood painting the floor red instead of feeding Eli. The bastard’s body had been pummeled and beaten and broken, a more brutal, and deadly version of what he had often done to his wife and kids.

It hadn’t been one of Eli’s cleaner kills.

Standing enraged before the lifeless woman who had let her children be beaten, his emotions, his helplessness apparent as he held the tiny, underfed nine year old in his arms while she sobbed and cried.

Eli had resorted to mind control to soothe the child, erasing her memories of that night and taking her away.

Sarel had strong, untrained psychic skills, not just the witchcraft. The hunter had left too much of himself, let himself feel too much rage. He hadn’t just attacked and killed—Eli had fought, wanting to feel bones break under his hands, wanting to feel skin tear and blood flow. And he had let his own blood be spilled as he allowed the man to fight—as he let the perverted bastard think he would win before he killed him.

Sarel had locked on the scent of his blood, his rage, convincing herself she was tracking a killer. That was how Sarel had found him. Tracking the path of emotions, the line of blood and rage, going without any knowledge of his looks or his name, for more than four years, she had tracked him.

Between the blood and the emotion, she was led across the country to Eli. It had taken years, but she had followed the trail, not seeing it for what it was, and had landed here.

Every unexplained death, every near bloodless corpse pulled her closer. She hadn’t heard, or if she had—she had ignored—the stories of abuse and neglect and crime that surrounded the supposed victims.

Having arrived here nearly a year ago she had hidden behind the guise of glamour while she watched Eli, while she planned, while she researched.

While she grieved.

Sarel thought Eli had killed her baby sister, the baby sister who was alive and well at Excelsior, learning the ways of Healing, being a happy child, being a witch, being free.

“Oh, sweetheart, aren’t you in for a rude awakening,” Kelsey murmured. Under her breath, she murmured the words to a spell of entrapment, one to hold the other witch helpless, both magically and physically, until Kelsey or Kelsey’s death, released it. Not that what she was going do was going to kill her, but it was definitely going to hurt.

Lifting her head, she looked at her audience of two. At some point, one of them had sent the others from the room, so there was nobody but Declan and Tori, the unconscious witch, and the dying vampire. Baldly, Kelsey said, “Eli’s running out of time. He’ll die unless she feeds him, and does it willingly, within in the next few hours. I don’t think we have the time to talk some sense into her.”

Declan had been standing behind Tori, his arms wrapped around her waist, holding her against his naked body, his chin resting atop her black curls.

At Kelsey’s words, he spun away and started to pace the confines of the room, his hands flexing and relaxing. From time to time, the bones in his body would start to shift and power would shudder through the room as he battled the wolf that raged to be free.

Tori caught him as he passed by her, stroking her hands soothingly down his arms before turning back to Kelsey. “So what do we do?” she asked calmly.

“We can’t do anything, but I can. However, I won’t be worth much afterward. I’ve put a spell on her, so she can’t run, and she can’t fight in any way. That way, in case this doesn’t work, she can’t turn on you while I’m out.”

“Out doing what?” Declan asked.

“Passed out. Out cold. Unconscious,” Kelsey said, a small smile tugging at her mouth. “This is definitely not going to be one of the smartest things I’ve ever done.”

With that she turned and moved to Eli’s side.

“I need her on the bed,” Kelsey said as she crawled across the bed to kneel in the middle by Eli’s prone form. She could feel him, still there, but growing weaker. The pain that was ripping through him was enough to make her nauseated, but she had to clamp down and shield against what he was suffering now.

It was the suffering from his past she needed, his emotions, his need for justice, his loneliness. Declan tossed Sarel down carelessly before turning back to his stalking. “If I fail, I know you will kill her,” Kelsey said softly. “But she didn’t do this because she is evil. She isn’t. She’s misled. But she’s also dangerous. Kill her, but do it fast, and do it clean. And—politely, if you can. She’s suffered enough.”

“Suffered?” Declan rasped, his voice a painfully deep growl, his eyes glowing neon green and swirling with his anger. “Suffered?”

“Yes. She’s suffered. As one member of the Council to another, I charge you with this. Do not toy with her. Do not be cruel. She may escape if you do. And you know we can’t risk that. But I know that she deserves better.”

Declan’s words were cut off by Tori. Her blue eyes were glittering and gleaming with the tears she still held back but she promised in a rough, husky voice, “If you fail, I will make certain she dies quickly and cleanly, Kelsey. I promise.”

Declan made a rude sound behind her and started to mutter under his breath as he resumed his pacing.

Kelsey idly wondered if there would be furrows in the wood from his pacing by the time this was over.

Turning she placed one hand on Eli’s chest, dropped her shields and called the magic. Placing the other hand on Sarel’s chest, her head fell back and the tips of her long braids brushed the linens.

Magic pulsed hot and thick through her veins as she let the power fill her, heat swirling and dancing through the air around her until it felt too thick to breathe. Light built and built and built and then exploded in a blinding flash.

Tori flung an arm over her eyes and cried out in shock as the light exploded like a bomb without smoke or fire. Through watery, hazy eyes she searched the room.

Kelsey wasn’t there.

“Where’d she go?” Declan asked. “I can’t see her.” Then he lifted his head, and flared his nostrils, dragging air in. “But I can still smell her. It’s like she’s…inside them.”

Sarel felt the alien presence battering at her sense of self but she was too fucking weak to fight it. It spilled in, flooded her, filled and then drained out, taking her anger and her guilt with it, leaving her hollow.

A soft, gentle voice said, “He isn’t what you think or who you think. You saw him with the witch sight, saw the warrior. That is who he is.”

“Fuck you.”

The woman laughed. Her voice stroked over Sarel, soothing a thousand pains, healing small hurts as she said, “He’s a good man. Didn’t your father deserve to die?”

“My sister didn’t.”

“No. The child didn’t deserve to die. And she’s not dead. But you won’t believe that. So I’m going to show you.”

The hollowness inside Sarel was suddenly flooded. That night—it was like she was there again. The blond, achingly beautiful vampire had kicked open the door only seconds after Sarel’s father had pumped her mother full of lead, while he stared at sweet little Lori with hot, hungry eyes. Lori was crying and screaming and covered in her mother’s blood.

The vampire had cast one look at her and whispered quietly, “Sleep.”

And Lori’s eyes closed as she slid to the floor, soft whimpers still falling from her lips.

“Invite me in.”

Sarel shuddered at the power in those words, recognizing the silent psychic command and watching as her father did so, inviting the man in while his mind frantically tried to figure out why he had just done so.

“You did it so I can kill you,” Eli purred, stalking around the room, circling ever closer to the sweating man who suddenly stank of fear. Eli looked like a tawny gold mountain lion, sleek, deadly, predatory.

He stopped when he was standing in front of the mortal again, flashing his fangs at him and smiling. “I’m going to enjoy killing you,” Eli whispered savagely.

Sarel’s father bellowed and flung himself at Eli, hitting him with a blow that would have shattered the jaw of a human. Eli smiled and said, “This is going to be more fun than I thought.”

Sarel watched as the blond vampire slowly, thoroughly, and with immense skill, pounded her father into the ground the way she had so often dreamed of doing. From time to time he would back off, allow the human to catch his breath, gather his strength and his fear, and launch another attack. Eli would take a few blows, letting the bastard think he could be beaten, and then he would whirl faster than the eye could follow and reappear behind her father, taking him, kneeing him in the kidney or smacking him tauntingly on the head.

The final time it happened Eli simply shifted, going from his mortal form to gray smoke, reforming behind the man who had gone white and pale with sheer fear. Eli drank in the fear like it was wine but when he gripped the man from behind and sank his teeth into the human flesh he did it merely to rip it open and make him bleed. The mouthful of blood he caught he spat out onto the floor after he had used his sharp teeth to pierce and rip open the carotid so that the man fell into a puddle of his own blood and died only seconds later.

Sarel tried to scream when she saw the man go to the sleeping child and everything inside her went cold as he reached to touch her. But he didn’t. He paused and stared at the blood on his hands and body. “That’s really going to help her mental condition, mate,” he muttered in a clipped English accent as he turned to walk around the puddle of blood.

Sarel was still frozen where she had been, unable to follow, but she heard water splashing and when the vampire returned, the blood still stained his clothes, but not his hands or face. Dull horror bloomed inside her at what she saw on his face when he paused to stare down at her mother’s lifeless body. Helplessness, rage, disgust. The same feelings Sarel had so often felt towards her mother.

The horror only grew when he picked up Lori with gentle hands. His touch woke the little girl and she started to scream, huge wracking sobs ripping from her between the screams, and the man’s beautiful face twisted with misery and sorrow. Sarel saw blood tinged tears trickle down his face as he rocked the grieving child back and forth. Finally, he caught her tiny face in one long, graceful hand and whispered gently, “Sleep, pretty child. When you wake, things will be better.”

Sarel felt power shudder through the air, and her psychic abilities let her see that he had erased Lori’s memory of that night. Completely erased, not covered, or pushed back until she was older. The night simply hadn’t happened.

Nausea roiled in her gut and she wanted to cover her mouth against the urge to vomit but she still couldn’t move. The house, the vampire and her sister faded from her sight, but she was now somewhere else, a million somewhere else, watching a million repeats of what she had just seen.

Yes.

Eli Crawford was a killer.

A vigilante.

She watched as he took the lives of drug dealers, men and women who sold children, rapists, child molesters. Not all of them were the scum of society she would have expected. Three she recognized—a hotshot movie star who was rumored to have a taste for cruelty, a politician who had used his wife’s money to aid his rise to the Senate while he kept her drugged and locked away as he raped their two children, and an NFL football player who had already done time in jail for battery. His wife had taken him back and he would have killed her that last night if Eli hadn’t intervened.

“Not real. You’re making me see this. It’s not real,” Sarel murmured, trying to console herself.

The woman’s sigh seemed to wrap around her. “You’ve enough of a gift to be able to tell if I were lying. I have no psychic gift to speak of, but I suspect you could see if I was lying. If you don’t believe what your eyes are showing you, then perhaps you will see what your soul and heart show you.”

Feeling as though she had been ripped from her body Sarel could see her herself, clad in black camouflage, smudged with dirt and soot, as she hovered above the bed. Next to her still form she saw the vampire—pale, gray with impending death. And then she was flung into his body.

Whatever it was that kept her helpless hadn’t blocked her sight this time. A warm, vivid blue light pulsed all around her. Warrior. She battled the unseen, unstoppable force that was propelling her straight into his soul. “Stop it!” Sarel screamed. She tried to dig in her heels, but the force that was behind her was far too strong and there was no stopping it.

No.

She felt Eli, felt his weak surprise, felt how he still battled against the insidious poison she had placed inside him, felt his gradual acceptance.

Eli was aware of them, she realized. And he knew who she was, but he ignored her.

“Kelsey, have you gone and grown up already, little girl?”

“Yes. It’s been nearly forty years, Elijah. Did you still think I was the little girl you carried away from that house before you burned it down?”

“Forty years? Only forty?” He laughed weakly. “A witch. How did I know that would happen?”

Sarel felt the other witch’s impatience, and heard it this time as the woman said, “Are we going to stand here and exchange small talk?”

“I’ve nothing better to do until I die. Rather takes my mind of the pain, actually,” Eli said.

“Don’t you want to live, Eli?”

Eli laughed. Sarel shuddered as the sound wrapped around her, sounding both hot and cold, hard and soft. Both a caress and a slap at the same time. “I’m not alive, Kelsey. I’m dead, a fucking vampire.”

“You’re not dead, Eli. You’re just not human anymore. But even if you are willing and ready to die, what about Tori and Declan? You’re bonded with them. They felt pain when you were hurt, and they’re sick now.”

“That’s a lie,” Sarel thought, startled. She could sense it, taste it. But Eli didn’t seem to notice.

She felt his unease grow.

“Tori and Declan will be fine,” he said finally. “Haven’t you heard? Tori is Wonder Woman. There is little that she can’t do.”

“She fed you, too much. Now she is ill.”

Eli seemed to shrug. “She will be all right. Both of them.”

“I don’t think they will,” Kelsey argued. “Tori tried to feed to you and it weakened her far too much. She’s in a sleep that I can’t wake her from, and Declan’s half mad with fury. If Tori and you both die and he doesn’t, I’m afraid I’ll have to kill him. He’ll lose control, Eli. Even if he doesn’t, what of his soul-bond to Tori? Do you really think he can live more than a few months without her?”

“NO.” The fury blazed and pulsed around them until Sarel could hardly feel anything past it, until she was suddenly the focus.

“You.”

Sarel felt the witch rip her soul back, felt the witch tear herself out of them both as Eli fought his way back to awareness.

And then both of them were awake. Lying on the bed and staring at each other. Rather, he was staring at her, while she resisted the urge to run away and hide.

“You.”

Eli’s eyes opened. He was too fucking weak to move but he could see the woman next to him from the corner of his eye, could smell her. It was the woman who had shot him, the woman Kelsey had brought into his soul.

She sat up slowly, her eyes refusing to meet his.

“Get…out,” he gasped, the fiery hole in his chest robbing him of the ability to think.

Through gritted teeth, she said, “I can’t.”

His eyes moved to the wide-eyed little redhead who stood at the foot of the bed, staring down at them, looking hardly more than the kid he had saved decades earlier. “Let her go, Kelsey. Get…her the…fuck away…from me.”

“I’m not stopping her from leaving, Eli. And why are you so eager to make her leave? She can end this, here and now.”

Eli’s eyes closed. God, he hurt. The blood in his veins pumped sluggishly and it seemed to be filled with acid, burning him from the inside out. “Tori…?” He could smell her, that subtle scent of peaches, sex, woman, and vampire.

“She’s down the hall. We can’t get her to feed, Eli,” Kelsey said, her eyes closing. She had to close her eyes, never having been much of a liar, if he looked dead at her he’d see the lie. Right now, he was probably too weak to sense it, but he might still see it. “Declan’s tried and she won’t respond to him. I don’t know how to reach her.”

Desperate energy suddenly flooded him as the rage broke open inside. Eli rolled, pinning the woman beside him, staring down into her slanted green and gold eyes. He was so fucking tired, and it wasn’t such a chore to let it all be over after three centuries of walking alone. He would never have Tori and there was no other woman.

But he could not let them die. Tori and Declan meant more to him than his own soul. This bitch in his bed could save him and then he could save Tori and Declan. Afterward he could go right on being lonely, but what the fuck else was new?

“You owe me blood, darling,” he purred with menace, his muscles trembling with the effort it took to move and hold her even though she didn’t resist him at all.

Those rather amazing eyes closed and she turned her head, offering her neck, saying quietly, “I know.”

Sarel couldn’t believe she was doing this.

Eli was as weak as a fucking kitten, his entire body quaking with the effort it took just to move. She could have thrown him off easily. Whatever bonds had prevented her from moving had been lifted and she could have tried to flee. No magic, that was still being held deep inside her, and would most likely reflect back on Sarel anything she tried to do.

But she didn’t try to run, didn’t even move away when the vampire covered her body with his.

His heart beat against hers, but weakly. He was dying. She felt sick. Her magic had done this. Her magic and her hate.

Sarel braced herself for the pain, remembering how he had mauled her father. Granted, her father had been a murderer and a child molester, but Sarel had just tried to murder Eli, and he didn’t know that she didn’t know and…and…and…she tried to slow the panicked flow of her thoughts as his golden head lowered to her throat.

It was going to hurt and hurt bad. And the awful truth was, she deserved it. If she had just looked, she would have seen the truth, right there in front of her, close enough to bite her on the ass.

A strangled gasp left her throat when his teeth pierced her skin, quickly, sharply, a sudden burning pain that was there and then gone, replaced by heat.

Her mind still ran in confused circles—how much would he take? Would she live through it? Would he let her leave? Would he turn her into a vampire?

Then she felt a soft brush on her mind.

A gentle shush that calmed the chaos in her brain and turned her body into mush, a seductive warmth chasing away the fear that held her body stiff and cold. The brush turned into a caress that drew her body tight once more, this time with need, and she cried out, arching up, desire she had never known racing through her body as he fed from her, his cool body growing warm, his trembling, weak muscles stilling as strength flooded back into him.

Eli groaned when she moved against him, crying out. Still weak, he knew he wasn’t up for aught but feeding. However, his cock didn’t seem to understand that as the blood he took instantly raced down to his shaft and he couldn’t keep from rocking his hardening cock against the notch between her thighs as he fed.

Eli’s hazy thoughts were slowly clearing and his strength was returning. Confused and distracted by the witch’s thoughts, he absently reached out and calmed her while he fed. She was sweet—hot, rich with youth and magic and power. The power that had damned near killed him was restoring him almost as quickly as he could swallow. He understood enough of her chaotic thoughts to recognize the grief and the sorrow, the guilt.

The hot young body was another thing he understood, driving his cock harder against her as he fed, swallowing more, her hot blood splashing in his belly, sending fiery strength out through his body.

He pumped his hips against her covered mound once more as he pulled away from her neck, pausing to lick the neat little puncture wounds, savoring the final few drops of blood before he pushed away, licking his lips and staring down at his almost murderer.

She was young. She was pretty. She was a witch. And she looked…oddly familiar.

Sarel’s lids fluttered. One hand lifted and she reached out for him, a weak moan falling from her lips. Beneath the sturdy cotton of the black shirt she wore, her nipples were hard and stiff. Eli could smell her arousal and he was tempted. If he was certain he had the strength, he just might rip her clothes off and give her a good hard fuck before throwing her naked ass out.

But he’d rather know why she had tried to kill him.

Even now she didn’t strike him as a nutcase.

The chaos of her mind hadn’t made much sense to him, but one thing had been clear. She’d come seeking vengeance for something.

Giving her a light mental slap, he cleared the feeding-induced lust from her mind and turned to look at Kelsey who stood smiling broadly at the foot of the bed. “Thank you, Kel—”

A movement, a scent caught his attention. Turning his head, he saw who had been standing in the corner. Apparently the whole fucking time. Tori and Declan. “Dying, brat?” he said, his voice still hoarse.

If she answered, he never heard it as Tori flung herself at him, wrapping her arms tightly around him and swearing at him, laughing at the same time. His own eyes stung as Tori buried her face against his naked chest, tears dampening his skin as she cried.

“Aw, sweet. Do not cry,” Eli said roughly, stroking her tumbled curls. “Your mate will finish the job if he thinks you care enough to be crying over me.”

“Shut up!” she hissed, smacking him in the arm with her hand as she pulled away to stare at him. Then her eyes widened. “Damn it, Eli. You look terrible.”

“Well, that is exactly the thing I needed to hear, thank you very much, sweet,” Eli muttered, shoving a hand through his tangled, matted hair.

Declan asked roughly, his voice thick, “How are ya feelin’?”

A wave of weakness washed through him and he pressed his palm to his brow. Tossing a look over his shoulder, he said, “Weak. Starving. Hot. I feel sick. How long will I feel like this?”

The stranger on his bed opened her mouth but he coldly said, “I was not asking you, girl.”

Color flushed her face and her eyes gleamed, but to Eli’s amazement, she remained silent. He would not have expected such…wisdom from her.

Kelsey suppressed a smile as she said, “It will fade within a few days, I think. If you feed again now, it will help a lot. You didn’t take much from Sarel.” Her eyes flitted to the silent girl on the bed. “If you fed from one of your people, or from me or Declan—”

“I can feed him,” Tori said softly.

“No,” Declan said, shaking his head. “You just fed him yesterday. Too much. This is too soon even for you, wonder girl.”

“Declan, I—”

“No,” Eli said, interrupting her. Her wide blue eyes swung his way and he shook his head, silently backing up his friend.

“I’ll feed you,” Declan offered, casting him a silent thank-you when Tori turned away and walked to the window to sulk. She hated when she wasn’t able to help. Pulling a knife from his pocket, Declan made a neat little cut in his wrist, just deep enough to provide a decent feed, and offered his wrist to Eli.

Eli accepted gratefully. As weak as he was, he didn’t feel up to feeding from a female. The sexual call a vampire exuded was always stronger when he or she fed, but only if he or she was feeding on their particular sexual choice. Eli didn’t feel any sexual draw toward a man and could feel from a male from now to doomsday and never feel aroused.

Oh, he could raise lust in men, if he was so inclined…but the inclination wasn’t there. The only inclination he had right now was to collapse in exhaustion. He did not feel up to the drain it would put on his system to fight the sexual arousal that would come with the women, no matter that he was near death’s door.

And besides, if he had to take blood again, it would have to be from Kelsey or one of his people—mostly werewolves, some humans. Kelsey seemed too much like a kid sister to him. He couldn’t feed from her.

And between an Inherent wolf, like Declan, and a werewolf…well, hell, that was like choosing between French wine and wine that cost two dollars. No contest. Closing his mouth over Declan’s wrist he fed, groaning silently when Tori decided to return at that moment and curl up against his side, bringing her scent and her sweet body.

“Little bitch,” Eli thought fondly as her hand slid down to stroke his thigh.

* * * * *

Sarel felt like she was watching a fucking peep show.

Well, no. Not exactly.

They weren’t exactly putting on a show. The brunette was curled against Elijah Crawford, who sat at the edge of the bed feeding from the long, lean blond who had tackled Sarel outside the house. The blond, Declan, didn’t seem the least bit disturbed when his wife—at least, Sarel thought it was his wife—started to stroke and caress Eli’s chest, his arm, his face, not sexually, really, more as though reassuring herself.

They cared. All three of them. About each other.

And not one of them gave a flying fuck if anybody knew it, or saw it. Finally Eli pulled away from Declan and said softly, “Thank you.”

Declan smiled and nodded, holding out his wrist to Kelsey who had come over to bandage it. Once that was done, he sat down behind his wife, pulling her into the curve of his body and Eli dropped down to lay his head on Tori’s thigh, his pale face lined with exhaustion. “I could sleep for a week,” he said, thickly.

“Then do it,” Tori said quietly, stroking his head with a gentle hand. “We’ll watch over you.” Over his head, she stared at Sarel who had climbed from the bed and stood watching them.

Sarel squashed down the fear this woman caused. Meeting those wide, deceptively sweet blue eyes, she stared at them unflinchingly as Tori said, “Declan and I will be here when you wake. Nothing will happen, I promise.”

Nope. Nothing was going to happen. Cuz Sarel was outta here.

“The girl?” he muttered, his eyes flitting in her direction.

Kelsey piped up, “She’s not going anywhere.”

“Shit. So much for that idea,” Sarel thought morosely.

To back it up, she felt a distant snick—a spell falling into place in the distance. She imagined that if she tried to leave, she’d get maybe a half a mile. And then she’d be stuck and could go no further.

Tori shifted from one foot to the other.

She wanted, desperately, to follow Declan to their room, rip his clothes off and tumble him to the floor.

But she didn’t want to leave Eli alone.

Declan grinned at her and lifted her chin with his index finger, pressing a soft, easy kiss to her mouth. “I love you, darlin’,” he said, his voice soft and musical with the faint sound of Ireland. “And I know you like I know my own hand. Stay. I do not trust the girl myself.”

The door closed behind him moments later and Tori curled up in bed after shucking her jeans, wrapping her arm around Eli’s waist, who slept obliviously. She lay so that she could see the door. Outside, she could hear and smell one of the wolves. Declan had posted a guard.

With a smile, she gave into the urges of her own body and slept.

Chapter Four

Eli’s eyes closed in bliss as the hot water pounded over him. Nearly a week’s worth of grime and dirt and blood washed away down the drain as he washed and soaped. Long fingers worked shampoo into his hair three times before he was satisfied.

When he climbed from the shower, finally clean, he felt almost like himself again.

He still hadn’t seen the girl.

Sarel.

He knew she was there.

He could smell her, hear her. But he hadn’t seen her.

That was probably best. Until he could be certain he had his control back he didn’t want to see her.

The door opened, steam escaping past Tori as she slid inside, her eyes hot and gleaming, her long slim body naked. Eli groaned as she plastered herself against him, her lush breasts straining against his chest as she kissed him hungrily.

Fangs nipped his lip gently, then she kissed the erotic little pain away as her busy hands closed over his naked ass.

“You’re wet, naked. Have I ever told you how much I appreciate the body of a wet, naked man?” she murmured as she pulled back to kiss her way down his neck.

From the doorway, Declan laughed. “Careful, darlin’. You’ll make me jealous. I thought I was the only one you liked wet and naked,” he said.

Eli’s eyes crossed when Tori closed her hand over his rigid cock, moving in sure, certain strokes as she smiled flirtatiously back at her husband. “You’re my favorite, of course. Come over here,” she ordered, flipping her curls over her shoulder. Once Declan was within reach, she clasped one hand behind his neck and pulled him to her, kissing him greedily, sucking his tongue into her mouth, biting down gently and then laughing when he pulled away and positioned himself behind her, pumping his cock against her naked butt.

Tori squirmed away and dropped to her knees in front of Eli, watching him from under her lashes as she licked a wet trail up his throbbing cock before taking him in her mouth.

Eli muttered, “Aw, fuck,” when she took his length almost all the way down her throat, the walls of her throat closing around him, vicing over his invading flesh and driving him insane as she slowly pulled off and then slid back down. Behind her, Declan was stripping out of his unbuttoned shirt and jeans, tossing them aside, and tossing a familiar bottle on the bathroom counter.

Eli muttered absently, “Carry that everywhere you go, Irish?”

“With Tori as my mate, how much choice have I got?” he replied easily, dropping to his knees and then turning to lie on his back, squirming down and under until he had his face between Tori’s thighs. “She’s always so ready for a three-way any time we are in your territory.”

His voice was muffled now and Eli groaned as Declan put his mouth on his wife’s pussy, which caused her mouth to tighten to the point of pain on Eli’s cock. Eli pulled his cock reluctantly from her mouth as she arched back, crying out.

“Lucky bastard, he is,” Eli muttered, glancing down to see Declan’s head between Tori’s thighs. He tumbled her down, dislodging her from Declan’s hold. Declan growled at him, but Eli only settled himself at her breasts, catching one nipple in his mouth and suckling hungrily so Declan again lay between her thighs, lifting her ass in his hands and burying his face against her.

The sweet scent of her arousal perfumed the air. Eli felt his cock harden even more as she arched up and screamed in climax moments later. “Gimme,” he demanded, nudging Declan aside. He shrugged and grinned, rolling to his back.

Eli spread her folds apart with two fingers and drew his tongue up her wet slit in one long, slow stroke, gathering her taste with a greedy groan before thrusting his tongue inside her wet passage. Declan was moving around beside him and Eli rolled his eyes upward and watched as Declan took his place at Tori’s breasts, kissing and nipping at the plump mounds, biting the peaked nipples, before moving up to eat greedily at her mouth.

Tori whimpered against Declan’s mouth when Eli wetted a finger and then pressed it against her anus, thrusting against the resistance there and sliding past it, before taking up a fast, hard rhythm that had her rocking against him. He held her hips still with his free hand, and growled a warning against her swollen flesh before he caught her clit between his teeth and gave a gentle tug.

Her sweet, sweet taste….it drove him mad. He pulled away and tugged her up, holding her body against him, stroking her quivering back as Declan moved up behind her, his face tight and hungry, his beautiful green eyes glowing and swirling and shifting with shades of green.

Tori groaned as Declan started to prepare her, rubbing her hole with the lubricant as Eli lowered his head to catch one hard, peaked nipple in his mouth. The thick, flared head of Declan’s cock nudged her anus as Eli bit down on her nipple, bringing a gasp to Tori’s throat. Her head fell back against Declan’s shoulder and he angled his head around to take her mouth roughly, driving his tongue in past her teeth and the emerging fangs to tangle with her tongue as he gripped her hips with hard, steely hands and drove his cock completely inside her ass.

Eli started to work his cock inside her narrowed passage, groaning as her swollen tissues resisted him. She was crying and gasping and mewling against him by the time he was all the way inside her, her wet, tight walls gripping him so snugly that Eli thought he would come if she so much as breathed.

Declan pulled out and pushed back in. Eli echoed his movement, the sensation sending delirious pleasure racing through his body. Tori screamed and squirmed helplessly. “Please,” she gasped, her head thrashing back and forth.

“Please what?” Declan growled against her ear, digging his cock inside her with short hard thrusts, shuddering as he felt Eli doing the same through the thin membrane that separated them.

“Please,” she repeated helplessly, reaching behind her and twining her fingers in his hair, holding him tightly against her.

“Please what?” Eli asked, echoing Declan as he lowered his mouth her long, pretty neck. The blood vessel there throbbed enticingly and he licked the fragile skin covering it. Her free hand came up to press against his nape, urging him closer.

On a shaking breath, she said to Eli, “Feed. And fuck me, hard. Both of you.”

Tori’s scream echoed off the walls as they pressed her tightly between them and drove ruthlessly into her body—Eli into her slick, swollen vagina, Declan driving between the tender cheeks of her ass into the narrow little hole that held him so tight and snug.

Eli’s fangs slid down and he struck, breaking the skin and the membrane of the artery, her sweet, intoxicating blood flooding into his mouth as he drove his cock inside her, feeling her walls gripping tightly as she moved closer to climax. It broke over her hard and fast and when she convulsed around him he lost control and spilled his semen inside her wet, waiting depths, his cock pulsing and throbbing as he pumped into her, letting her drain him completely.

Behind her, Declan growled, low and harshly, as he drove deep and held still, locked tightly inside her as his climax rolled through him.

Moments later, Eli asked roughly, “Is this like a get well soon card?”

Sarel’s breath came raggedly. Her face was hot. With disgust and horror, she insisted.

They were fucking. All three of them.

Kelsey and the others were moving around as though this were nothing, as though it was no big deal.

But the three of them were in the room over their heads, fucking and moaning—the bitch whimpering, crying out, the men moaning raggedly.

It’s not that the people in the room with her where undisturbed. Hell, they were hot. The woman sitting next to her was squirming in her seat, her nipples pressed against her silk shirt, her eyes glazed and blind. Finally, she got up and left the room, and shortly one of the men followed her.

Sarel left as well when her sharp hearing caught the words, “Feed. And fuck me.” She stomped out onto the porch into the cool night air, hoping it would cool her hot face and bring reason to her suddenly clouded mind. She knew what lust looked like. And for a few brief moments, while Eli had fed from her, she had known what it felt like.

But that had been only his vampire powers, him seducing her with his own form of magic. She knew that vampires needed emotions almost as much as blood—and the emotions from good hard sex were second to none. Not that she would have given it.

Of course, it rather stung that he hadn’t even tried to take it. Not that she would have ever admitted that.

The door opened and she didn’t need to look to know it was the other witch. “I wouldn’t judge them, if I were you, Sarel.”

“She’s fucking two men. Crawford’s fucking another man’s wife. The man is letting it happen. What’s to judge?” she sneered.

“Exactly,” Kelsey replied sharply. “They are all consenting. And all three care. But, more so, this is something they need, and it is something that doesn’t concern you. If you hadn’t let your hatred and your guilt cloud your vision you wouldn’t be here, and you wouldn’t have heard any of that. So if it bothers you, it’s on your own head.”

“When can I leave?”

“When Eli is ready to let you,” Kelsey answered. “Why don’t you run upstairs and ask him?”

And see him? Hot and sweaty and wrapped around that slim, lovely brunette that he watched with adoring eyes?

Not.

If anybody had dared to suggest to Sarel that she was jealous, she would have leveled them with a bolt, and be damned the consequences.

“Does she really have to have both of them?” Sarel asked reluctantly, her eyes drawn upstairs.

“No,” Kelsey replied with a small smile. “She doesn’t have to have anybody beyond Declan. But Eli, from time to time, needs her. He is lonely. She knows that. They…forged a bond, unwittingly, trying to save her life a few years ago. They did save her, but it bound the three of them very close together. Tori and Declan could easily carry on without Eli—after all, they have each other, but he would suffer. And why should he? He saved her.”

Lonely, my ass, Sarel thought bitterly. In all the months she had spent watching Elijah Crawford, the beautiful man was never alone. Never without companionship. Never without a woman unless he wanted it that way.

Kelsey sighed, shaking her head. “You can be surrounded by people, Sarel, and still be alone. I’m surprised an intelligent woman like you hasn’t figured that out yet,” she said, then she walked back inside.

Eli stared across the room at the woman who had tried to kill him.

Kelsey had told him why.

He had to admire the girl’s courage.

Witch or no, she was just a girl. Untrained, she was alone, and all of twenty-four. You had to admire somebody who would go after a vampire armed with nothing but psychic talent, magic and wits.

And she had damned near killed him.

If it hadn’t been for the bond he shared with Tori and Declan, he would have died. They had known what had happened and gotten there within hours. It bought him the time they needed while they waited for Kelsey, and Declan had taken this willful little bitch down and brought her to him.

Kelsey.

Still a little spitfire, he thought with a fond smile. She had been that way when he had pulled her out of hell forty years ago, kicking and clawing, certain he would try to hurt her as well. After all, everybody else in her young life had.

He never would have imagined the waifish little eight year old he had taken from a rather stately old home in Memphis, Tennessee would grow to be such a fine young woman, never imagined she would turn out to be a witch, or serve on the Council. And a damn fine witch, a powerful one, not even reaching her peak yet.

“Well, are you just going to stare at me all night?” she finally snapped, her bravado starting to shatter.

He shrugged negligently, clasping his hands together as he continued to stare at her. “It is no hardship. You are rather easy on the eyes, even if you did try to kill me.”

She flushed a faint, lovely shade of pink from the low neckline of her scoop-necked black tee all the way to her hair line. Eli wondered absently just how far down that flush would spread. He laughed silently at her…at her, at himself. “You are not the first to try to kill me you know, Sarel. But you are definitely the first to blush over it,” he mocked her lightly.

“Am I supposed to say I’m sorry?” She glared at him. “I thought you killed my baby sister. I now know you didn’t. I was wrong. I am sorry.”

Eli smiled lazily. “I know.”

“Then what am I doing here?”

Eli shrugged again with that slow, lackadaisical motion that he knew was making her grit her teeth in frustration. Damn it, but she was adorable. And sexy. And hot. She was making him burn. Her hair was an unusual deep shade of reddish gold, thick and straight, falling nearly to what he thought had to be the most perfect ass he’d ever seen. She had strong, slender shoulders, high, firm breasts, a flat belly, and long, muscled legs he wanted to feel wrapped around his waist.

Conceding to himself that he wanted to see her naked, wanted to see those lovely tits, taste her nipples and her blood and her sex, he wanted to see if her passions burned as hot when she was aroused as they did when she was angry.

She had just tried to kill him—not even two weeks ago—and now he was nearly ready to die just to fuck her.

And he imagined if he told her that, she would find another way to try to kill him.

“You need to be trained,” he finally said, drawing one leg up in the chair, casually, hiding the arousal just looking at her brought on. She was nervous enough and the last thing he needed was a nervous witch. Especially since he had made Kelsey release the bonds she had been keeping on Sarel’s magic. “You’ve enough raw power to level this house, and that’s dangerous.”

“I don’t need training.”

Eli smiled, his head falling back to rest on the cushions. Through the veil of his lowered lashes, he studied her. “I figured you would say that,” he mused. A cool, calculating smile settled on his lips and chilled his eyes. “Tell me, don’t you think you owe me more than an apology for nearly killing me? For saving the life of your sister? And not just saving her, but caring for her these last five years? I did not just take her and leave her in the hands of a foster home, or an orphanage. She’s in the finest of schools, being loved and cared for. Do you owe me for that?”

Guilt, the best of motivators. Eli laughed silently as her eyes flashed, and her mouth fell open in shock, then snapped closed. “I, uh, well. Fuck.”

Eli purred, “Darling, I’d love to, but that is not what I had planned.”

Blushing furiously, she whirled on her heel and stomped to the window. “What do you want from me?” she whispered.

“The next five years of your life. After that your debt to me is satisfied. You’ll go to the school and learn to control your magic, which will take the entire five years. Then you are free.”

“Five years?” she repeated, incredulous. Sarel wanted Lori, to finally find her, hold her close, reassure herself she was safe, but—she owed him. For nearly taking his life, and more. “Five fucking years.”

“You will not be spending the five years fucking,” Eli assured her, just to see that lovely blush again. He wasn’t disappointed.

The flush spread upward and those proud, lovely shoulders slumped. “All right.”

Damn it, she was adorable, though she’d hate to hear that, he was certain. There was something about her that drew him. It was almost like she had a call of her own. Staring at the dejected slump of her shoulders, he took pity.

Eli had spent more than three centuries on this earth and he had never been a stupid man. He was well aware of what she had been planning to do, whom she had been planning to seek out. “Get packed. You’ll be leaving with Kelsey. She’ll be one of your teachers most likely. She leaves in an hour.”

“And don’t look so glum.” Just before the door slammed, he added, “Your sister Lori lives at the school. She’s a student as well.”

He shifted to an insubstantial mist a second later and laughed at the look of incredulity on her face.

Chapter Five

Five Years Later

Sarel strolled out of Excelsior in December, feeling the freedom, the incredible release. It wasn’t just knowing she had fulfilled her obligation to Elijah Crawford, though.

Until she had come to the school she had not realized how much of a burden her untrained magic was.

Assuming her wild magic was what all witches dealt with—that uncontrolled energy that ran through her like a wildfire—she had thought she must constantly battle it, lest it consume her.

After less than six months at Excelsior she had realized how wrong she had been. Trained magic was like breathing. It was natural, it was easy, it was controlled.

No longer did she sleep in stops and starts, afraid that the magic would pour from her and damage something, but soundly and sweetly. Often she dreamt of the golden, beautiful vampire who had sent her here.

Dreamt of him…wanted him, yearned for him.

She could admit that now. Hell, she had wanted him even when she had wanted to kill him.

The vampire had shown no sign of ever wanting her though.

No way would she go chasing after a vampire like a bitch in heat, being certain he dealt with that far too much. Never would she become like every other woman he had dealt with, even if she was dying to spend one night under him letting him fuck her within an inch of her life.

Blowing a lock of her burnished red hair out of her eyes, feeling the sun on her face as she jogged down the steps away from Excelsior, she at last felt free from the long halls, the endless training sessions and the boring meditation. Of course, if it for wasn’t the meditation, she never would have learned the control that had finally given her the most blissful peace.

Though glad to be free of Excelsior, she would come back from time to time. For a visit. Not to teach, hell no, and definitely not as a student.

With a laugh, she headed for the path that would lead her away from the school for the very last time.

The trail was a long, winding one, leading from the sprawling stone construction down the hill nearly a half mile to the dorms and parking lot.

Sarel was less than a third of the way when she smelled it on the trail. Her senses had always been very acute, but the training had refined them. Lust. After being around so many hormonal youths she recognized the scent easily now. But she was puzzled, because she smelled vampire as well as a shifter and the sun was blazing high overhead.

She rounded the corner and saw a blond man holding a woman against a tree, her legs locked around his waist, heels hooked together just above his ass as he kissed his way down her slim, pale neck. That shaggy blond head didn’t look familiar, but it was rather fine ass she was staring at.

But the brunette there…yeah, she knew who the woman was. Tori Reilly, bonded and married to Declan Reilly, who Sarel assumed was the blond. But Tori was a vampire. Her impossibly blue eyes opened and she stared directly at Sarel, eyes fogged by lust, but aware enough. “Darling, we have company,” she murmured.

“I know.” The words were hardly more than a growl. “Tell her to go away.”

“Seeing as how we came here to see her, that’s not very nice, baby,” Tori said, although her breath caught a little as he moved against her.

Sarel felt the blush start to rise and battled it down. Sometimes—now—it actually worked. She didn’t have a fair complexion, despite the auburn hair, but rather golden skin all over—from head to toe—so why on earth did she blush so fucking easily? She wasn’t naïve, nor sheltered.

Watching the shifter as he touched his wife, seeing the way she responded made Sarel’s body heat, made the blood rise to her face, and …shit. It made her hot. Plain and simple. It just made her hot.

Declan slowly lowered Tori to the ground, stroking his hands over her unabashedly, from her hips up her sides, over her rounded breasts to cup her face. Then he kissed her deep and slow, tenderly, so tenderly, it made Sarel’s heart flip over in her chest before he released Tori, and moved to stand beside his wife.

Both of them pinned her with hard, cool eyes.

Sarel was uneasy. It didn’t feel right, standing here in the cool green woods with these two. Especially since one of them shouldn’t be able to venture outside for hours yet. There were spells, she knew, that a witch could cast that would protect a vampire from sun for brief periods of time, but she scented no magic. Being a young witch— powerful but young—there were many different flavors of magic, so maybe she was mistaken.

Absently she reached up and pressed her fingers against the cross she wore under her shirt. It was silver, heavy, almost as old as Excelsior, and it gave her great comfort to wear it. Having learned in the past five years that while Elijah Crawford was most definitely one of the ‘good’ guys, many other vampires weren’t, and Sarel didn’t trust Tori. Granted, most of that was probably just jealousy, but hell.

“Isn’t there something about vampires and sunlight?” she finally asked as Declan and Tori continued to stare at her.

Tori smiled slowly, a rather disturbing smile that brought no warmth to her lovely, angelic face. It revealed two sharp, white fangs and it made Sarel’s blood run cold. “I’m a rather unusual vampire. Elijah could tell you all sorts of things about me.”

Sourly, Sarel said, “Oh, I just bet.”

Declan suppressed a smile. Tori didn’t bother. She laughed outright, her blue eyes glinting with amusement. “Isn’t that—fitting,” she decided.

“What?” Sarel asked defensively, crossing her arms over her chest. Her heart was still pounding hard and heavy. Fear, she knew. She was afraid. She should use the meditation skills she had learned and calm the fear. But that would be admitting she was too afraid and she didn’t want to admit that she needed to be calmed down.

“You are jealous,” Tori replied, sliding her hands into her back pockets, rocking back on her heels and smiling sweetly. “I don’t normally share details of my sex life, but I’m tempted. Eli’s quite excellent. Want details? How good it feels to be between the two of them?” She slid her eyes sideways to study the sexy form of her husband—the way his pale blond hair tumbled over his face, his large intelligent green eyes, his long lean body, broad shoulders, narrow hips. “I could give you details.”

Sarel’s breath caught in her chest, her face went hot. Details? No. It wasn’t details she wanted, she wanted the experience. And to wipe that smirk off Tori Reilly’s face. Even if that bitch had every right to hate her, just to be petty, she’d prefer the experience to be with Eli and Declan, not Eli and some faceless stranger.

“Tori,” Declan said, rolling his eyes. “Don’t be evil.”

“But Declan, the little bitch deserves it.” Tori caught her husband’s eye and shrugged, muttering, “Oh, all right.” Turning back, she met Sarel’s gaze, a tiny, pleased smile on her face, having accomplished exactly what she’d intended, after all.

If Tori hadn’t had what she had been wanting for the past five years, Sarel just might like the cocky vampire.

“We’re here for the Council.”

The Council.

Sarel knew of the Council.

No student at Excelsior didn’t know. Many of the students were recruited by the Council after graduation. Many dreamed of being a Hunter, but most went on to become teachers, healers—like Kelsey—or scholars.

Hell, even her little sister Lori was going to go on to serve the Council as a Healer. Lori had completed her training already and even now was with Eli, serving an internship—to see if they were compatible.

That really burned Sarel, but she refused to let Lori see. After being separated so long, she couldn’t let anything dampen their blossoming relationship. And Kelsey had assured Sarel, with mild amusement, that Eli would feel far too…fatherly towards Lori to indulge in any sort of relationship with the young Healer.

One sister serving as a Healer—

And the other, possibly a Hunter.

Not many witches had it in them to become a Hunter. Witches were healers, teachers. Rarely were they warriors.

Sarel had never really thought of it. The Council had not sought her out. Many times, that was what happened. The outside world thought Excelsior was an arts school for talented and troubled children. They found the children who needed them—and those children were definitely talented, and most often troubled—and sent them a scholarship. If the scholarship wasn’t enough, then usually some ‘persuasion’ was used, in the form a light mental touch. The children’s magic needed training, before they hurt someone.

Or before somebody who saw the magic hurt them.

So the witches had no problem using magic to get the child into the school.

Sarel had been much older when she had gone to Excelsior and it had only taken her five years, instead of the normal ten or more. But she had never dreamed of the Council. She had dreamed of someday living a normal life with her sister.

Of course, her sister was one of the starry-eyed ones who wanted to stay on in service to the Council. She was serving who she wanted, Elijah Crawford. And she had become exactly what she had wanted, a Healer.

What they wanted of Sarel, she had a pretty good idea. She was a fighter, born and bred.

Neither Tori nor Declan looked pleased about being here.

“You’re a witch. You’ve a gift. Are you familiar with noblesse oblige?”

Sarel sneered at him. “I don’t owe you damn thing.”

Tori laughed. “She’s not familiar with it, darling,” Tori said, answering the question Declan had asked of Sarel. “Noblesse oblige is the premise that those who are more fortunate are obligated to help those who are less fortunate. The Hunters Council was founded on such a premise.

“And for some unfathomable reason they think you ought become a part of it,” she finished, looking at Sarel like she had climbed out from under a rock.

“Tori, enough,” Declan said with a sigh. “She is practically a child. And she was a child when she did it—a stupid one, but a child nonetheless. She thought he’d killed her sister. It was mistake. Let it go.”

“Let it go,” Tori whispered. Her eyes started to glow. Like neon, Sarel thought. And if she’d had any doubts whether Tori was indeed a vampire, they died in that second.

Tori’s eyes glowed like a neon blue sign—hot and wild and glimmering—full of anger and rage. “Let it go?” she repeated, her wrathful whisper filling the forest, sliding through the trees like a deadly snake, sending icy chills down Sarel’s spine. “She nearly killed him, yet he repays her by sending her here, to the finest of schools, paying Excelsior to take her in. Excelsior wants her, of course. The Council wants her. And all is forgiven because she was just a stupid kid?”

“Look, bitch, you got a problem with me?” Sarel snapped, tired, ready to go home, to go to bed. The euphoria from just moments earlier had faded and she was tired, angry and ashamed. Guilty still, after five years. “Let’s just settle it.” Surely, she could handle one young vampire. Tori had only been dead less than a decade and—

Sarel was on the ground under one hundred thirty pounds of furious, deadly female—flashing fangs and venomous anger. She should have been able to throw her easily. She had a good thirty pounds on Tori, and probably five inches in height, but the small, slim hands held her pinned with laughable ease.

Sarel waited for Tori to strike. There was a hunger lurking in her glowing eyes and an anger that Sarel knew Tori had every right to.

But her neck wasn’t ripped open. Sarel awkwardly spilled the silver crucifix from her shirt and Tori laughed, reached for the chain and snapped it, lifting the cross to her lips and kissing it. “A lovely piece. My mother would have loved it. You should cherish it.” Then she had the gall to tuck it back into Sarel’s pocket and pat it lightly.

Sarel started to mumble lightly. In time, she would be able to cast spells and work magic without words. She no longer needed gestures, but the words—she needed them still. However, she didn’t get the chance to finish them. A fist flew out of nowhere and struck her in the mouth. Then the weight on her waist was gone and she could rise.

“Settled,” Tori said, smiling as she daintily licked a few drops of blood from her fist. “Hmm. Female. Female blood just never tastes as good to me.”

Declan closed his eyes.

If Sarel had any clue about men, he was praying for patience.

When he opened his rather dreamy green eyes, he looked at Sarel with an assessing gaze. “Tori can most likely let this go now—can you?”

Sarel sat up slowly, her head aching, her mouth numb and wiggled her jaw slowly. It wasn’t broken. If the vampire had wanted it broken, then Sarel figured she would have been drinking her meals through a straw for the next few weeks, though she could taste blood—bitter, salty, metallic. “She’s a right to one free hit, I’d say. One.”

“Honey, if I had wanted more than one, I would have already taken it,” Tori smirked, dusting her black pants off, smoothing down the short, snug blue sweater she wore. After tossing her hair back, she smiled sunnily. “The Council is asking for you.”

And you didn’t tell the Council no.

You could always refuse to join.

But you had to at least listen.

Sarel didn’t tell them no .

She had known she wouldn’t.

She even knew on the trip there why she was being called to the Council. She was a warrior. Witch or no, she was a fighter, and she always had been. All the students at Excelsior had to go through self defense. After less than a month, Sarel had been asked to assist in teaching the younger students.

It was on the trip back, flying over the Atlantic, that she had wondered who they were sending her to. She’d been told she would be given to a partner. The Hunters were almost always in pairs. And the newest Hunters were always put with a more experienced Hunter.

Malachi, one of the vampires on the council, had told her in a quiet voice her mentor would meet her flight in Chicago. His voice hadn’t sounded of England, the way many of the Councilors had, but almost Irish, like Declan’s. Though not…quite. Maybe Scotland.

He had watched her warily, with distrust.

Sarel had watched him, warily. The older vampires had a…feel to them. And Malachi wasn’t just old…he was ancient. He had a feel of age to him, great age, like the forests in England, the stone circles in Ireland—great age.

Malachi didn’t like her.

She suspected she knew why.

Elijah Crawford.

They were close, her gut told her.

The flight seemed to go on for an endless night, but it wasn’t even two a.m. when they landed. Disembarking quickly, she was ready to meet her new mentor—cripes, what a hokey word—get it over with and find a fucking bed. She was so damned tired.

It had been exhausting, the whole damned week, ever since finding Tori and Declan at Excelsior, the packing, the whirlwind flight to England, the intense, relentless interviews.

Needless to say, witches, vampires, shifters had all presided. Kelsey had been there, smiling comfortingly, a silent, soothing presence. Malachi had been there, a very disconcerting presence.

There had been a number of excited phone calls from Lori, filled with nerves, pride, and worry.

At least they had wanted her. Until Excelsior had gotten hold of her, she had been rough and unrefined, guilty of attempted murder, and had no last name until she chose one at random. Sarel Chandler.

Still, they had wanted her.

No one had ever wanted her before.

Chapter Six

Elijah wanted her.

When he had been lying in his bed, still nearer to death than he liked to think about, he had wanted her. That unusual dark reddish hair, shot through with streaks of pure gold, her widely spaced, slanted green-gold cat’s eyes, and that lush body. She was built like a movie star from the 1940s, lush and sexy. Why in God’s name had men decided that women weren’t supposed to look like women anymore?

Sarel Chandler looked like a woman. Big breasts, little waist, round hips, round ass, long lovely legs.

And that hair. To be able to free it from its confines and bury his face in it and see if it still smelled like honeysuckle.

He grinned. Waxing poetic about a woman’s hair—he had it bad.

Elijah stood in the shadows, watching her among the milling passengers, looking tired, confused, lost, and defiant.

Why couldn’t they have sent me somebody a little easier? Eli wondered.

But, hell, Eli had never really enjoyed easy.

Lately, he had been bored, and so fucking lonely.

He wanted her, and damn it, he was going to get her.

He was briefly distracted by a whisper in his mind…one of his vamps, Sheila touched his mind and waited for his response. A brief smile crossed his face as he thought of the newly turned young vampire from Georgia and he answered, “Yes, sweet?”

“We have intruders, prowlers. They seek you…I hear them looking for you on the streets in town, and I smell them around our lands. Shall I go and find out more?”

“Not alone, Sheila. You’re too young, too new. Take Jonathan—”

Sheila’s mirth filled his mind and he sent a silent query. “He’s too hooked on your new Healer to bother with escorting me into town. Rafael?”

Eli suppressed a smile. Sheila was entirely too taken with Rafe, but Eli wasn’t about to have the two hundred year old vampire out on the town, so to speak, with a vampire who had been changed less than a year. Sheila was entirely too…charming. Eli preferred to keep Rafe focused when he wasn’t around.

“Jonathan,” Eli said firmly. “And tell him to leave Lori alone. She’s a child, and too young for him. You can play with Rafe later, sweet. Find out what you can and keep me updated.”

Then he focused his full attention back on Sarel, licking his lips, touching his tongue to the tips of his fangs as they dropped down, his body going on red alert at the sight, the scent of her.

They hadn’t told her that he was to be her first, and possibly, only trainer. If Eli had his way, she would be his partner. Since his first partner had died, he’d been alone. Caris had been the first and the only partner he’d ever had. When the young werewolf had died, the Council had tried to make him take another, but Malachi had intervened.

Malachi was not one you could easily tell no.

Even the Council.

What had Sarel thought of Malachi?

Wondering if Malachi had fucked her, he discarded the idea. Malachi may have found her physical form attractive, but if he knew Malachi, the older vampire was still too angry. He would have kept it well hidden, although he’d nourish it for ages.

Still, the old one cherished women far too much to ever take one in anger, even one he disliked. He would not trust himself not to harm a woman if he fucked her in anger.

Had Sarel been drawn to him?

Some witches were more immune to the vampire’s call than mortal women. If Malachi had been suppressing it, chances are, she wouldn’t have felt much unless they were in direct physical contact.

Sliding through the shadows as though one of them, his long coat caressing his ankles, his eyes roamed over her body hungrily. Watching her green-gold eyes scan about impatiently, he could smell her frustration and see the way her pulse throbbed under the thin shield of golden skin in her neck.

Keeping to the rear of the thinning crowd, he moved until he was at her back, tsking under his breath. They would have to have to work on that. She shouldn’t leave herself so easily unprotected. Once he stood a few mere feet behind, Eli just waited, breathing in the sweet scent of her—honeysuckle, the perfume of her sex and blood.

Right before she sensed him, he asked in a low voice, “Are you waiting for someone?”

Oh, no.

They wouldn’t have paired her with him.

Was this her punishment?

All the teachers knew, of course.

She’d had to confess how guilty she felt. And even if she hadn’t confessed, many of them were empathic, and they felt it, just as they felt …other things, before she’d finally learned how to shield.

Counseling for the troubled was routine for anyone going through witch’s training at Excelsior. It wasn’t wise to train the gifted if the gifted were likely to go postal. The problems had to be addressed, first.

Of course, she had sensed things from them as well. Not true empathy, that had come later, with training. She’d sensed their distrust of her; she’d won some of them over.

Others, not so much.

Some were still angry with her. And others…hell. They were probably testing her.

They were placing her with the man she had to thank for being what she was today—Eli, the man she had tried to kill.

“Eli,” she said quietly. The low raspy quality of her voice sounded flat and unwelcome even to her ears. Knowing he could tell she wasn’t pleased, she wanted to kick herself. At the least, she needed to try to make the best of this.

Elijah smiled, a slow, lazy cat’s smile that had a bolt of need striking through her belly…lower. Heat flooded her, the hot, strong tug of desire that seemed to arise even at the thought of him.

And he knew, damn it.

Knowledge filled his eyes and her heart sank. Of course, he knew.

The Master vampire, her new trainer knew how much she wanted him.

And didn’t that just beat all?

“You sound so unhappy to see me,” Eli purred, reaching out and drawing her carry-on bag from her shoulder, slowly sliding it down her arm, somehow managing to graze the side of her breast with the back of his hand as he did it. She stared at him in silence as he threw the bag over his shoulder.

“Did you have anything to do with this?” she asked.

“No. I knew beforehand, of course, and I could have refused. But what would be the point of that, I wonder?” He moved a little closer, until the toes of his black boots nudged hers and they stood face to face, nearly eye to eye. “Shall I send you back? I will, if that’s what you wish.”

“Why?” she asked, her voice nearly soundless.

“I do not want an unwilling student.” His breath was a soft warm caress on her face. It smelled oddly sweet, not the way she would have imagined a vampire’s breath would smell. It smelled like clover, and cinnamon. Like tea, she decided. “It would be dangerous for both of us.”

“I won’t be a danger.” She set her jaw and tried to clear her mind, tried to think about anything except for the one thing that was screaming inside her head…want. She wanted him. So damned bad, it was an ache inside her.

“Does that mean you are—willing?” Eli asked, that same slow smile of amusement on his mouth.

“Yes.”

Eli’s head lowered. For one brief moment, Sarel thought he might kiss her.

But then, before she even realized he had moved, he was gone.

Elijah Crawford was happy.

Not having been happy in so long, he had wondered if he would even recognize the feeling if he felt again.

Not only was she drawn to him, she was truly attracted.

He suspected she was also truly sorry for what had happened. Not just because she’d been caught, which was why a lot of people seemed to be sorry. No, she seemed to regret it. That was…well, unexpected.

Of course, he wasn’t above toying with her awhile, or seeing if he could make her as mad with lust as he had been for the past five years. It was humiliating—truly. This woman had come closer to killing him than any other in more than two centuries. If it hadn’t been for his friends, he would surely be dust in the ground right now and sweet Sarel would be as well.

Unless she was still in a jail cell, locked far below the earth. They could have locked the magic inside her, made her a prisoner inside her own body, inside her own mind, until she slowly went insane. Then they would have killed her. The Council didn’t actually believe in torture, but they did believe in making the criminal suffer. A quick death for the killer of one of their Hunters would not have been their choice.

All in all, Sarel had no idea how much she owed the other three. She paced silently at his shoulder, her unusual cat’s eyes straight ahead, looking neither left nor right. A great many changes had occurred in the past five years, Eli noted. Not physically, but, well, he couldn’t put his finger on it. She carried herself differently. Having spent most of her teenage years on the street, she had been rough, hostile and unkempt while in his home.

That was gone.

That raw, rough power was gone—replaced by a magic so pure and gleaming it was like staring at a fine diamond with an inner fire.

Sarel glowed with health, with self confidence and a sensuality he burned to taste. His jaws ached, his cock ached. Eli wanted to brush all that gold-shot red hair aside and break the fragile skin of her neck and feed while he fucked her. He had never forgotten the taste of her blood, or her magic.

Stifling a groan, he stalked through the terminal, lashing his hunger down tight. He didn’t want her knowing just yet how badly he wanted her.

Not yet.

Not until he knew whether or not the sweet scent of lust he had scented on her was the vampire’s call-induced lust, or something more.

Sarel drew one knee to her chest, leaning her head back against the cushy leather of the limo. A limo, of course. What would have surprised would have been if he’d arrived in something boring, like a station wagon. She let a small smile of amusement curve her mouth as the sleek car carried her away from the busy airport. “Where are we going? It’s almost morning,” she said. “We don’t have time to get to your home or catch another flight before sunrise.”

“I know. We’re going to a friend’s.” His voice floated out of the darkness, dark, elegant, cool. He turned his face toward briefly, away from his study of the night before saying, “We’ll catch a flight to West Virginia tonight.”

“If they had told me where to go, I could have seen myself to your house,” she said. “You didn’t have to go to all this trouble.”

Eli’s golden eyes widened as he slid a look her way, those eyes reminding her of the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. “Darling, I do not think they trust you that much,” he said baldly. Sliding those amazing eyes over her curled up body, as though inspecting her for weapons, he mused, “I’m not quite sure I do either.” Or maybe he was wondering what she would look like naked.

“Do you really think I’m stupid enough to try and pull anything? I know better now,” she said, stifling the hurt. She couldn’t really blame him, could she?

Eli smiled, a little sadly, she thought. “Oh, I hardly think you’re stupid, sweet. However, it is hard to break old habits. Especially habits nearly more than three centuries old.”

“How can we be partners if you don’t trust me?”

A golden brow lifted. Sarel’s eyes were drawn, unwillingly, to his sexy mouth, the thin upper lip, the fuller bottom one as he said, “Partners? We are not partners. At least not yet. It’s not an unusual thing for a lone Hunter to take on a new student as a partner, at least for a time. But wouldn’t we make an odd pair, Sarel?”

“Eli—”

“Do you think it would work?” he mused.

“Why wouldn’t it?” she asked blandly, fighting to keep any emotion out of her face, her voice.

“Darling, you tried to kill me, did you not? I realize it was under mistaken beliefs, but all the same, you still tried to kill me. But beyond that, are we compatible?” he asked. Sliding out of his seat and moving across the floor of the limo, his eyes locked on her face.

Damn it, he moved like a fucking cat, slinking and liquid and faster than lightning. Before Sarel realized it, he was on her, one hand drawing her bent leg down, and pinning her legs in place with his elbows. “Are we compatible, Sarel Chandler?” he purred, sliding one hand up her thigh, her side, over her ribcage. Her breath caught when he cupped her breast, lightly at first, and then more firmly when she didn’t argue.

“You tried, and nearly succeeded, to kill me. Partners,” he murmured, lowering his head to nuzzle at her neck. “Do you even know what you ask? To partner with a vampire Hunter? You, a woman? To a male Hunter? We’d fuck, you know that, don’t you? It may not be a rule, but it is almost a certainty. And I’d feed. Are you willing to feed me?” Eli purred as he licked a hot, wet path across her neck, teasing her with the sharp edges of his fangs as they slid from their sheaths. “The vampires are almost as insatiable as the wolves, have you heard that? We need to feed more than we need to fuck, but not by much. Now my friend Declan…he’d nearly die without sex, or go insane. That’s just the way the wolves are. I can control it better, but I need it almost as much, pretty little Sarel. Blood and sex—they are the mainstay of a vampire’s existence.”

Sarel whimpered as his thumb scraped over her nipple. She had heard, yes, but she hadn’t expected him to it put quite so bluntly. Or so soon. And she sure as hell hadn’t expected him to demand an answer.

The buttons on her shirt popped open as he grabbed the sides and jerked, shredding the material, staring down at her with glittering eyes. Beneath the red lace of her bra, her nipples throbbed and ached, begging to be touched. Lowering his head, he licked a wet trail along the line of her bra, but went no further as he looked up at her from under his lashes and asked, “Are you willing?”

He was daring her. And testing her, she suspected—testing to see if she was, well, safe. She was. Sarel would sooner drive a stake through her own heart than hurt this incredible man.

Damn it all to hell, she wanted him.

Lifting her lashes, she stared him in the eyes, feeling that hated blush creep up, starting from her breasts and moving upward until her entire upper body was flushed. Slowly, softly, she said, “Yes,” as she reached forward, underneath where he reclined against her and flipped open the front clasp of her bra, spilling her breasts free to his gaze and mouth.

A golden brow lifted and Eli smiled slowly, that lazy cat’s smile that drove her mad, mentally and sexually, with frustration. “Are you certain you know what you’re saying, pretty Sarel?” He lowered his head, catching a nipple in his mouth, mindful of his glistening, sharp fangs. She flinched, unable to help herself. Crooning softly and stroking a hand down her ribcage, he pulled back to murmur, “I’ve never hurt a woman in bed unless it was what she wanted,” before returning to draw her nipple deep into the wet cave of his mouth.

Noticing that he felt cool at first, she realized the longer he pressed against her, the warmer he felt. Leeching her warmth. She had heard vampires would do that with a non-vampire partner and had been revolted—but it wasn’t revolting. It was…amazing. Sharing her warmth was like sharing her soul with him.

Eli’s teeth, the front teeth, closed gently around her nipple, drawing it out from her body tightly, biting down gently before teasing it with a wicked tongue as his hand slid down her quaking belly to pop the button on her jeans. Underneath, he found her naked. Lifting his head, he asked, “No panties, darling?”

Shaking her head mutely, she tugged his head back to her breast, whimpering in her throat. His mouth—sweet heaven—his mouth was unbelievable. Returning to suckle and bite at her breasts until she was writhing against him, his hand slid inside her jeans. Pulling away from her breasts and curling up next to her, he nuzzled her neck. “You never did answer me. Are you certain you’re ready for what I’d need? Not just a bed mate, and a partner—will you be willing to feed me?”

In response, she reached up and tossed her hair over her shoulder, baring her neck.

Eli groaned at the simple offering. He could still remember her taste—hot, sweet blood, the taste of innocence, somewhat tarnished, but still innocence, magic, youth, and power. Drawing it out, he licked a path up her neck and sent a silent command to the driver to circle until he told him otherwise. Stripping Sarel out of her boots and jeans, brushing away the shreds of her shirt and open bra, leaving her gleaming golden body naked, he took her down to the floor of the limo.

Clamoring with sexual and physical hunger, Eli wanted to make this last. Although five years was nothing to him, it seemed as though he had been waiting for Sarel for a very long time. She was it. This was what he had been waiting for.

Settling back on his heels, he stared at her. First, her eyes—just her eyes—those green-gold eyes, slanting up. The tip-tilted straight little nose, her high cheekbones, and her full lipped mouth and sharp chin.

And that hair…Lifting a strand of it, Eli drew the honeysuckle scent deep into his lungs, smiling slowly at her, absently tracing a thumb over her nipple, which heated and hardened against him.

Her dark, dark red hair gleamed under the dim lights, the golden threads in it winking at him. He loved her hair. Lowering his head, he buried his face against the spot just behind her ear, rubbing his face on her silky locks, just breathing her scent in. The scent of honeysuckle and her arousal thickened as her breathing increased, and when Eli laid his palm over her chest her heart beat thudded against his palm.

Sarel’s breasts were big, round and firm—perfect. Not overblown, but lush, topped with large deep-red nipples. Bending his head, he caught one in his mouth, humming in appreciation as she gasped and buried her fingers in his hair, pressing them to his scalp and holding him close.

Cock and jaws both aching with need, his groin and belly throbbed. Fuck. Knowing that seeing her was going to drive him insane, he’d fed before he had left home. He hadn’t lost control like this since his first century. Not even Tori made him hunger like this.

Settling back on his heels, he jerked his shirt off, tossing it to the corner before focusing on his boots, belt and trousers. He wasn’t going to fuck Sarel for the first time with his pants hanging around his knees.

But first…he had to taste her.

Settling between her thighs he spread them wide and licked her once before catching her clit quickly between his teeth as she tried to pull him away. “What are you doing?” she screeched, embarrassed, shoving him away. Or trying to.

“Having a snack,” he muttered, groaning and spreading the lips of her sex with his fingers and driving his tongue between her folds.

“Eli, stop, damn it. You can’t—”

In response, he screwed two fingers deep inside her, settling his mouth back on her clit, taking the entire bud inside and sucking on it until the words died on a strangled gasp. She arched up, her voice rising in a breathless scream. Slick, wet walls closed tightly over his fingers and he shuddered as he imagined how tightly they would close over his cock.

“Poor thing,” he crooned into her mind as her tight mental shields shattered, letting him inside, letting him feel her amazed, shocked pleasure, her embarrassment, her need. “Hasn’t anybody ever gone down on you before?”

“Huh? What?”

Eli laughed against her, delighted. He wanted more. But he needed to be inside her and he needed to sate the hunger that was growing ravenous in his gut. Crawling up her body he mounted her, taking his cock in his hand and easing inside her. Her wet, slick passage was tight around the head of his cock, squeezing him, driving him mad.

Crooning to her as she tensed, he knew her tissues were still sensitive from orgasm.

He thought.

“Um, Eli…I probably oughta tell you something,” she muttered as he was lowering his head to her neck, ready to feed and fuck. Such a sweet little gift, he was thinking. He hadn’t expected this.

Especially not from Sarel. And never so soon.

“Hmm?” he murmured as he licked her neck. He could almost taste her blood in his mouth, feel the sweet break of her skin as his fangs slid home, feel the sweet, wet clasp of her pussy on his cock as he drove inside.

“I’ve never had sex before.”

Elijah froze, two inches of his cock wrapped in satiny wet pussy, his mouth pressed against her sweet, warm neck. A rough breath shuddered out of him and he groaned. Part of him, the more noble part—the part that still remained from the English lord he had been three hundred years ago insisted he stop. The other part knew that Sarel wanted to be here. She wasn’t doing this out of pity or guilt or obligation. Some women would do it, perhaps.

But not Sarel.

He propped his weight on his elbows and stared down at her, resting his forehead on hers, rocking his hips just slightly, letting her sheath acclimate to him. “I feel like I should make sure you want to continue then,” he murmured as her body shuddered. Moving so that he could roll and pinch her nipple teasingly, lowering his head to suck the sweet bud deep into his mouth, he let her feel just the edge of his fangs before lifting his head and staring into her eyes.

“If I didn’t want to be here, I’d still have my clothes on,” she said, panting, her eyes glazed. Slid her hands down, she grasped his firm, muscled ass in her hands and tried to pull him deeper.

Obliging, Eli slid an extra three inches in and she gasped, arching up, her head falling back, neck exposed. “If you are certain,” he murmured, eyes locking on the vein throbbing in her neck, so sweetly exposed.

Hell, he was just a vampire, he could only stand so much. Sinking his fangs deep, Eli drove his cock through her snug, wet, untried body, shuddering as she clasped him wet and tight, the sweet virginal resistance driving him mad as her blood spilled into his mouth. A moan vibrated in her throat as he fed.

She moaned weakly, and through her mind, he felt the pain twisting inside her. He reached out with a gentle mental touch, unwilling to draw away from the sweet flow at her neck. “Shh, I know it hurts. It will not last, I promise,” he crooned as he buried himself to the balls.

Cupping one rounded, firm breast in his hand and rolling the nipple, he pinched it lightly when she shuddered. The other hand he slid down her side until he palmed her hip, then her thigh, drawing it up, opening her body more. She stiffened in automatic protest and he calmed her with an absent mental brush. “Trust me, Sarel,” he purred, dropping the shields he held on his call, the subtle sexual beckoning all vampires exuded. Malachi had once likened them to animals in heat—but it was the humans who could sense it and it drove them mad, even though they didn’t realize what it was. A vampire learned to suppress it with time. It wasn’t always necessary to do it—right now, definitely not necessary.

Many witches had a natural immunity to it as long as they weren’t touching the vampire in question.

Sarel was touching, a lot of touching and her response was instantaneous.

Shuddering, she stiffened, her nostrils flaring and eyes glazing. The muscles in her tight, wet pussy clamped down on his cock and it was like nothing Eli had ever felt in all his life. “Bloody hell,” he gasped, pulling from her neck, belly pleasantly full, the blood lust sated, but his cock so hard he ached. He pulled away and sank back into her, his long, lean body shaking with the pure bliss of it, as her satiny wet sheath caressed him. Her head fell back, eyes half closed as she stared up at him, lips parted, damp and swollen.

Two neat puncture marks marred her golden neck. Hard nipples stabbed hotly into his chest. With a growl, he lowered his head to catch one in his mouth. Crying out, she buried her fingers in his hair, her legs coming up to wrap around his waist.

Sarel was dying.

Nobody could feel this kind of pleasure and live. It just wasn’t possible. Eli’s thick cock inside her shouldn’t feel this good. It hadn’t, not at first. She had thought the burning, driving pain would split her in two until she felt some creeping, hair raising sort of magic roll over her and fill her belly. The pain died, the magic left with it and the lust was all that was left.

Never, from the first time she had seen him, had she been able to look at Eli without wanting him. Staring at him now, his golden head lowered, his hot mouth feeding ravenously at her breasts as he sucked one of her nipples deep into his mouth, his thick, hard cock driving up into her, she felt something rip open inside, something that was even more magical than what she had been born with.

A hot ball of fire grew inside her belly, filling her mind, her heart, her very soul. He hovered outside the edges of her soul, and she knew if she allowed it, he would come in. And maybe never leave.

She wouldn’t allow it.

Sarel doubted she could stop it.

Driving back in, passing over the hot bundle of nerves inside her, Eli made her scream and arch as he licked, then bit her nipple. Tracing his finger up the crevice between the cheeks of her ass, she shuddered. His long, pale body hovered over hers, gleaming in the faint light, his eyes golden and hot, his hair falling into his face, his sculpted mouth swollen. The muscles in his chest gleamed with a fine sheen of sweat as he moved over her supine body, driving so deeply inside her she wondered if she could ever let him leave.

Sarel couldn’t breathe with it.

She started to shove him away.

“Do not fight it,” Eli murmured, rising from her nipples to catch her hands. Pinning them by her head, he stared down at her, compelling her to look up at him. Doing so, she watched his gold eyes and pulled her legs down, trying to close herself off.

“Can’t have that, now can we?” he purred, shaking his head, his English accent thick and heavy with need and reluctant amusement. Releasing her hands he moved so quickly she had no time to do anything. Before she realized it, he had caught her behind the knees and lifted her legs high, using them to pin her down and open her body—exposing her wet folds and swollen clit to his eyes. Staring down at her, he drove in. Slowly.

Watching her.

Ah, what a picture she made, Eli mused, her legs shoved high, opening her sweet, pretty little sex, the tight, silky little red curls that guarded her catching his eye. Looking down to watch, he pulled out and pushed back inside her swollen sheath again.

Bending low over her, he caught one plump, red nipple in his mouth as he continued to fuck her helpless body slow and deep, his shoulders and torso holding her pinned so that he could use his hands in other places. He caught her swollen clit between thumb and forefinger, pinching and stroking until she was mewling and begging and sobbing once more.

Releasing her legs and hooking his arms under her shoulders, Eli started to fuck her hard and rough, setting his mouth on hers, driving his tongue deep inside, taking more of her taste, a taste he hadn’t even known he was craving.

Only when she was shuddering and screaming into his mouth as she came did he let himself come, flooding her spasming sheath with his seed.

Sarel sighed wearily as Eli wrapped her in his coat, stroking her hair, bussing her cheek. She was tired from the feeding, the fucking—both she assumed. Was he always this…considerate, she wondered?

Probably so.

Even though, logically, she knew she would make a good partner to him once she was trained, she doubted he would ever care for her. Not the way she cared for him.

Not after what she did.

So he must just be a naturally considerate lover. She read romances. Some men did like to cuddle. Or was that a fairy tale? Maybe three hundred years ago, men were different. Or maybe Eli was different.

“If you keep thinking so hard,” Eli mused, stroking the tiny furrow on her brow, “you will give yourself a headache.” After he finished tugging his clothes on, he settled back on the seat—sending a silent command to the driver to head for Byron’s house outside Chicago—then he shifted her on his lap, spilling his coat open so that her back and legs were covered, but her front was bare and pressed to his naked chest. “You have the sweetest tits I have ever seen,” he murmured, cupping one in his hand and stroking his thumb over the nipple.

She flushed and he chuckled, watching as the blood started to rise—started at those sweet mounds and rose until her face was that charming shade of pink—her eyes darting everywhere in order to avoid meeting his. He caught her cheek and made her look at him as he lowered his mouth to hers, taking her gently, the way he had not been able to earlier. Gentle was not something a vampire could manage when he hungered. And Eli had hungered for Sarel like he had hungered for no other.

Sliding his tongue past her lips, he tasted her, finding her sweet, tangy and wild—much like the taste of her blood and sex, like her magic had been five years ago. Their tongues tangled and he sucked hers into his mouth, drawing her into the kiss and she moved, straddling his lap and cupping his face in her hands, that glorious auburn hair falling around them like a cloak, the coat falling from her shoulders to the floor.

Eli’s hand went down to cup her ass. She broke off the kiss with a gasp, her head falling back. Moving to her neck, he kissed and licked his way down to her shoulder. Over the smooth, softly rounded flesh, he saw the eyes of the driver in the mirror, fastened on Sarel’s sweet naked butt. Eli’s eyes glowed, his fangs flashed and he snarled in anger.

The man’s eyes glazed, his gaze snapped back to the road and Eli buried both hands in Sarel’s hair, arching her back so that her breasts were thrust up to his mouth and gaze. He jumped slightly when he felt invisible little fingers on his belt buckle, but then he laughed, glancing at up at Sarel and saying, “Clever little witch.”

Grinning, she sighed, “I try,” before tugging him down to her breasts and letting her magic free him from the confines of his pants. His cock sprang free and she rubbed herself against him, still sore and achy, but hungry for him. She had been hungry for him since the first time he had fed from her. Before that even. The fat head of his cock settled on her clit and he rubbed it, slowly, deliberately as he bit gently down on her nipple. Whimpering and shivering, she wrapped her legs around his waist and tried to draw him inside.

Eli wanted to slow down, but he knew they’d be at Byron’s in less than twenty minutes. So when Sarel’s heels dug into his ass again, he let her pull him inside, sinking into the slick, wet confines of her tight little sheath, groaning at the resistance and watching her face. Eyes closed, head back, her hair fell around her naked shoulders and breasts, damp with perspiration, curling just slightly, her skin glowing, nipples hard and nearly blood red from her arousal. The muscles in her belly shifted and played as she rode him, her tissues stretched incredibly tight around him.

Cupping her ass and sliding one hand down, Eli coated his fingers with her cream before sliding slowly up the crevice to caress the pucker of her anus. Letting his head fall back against the seat, he watched her through slitted eyes to judge her reaction.

She shivered and her back arched, lifting her breasts higher.

She moaned and slammed her hips harder down on him.

Eli pressed a little harder. Her heavy lids lifted, revealing eyes with pupils so dilated they appeared nearly black. With a voice thick and hot, she gasped, “What are you doing?”

“I like fucking a woman here,” he replied, pressing even harder until just the tip of his finger entered her. She arched and cried out, and the muscles in her pussy squeezed down on him while her entire body shuddered.

“Nuh…nuh…now?” she squeaked.

Eli chucked, withdrawing his hand and sliding down to gather more cream. “No, sweet. You’re not ready for that, I would hurt you. But I like it. Does this feel good?” he asked as he slid the tip of his smallest finger into her bottom to the first joint.

In response, she bucked against him and came with a cry.

Groaning and withdrawing his hand, gripping her hips and pushing up into her with hard furious digs of his cock, he let her rhythmic contractions milk his own climax from him. When she collapsed against his chest moments later, he murmured weakly, “So was that a yes?”

Chapter Seven

Sarel didn’t have the strength to argue with him when he just wrapped her in his coat when they arrived at his friend’s house. She certainly didn’t have a vampire’s sense of smell and there was no denying what had happened earlier.

Eli didn’t even bother pulling on anything besides his pants, a flowing black pair of trousers with a wide leather belt that looked like nothing out of this century. Or actually, any century she could recall. He managed to hold her in his arms as he climbed from the car, as though she were a child.

Curling sleepily against his chest she stroked the smooth skin there. Sarel didn’t like chest hair. Period. A ribbon of golden hair running down from his navel to widen just around his cock and balls was fine with her, though. Eli’s chest was wide, muscled to perfection, and gloriously smooth. Unable to resist, she leaned forward, kissing his chest, licking it, tasting salty sweat, warm male.

Glancing down at her, he lifted a golden brow before looking back to the porch where his friend waited. She felt something in the air and suspected they were speaking mind to mind. When they reached the porch the man greeted her as though she was wearing a formal gown instead of being wrapped in Eli’s coat.

He didn’t even blink as he guided them into a large, secluded old home. She spotted, unless she was mistaken, three werewolves, and one Inherent shifter, a woman.

There were also two lesser vampires and another witch besides herself. Not as strong, but a witch and one of the warrior kind—like herself.

A stronghold.

Eli would be safe here.

Odd, that being the first thing on her mind.

She looked at her host and blinked slowly, sleepily. His hair was black, cut short on the sides, longer on the top so that it fell in his eyes. Sarel imagined it drove his ladies insane. A human was at his side, hovering, waiting. Smiling patiently down at the human he said, “We won’t be needing anything. Unless, Eli—”

“A bath,” he supplied easily.

Sarel was too tired to even blush as the human looked at her. There was nothing in her eyes, but normally, Sarel would have been embarrassed at least. Footsteps sounded unusually loud on the stairs and moments later, Sarel’s sharp hearing heard water running. “I’ve rooms—”

“One room,” Eli said. “Change of plans.”

“Fine by me,” Byron said. “The room is central, close to mine, actually. Micah will be around while you sleep, should you need anything. I’m fairly tired myself.”

Sarel’s nostril’s flared and unless she was mistaken, she smelled blood, violence, anger.

Eli glanced down at her, and she saw acknowledgment in his eyes. “All is well?” is all he asked.

Byron sighed wearily, Sarel thought, as he pressed a hand to his eyes. A flowing sleeve, a poet’s shirt—how appropriate—nearly obscured his strong, masculine hands and Byron muttered, “Bloody hell, Eli. All is not well. But it will be. That is what matters, in the long run, right? The fucking long run.” A snarl darkened his face and his fangs flashed, his eyes glowing, making her think of a violent thunderstorm. “The fucking long run.”

Unlike Declan and Eli, even Malachi, Byron sounded pure American. But he had an aged feel to him, and unless she was mistaken, he was at least a hundred years old. And he had not had an easy night.

Sarel shifted, and said, “I can go get cleaned up, if ya’ll need to talk.”

Byron smiled down at her and she fought the need to gasp. Oh, my. He was hot. And he had sad eyes, full of pain and sorrow. What was it with these vampires? Did any of them not have issues?

“You’re a sweet one, aren’t you?” he murmured, shaking his head. “Talking does not help. I’ll take a bath. I’ll feed, and then I’ll find a woman to take to bed with me. That will help.” His startling gray eyes, lighter gray rimmed by dark, roamed over her face and unkempt hair, and a spark of mischief lightened them for just a moment.

That odd feeling again, where she suspected words she couldn’t hear were being spoken and then Eli’s arms tightened and he actually snarled, his fangs flashing.

Byron laughed. “Maybe next time,” he said, and then he turned and walked away, moving silently and swiftly, the Inherent wolf trailing silently in his wake, her eyes wide and watchful.

Eli found Sarel already asleep in bed. Falling into bed his body was heavy with exhaustion and his mind befuddled. The sun was already on the horizon. There were no windows in this room but he could feel it. He had checked everything, force of habit. He trusted Byron, but he trusted himself more.

Settling behind her, he wrapped one arm around her, the other under his head and he was gone.

Vampires did dream while they slept, and it was sleep.

He did not die when the sun rose—his heart still beat, only a few times a minute, but it still beat. And he breathed, irregular and erratic, but breathing all the same.

Eli could think and dream.

They had almost bonded that first time. The soul-bond, like Declan and Tori shared, one that transcended time and mortal coils. A bond that would allow Sarel to be as long lived Eli. Nothing short of a mortal kill would kill either of them, if that happened. Would she hate him for that?

This woman was truly the one he had been waiting for.

In his heart, he had already known that.

The moment he sent her away he had ached for her, even though he knew that wild magic could not go untaught. It was too dangerous.

Ah, the dilemma.

The bond had to be forged in lovemaking.

Every time they were together, they would grow closer and closer, until the bond just snapped into place. Once in place, nothing could break it, except death. And not even that, truly. If one died, eventually the other would follow. Rarely did one bond-mate survive more than a few months past the death of their beloved.

And as perverse as Eli was, he was basically an honest creature.

He couldn’t put Sarel into such a situation without her being willing.

Which meant, to his disgust, he couldn’t fuck her again unless she knew what she was getting into.

Sarel awoke an hour before dusk.

Working her way down Eli’s sleeping body she kissed his flat, pink nipples and licked his navel, before taking the head of his cock into her mouth. She hummed with surprised pleasure as he grew hard and firm and filled her mouth. She knew the moment he woke—his body stiffened, his hands tangled in her hair, and he stifled a groan.

Lifting his hips, he drove his cock further into her throat, bringing tears to her eyes as she fought the instinct to gag. Forcing her throat to relax, she took him deeper than she would have thought possible. Slowly, she moved her head up and down, wrapping one hand around the base of his cock as she found a rhythm and settled into it, listening to the ragged groans as they fell helplessly from him.

Sarel pulled away and swabbed the head of his cock with her tongue, laughing as he rasped out, “Bloody hell, woman,” and slammed his head into the pillow, gritting his teeth when she moved lower and licked delicately at his furred sac before taking his cock back into her mouth.

The pale, carved lines of his body called her eyes and she stared up the length of him as she slid her mouth back down until she could take no more, relishing the warm, salty taste of his skin, the smoothness of him, the slow, steady pulse she could feel in the distended vein that stood out on the underside of his shaft.

Pulling away, she cupped him in her hands and pumped his cock slowly while she studied him, fondling his balls, leaning down to lick the head of his cock before lifting back up and just watching the play of her hands on him. Eli laughed and groaned at the same time. “Are you trying to drive me mad? Studying for anatomy? What?”

With a cheeky grin, she lay back down and took him inside her mouth, sucking at him until her jaws ached with it, feeing his hands fist in her hair and shudder as he bellowed and started to pump his hips up to meet her mouth.

He came with a ragged groan and when it was done, she lifted her head to smile at him.

Eli was smiling back at her, his eyes sleepy…deceptively so.

Before she realized what he was doing he had her on her back, her thighs spread and open and he was drinking from her sex like he was starving.

Shrieking when he drove two fingers inside her, he fucked her ruthlessly to climax while he sucked on her clit. Crying out as he gently bit her clit, she quivered in anticipation when he urged her onto her knees. But all he did was spread the cheeks of her ass while she squirmed to get away. Smacking her butt he ordered, “Be still,” as he wet his finger, gathering the moisture from her sex and using it ease his way as he pressed his index finger inside her ass.

Shivering, feeling oddly cold and hot at the time, her skin feeling entirely too tight for her body, he invaded her. “Push down,” he said roughly. Obeying him, she did, and he slid his finger completely inside, causing her to scream. The scream came again as he started to fuck her ass with his finger, slowly, carefully, bringing her to climax with just that while she stayed there on her hands and knees, him kneeling behind her quivering upthrust butt.

“I am dying to put my cock inside you,” he murmured, watching as he speared the tender little hole, working her a little closer to the edge, her hot, wet sheath clinging to him tightly.

“Eli…”

“Play with your clit, Sarel,” he told her. “Touch it. Or would you like me to call Byron? He could come in here and go down on you while I do this.”

Her back stiffened. “What?”

He laughed. “You did not say no,” he murmured, filing that away. “Shall I call him? He will want to fuck you when he’s done.” Eli had to lash down the uneasy feeling that caused, but he could feel the excitement in Sarel. She wanted to have what Declan and Eli gave Tori. He could feel it. And he sensed she wanted it with Declan and Eli. Not gonna happen, sweet. No way he’d allow Tori to be hurt like that, even if Declan would go along with it. And the Irishman would never do it. He was more likely to sprout another head or turn into a vampire.

But he could let her have the pleasure of it.

Though she was nowhere near ready for a threesome, this could get her closer to that, and maybe it would wear her out enough, tire her enough that she wouldn’t wonder why Eli didn’t mount her himself.

The door opened.

Byron walked in, his eyes already hot and hungry, his black silk shirt hanging open over a broad chest. A fine vee of silky black hair between his nipples arrowed down his torso, over his belly and disappeared into his trousers. Eli communicated silently with him, warning him of Sarel’s inexperience, and Byron chided him in the same manner, speaking only into his mind, “Give me some credit. I’m no fool. I won’t scare her off. I can tell what she is to you.”

Sarel’s body went taut as a bowstring and Eli stroked his free hand down her side, soothing her as Byron dropped to his knees in front of her, smiling crookedly at her. “The things a host must do to make his guests feel at home,” he teased gently, taking her face in his hands and kissing her slowly, carefully, sliding his tongue inside her mouth, humming in appreciation at her taste.

When she didn’t freeze, Byron slowly lifted her kneeling body up and Eli stilled, cuddled his aching cock against her butt, giving Byron a few minutes, as the dark haired vampire worked Sarel back against Eli, pinning her body between them.

“Damn it,” she whispered on a shuddering sigh as Eli rocked his cock against her ass. Byron was working his way down her neck, her shoulders, catching her breasts together and plumping them up, burying his face in her cleavage before taking one nipple then the other in his mouth, suckling deep.

Sarel’s head was spinning.

It was her fantasy. It had been for five years, since that last day at Eli’s, the day she had heard him with Tori and Declan. That was the reason she hated Tori. And while Byron wasn’t Declan, he was gorgeous and he was here, sucking on her breasts, and whispering against her skin, and sliding one hand down to cup her crotch before driving two fingers deep inside her dripping pussy.

She was living a fantasy.

Twenty four hours ago, she had still been a virgin. Of course, that was because subconsciously, she had been waiting for Eli.

Byron turned and shifted, moving onto his back, with his head between her thighs. Starting by licking her, he then began driving his tongue deep inside, carefully, his fangs never once touching her, even when he began to nibble and suck on her clit.

Eli went back to finger-fucking her ass and she cried out, unable to hold back. She screamed and rocked her hips, hungry for more. “Eli, please,” she whimpered, pushing back against him. Byron’s hands held her hips still though, and she could only move so much. Two thick fingers invaded her cleft and she bucked, rocking against them, riding them and the mouth that had settled on her clit, but it wasn’t enough.

She wanted more.

“Eli!”

Groaning against her hair, he thrust his cock hard against her hip. Need grew, hot and urgent in her belly and she grabbed for him, but he stayed just out of her reach. Insane lust drove her and she dug her nails into his arm, demanding and begging. She shuddered in satisfaction as they moved around her, one of them crouching behind her, the other in front. When she looked up, Eli was kneeling in front of her, staring down at her with gleaming eyes, while Byron gripped her hips and drove deep inside her with one quick thrust.

Sarel felt like the whole thing was unreal—staring up into Eli’s face over the plane of his muscled chest, his lean belly, his thick cock only inches in front of her mouth—while a man she barely knew fucked her from behind. Byron’s hand reached around her and his fingers played tauntingly with her clit, pressing, pinching and teasing her into orgasm as Eli slid his cock between her lips and inside her mouth and she swallowed the head down as far as she could take it.

Over her head, she heard the growl that rumbled out of his chest and it sent a thrill of power through her. Eli buried his hands in her hair just as Byron slid one finger down to press against her anus.

“She’s more ready for this than you think, Eli,” he said roughly as the tiny little pucker opened easily for him. She shuddered, caught between pain and pleasure as he worked his finger inside while he continued to fuck her.

Eli snarled and sank his fangs into his own lip, watching while another man fucked his woman. Sarel’s mouth felt like heaven, and it was…erotic, certainly, to watch another man bring her to climax while she went down on him. His hands tightened to the point of pain as his balls went on red alert with impending climax just as Byron brought her over. When she screamed and came, he spurted his come down her throat, groaning raggedly while Byron gripped her hips and shoved her ass a little lower, riding her hard and deep as her head fell away from Eli, a weak moan falling from her lips as she came.

Fuck.

He rolled her away from Byron and the three of them lay there for long minutes, the little witch unaware of his frustration as she sat up, shoving her sweaty hair out of her face, staring down at him with a smile and glowing eyes. “When can we do that again?”

Chapter Eight

Eli swore in hot, furious frustration.

Sheila was hurt.

She had been out training, and hadn’t listened, silly woman, to Jonathon. A vamp pit had been set on his land—a deep hole, lined with stakes—had been dug and she had been out, scenting human. Jon had smelled the wood and swore hotly, told her to back off.

Had she listened? No.

What in the bloody hell was going on?

“Newsflash,” Jonathon said. “You’ve got a new friend inviting you to come and play.”

And Sheila had gotten hurt for it. It didn’t matter that her inexperience, and her not listening, had led to it. And it did not matter that Jonathon had gotten her out and she would be fine. She had been hurt, on his watch, on his lands. He had failed her.

Bloody hell.

Sarel stared at the deep pit, dug unevenly into the earth, studded with spikes of cedar. She could smell the wood a few hundred feet away. How the vampire, newly turned or not, hadn’t noticed it, she didn’t know. “A vamp pit?” she guessed sarcastically, lifting a brow, casually moving forward and placing her shoulder a little in front of Eli’s body. If he stumbled, or was pushed, she’d feel it and have time to act—

She didn’t realize that Eli caught the movement and smiled a slow smile, pleased at the protective act, or that all the others were studying her with disgust. A smattering of applause clued her in on the disgust when she lifted her eyes and saw the weres surrounded her, and Eli was looking at her with grim distrust or outright dislike. One bold individual said, “I bet you passed How to Kill a Vampire 101 with flying colors.”

Nausea rolled hot and thick through her gut and she looked away, feeling her face flush red. Eli moved around the edges of the pit carelessly, moving toward the man who had spoken, going nose to nose with him. “I imagine, Brent, that she’s mastered how to make a wolf slink away from the full moon with his tail between his legs as well. And so have I. Shall I show you?”

Brent cocked a brow arrogantly. “I haven’t forgotten what she did, Crawford.” A shaggy black brow lifted and he slid his eyes to Sarel slowly. “I smell her on your skin, and you on hers. You are my Master. I serve and respect you with gratitude, with pride. But you brought her back here, fucked her, and now all is forgiven? Was she that good? Can’t be…It doesn’t change what she did.”

“No…no, it doesn’t. You are quite right. But you’ve no right to judge me for my actions, or anybody else, Brent. The Council took pity on you, a long time ago, remember? You are no longer on sufferance, but you were once. As were many weres who were left alone and had no idea how to control their changes, their rages, their hungers.” Eli smiled sharply, revealing glistening fangs and a hard glint in his eyes. Anger rolled from his body like a wave of water as he looked from one pair of eyes to another—until their eyes fell away in deference. When he looked back at Brent, the wolf was still staring at him head on, his jaw clenched, his face going ruddy with anger. “And for your astuteness, until you can figure out why the council sent her here, you can have the pleasure of filling the pit…all by your lonesome, while I figure out who set it in the first place. Have fun with it. I imagine it took a good day and three or four people to dig it.”

Sarel felt a distant, forgotten shame coming from the were as he stared at Eli before turning away and staring into the pit. The other wolves melted into the forest, leaving Sarel and Eli. She turned and followed him slowly back to the house more than three miles away.

Once they were out of hearing range of the werewolf, more than a mile away, she said quietly, “Your people hate me.”

“The Council is testing you. You did not truly think it would be easy, did you, Sarel?” He moved over the uneven ground in silence, his feet passing over the ground lightly, easily, the moon reflecting off the white linen of his shirt, the gold of his hair. Pausing, Eli looked back at her and a small smile curled his lips. “You are not without those who understand, though. All know Lori already, and all understand that she is what you were trying to avenge. You were mistaken, you were wrong. But it was not an evil thing you were trying to do. Just a mistaken one. It’s the wolves you will have trouble convincing, but they will come around sooner than you think.”

The churning in her gut was making her feel slightly ill.

“If I had managed to convince myself, then it might be easier to convince others.” Her voice was low, soft, full of self blame. Folding her arms around her waist, she rocked back and forth on her heels and stared up at the sky through the veil of branches. “I haven’t fully forgiven myself.”

Eli moved closer, sliding his hands around her waist, down to cup her bottom, lifting her up against him as he slanted his mouth across hers. Pushing his tongue into her mouth, he backed her up against a tree, bracing her there before rocking against her and shuddering as her thighs fell apart in welcome and she sucked his tongue into the wet cave of her mouth. Pulling his mouth from hers, he kissed his way to her ear and murmured, “Forgive yourself, Sarel. Let it go. I forgave it the moment I looked into your eyes as you sat in my office that day, maybe before then. Let it go, and be with me.”

Chapter Nine

Sarel stared at Eli, her whole body cold.

“You are nuts.”

“No, my lady, I am not,” he replied, settling down in his chair. His lady. His. The question was—would he be able to keep her.

Elijah had waited for this discussion to take place until they had gotten home. Byron had given him a commiserating glance on the way out the door, but he hadn’t truly understood. He had enjoyed fucking Sarel too much. Why would Eli give up a chance to have that always? The soul-bond was fated.

Even fate shouldn’t be forced on a person. Especially not forever.

Eli knew about it.

Sarel did not.

Well, she did now.

“You are telling me that you and I will have what Tori and Declan Reilly have.” The words felt as though they were coming through her throat like glass over raw flesh—abrasive, painful, and sharp. He was mocking her. The bonds the hybrid vampire and the Inherent shared were rare, they were taught this fact at Excelsior. For she and Eli to share one was too unlikely.

And he didn’t really seem to like her.

Attracted to her, yes.

But like her?

“If we continue what we were been doing that last day, then yes. The bond is forged through sex and closeness. Mainly sex. I was drawn to you, but I didn’t suspect a bond was possible until I saw you at the airport,” Eli said evenly, watching her still, pale face.

“So if I don’t fuck you any more it won’t happen,” she said stiffly.

Almost soundlessly, he replied, “No.”

“What happens with this bond?”

“Our souls merge. Our—life forces, you could say. I will not have your magic. You will not have any vampiric gifts, but you will live as long as I. The only thing that will kill us is a mortal wound. And what kills one, will most likely kill the other, in time. I’ve known bonded mates whose heart’s even beat the same—they share thoughts, memories, everything.”

Sarel laughed bitterly. “You don’t want that with me,” she said, shaking her head.

Eli said quietly, “Do not tell me what I want, Sarel. You do not know me.”

“But didn’t you just tell me we are bonded?” she mocked, arrogantly.

“Not yet,” he said, growing frustrated, shoving his hand through his golden hair. He rose from his chair to pace. Usually he could sit and stare, like a lion waiting for his prey, but now he moved restlessly. “Damn it, woman. You could drive me to drink.”

Nastily, she said, “You can’t drink anything but blood.”

Emitting a loud bark of laughter, Eli stalked to a cleverly concealed cabinet and opened it, revealing an assortment of liquor bottles. Brandishing a bottle of brandy and a snifter, he poured a very full glass and downed half of it, far too quickly to appreciate the fine taste. It had taken a century to tolerate alcohol, but tolerate it he could. “Don’t know much about us, do you, pet?”

Blushing furiously, she felt like a fool.

“I can’t eat solid food, but I can drink damn near anything I choose, except dairy products or anything with strong acids. They sicken any vampire, except Tori. And acids are damn near poison.”

She sulked at the woman’s name.

“Be careful, pet. Tori is a dear friend, and you do not know it, but you’d be dead if it weren’t for her,” he warned, pointing a long, graceful finger directly at her nose.

Flinging her hair over her shoulder, she snarled, “How do you figure?”

“You would not have evaded the Council for very long if I had died. Tori is the only reason I lived. Her blood is what saved me, what bought me time while Kelsey rushed like mad to get here. If I had died, the Council would have hunted you down. And no reason, no excuse would have kept you alive. They would have pitied what you suffered thinking that Lori died. But they would have killed you still.” Eli’s eyes blazed with anger as he pictured it. Most likely, Malachi would have found her and he would have killed her. It would have been quick, because he would never torture a woman, but she would still be dead.

“So, if it weren’t for Tori, Declan, and Kelsey, you’d be dead alongside me. Think on that, the next time you see her, and jealousy eats you up.”

“Jealousy?” she sputtered, the embarrassment inside her making her queasy and lightheaded. “Why the fuck would I be jealous?”

Eli laughed, setting the snifter down and moving across the room to her. “Well, I do not know,” he purred, catching her body before she could dodge him and pinning her against him. Stroking his hands down her back, he asked, “Why would you be jealous? I smell it on you, in the air, on your skin.” Catching her mouth, he kissed her roughly, deeply, his hands on her ass, lifting her up against him. “Are you jealous? If I were doing this to Tori right now, and you saw, would you be?”

Her eyes blazed with rage and thunder rolled through the air outside. Throughout the room everything that wasn’t attached to something, including them, lifted several inches from the floor and hovered for long moments before drifting back down.

Eli pulled away, stroking her hair and smiling down at her with a tender smile that baffled her. “I missed you like mad while you were gone. You were in this house for only a handful of days but it was empty when you left,” he whispered softly. “I could have kept on; I could have fucked you last night instead of calling Byron when you were begging for it. Once the bond happens, it cannot be broken.”

She wanted to believe the promise in his eyes.

But she didn’t want to risk it.

And forever was a long time to live on the edge, wondering if he would tire of her. A bond could happen, maybe—but who said he had to love her?

Shrugging his gentle hands away, though her heart melted at his words, she told him “I don’t want to live forever. Not even with a man who can fuck like you.” Then she walked out of the room.

Eli’s heart felt like it had been ripped out, danced on, then sewn back together by somebody who was very inept.

He had called the Council.

Sarel had to be sent to somebody else for training.

She could not stay here.

Very angry when he had informed her that somebody would be coming for her, she had hissed at him, “I didn’t say I wanted a new trainer.”

“I’m afraid, pretty Sarel, you do not have a choice,” Eli informed her coolly, looking up from the spread of documents in front of him. The sun was sinking lower on the horizon and hunger was a dull ache in his belly, but he wasn’t hunting while she was here.

Once he got some business done, he’d call Jonathan. The wolf was always willing to feed him, and then the two of them would, try to discover what was amiss. Locate these wraithlike intruders that came and went with nary a trace.

Though he wasn’t a Hunter in full yet, the lad had something many didn’t have, an instinct Eli rarely encountered. Caris had had that knack…a sad smile tugged at his mouth.

He should have taken Jonathan on as his partner, trained him and saved himself this heartache.

“If you didn’t want me here, then why allow me to come in the first place?” she demanded.

Lifting a blonde brow, Eli replied “I allowed it because I love you and I had hoped you would learn to feel the same for me. It’s obvious, now, it won’t happen, so why torture myself? After all,” he mocked, stifling the hurt her words had caused, “I’m good enough to fuck for a while, but who wants to live forever with me? Byron will be here to collect you by midnight.”

“Byron?” she asked, blushing furiously. Her heart was racing a mile a minute. He loves me? He’d just said it. Openly, easily. But Byron? He was sending Byron to collect her?

“Yes. Another Hunter must take you to the Council until they can decide who can have you. Hunters are valuable, but untrained ones are vulnerable. Tori and Declan are the closest, but they are on assignment and they can’t escort you. Malachi is close by, but he is—unwilling—shall we say. So, Byron it is. Now, I’ve work,” he drawled, dragging his eyes away from her face.

“Eli...”

His temper snapped. “Sarel, go away,” he snarled, sliding his hands under the desk and flinging the heavy oak aside as though it weighed less than air. “You seem to want to make up for what you did, now here’s your bloody chance. Leave here. Now. You will leave me and not come back. Ever. I love you, but I obviously mean nothing to you except a stiff dick. You can find that elsewhere. Now leave me alone.”

Sarel stared at him, her heart pounding in her chest. The look in his eyes equaled that of the tortured pain she had seen in his eyes the night she had shot a poisoned arrow into his body for a crime he hadn’t committed. Slowly, grief black and bitter in her heart, she left the room.

“Eli…”

“I said leave,” he rasped. “And if you don’t do it now, I’ll have you dragged out of here, so help me God.”

Crossing to the window, Eli threw it open, and for a moment he almost wished Hollywood had it right. Because if it did, he’d be dead right then as the setting sun shone on him in all its glory. His body going up in flames would be much less painful than this.

Eli felt the tensing in the room only moments before Rafael knocked on the door. The other vampire was growing powerful, very powerful. He was nearing his second century.

Idly, he wondered how long the younger Hunter would be content to remain on a Master’s territory when he was likely able to be a Master of his own territory, his own enclave, able to come and go as he chose.

“Any news on those who dug the pit?”

“I’ve found their scent in town.” Rafe moved slowly into the room, his dark eyes blank, watchful. It had been two days since the young witch had left, and Eli’s temper had not been…reliable.

“We shall go a-hunting then.” Lifting his head, he glanced at Rafe and said, “Is this a one man job or more?”

“Small time, from what I can tell.” He lifted his shoulders in a shrug, glancing absently around the room, tired, restless, discontent, angry—unsure why.

Eli smiled a little, all too aware of what the younger vamp was feeling. Sighing, he shook his head. And there went another. “We’ll go over what we have then.” It wouldn’t be long before this one was gone as well. They needed to talk, he knew. And soon.

Eli glanced at Rafe with an arched brow.

“A small group of businessmen. You’re ruining their sport.”

Sport. Eli snarled under his breath.

Their sport…the buying and selling of teenaged runaways for the pleasure of being the one to rape them was sport?

One of them was a sorcerer, a talented one, which was how they had managed to detect Eli, and managed to go undetected themselves for some time. As Eli prowled outside the small office just in front of the warehouse while they plotted a way to take another one of his people, Eli’s people, he raged in silence. They dare to harm what is mine—

“…some Exstacy and she’ll be begging for it. Bring a damn high price. She’s got a mouth on her like a porn star, an ass made for a good hard butt-fuck, and her cherry is still there. She’s only thirteen and looks it,” one man said, jerking Eli back to the present. “I’ve got my two most reliable men watching her, making sure she stays in just that condition and I’ve already got a buyer. We just have to keep the local do-gooder away from here in two days. Then we make the sale and we’ll start talking about other places that are less risky to do our business.”

His fangs dropped and the scent of blood was a siren’s call as he stared through the window, focusing on the blood that moved under the man’s skin, pounding within the vessel, beckoning to him.

But there was a girl. Another child to save.

Always another child—

He dragged in air—forcing the cool air into his lungs—clearing his head. There was no child here now, but there had been a young one around this man recently, one still in the bloom of innocence, still fresh. Eli could smell it on him.

For a moment, he was pulled back to another child, Lori, and he thought of Sarel.

No…there will always be another lost one.

I can’t let each one remind me of her.

Not when I have eternity, and she wants less than a handful of years, and none of them with me.

* * * * *

Malachi stared at Agnes as though the old woman had lost her mind. “I think not,” he replied slowly. “I do not take on students. And if I did, it would not be her.”

“I do not want her as your student. She belongs with Eli. Just take her back to him.”

“Eli doesn’t want her. He sent her away.”

“They are bonded, whether they realize it or not,” the stubborn old witch argued. “He deserves some happiness and she is his only chance. Now, you stubborn old ancient goat of a vampire, do it.”

Only she would dare speak to him like this.

Malachi couldn’t resist the smile that spread over his face. “You’re wrong. And I’m sorry, but he doesn’t want her.”

“He sent her away because she refuses him. She thinks the bond isn’t there. I see it, I know it’s there. If we keep them apart, we will lose them both.” Craftily she said, “We need them both. And he’ll need her soon. He has another…problem. He’s got a knack for finding trouble lately. The kind that would get him killed.”

Malachi stilled, his blood freezing. “You lie.”

“No. And you know that. However, in order to save him, you must save her as well. By the time you find him, he will already be injured. And that means she is injured. They must be together to recover. She will have to feed him to save him and he must be saved in order for her to not die.”

Malachi glared at her. “You old bitch,” he snapped.

The gray haired witch laughed as the handsome vampire left her home, the afternoon sun shining upon his banner of red hair. “I’m still not as old as you,” she called.

He flipped her off.

Sarel dragged her heels.

Malachi ignored her, his fingers locked around his wrist, dragging her from the room the Council had given her for the duration. She had felt their displeasure. Nobody knew what had transpired, exactly.

But none of them blamed Eli.

They blamed her.

Hell, she blamed her.

She figured Malachi could kill her here and now, in the halls, and none of them would save her.

“I’m not here to kill you,” he said.

She gasped. Mind reader?

Casting her a cold look and scanning her from head to toe, he obviously found her lacking. “You may be a witch, but I’m older than the ages, and your powers are nothing to me,” he said.

“Where are we going?” she asked breathlessly, trying to keep up with his long strides.

“Would it frighten you if I said I am your trainer?” he asked maliciously.

“Yes,” she answered bluntly and honestly.

“Good,” he said coldly.

“Are you?” she asked, hating how timid she sounded.

Malachi didn’t answer.

Bastard.

She flinched, knowing he heard her.

Hearing an odd, stifled sound she didn’t dare wonder whether he was laughing at her or trying to suppress a snarl.

Following him meekly, silently, she willed her mind into a blank canvas. Something told her that if he wanted her dead, and decided to follow through, the Council would do little to punish him.

Malachi couldn’t help it—she may have been a mean, dangerous bitch to Eli, but she was an impudent little thing. Hearing the silent Bastard, he couldn’t completely stifle the laugh.

Herding her onto the private plane, he pushed her none too gently into a seat. It had only been two weeks since Eli had sent her away. It was already showing on her and he had to admit, he suspected Agnes was right.

The girl had lost weight, her lovely mellow gold skin had turned sallow, and her eyes were dull.

Which meant Eli wasn’t going to be at his best either.

They had to hurry. Various reports coming in did little to soothe Mal’s temper, or the fear that was lurking just under his skin. A wounded young vamp in Eli’s territory—wounded in a vamp pit. Vamp pits…the wolves would have discovered them, unless a witch was helping to hide the scent.

Questions asked by people whose faces couldn’t be remembered. Aye, something was stalking Eli.

And not just Eli.

Two more Masters, one in France, one in Canada had been suffering similar problems and not reporting them. One finally reported it last week. One would not be reporting at all. That Master, the one from France, ah well, Malachi knew that Agnes was going to her wake tomorrow. She was traveling to Scotland to bid her farewell to the vampire. Sabine Delacroix had fallen to a weapon no vampire could escape. Her house had been torched at noon, and when she had tried to flee with the help of two of the shifters who had come to her aid, they had all been shot down.

“What do you mean, she’s not in England?” Eli asked wearily. He pushed a hand through his hair, cursing the weariness that had plagued him the past few weeks.

He’d just wanted to see how she was…just to make sure she was okay. He hadn’t needed to talk to her. But nobody would give him any news.

And now this?

“Byron, damn it, would you tell me what is going on?”

“Hell if I know, Eli.” On the other end of the line, Byron sighed. “Agnes told me to take her to Excelsior. I’m just a peon. I follow orders.”

“Why Excelsior? She doesn’t need training,” Eli muttered. Fuck, he missed her. He shouldn’t have been so rash…should have taken more time. With everything. “She was supposed to go to the Council, not back to school.”

“She’s not at school. At least not anymore,” Byron said, keeping his voice level. “Malachi has her. Agnes has paired her with him.”

Malachi…

Hours later, Eli still couldn’t believe it. He wandered through the streets as he circled around the house where the girl was supposed to be sold.

Elijah felt the bitter anger work through him and had to shove it aside, it exhausted him so. “Not while I breathe,” he swore softly, peering at the warehouse. Still quiet.

Malachi. What the fuck was she doing with Malachi?

Shit.

Fuck.

Wrong choice of words.

Because then he imagined them fucking. And he wasn’t sure he could forgive his old friend if he had laid his hands on Sarel’s golden body. Byron was one thing. Byron was younger than Eli, and Eli was a stronger Master, more dominant. But Malachi—

Eli whirled and punched the wall, his fist going through the brick, pain lashing up his arm.

Sarel felt the pain tear up her arm and she cried out, staring down at the unmarred skin.

Malachi was at her side instantly, staring down at her hand. She wasn’t sure, but she suspected the concern in his eyes wasn’t all for her.

Still nothing. Eli narrowed his eyes. Something wasn’t right. Too quiet there. There was little sound of life inside the warehouse...little movement. Too dark, too still.

The unease starting to prickle down his skin and he almost backed away, listening to three hundreds year of instinct.

But he moved forward, out of the darkness, out of the shadows, and he crossed the street and stalked into the warehouse, unaware that he was being watched. He heard the snick as the door locked behind him, but it was too late. When the fire broke out, he was almost relieved. He would have just sat down and let it happen if he hadn’t seen Jonathan and Lori, Sarel’s little sister tied and bound in the middle of the room, unconscious, helpless, while the fire blazed around them.

Somebody had rigged the warehouse with small bombs. He should have smelled the ingredients they had used. He would have if he hadn’t been so tired, so distracted.

But if he had, he wouldn’t have come in and Jonathan and Lori would have died. Lori had just come to him, only a few months before Sarel had been sent to him, wanting to be his Healer in the small enclave that was growing within his territory. He had accepted, thinking it would be one more thing to draw Sarel to him in time. He had accepted, thus he had placed her in harm’s way.

Launching himself at them as one of the devices behind him exploded Eli lifted them both and ran for the stairs. The humans would be watching the ground floor windows, but from the upper floor, maybe he’d have a chance.

He came out on top of the warehouse and crouched over them, taking the bullets that came from the right into his own body.

Sarel screamed as pain ripped through her. What was going on?

Malachi crouched by her side, sending silent commands to the driver, following Eli’s scent. He knew his old friend and could find him quickly—he only hoped it was quick enough. They had landed moments after Sarel had experienced that first odd pain in her hand and Malachi had hoped they might find him before anything else happened.

That was when it spiraled out of control.

They came to a building that was burning and he ordered the driver to stop. He shifted and reformed into his mortal form on top of the house, taking the one who was shooting at Eli and casually breaking his neck, letting none of his rage show.

Taking the unconscious pair in his arms, he jumped the two stories down and put them in the car. Shifting again to mist, Malachi reformed at Eli’s side and took the bleeding body of his friend in his arms to assess the damage.

It was nearly total.

Malachi felt his throat close with grief, his jaws ache with rage. Bullets flew around him and he dropped his shields, sending out a paralyzing fear. A vampire should have a focus, a face in mind, somebody he knew...but Malachi could do many things a vampire shouldn’t have been able to do.

Every mind that was focused on harming Eli right now was destroyed, utterly and entirely, in that very instant. Screams of terror filled the air as Malachi jumped from the building again, uncaring of any who saw.

He usually made some attempt to hide his abilities, but nothing mattered beyond Eli right now. What the fuck did it matter that Malachi possessed abilities that no vampire was supposed to have? He could attribute it to the fact that his mother had been a witch. Now he wished she had been a Healer and he had some more useful magic in his blood.

The bullets had damn near destroyed Eli’s heart. If he had been human, there would have been nothing left to save. As it was, Malachi was amazed.

He took Sarel’s wrist, relieved to find a pulse was still there. Fairly strong, even though she was unconscious now. Using his own fangs to rip her wrist open, he pressed the wound to Eli’s mouth.

Thankfully, the blond vampire closed his mouth over the wound of his own accord after a few moments. Malachi slid his hand under Eli, to cover the gaping wound there and prevent more blood from flowing out.

When Eli’s eyes finally opened, Malachi breathed out a ragged sigh of relief.

And then he sent out a summons.

Malachi was finally going to get to meet Tori Reilly.

Chapter Ten

Eli rolled onto his side, staring at Sarel’s still body. Malachi said gruffly, “Somehow you forged a bond without sex. Or without enough sex. Agnes saw it. I brought Sarel here.”

“She doesn’t want this,” Eli said.

“She was dying, as surely as you were,” Mal said softly. “I saw it with my own eyes. Even without tonight, you both would have died without the other in a matter of months.”

Eli wrapped his cold hand around hers and called her. She was going to hate him.

Tori arrived at the house four hours later and promptly offered her wrist. She joked with Eli tenderly, “I’m a walking blood bank, aren’t I?” She looked at Sarel who lay sleeping in the bed next to him, curling around him, needing his nearness even in sleep.

“Bonded?”

“She doesn’t want it,” he said.

“Fuck that,” Malachi said harshly. “She loves you.”

“She told me, plain as day, she doesn’t want to spend forever with me. And now, we’re both screwed.” Eli couldn’t fight off the urge to curl around her naked body, his own aching from the assault he had taken only hours before. That would all fade, thanks to Tori, within a week or so, instead of months, but for now, he hurt.

“I’m sorry,” Tori whispered, sitting by his head, stroking her fingers through his hair. Declan stood behind her, wrapping her wrist with a bandage she wouldn’t even need in ten minutes as he had a stare-down with Malachi. The ancient one stared at Tori with gleaming, navy eyes, a hungry, appreciative smile on his lips before he looked back at Declan.

He smiled slowly, moving his eyes from the wolf back to the wolf’s lovely mate who stood studying Malachi with curious eyes. Malachi let his eyes roam over her lithe little body, his thoughts clear on his face before returning his gaze to Declan.

The devilish glint in the ancient’s eyes faded as Eli glared at him. “Time. Eli. Give it time,” Malachi suggested from his crouch in the corner, his long fingers weaving his damp, long hair into a braid. His naked chest still gleamed from the shower he had taken just minutes ago to wash the dried blood from his body. He had waited until the last, waiting to see that Eli would be fine before he had bathed.

Even then, he had gone to check on Jonathan and Lori first.

“Time,” he repeated absently, staring out the window.

Eli laughed sourly. “I have all the time in the world now, don’t I?”

Sarel woke to darkness.

Eli’s bed—his scent surrounded her, filled her.

He filled her.

She remembered the brutal burning pain, and his memories assaulted her; she sat up screaming, her hands pressed to her temples. Gone. He was gone. Gone.

Eli’s arms came around her and he pressed his lips to her brow and whispered, “I’m fine, pet. I am fine.”

Her hands raced over him, feeling scars and wounds. He flinched and she jerked as an echo of his pain raced through her. “What has happened?”

“We bonded.”

“I thought it hadn’t happened yet.”

“So did I,” Eli said softly, his hands falling away. She caught a faint glimpse of his golden eyes as her own eyesight adjusted to the darkness. He let her move away and he didn’t follow.

She suspected he couldn’t just yet. She smelled another woman on him. “Tori fed you,” she said softly.

“Her blood heals faster than others,” he replied. From the sound of it, he had lain back down. “Malachi called her. And frankly, I don’t see the point of suffering through weeks or months of weakness if feeding from her can change that.”

“Do you love her?”

“What do you care?” he asked bitterly, staring into the darkness. “You do not love me. This bond is nothing more than a bloody unfortunate inconvenience to you. A bloody cruel trick that God and fate played on you. I care for Tori. Very much. We still share a bond, and on some level, I do love her, but more as a friend. I think I could have fallen in love with her if I hadn’t met you. And been bloody miserable, because she belongs to my best friend.”

“I don’t want you fucking her,” Sarel said harshly.

“Bloody hell, what kind of bastard do you take me for?” He laughed but the sound was bitter. “I have no plans, now or ever, of fucking her again. Unlike you, I would not want to cause my mate pain.”

Sarel flinched as the implication sank in. Damn it, what was she doing? He was going to think she really didn’t care.

Laughing softly, he murmured, “That’s just it, pet. You really don’t.”

She froze.

Sarel hadn’t realized just how complete the bond had become. Eli could read her thoughts, but couldn’t yet see inside her soul. Because she did care. Damn it, she loved him.

But when she turned around to tell him, he had disappeared—shifted into that damned insubstantial mist and left.

He loved that fucking disappearing act of his.

It was very possible for two people to co-exist in one house for days on end without seeing each other. To even sleep in the same bed. Eli waited until exhaustion had her dropping before he slid into bed. It took the edge off and he was able to function. Pressing his body to hers filled the hole in his heart, for the day, while he slept, even though he did wonder why she bothered to adapt her sleep pattern to his.

And he wondered why she bothered to seek him out.

He didn’t give a flying fuck if he looked the bloody coward. If he heard her footsteps, he simply shifted and left the room. Tori looked at him with raised brows and knowing eyes when he reformed in the game room, a room he never entered.

Declan was out doing patrol, making sure all was at peace. Malachi had patrolled the previous night. They’d switch off until Eli’s strength had returned.

Settling into a chair to watch Tori and Jonathan play pool, Eli wished he had never accepted Sarel as a student.

“You can’t run forever.”

“I find it hard to believe you run at all,” Malachi said, entering the room, his dark blue eyes narrow and cool. He tossed Tori a hot glance but she ignored him. Eli was rather satisfied to see that she was more immune to Malachi than either of the men had expected.

“I’d prefer not to have my heart smashed to pieces again, thank you very much,” Eli said, staring up at the ceiling. Maybe he’d go for a ride. It was close enough to sundown. By the time he got the horse saddled, changed clothes…

“You are hiding from the gun?” Malachi asked, confused. “Those men are of no danger. What few lived through the mental blast are mindless now, nothing but blathering idiots. Tis unlike you—you have never hidden from danger before. Has your mind been damaged?”

Eli laughed while Tori snickered, sending the older vampire an amused look. “He’s talking about having his heart broken, Malachi. Figuratively,” she advised him.

Malachi sent her a withering look. God forbid the ancient one be wrong, Eli thought with some reluctant amusement. Yes, a ride would be good—a slow easy ride. A few more days and his body would be mended and he would tackle the problem of how to deal with Sarel. Perhaps if she would be willing to spend two weeks a month—

“Just take her to bed and keep fucking her until she realizes what a fool she is,” Malachi told him, ignoring the arch look Tori sent his way. Malachi wasn’t very pleased about a woman who wasn’t overly impressed with him. Granted, it was tiresome having a woman who fell over her own feet to please him, but a winsome, graceful woman who knew how to pleasure a man was a treat.

“Yes,” Eli said sarcastically, smacking his hand. “That is exactly so. Do exactly what put me is this spot and all is well.”

Tori smiled and shrugged. “Actually, it may be not a bad plan. But I’d replace the fucking with some loving. She does care for you, Eli. The bond wouldn’t have happened without it, no matter what you think.”

Sarel glanced over her shoulder and suppressed a sigh. Exactly who she needed to see.

Tori leaned against the railing, tipping her head back, soaking in the late day sun. “Eli’s going for a ride in a bit. By the time he has changed clothes and gotten the horse ready, the sun will have set. It will be a few hours before he is back, so I have a question for you. But before I ask it, I need to tell you something.”

“He is in love you,” Tori said.

“I know,” Sarel answered quietly, her belly flipping over. It did, every time she thought of it. She had come to grips with it, and in the past few days she had even accepted it. But every time she tried to talk to Eli, he disappeared. Oh, she knew he was there. She could feel him as he slid past her, or scent him in the air around her, knowing he had just vacated the room.

He would be warm around her body right before she woke, and then gone. “I keep trying to talk to him. I’d like to say he won’t listen, but the bastard won’t sit still long enough for me to find him.”

Tori asked, “Do you blame him?”

“No.” Sarel groaned and let her head fall forward, missing it as Eli ran swiftly from the house to the stable, moving away from the still painful effects of the too bright sun. Within the next thirty minutes, it would be safe for him. But not yet.

“Okay. Here’s my question. Do you love him?”

“Yes,” she said. Something inside her broke free and tears seeped down her cheeks and she repeated it quietly, “Yes. I do.”

“Want some advice?” Her eyes on the stable, Tori said, “Go to bed. Like as in now. When he comes in, pretend you’re already asleep. You’re a witch, meditate. You can fake it. When he comes in, as I’m sure he will, jump him. He won’t be able to say no. I smell him all over you. I know you share a bed. Once he’s inside you, he won’t be able to not listen to you.”

A rather simple plan.

Sarel wondered why she had not thought of it.

Tori turned and was on her way out. Then she stopped and looked back. “One more question. Why did he send you away?”

“I told him I didn’t want to live forever with him,” Sarel said, her face hot with shame. “I lied. I thought he’d get tired of me.”

“You really don’t understand the bond thing, do you?”

Sarel reached up and rubbed her aching chest, where her heart seemed to beat only half the time. Weakly, she smiled and said, “I didn’t until the past week.”

* * * * *

Eli slipped into the room.

He really wasn’t certain how much more of this he could take.

Shedding his clothes, he wrapped his body around hers, breathing in her scent. He had fed from Declan. His circle of meals was growing sparse as well. He’d have to start hunting soon just to find blood. It was impossible to feed from Tori without wanting to fuck her, and even that urge would hurt Sarel. If he didn’t give in, he feared that would hurt Tori. So he was screwed either way there.

Her chest moved regularly in sleep so he cuddled a little closer, and stroked her hair, rubbed his hand over her hip, caressed his thumb across her satin skin. She looked better as well. The pallor had faded, replaced by the warm honey gold of health. He had seen her from the stable, talking to Tori. It hadn’t turned to violence, which satisfied him.

His cock ached.

Cuddling it against her butt, he ordered himself to sleep. The sun was riding dangerously high, so high, his skin was near tingling before he had come inside. Of course, Malachi and Tori were still out there. Lucky bastards.

Malachi didn’t believe it.

He was in for a surprise…

Eli tumbled headlong into sleep.

Sarel’s skin was humming with need. She had followed Tori’s advise all right. She had bathed in oil—honeysuckle, of course. She knew how much Eli loved the way she smelled. Then she had slept, lightly. When he had entered the room, she was aware. She rested for a while longer, and woke far earlier than he.

Rolling to her side, she tossed the covers off and stared down at him, licking her lips. Lowering her head, she pressed a kiss to his mouth and whispered, “I love you,” just to make sure she was able to say it, at least once. Just in case he did his little vampire presto change-o once he woke.

Of course, she thought as she shimmied down, she was going to make as sure as she could that he wouldn’t want to go anywhere.

She licked his cock, his balls, then his cock again, taking the hardening shaft deep inside her mouth, working it until it was hard and firm, wet from her mouth. Wrapping her hand around the base, she picked up a steady rhythm, staring up his body. The room was still dim, so she loosed a low ripple of magic, and tiny balls of light bounced throughout the room—like candles—and she was able to see his body clearly just as his lids lifted.

The fog was clearing from his eyes—eyes that were hot with lust—and she chanced a little more magic, a locking spell, in case he did decide to do a shift. She didn’t know if it would work, but she felt the spell in the air as it locked into place. If it worked, Eli may be able to shift, but he wouldn’t be able to reform anywhere outside this room.

But he did not try to shift into mist.

Burying one hand in her hair, he groaned and pumped his hips up into her mouth, the other hand going down to cup his balls. “Sarel,” he rasped, staring down at her face, his eyes swirling, glowing and burning hot.

The muscles of his chest heaved with a ragged breath and his belly flexed as she slowly lowered her head back down, lifted back up, staring up into eyes all the while.

The adoration she saw there nearly broke her heart. She had tried to throw that away. She was such an idiot. Swallowing the head of his cock down, eyes tearing, throat and lungs burning, she tried to take as much as of him as possible. Swirling her tongue around the rounded head, she stroked the furred sac of his balls with one, and pumped his cock up and down with the other.

Eli cried out and his come shot down her throat in rhythmic waves. While he lay gasping for breath, she pulled away and straddled him. When he would have tumbled her to her back, she shook her head, snapped her fingers, whispered words of an entrapment spell.

His wrists were pulled high over his head without his consent, his eyes wide, and then curious. She lowered her head and kissed him, licking his full lower lip, moving down to nip his neck. “You. Tonight is for you,” she murmured. “And there’s something I probably oughta tell you.” She straddled him, staring down at him where he lay pinned by her magic. The position caused the muscles in his arms to bulge and displayed his chest rather well, Sarel decided. Leaning down to kiss him just there she took his cock into her hand and slid down slowly, biting her lip as she worked him inside.

The wet, warm clasp of her pussy hugged him tightly as she slid down on him and Eli groaned raggedly, his hands closing into tight fists as he jerked uselessly against the unseen restraints. Ever so slowly, feeling his width carving through her, Sarel slid down until she’d taken all of him and then she leaned forward, planting her hands against the muscled wall of his chest, her hair falling around them as she stared into his eyes.

Slowly, the action difficult after keeping her feelings hidden after so long, Sarel shoved the barriers to her emotions aside as she seated herself fully on him. Leaning over him, she took his face in her hands, gasping as it drove him just a little deeper inside her. “I do care, Eli. More than that, I love you,” she whispered, rocking against him, riding him slowly as the pleasure built.

“Free my hands, pet,” he growled, his fangs dropping down as he pulled his mouth away. Arching his back, he pushed his cock deep inside the wet embrace of her pussy and shuddered as she convulsed around him, her head falling back as she moaned and whimpered.

Then she shook her head. “No… This is for you…”

And leaning over him, she lifted her hips up, and started to ride, taking his cock in slow, shallow strokes, then faster, steadier strokes, until he started to shaft her deeper, his eyes locked on her face as he twisted his hips and pushed the head of his cock over the spot deep inside her cleft that made her scream.

She felt the soft, seductive push of him inside her mind as the climax washed over her and she whimpered as he started to wrap her in a web of seduction so tight, so hot she could barely breathe past it.

“Let me go, Sarel,” he rasped. She released the spell and cried out when he rolled her under him, shoving her legs wide and high, brushing her hair back and nuzzling her neck. Pressing the back of his neck and arching her own toward him, she cried out as Eli struck.

His fangs sank deep as he fucked her hard and rough and desperately. “Love you,” he told her silently in her mind as he rode her. “Love you, love you love you.”

As she buried her fingers in his hair, his hot mouth at her neck sending shudders down her spine that merged with the ones his cock was sending upwards. “If you’d stopped…avoiding….me, I’d have told you…sooner,” she panted, driving her hips upward, taking more of him.

Groaning, Eli pulled his mouth away, then his cock, causing her to scream in frustration. But he flipped her onto her hands and knees and she sobbed when he drove back into her wet cleft, sinking in deeper and harder than before. She glanced up and grinned weakly, whispered, and watched as the little bottle on the bedside table drifted over to them. It bobbled a couple of times—for some reason, she couldn’t focus.

Eli spied it and he laughed shakily.

She squirmed when she felt the cool liquid on her anus and gasped when he worked his finger completely inside her. “I want your cock inside me tonight,” she moaned brokenly.

“Not ready,” he muttered, driving back inside her tight cleft, groaning as she closed over him. He pulled his finger out, and started to work two insider her.

“Damn it, Eli, please,” she sobbed, thrashing wildly on the sheets.

Hell.

Pulling his cock out, he watched as he slowly speared her waiting hole with two fingers, the tight little pucker opening and then closing around them—hot, damp, sweet. His eyes closed and he reached for the lubricant. “It will hurt you,” he warned her.

“I don’t care,” she panted, rocking back to meet him as he drove his fingers back inside her.

Pulling away he took the lubricant and coated his cock heavily, then the tight, pink pucker, even though it already gleamed wetly.

I can’t believe I’m doing this, he thought, staring down at his cock as he started to prod her. She opened slightly and pushed down and he hissed, groaning as the first three inches slid inside, almost easily. But then her body arched and stiffened as the pain started.

Bending over her, he started to stroke her swollen clit, pumping his fingers in and out of her dripping pussy while he murmured in her ear, “It will pass, pet. Breathe out, that’s it. Ah, you are so fucking sweet. Hmm, that’s it.” As her body shuddered, then relaxed, he slid further inside, until half of his length was in. He paused again, petting and stroking until she relaxed, then continuing this time and driving her closer to orgasm. When he felt the spasms in her vagina echoing through the thin membrane, he gripped her hips in his hands and drove completely in—his thick cock buried inside her snug, virgin ass while she screamed, half with orgasmic pleasure, the other half in shocked pain.

Stroking her back and the globes of her bottom he whispered, “I’m sorry. It always hurts the first time. But I will bring you pleasure, I promise.” And he did, using his cock and his hands, pulling out and driving back inside the sensitive passage, playing with her clit and teasing her until Sarel was screaming and begging for release.

Sarel fell from her hands to her chest, unable to hold herself up. Eli kept his grip on her hips, otherwise she would have fallen completely. She shuddered and moaned, feeling him spread her wide so that he could burrow back inside. It made her scream. His fingers pinched her clit again, and she thought she would die.

Then his cock pulled out and she moved back, seeking more, loving the moan she heard from him, loving the pleasure she sensed inside him. He filled her, full, too full in her bottom, but not just there, inside her soul, inside her mind. She felt his arms come around her and pull her back and up so that she was pinned upright against his body as he drove his cock up into her ass.

Putting his mouth to her ear, he whispered, “Three centuries. I have waited three centuries for you, Sarel. I could not have waited much longer. I love you, to the bottom of my soul, for all eternity.”

Shuddering as his last thrust drove her over, his hot semen spurted into her sensitive sheath as he was whispering against her ear. “I love you, Eli,” she whimpered, twisting her head around to catch his mouth.

Their tongues tangled and magic exploded around them as the climax broke over them.

Eli eased their shuddering bodies down to the bed and hugged her tightly to him. His body was shaking so badly it felt like the bed was moving from it, Eli mused, burying his face in her damp, sweaty hair.

Sarel’s quivering body jumped when a fist started banging on the door and Eli snarled, glaring over his shoulder. Covering Sarel’s naked body with a blanket, he turned just as Malachi threw it open.

“Mother of God, Eli, the next time you plan on fucking your little witch into the next world, make sure she doesn’t bring the house down around us,” he boomed, his dark-blue eyes blazing. There was more mirth than anger in his gaze.

But it was then that Eli realized that it was Sarel’s magic that was making the house shake.

“Bloody hell,” he mused, falling back onto the bed and pulling her up against him.

She blushed furiously and forced the wild magic back down inside. “I’m sorry,” she muttered as Malachi closed the door, his laughter following him down the hall.

Eli grinned weakly. “Maybe we can find a spell to counter it.”

“We will,” she swore solemnly, wincing a bit as she shifted to find a more comfortable position.

Eli’s hand stroked her hair. “I love you,” he whispered. More to hear her answer than anything.

She smiled against his chest and said, “I love you,” before snuggling against him.

And then he closed his eyes and for the first time in years, when the moon rose, he didn’t.

Chicago

Byron watched as Kit strolled past his door, the t-shirt she wore barely covering her rounded rump.

She glanced at him, her eyes cool, her face blank.

In his lap, he held Korine, one of the young weres he had brought into the house only a few months earlier.

It was nearly midnight.

Kit’s door closed and Byron lowered his mouth back to Kori’s neck, and wished—again—that it was Kit he held.

But the Inherent wolf wasn’t for him.

Not ever.

The Hunters: Byron and Kit

by

Shiloh Walker

First digital printing 2004

Please note: This is the original 2004 version—it has been edited. Some new material has been added, but the basic story remains the same.

The Hunters: Byron and Kit

© Copyright Shiloh Walker, 2004

Cover Art Angela Waters

Prologue

Byron stared down at the pain-racked body of Kristof Beauchamp and wasn’t sure if he could fight off his rage much longer. The man responsible was in this house and Byron would see to it that he paid. But his duty, through friendship, was here, by his dying friend’s side.

“Katrine…will you take care of her? So young, she is, and now alone…”

Byron held tight to Kristof’s hand and broke a promise. The Inherent was so battered in body, so injured—the vampire doubted the shifter would even notice. As Byron slid inside and separated the pain from the man, Kris was able to breathe and think without the pain caused by the silver and poison.

“I’ll take care of the girl as though she were my own,” Byron promised, smoothing back Kris’s sweat-tangled hair. The air stank of the poison that was eating through Kris’s body and Byron shoved his fury under control again. Silver and wolfsbane…a carefully made poison that served only one purpose, and it was exactly what it sounded like. It had been put inside a hollow silver bullet that had exploded on impact with Kris’s body and even now was eating away at him like acid.

“She will not be a girl always. What then?” Kris asked, his accent thick with his weariness.

“I’ll see to it that Kit has everything her heart desires,” Byron promised. “She will want for nothing.”

Kris laughed, and when he did blood leaked from his mouth. “My Bella is telling me…da, you had best remember that. Kit will want what she wants. Da.” His combined French and Russian upbringing made his accent, at times, difficult to understand. Bella? The lady had died in childbirth three years earlier. “Ah, my Bella. I see you now. But Katrine. To leave her, my bebè, my heart breaks.”

“Go to Bella,” Byron whispered roughly, feeling tears sting his eyes. He could hear the baby crying. The hearing of an Inherent child was sharp, and she had heard her father. One of his people should have taken her away. They’d be lucky if heads didn’t roll for letting the baby be upset this way.

“I will take care of Kit, I promise. I will do everything in my power to see her happy.”

Chapter One

Twenty-four years later…

“…that's it, baby girl…take it…relax…”

Kit gritted her teeth as she listened to that low, husky male voice.

She knew that voice.

Loved that voice.

Prayed to hear that voice murmuring to her, just like that.

But it wasn't happening. Right now, the rat-bastard was talking to one of his humans.

Fine. It was nothing new, she told herself. Focusing on the spreadsheet on the screen of her Mac, she continued with the paperwork, one of the many tedious jobs she was had to attend to as the second-in-command here.

All the while, the man she loved fucked another woman. And Byron wasn't alone. One of the other Hunters was playing with them. Bastards. The lot of them.

Groaning, she snatched her iPod off the desk and turned it on, plugging the earbuds into her ears and turning it up. The low, raw sound of Marc Cohn's voice blasted out, doing something to block out the sounds of sex and heat and everything she really, really wanted to have for herself.

She had four minutes of blissful respite.

And then she felt the vibrations of footsteps, heard somebody speaking. Scented the change in the air.

Looking up, she saw one of the humans that lived at the Enclave. The man had a note in his hand. He held it out to her, nervously. And as she took it, he whirled around and ran off.

Her gut clenched as she looked down and read it.

Come to my office. Immediately…Byron.

She frowned.

That was Byron's handwriting, alright.

It smelled like him.

Tugging out the earbuds, she shifted her gaze upright.

Heard the sounds of sex.

Carefully, she turned off the iPod. Stood up.

Why was he doing this?

Over the sound of Melissa's whimpering cry, he heard the sound of footsteps. Harder to smell as much, over the scent of her blood…he'd just fed. Add to that the scents of sex and sweat and it was just harder to filter through it all.

But when the door opened, his mind almost tumbled to a halt.

What the—

Kit.

He stilled beneath her, hands braced on Melissa's hips.

Ben, kneeling behind Melissa, continued to move, oblivious.

Oh, shit—

He waited for the door to shut, braced to pull away. Damn it, what in the hell—

But Kit sauntered inside and flung herself into the chair by the fireplace, her eyes flashing fire. Her lip trembled a little as she glared at him.

And then, without saying a word, she tugged her skirt up. Revealing blood red panties.

Blood roared in his ears as she slipped her hand inside that red silk.

Craning his head around to watch her, he jerked his hips, driving upward into Melissa's waiting pussy. Melissa whimpered, but he wasn't even aware.

As Kit's fingers disappeared, he bit back a groan.

She wasn't doing this…

But she was.

And as she started to stroke herself, he found himself staring at her hand. Unable to look away.

The one woman he wanted.

The one woman he couldn't have.

“You!”

Melissa finally managed to lurch to her feet. Ben stood in the background, watching in silence, while Byron leaned against his desk, still staring at Kit. She'd stroked herself to climax. Damn it, he wanted to go to her, catch her hand in his and lick the essence of her from her fingertips.

Instead, he stood there, trying to piece together just what had happened.

Kit hadn't come in by accident.

He couldn't read her mind.

The mind of a shapeshifter was a strange thing and he couldn't pierce it.

But Melissa was mortal. One he'd fed from, often. She was an open book. A deceitful one.

“You fucking pervert!” Melissa hissed, glaring at Kit who still lounged in the chair, her eyes heavy-lidded, her hand resting low on her belly, skirt rucked up, a smile on her mouth.

It wasn't a replete smile, though.

It was sharp-edged; jagged, like broken glass.

As Melissa lunged for her, Ben moved, coming up off the floor with the blurring speed of a shifter, catching her before she moved five feet.

Kit just laughed.

“Oh, come on, Melissa. What did you expect me to do? Just stand there? Byron apparently wanted me to see this little show. I might as well enjoy it.”

“I didn't call you here,” Byron said softly.

She slanted a look at him, her eyes narrowed.

Her nostrils flared.

She'd know if he lied. Scents changed with lies. But he wouldn't lie to her. Not to Kit. Not ever. He might not tell her how he felt, but he wouldn't lie to her.

As Ben turned to look at him, puzzled, Byron focused on Melissa's face. “Melissa, why were you in my office earlier today?”

She whipped her head around, staring at him.

And he pushed inside her mind.

Saw the answers for himself.

Pulling back, he closed his eyes. “Melissa, you're no longer welcome here. Kit, my apologies for this…deception. Ben, escort Melissa to her rooms and let Nick know to start preparing for her departure.”

Melissa started to cry.

And Kit…she just stared at him.

Stared at him, while the rich, ripe scents of her arousal perfumed the air, teasing his hunger.

Chapter Two

Kit tapped her pen on the table and stared at the disheveled woman in front of her. “I warned you, Melissa. Byron made himself clear on this issue. You're leaving. I can't intervene for you.” Nor would I.

Seriously, what was this woman thinking?

Although Kit had done this many, many times, this was a first.

Melissa had intentionally set that debacle up, something Kit now knew.

Although, in truth, Kit had done this thing a number of times in the past few years. Too many times.

Byron discarded women the way she discarded shoes, it seemed. He wasn't unkind with it, but he also couldn't keep women around for more than a few months. Especially mortals.

Mortals who spent too much time around a vampire, for feeding, for sex, sometimes got addicted to it, and that wasn't good for either party.

It wasn't any help that Byron was just plain addictive period and Kit didn't think it had anything to do with the vampiric pull, either. The sexual pull a vampire exuded was always intensified after he’d touched one particular woman. Byron would have been intoxicating to a mortal, she knew it.

For a little while, Melissa had been his favorite and now…well. She was just shit out of luck.

Studying the unhappy blonde in front of her, she figured they finally had something in common.

After what had happened, Kit figured she had every reason to hate the woman in front of her. And she was pissed off. Miserably jealous. Hell, Melissa had shared Byron's bed. Shared his affections.

But then she'd screwed up. And Byron was pissed. So very pissed.

Byron wouldn't trust her again, and if Melissa thought Kit was intervening on her behalf, she was messed up.

This was one mess Kit wasn't responsible for, a mess she wasn't cleaning up.

She'd had him, Kit thought, disgusted. Had Byron all to herself, for all that time. And then she'd started thinking maybe she could keep him. Or whatever crazed idea had gone through her head. Kit just didn't know.

For more than a year, Melissa had shared Byron's bed. A year. Then Kit had slipped up.

It had all started because of Kit's inadvertent watching. Maybe it was fitting that was what ended this, she mused.

“Isn't there anything you can do?” Melissa whispered, staring at Kit, eyes swollen, nose red.

“No.” Kit turned her head, staring out the window as she thought back.

A year ago. It had only been a year.

She had walked into his office thinking he had business to discuss, and instead she had been audience to a blowjob. Granted, somebody had given her the wrong fucking time. He had wanted to talk to her in a couple of hours, but for crying out loud.

Well, it really wasn’t his fault.

She could still remember it, how Melissa had sucked on Byron’s cock, and how much Kit wanted to be the one doing it. Byron had opened his eyes—he had known she was there—and glared at her. “Do you mind, Kit?”

“Not at all, Byron. I like to watch,” she had drawled. Well, she hadn’t ever really watched anything like that before, but she hadn’t really been able to leave either. Her eyes were drawn to the length of his cock as Melissa slid her lips up and down, pulling back to stare at Kit with wide eyes before resuming what looked to be a very pleasant task.

His fangs flashed and she suspected part of him wanted to tell her to get the fuck out. But another part was aroused. He had gripped Melissa head’s tightly and started to rock his hips faster, forcing his cock farther and harder into her mouth until he came. Kit’s sharp sense of smell caught it in the air and she stared at him, so hot she burned.

He’d made his human pass out. “That’s the bad thing about humans, Byron. They just can’t handle as much,” Kit said, tsking a little, clucking false sympathy.

That was when things had started to change, at least on his end. And for Melissa.

Things had been changing on Kit's end for a long time. Byron was her soul mate. She knew it. She had told him so when she was nineteen, which had been a mistake. Apparently. He had taken her for a love-struck kid and he had laughed, patted her on the head, and sent her off to college. Six years ago. And she still felt the same.

After her little peep show, Melissa had resorted to petty insults. Stupid jibes and quips. And Byron…well, he had gone out of his way to antagonize her, and she couldn’t figure out if he was angry at her or trying to tease her.

He was so…skilled with women, but he was acting so crudely toward her. He was her boss, signed her paychecks, but he was also her Master. She had gone into service to a Hunter, and sworn to abide by the Council law. That meant something, damn it. She not only was a Hunter in her own right, she was his first Lieutenant, his guard, his servant, the highest honor a Master vampire could afford a member of his enclave.

Kit guarded him while he slept; she ran the household and his people while he was away.

She owed fealty to him until she decided that she was going to leave, or he decided to send her away. It was still her decision—although one hundred years ago, it wouldn’t have been. A hundred years ago, she would have been Byron’s until he was tired of her, or until she died. But times changed.

If she chose to leave, she could. She'd have to appeal to the Council, but they wouldn't deny her, she knew that. She would have to appeal to them and they would allow her to leave, providing she did things appropriately. All she had to do was state her case, basically her unhappiness with the situation, and they would let her leave. The Council didn’t like any of their people being unhappy.

Kit just couldn’t seem to make herself do it. Yet.

She couldn't leave him.

And now she had to find a way to deal with another woman who he had left heartbroken.

Her job really, really sucked and she wanted to go tell him to clean up his own messes.

Sadly, this is was her job. Byron was her Master and although she wasn't anything resembling subservient, if he gave her an order, she must follow.

She actually had a position of power in his enclave. All obeyed her as they obeyed him. Nobody could question her orders, for her orders came from Byron. She acted as his second, and if she expected others to follow his orders, then so must she.

Which was how so many damned messes ended up on her plate. One right after the other.

If she could just get this one off her plate, though, she had some downtime. She had two days off a month, the day before the full moon and the day of the full moon, and she'd get the hell out of dodge. It was the one time of the month she could get away, and just breathe.

Kit's abilities as a shifter had nothing to do with the moon, but sometimes the pull of it made her edgy and she preferred not to be around during that time, if she could. For the past few years, it was routine that she take those two days away from the Enclave and sometimes, she hated it.

Now she needed it.

But first…she had to get Melissa out of here.

“Melissa, there's nothing else I can do. You're set to leave by the end of the week and if you don't leave on your own…” Kit let her wolf show in her eyes as she leaned forward and added, “I'll make you leave.”

Chapter Three

Byron heard Melissa crying in Kit’s office, and he fought the urge to break the door down and drag the little bitch out.

Why wasn't she gone already?

He thought back, mentally checked the days.

Yes, she had another day left.

Damn it, he should have sent her away weeks ago.

He'd heard all the catty whispers. Maybe he shouldn't have ignored those. But he'd…shit. He'd screwed up, that's what he'd done. Using Melissa to keep Kit at bay, but it had been a mistake.

When the petty insults had spiraled, gotten worse, he should have known she'd take it a few steps farther. The disaster in his office a few days…

Mentally groaning, he wished, for the thousandth time, he'd done something, anything to prevent that.

Acted sooner. Realized it was Kit outside his office. Sent her away. Shit, sent Melissa away.

She was leaving now, but it wasn't soon enough. It had taken him a few minutes to figure out what had happened, but once he knew…Yes. It was done.

Arrangements had already been made.

She'd be set up in an apartment, a job had already been found and one of the older vampires was going to wipe her mind.

She wasn't going to be given the option to go to another Enclave, not after what she'd done.

She'd hurt Kit.

Damn her.

He had wanted her, yes.

But he craved Kit.

Kit thought he was blind, as well. Thought he'd forgotten what she'd told him all those years ago. No. He'd forgotten nothing. He knew how she thought she felt. She was still a child though, and she hadn’t really experienced life outside his territory. How could she know if she was in love with him?

Even when he had sent her off to college, she had done it in her own way. She had completed in less than thirty months the courses it normally takes four years to do. She had stalked back up to the house one late summer night, on a full moon, wearing that beautiful wolven form. She had thrown back her head and bayed at the moon, and she had been laughing at him.

But he had made a promise that she would have what she wanted, and he wasn’t it. No matter how much he might want to be.

The tiny little dark-haired child had grown into a woman he wanted more than he wanted to see another sunrise. After almost a century of darkness, he would never have thought anything would beckon to him more than that. But if he could chose between being able to walk in daylight again without harm, or having one night with Kit?

No contest.

He forced himself to walk past Kit’s door.

She would handle it. She handled everything. Every fucking thing he threw at her. And he hated himself more each fucking day. He kept waiting for her to grow tired of the orders, the commands, but she never did.

She never told him to shove it, never once threatened to walk. He kept waiting to hear that she had petitioned the council to revoke her pledge to him, kept waiting to see her walk out the door.

He wouldn’t even be surprised to see an older Hunter come to claim her, even though he would fight to the death before he allowed it.

He kept waiting for her to leave him.

That was what he needed her to do.

He didn’t have the strength to make her leave.

And she was so fucking stubborn.

Byron remembered every challenge she'd dealt with.

Hell, even this latest mess that Melissa set up.

Kit had walked in, thinking he'd set it up. She'd come in, knowing full well what was going on. In the back of her eyes, he'd seen the hurt, the misery, before she'd hidden it.

Had she left? Had she attacked him? He could feel the anger inside her. The hurt.

But had she reacted to it?

No. She had settled down and started to masturbate, staring at him all the while. He'd fucked Melissa harder, imagined it was Kit and watched the movement of her fingers in her panties, smelling her arousal in the air over that of Melissa’s and Ben’s.

Just days ago.

Each second that passed was a lesson in agony. Every second that he couldn't have her...

Melissa, the silly fool, had tried to pretend outrage when it was done. But he'd seen through it. Realized what was going on.

And now she was trying to beg Kit to intercede on her behalf.

Fuck.

If Kit said anything to him about Melissa staying on, he just might spank her.

Melissa had actually dared to call Kit a pervert. Had insulted her. After she'd arranged that. Then she'd tried to attack her—she must have a death wish or something. Ben had stopped that mess, quick, but the only thing that made sense was that Melissa had lost her mind.

The ignorant little blonde had even tried to launch herself at Kit but Ben had caught her around the waist, while Byron stood there, hard, aching, hungry…and unable to tear his eyes away from Kit.

Once they'd been alone, things hadn't gotten any better. Shit.

He should have just walked away.

Ben had dragged Melissa out of the room just as Kit went to stand, her swinging, flirty little skirt falling back into place, hiding her panties. Byron hadn't been able to stay away, sliding from the bed, crossing the room.

The scent of her was a song in his head, one he couldn't deny. Catching her wrist, he had brought her hand to his lips and licked her fingers, capturing that sweet, tangy taste and watching as her eyes rounded.

Then, still riding high on that, he'd gone to his knees in front of her, ripped her panties away and tasted her there.

Stupid, stupid, stupid…

Even now, the taste of her was one he couldn't forget. He craved more.

She'd cried out in shock, then groaned, buried her hands in his hair as he pushed her hard into an orgasm.

Without letting her come down from that, he'd fed from the sensitive, intimate area on her thigh. Drunk on her taste, on her blood, intent on taking her, he'd gone to stand.

And that was when she'd hit him.

Hard.

Hard enough to sit him flying across the room.

“Bastard.”

He could still hear her…the disgust heavy in her voice. The arousal. The misery.

Bastard.

Shit. He was a bastard. And all he did was hurt her.

“Kit, I…” He still didn't know what he would have said.

But she hadn't wanted to listen. She'd shifted, wolf-quick, from human to full-wolf form, not the half-wolven, half-human form she sometimes chose. She chose the wolf—the better to run with, my dear.

And Byron had to watch as she ran away from him.

He'd thought maybe, just maybe, he'd finally pushed her hard enough. Maybe she'd leave.

Although if she did, he knew he'd fall apart. He'd just have to fall apart, though, because she was better off away from him.

Damn it. He was losing it.

Silently, he moved away from the door. He needed to get away from here. Get some distance.

Some perspective.

Tomorrow was the day before the full moon. Which meant Kit would be gone.

He could think. Get his head on straight. Relax. Maybe find somebody to take Melissa's place…

Aw, fuck. That was the last thing he needed to do. Melissa was one of the reasons he was in this screwed up mess to begin with. Kit was hurting, and he hated it, and he couldn't do a damn thing about it, because what he wanted to do was hold her, and cuddle her and tell her he was sorry, but she was mad at him, she had every right to be, and if he apologized…

Shit. He needed her mad at him, right?

He stalked out the door.

He had a fucking job to do, and it didn’t include mooning over a sweet little shifter with eyes like storm clouds.

“You can't kill me…”

“Yes, I can.”

Byron wasn't in the mood to chat.

The four Hunters he'd brought with him had already rounded up the humans. They were going to have to have their memories altered. Some needed medical attention. A few of them needed more intensive help…the kind of healing Byron couldn't hope to give them.

All because of this fucker here, a man who'd been operating a slave ring two hours out of Chicago.

Too close to Byron's territory.

Slave ring. Not a good name.

Fast food, maybe? He grimaced as he circled around the man who held immobile by the reinforced cuffs. His left leg had been cut off. Byron thought it might be over by the back door.

“I'm asking for sanctuary,” the vampire spat out.

“Sanctuary,” Byron drawled. “Oh, that's a laugh. After you kidnapped a dozen women and held them prisoner? Good luck with that one.”

“I didn't kill any of them.” His smile turned cagey. “It's not much different than what you do.”

“Well, except for the kidnapping part.” Byron smiled, lifted his blade. It was a little too long to be called a knife. Too short to be called a sword. Perfect for severing a head.

The vampire didn't even have a chance to scream.

Blood and violence and a decent kill should have done something to sate the frustration rumbling inside him, but it hadn't.

Byron was still burning with it as he made his way to his rooms that night. Rooms that took him too closely to Kit's. Swallowing a curse, he paused, leaning against the wall as he heard a soft, gasping cry.

That was Kit. Had she...if one of his men were in there…

His ears pricked and one hand clenched in rage before he realized he heard only one voice, one person breathing raggedly. His people were talking, some were sleeping, the low hum of conversation buzzing…but there was just one person in that room. Just one.

He felt like a fucking pervert as he stood there, head bowed, listening.

Soft ragged cries. Hungry whimpers. Broken moans.

Kit had never taken a lover while in his house. She most likely had in college…hell, she had been gone two and a half years.

But there had been no lovers in his house. Not once.

He didn’t know if he could have allowed it, but she had never even tried.

He wasn’t being fair to her. She climaxed with a soft, muffled wail, hidden by the walls of her room, while he stood out there and imagined it, pictured what she was doing…and imagined he was in there, doing it to her.

As the need, hunger and misery tore him apart, he forced himself to walk away.

He wasn't being fair to her.

Chapter Four

The next two days were the longest of what had already been a long life.

He made plans.

He thought it through.

Told himself he was making a mistake.

Convinced himself it was the right thing, only to start back at square one. Again.

By the time sun had set the day after the full moon, he had almost driven himself insane.

But he knew what needed to be done.

The plans were set.

Tickets had been purchased and arrangements had been made. He had one week to say goodbye.

Kit needed to explore the world. Find herself. Find who she was, who she had come from.

Two years. He needed to give her that…and he needed to give himself some time, some distance away from her, before he lost his mind.

Staring out over the horizon, watching the myriad of colors as the sun disappeared, Byron convinced himself this was what he needed to do. It was.

She was stifling here. So miserably unhappy. So much she hadn't seen or done.

It was time that ended.

Two years, damn it. He could handle two more years.

“You’re what?” Kit asked, almost soundlessly. She cleared her throat and spoke again, only slightly louder. Byron was sitting at his desk, looking for all the world like an upper-class businessman. He was wearing a white silk shirt, a black vest, unbuttoned, and a pair of black, trim-fitting pants. His hair would look ridiculous on some men—like a man trying to follow the trends—the way he kept it cut brutally short on the lower sides and the back, letting it fall long on the top and upper sides.

Kit loved his hair, loved how thick and soft it looked, loved the midnight-blackness of it. She knew his feet were bare and she knew he couldn’t do a damn thing with a computer. She did that for him, but he was a fucking genius when it came to mathematics, and he ran a small empire from this little enclave.

He was the youngest Hunter in America, and the youngest Master with his own Enclave. There had been others in history, but they hadn’t lasted long. So far, Byron had not only lasted, but thrived. He dismissed those facts as he dismissed his wealth, attributing it to luck.

Byron was more than a Hunter, even if he didn’t acknowledge that.

Kit knew it even if he didn’t. Byron was amazing. And together, they could be more so. But he didn’t want that. He didn’t want to share his life with her. He didn’t want her.

He was sending her away.

“It’s time you go to France and find out more about your mother’s people,” he said, forcing himself to ignore the wild pain in her eyes.

“You’re sending me away.”

“I’m not sending you away, Kit,” he said quietly. “There's a pack in France…your mother's family. They want to meet you. You'll spend some time with them, before you travel to visit your father's people.” He paused, studying her face. “Then you come back here. It's just for for two years.”

“You're sending me away,” she said again, keeping her voice level. He wasn’t going to appreciate another wailing, sniveling female. She couldn’t stop the pain from showing, but she’d be damned if she cried. “You’re sending me away, just like the rest. But I haven’t done anything.”

“No,” he agreed. “You haven’t done anything. It’s France, Katrine. Don’t you want to see France? Russia? It's your history, Kit. You'd mentioned you wanted to go sometime. It's time to do that.”

Not unless you are with me, she thought. She just stared at him, bleeding inside. Finally, through her tight throat, she asked, “Why?”

Byron stared at her and said nothing.

She swallowed, the sound horribly loud in the silence of the room. Her body felt terribly bruised and battered—strange. All she had done was walk in here and stand in front of the desk for a mere three minutes. And her whole life had just been irrevocably changed.

She turned and slowly walked away.

“Fuck,” she heard him say quietly. “You’ve never been anywhere else, sweet. You have to go see other things, try other things before you commit yourself to my world.”

“I’ve committed myself to this world already, Byron. Or have you forgotten?” she asked wearily.

He hadn’t, no. How could he forget the delirious, shameful pleasure that had filled him when she had petitioned the Council to join his Enclave, to join his world? It had given him the right to keep her, for always. But Byron knew he really didn’t have that right, because of the promise he had made to her father. He shouldn’t have agreed to take her in. But if he hadn’t, she would have been sent to another Hunter.

“Kit, you don’t belong here.”

She laughed—a horrible, wild sound that echoed through the room and it made them both wince. “Yes, I do,” she said. And then she left.

Byron felt shaken to his soul. He had never seen her eyes look quite that empty. Damn it, it was France. For a year. Then Russia. Another year. Then she was coming back. He’d damn well see to that. She didn’t truly think he’d let her leave him forever, did she?

She’d go, experience a little more of life than she could here, and then, when she returned, he’d—

Fuck, what in the hell was going on? Byron paced the room, hungry, mad, furious with himself and with her. She had looked so hurt, so unlike Kit.

He left his office for his rooms, ignoring Ben, the Inherent who lived with him, and Mathias, the vampire who served as his third in command, under Kit. All were under Kit. Kit was the only one he trusted with everything, and he had to send her away. Damn it all to hell and back, he thought furiously.

Byron tore off his fine clothes and donned tougher, darker clothes that would blend with the night as he hunted. He was a young Hunter and though he was strong, he wasn’t as arrogant as some. He wasn’t going to trust only his vampire abilities to save him. He knew how to fight, and he trained regularly. He made sure all his people did as well, in case anyone ever tried to bring a battle onto his territory.

He wanted a bloody fight tonight and he doubted hunting was a wise choice.

But Byron took to the woods and went searching for prey. He had set up his territory in a wooded area, buying enough land to provide himself and the wolves some privacy, but keeping them close to the city so he could hunt easily. He had known his duty was to keep his chosen prey nearby.

As always, he found it in Chicago. This, of course, was why he had chosen it as his territory. Even in his former life, this had been a large city and trouble had always been brewing. A few decades had not changed that. The method of madness had changed. More guns and drugs now, instead of fistfights and alcohol, but it was there.

He found his preferred prey in a rough neighborhood. They had been stalking a pretty young girl in a nurse’s uniform who was now fighting wildly against the two men who held her. There was a third, and Byron waited until the third had moved a little closer before he reformed and moved in, taking the man’s neck and snapping it like a twig before catching another in a mental hold and freezing him.

The third one hadn’t realized what was going on until the girl took off running. He started to go after her when Byron caught him and threw him against the wall with his inhuman strength. The blow caused the man’s head to split and start to bleed while Byron stared down into the man’s dazed eyes. “She doesn’t want to play, my friend,” he crooned, catching the man’s head and jerking it to the side before he struck. He took only a little, enough to establish a mental connection while he laid a path.

The next time this bastard tried to prey on any creature, it would be his last. If he faltered in any way, it would lead Byron back to him. Drawing back, staring into his eyes, Byron promised, “I will know. And I will kill you,” he promised roughly, a tiny drop of blood on his lower lip.

Then he turned to the third man. Because this one was already dead. He was the girl’s brother. She had gone to the police about her brother—she suspected he had something to do with another girl’s rape and murder. She’d been right—Byron saw that before he even touched the man’s mind. But she’d not been careful enough and her brother had found out.

This would have been her last night on this earth.

Byron smiled seductively, even pleasantly at the younger man, stroking his face as he listened and made sure the girl was far away. “A brave girl, your sister. She’ll prosper now. I’ll make certain. Ah, Max, isn’t it? Your sister is about to come into some money and she will find her way out of this hellhole, as you like to call it. I want you to know that, to know she will live a long and prosperous life.”

“Who the fuck are you?” Max tried to snarl. Not very effectively, since he was all but whimpering with fear.

The vampire flashed his fangs. Max tried to scream, but Byron pressed his thumb against his windpipe and cut off his air supply. Max was trying to tell his body to run, but Byron had already taken control of his mind and the human couldn’t move. “Why are you doing this?”

“Remember the girl you raped?” Byron murmured, pushing Max into the shadows, listening for any sign of another watching. “She was young, wasn’t she? Just a child, really. All that youth and innocence, and you destroyed it. What is that saying? Oh, yes. Payback is a bitch.” Byron took the memories that Max had been relishing and turned them back on him, only now, Max was in the girl’s position and he experienced the horror. Byron’s psychic skill wasn’t enough to make him actually suffer as much as the girl did, but he made sure the pathetic piece of scum had some inkling before he broke the link and grabbed him up from where he had fallen on the ground.

“Now do you know why?” Byron purred menacingly. “Do you know why I am going to kill you? You stalked and killed a child and would have done the same to your own blood.”

“You can’t just fucking kill me,” Max sobbed.

Byron laughed. “Yes, I can.” He wasn’t even going to feed here. He reached in with his mental hands, grabbed the man’s mind and crushed it, watching pitilessly as blood started to trickle and flood from the man’s eyes, ears and nose. He heard pounding footsteps and he knew company was coming.

He watched and waited until the last breath shuddered out, and then he let his mental grip go and the corpse fell at his feet.

Then he lost himself to the shadows as others began to arrive, drawn by the screams.

He was tired when he returned to the house, though it wasn’t even midnight. It had been an easy night as far as hunting goes. Sometimes, he was given an assignment, like the feral. Other nights, he just trolled, looking for scum like those he had found tonight.

Normally, on a night such as this he would have gone for more, but he was too fucking tired, and he knew it wasn’t the hunt.

It was Kit.

He could even smell her, the sweet, intoxicating scent of the soap he ordered for her directly from England. She went through bottles of it, then after she climbed from the bath, she would smooth oil onto her wet body, and her scent always lingered—

She was in his bed.

Naked.

It was not an odd thing for him to find a naked woman in his bed.

But a naked Kit, that was odd.

“Have a nice hunt?” she asked, her voice rough, soft, her eyes chilly.

“Kit—”

She pushed onto her knees and lifted a finger to her mouth. Then she trailed that finger down her body to trace over one nipple, then down her slim, golden torso before sliding through her naked folds.

“Damn it, Kit, don’t.” Byron stared at her hand, at the naked folds of her sex. She had waxed. The soft curls he had nuzzled the last time were gone, and the plump lips were naked and smooth. He could smell her over the distance that separated them, wet and hot, and still angry.

“Why not? You’re sending me away, that’s what you do with a woman, once you sleep with her. Eventually. Only I haven’t had that pleasure, so why not?” she asked, moving around again, this time to lie on her back, knees bent. “Won’t you give me just one night, Byron? Just one?”

His jaws ached and throbbed in time with his cock as he watched her start to stroke herself, her slim little fingers rubbing her wet, swollen clit until she was rocking her hips and moaning weakly in time with her movements. “I’m not sending you away,” he rasped, haltingly taking a step closer.

“Come and play, Byron,” she teased.

He moved closer, following the movement of her fingers, drawn by the scent of her body. Damn it, he loved her. He wanted her. He had for years, but this was Kit, Kris’s little girl, and he had promised to take care of her, not fuck her like she was some whore.

This was Kit. Not any other woman. She wasn’t for fucking.

“Come on,” she cajoled. Her lashes fluttered closed and she whimpered when he rested one knee on the bed and brushed her hand aside, replacing it with his, lowering his head to catch one large, dark nipple in his mouth. She had large breasts, especially for a woman as slender as she was, with big, dark nipples that always seemed to be erect. He bit down carefully, and groaned when she cried out and pressed harder against him and he started to pump two fingers in and out of her wet sheath.

Damn it, he couldn’t fight this anymore.

He sat up briefly, jerking his clothes off, before covering her and using his thighs to open hers. She brushed her hair aside, baring her neck, and Byron shuddered at the simplicity of the gesture as he licked her, sucking the fragile skin deep into his mouth. He started to enter her, probing the hot, wet entrance to her core, his body tensed and aching. She was tighter than he had expected. As he pushed the first two inches inside, her snug, silky little pussy convulsed around him and Byron groaned as she arched up, taking him slightly deeper.

Much tighter, but she was wet and slick, ready for him and her pulse beat madly against his mouth. Byron was so fucking hungry for her—for her sex and her blood. He drove deep, his fangs breaking through her skin just as his cock tunneled through her tight wet passage while she jolted in surprise at his rough invasion.

Kit, he reached out, touched her mind, felt her surprise—the pain, the shock, the need—as he drew one of her knees up over his hip, shuddering at the sweet, wet grip of her virgin pussy around his cock. Her blood rolled down his throat, ripe, powerful, rich. Kit, why didn’t you tell me?

“Why? So you could turn me down?” she asked bitterly.

“I don’t think I could have, not any longer,”he answered, a groan vibrating up from his chest. She felt the vibration of it through her neck as it shuddered down her chest, tightening her nipples, and pooling hot in her belly. He pulled his cock out, then surged back in, one big hand cupping the cheek of her ass lovingly. So sweet, Kit. So tight.

He pulled reluctantly away from her neck, licking away the drops of blood before leaning down, wanting to kiss her, but settling for rubbing his cheek to hers. He was surprised when she sought his mouth, surprised when the lingering taste of blood didn’t bother her. He started to pump his shaft inside her, loving the way she hugged his cock—tight, wet, snug, and only his. She rocked up to meet him, eagerly, hungrily, and he slammed into her harder, control forgotten. He moved and shifted her so that he could reach her clit and play with it while he fucked her. He felt her response when she cried out, the vibrations reaching down through her body and up through his cock, spreading over him, tightening his balls, heating his blood until he was certain his entire body would go up into sweet, hot flame.

Her bud was slick and swollen and hard. Byron shuddered as he pushed back inside her, keeping one hand on her thigh, holding it high, and open, watching as he drove in, almost hypnotized by the erotic sight of his own cock invading the wet little cleft. He couldn’t tear his gaze away as he pulled out—the flesh wet and gleaming—then pushed back between those plumps lips. The smooth flesh of her naked mound taunted him and he left her clit briefly to stroke the smooth lips, his gaze traveling her sweetly curved little body to meet her eyes as she moaned and reached for him.

Byron bent over her and caught her seeking hands, pinning them high over her head. “Are you mine tonight?” he asked her gutturally, driving deep inside the wet clasp of her pussy, feeling his orgasm rushing up. He had wanted her for too long and he couldn’t fight this. “Are you staying with me all night?”

“I’ve been yours for years, you idiot. I’ll be yours for always, if you’ll just open your eyes,” she said, her eyes blind and dazed as she lifted her head and tried to catch his mouth. He let her and shuddered as she sucked his tongue into her mouth greedily, biting down gently and wrapping her strong legs around his hips as he shafted her virgin body roughly. He kept her hands pinned with one of his and slid the other down, palming her tight little ass and lifting her higher against him, moving harder, more roughly into her as she started to convulse around him. The satin confines of her pussy tightened around him, growing wetter and hotter, until she started to come.

He swallowed her scream and pumped her full of his come, before he let his body fall briefly to rest on top of hers.

But only briefly.

Then he was carrying her into the bathroom, into the shower, where he started to soap her clean. He knelt in front of her, holding the hand-held nozzle, while the double wall-mounted sprays pounded them from both sides as he lifted her. Holding her weight in his hands easily, he admired the naked mound she had prepared for him. “Always teasing me, Kit,” he murmured as he nuzzled the sweet little mound. He slid his tongue through her folds and then he lifted his face and looked up at her, water beading on his lashes. “Open yourself up, baby,” he whispered.

He watched her swallow nervously and then her hands moved and she did it. Using both hands to spread the plump lips of her sex, she exposed the swollen bud of her clit. Byron turned the hot, massaging spray on her, grinning hotly as the sound of her wails echoed off the walls. He had dreamed of doing just this to her, for years.

Always teasing him, he had told her. She had loved to use his shower, even after he installed a similar one for her. He had walked into his bathroom once, thinking one of the human girls was in there. He had every intention of joining whoever he heard moaning so sweetly.

Kit had only just turned eighteen—he had known she had been experimenting, but how was he to know she had been masturbating in his fucking bathroom? She had been using the massaging showerhead on her clit and screamed in hoarse pleasure while Byron stood frozen, shocked, aroused, and hungry. She had opened her eyes, but instead of being embarrassed, the way an eighteen-year-old should have been, she had grinned at him, hot and sweet and inviting.

Now she started to rock against the pulse of the water, humming low in her throat, sobbing as the stimulation brought her to the edge hard and fast. Byron had lowered one of her small feet to the ground, still bracing her weight as he slid two fingers inside her, pumping deep as she keened and cried out. Each time she came a little closer, he backed off. And he started to work the natural lubrication of her body lower, pressing against the sweet pucker of her ass, wishing she wasn’t a fucking novice.

He was finally taking Kit, but he couldn’t take her the way he wanted.

Her eyes flew open at the alien caress but instead of pulling away, she pushed against him, and slid down on him, oh, fuck, taking his index finger completely up her snug little ass as she shuddered and screamed, flinching at the pain but riding it and rocking against the caress of the water.

Byron threw the shower nozzle away and leaned forward, catching her sensitized clit in his mouth. She screamed in startled, pained pleasure. Coming instantly, she rocked up and down, riding his mouth and riding the thick finger he had buried inside her ass. The shivers were still racking her when he stood, moving awkwardly to keep from dislodging her as he lifted her one-handed and drove inside, groaning as she continued to quake and shudder around him.

“Byron…” she sobbed, reaching up and tangling her hands in his wet hair, staring up into his face, her eyes hot and pleading.

He murmured softly, “Sweet little Kit, you feel so good. I’ve wanted this.” He punctuated it by driving deep, pounding into her, alternately with thrusts of his cock into her pussy and thrusts of his finger into her ass. “Will you let me fuck you here? You’re such a little thing, Kit. You’re so snug, so tight.”

“Anything,” she gasped, hot little chills racking her body as he invaded her from both front and rear. His large body covered hers completely, possessed her completely. His thick, long cock left her then burrowed back inside and she wanted to cry at the pleasure of it. Then he worked his finger back inside her ass and the hot, painful little pleasure drove her mad. Her nipples ached and burned and throbbed, his water-slicked chest rubbing against them as he fucked her.

His dark blue eyes stared into hers, full of need and something that looked like tenderness. Kit was bewildered. She tried to think past the need that fogged her brain. How could he care for her and still send her away? He lifted her mouth and kissed her roughly, one of his fangs nipping her lip. He caught the lingering drop of blood hungrily and sucked it away before he muttered, “Stop thinking and feel. Feel this, feel me. “ Driving inside, he held there, throbbing and still. Finally, he started to lift her, working her small, light body up and down his length. Reluctantly drawing his finger from her ass, Byron gripped her hips and stared into her stormy eyes.

He moved slowly at first, until she started to wriggle and squirm eagerly. Then he started to move her faster and faster until he pinned her against the wall and plundered her tight little pussy, filling her with hard, rough digs of his cock that had her screaming his name.

“I love you,” she wailed as she started to climax.

Byron shuddered against her and groaned as he came, whispering in her ear, “I love you, Kit.”

Moments later, she struggled out of his arms, and away, moving out of the shower. He tried to hold her but she was nearly as strong as he and if this wet, angry woman didn’t want to be held, well, she wasn’t going to be held.

“If you love me, then why are you sending me away?” she demanded, shoving her wet hair out of her face.

Byron turned off the water and moved out of the stall, staring down at the defiant woman in front of him. “Kit, your father was my best friend. I swore to him that I would see that you were happy. You’ve never known anything outside of this. How can you know if this makes you happy if it is all you’ve ever known?” he asked wearily. How can I know you'll stay? How can I know I'm what you want, if you've never seen anything else?

Kit pounded her fist against her chest. “I know how I feel, Byron. I look at you and I feel my heart. My other half. My soul mate.”

He cupped her face but she knocked his hand away. Sighing, he prayed for patience. “This is only for a while, Kit. To make sure you know this is what you want.”

She curled her lip at him, a derisive look on her face. “So I guess I’m to go out and fuck as many men as I need, party through all hours of the day, experience life or whatever bizarre idea you have in mind to make sure this is what suits me.”

Byron shoved down the insidious anger. She was trying to piss him off. He didn’t have to let her know it was working.

“It’s for a short while, Kit. And I’ve made up my mind,” he said firmly.

She smiled sweetly. “And I’ve made up mine,” she replied. She turned her back and started to walk away but Byron grabbed her. Snarling, he said, “You told me I could have tonight. “

“Go fuck yourself,” she snapped, squirming.

“Why? You’re here, and you’re mine, and you’re what I want,” he said, reaching down and cupping her. She was wet from him still. He started to pump his fingers inside, laughing when she stiffened against him before helplessly starting to ride his hand. He pushed her down to her hands and knees and drove inside. She wailed and twisted against him, clamping down around him.

Byron focused on the sweet keening wails that fell from her lips as he hunkered low over her body and fucked her slowly, wetting his finger again and sliding it inside the snug fit of her ass. She rocked back against him and he laughed. “Still want me to go fuck myself?” he asked, slapping her ass.

She jumped and cried out, startled. He did it again, and she clamped down on his thick cock and came, quick and hard. She started pushing back on him hungrily, looking for another spank, another climax. “See?” he teased. “It’s more fun to fuck you.” He shoved her to the floor and wrapped her hair around his free hand, baring her neck before he struck. His fangs sank through the fragile skin, through the marks he had made earlier, and he fed again, groaning in rapture against her sweet skin.

She cried out and arched up, pushing her ass against him, and he gripped her hip, riding her hard until they both came.

They argued again.

They fucked again.

They showered again.

They ended up in her room, where Byron went through the sex toys she had bought and he had decided he would use them on her until she saw reason.

Kit had already seen reason. And she wasn’t giving in to him just because he was a big, sexy vampire who was used to getting his way.

“For crying out loud, I’m not sending you away!” he shouted. “It’s just for a while. It doesn’t even have to be two years. A year. Okay? One fucking year. And if you’re still so fucking sure after it’s over, then so be it.”

He had to be sure, damn it. If she grew tired of this, decided this wasn't what she wanted…he'd go insane if she left him later on. If she was going to walk, she had to do it now. Before he lost himself to her any more than he already had.

Her eyes were cool, flat as she stared back at him. “If you send me away, I won’t come back.” Point blank.

Byron froze. “Don’t say that.”

She lifted her chin and repeated herself. “I mean it. I’m sure the Council can find something for me. If I leave here, that’s it. I’m gone for good. I'm sure I'll have plenty of chances to experience life while I'm out there. You won't have to worry about me anymore.”

He snarled at her and pinned her to the bed, taking her hands high over her head and tying them tight. Even an Inherent needed to be able to have leverage in order to take advantage of her strength, and he had just taken that away. Taking one of the vibrators, he spread her legs wide and pushed it inside.

Kit glared at him even as her mouth parted in a surprised “Oh.”

“Say it again,” he rasped. “Tell me you won’t come back to me.”

“I won’t—”

Flicking it on, he pressed it deeper inside and lowered his head to the sensitive flesh at her thigh, nicking it with his fangs. “Tell me you'll come back, Kit. Damn it, say it.”

“Not if you make me leave,” she gasped.

Lifting his head from her thigh, he stared at her. “Wrong answer,” he whispered. Flipping her over on to her hands and knees, he spread the cheeks of her ass and licked her there, listening to her embarrassed little shriek. He used his legs to pin her in place while he picked up another toy, this one a slender wand-shaped dildo with a flared base that was designed for anal use.

He lubricated it and slid it inside her, listening to her hungry cries as she tried to muffle them in the bed. He steadily slid it in even when she tried to squirm away. “Stop moving—you’re making it worse, Kit,” he told her impassively. Once it was lodged inside her ass, he moved her onto her back and pushed the vibrator back inside, teasing her, toying her, waiting until orgasm was just a breath away. And then he'd back off, deliberately holding the release from her. “Tell me that you’ll come back.”

Finally, she sobbed out, “Damn it, I don’t want to leave! But your sending me away will kill me. If I leave, I am not coming back.”

He moved up on her, taking the toy out and driving his cock inside. She whimpered in pain, in pleasure, in need, taking him deep inside. “Say you’ll come back to me,” he ordered roughly.

She sobbed out his name and screamed as the climax rolled through her before he was even halfway inside her. Byron shuddered and worked his cock completely in, pulled out and burrowed back in. She wouldn’t truly stay away, not Kit, he thought as he rode her, her sweet wet pussy hugging him tightly as he slid back inside.

She belonged to him. She belonged here.

Then why are you sending her away?

Byron drove desperately into her, as the sunrise came ever closer. Kit’s bedroom was full of windows and he could sense the lightening in the sky outside. Her silky cleft was swollen from being ridden all night, but she still lifted for him, still clung to him eagerly. Byron buried his face in her neck and groaned as his climax raged over him, building at his spine and burning through his balls and his cock.

Chapter Five

Byron gathered a slumberous Kit into his arms and carried her back to his room. A niggling little doubt was in the back of his mind as Kit nestled into his bed next to him. He clamped both arms tightly around her waist and asked, “Stay here?”

“Can’t,” she evaded. “Hungry. Need another bath.”

A vampire’s sleep wasn’t one that could be fought off until he had several centuries behind him. Byron only had one and a handful of years. “You're staying here, damn it,” he said, kissing her roughly. “ I love you.”

“I love you,” she said quietly, stroking one hand down his arm.

Byron listened to her steady heartbeat as sleep caught and held him. He should have made the others watch her. If he ordered them to make sure she stayed—he woke up remembering that was a foolish thought. She had agreed to come back.

Then he froze as he climbed from bed.

No.

She hadn’t.

Of course, he hadn’t told her when she would be going. And now he was thinking he really didn’t want her to go at all.

So the sensible thing to do was—

“The sensible thing? Now? When my bebè is gone he wants to do the sensible thing?”The voice that rolled through the room was one he had not heard in over two decades. Kristof was gone. Dead and gone. Of course, it was unmistakable, the odd blend of Russia and France. “That is much sense you make now. The sensible thing.”

And the voice that followed was also one that belonged to somebody dead. All French elegance and fancy French sex. Byron turned slowly and saw the two very solid, if somewhat, well, ghostly, forms hovering by the door.

“Shit.”

Kris laughed, his head falling back, that familiar joyful laugh that he had passed on to his daughter. “So eloquent, my friend. You have stepped into shit, you have. She say what she mean, my Kit. She will not come back to you.”

“I didn’t send her away!” Byron shouted.

Bella smiled sympathetically.”That is how Katrine sees it, Byron. And if you want her back, then you will have to go to her and bring her back. Now.”

“She needs some time to—”

“Bah,” Kris spat. “Time? For what? To be lonely and miss you? Is that what you would have my bebè do for two years? Is this how you take care? By letting her be lonely? She is your mate. Bella tells me this, long before I died. I try to tell you, when I died. And I tell you now. Go to her now, or you lose her.”

It was then that Byron remembered something he had forgotten. “My Bella is telling me…da, you had best remember that. Kit will want what she wants.”

Kit will want what she wants.

“She'll want what she wants,” he whispered. Looking back at Kris, he went to speak.

But they were gone.

The room was empty.

Dropping to sit on the bed, he sat there, staring at his big rough hands.

Shit.

It would have been nice if Kit’s parents had bothered to tell him where their daughter had gone.

He hadn't told her where she was going, when. So it was unlikely she knew about the flight plan. He was still setting that up and hell, it was his plane she'd be flying on, so it wasn't like she could do that on her own.

Rising, he snagged a pair of jeans. Maybe she wasn't gone. Maybe…

But he was fooling himself. Her absence was already an ache inside.

A search of the house revealed she was indeed gone. She hadn’t taken the car he had given her when she had come home from college, or anything else he had given her.

All she'd taken were the clothes she'd bought for herself. Her anger. A few personal items. That was it.

The house felt empty with her. Although he caught her scent everywhere. The scent of her anger. The scent of the soap she used. The simple, lovely scent of her. She was everywhere.

And nowhere.

It was driving him crazy. Ben eyed him warily as he ordered the other wolf to do a websearch for her. She hadn't been using her credit cards, Byron already knew that. Made it that much harder to track apparently.

Damn it, where was she?

She wouldn’t go to France, Byron suspected. She would know he’d come for her eventually and she would not be where she could easily be found or brought back. So she’d either go to ground or go someplace where she would be protected.

And then he felt like pounding the wall with his fist.

She’d already told him where she was going.

The fucking Council.

Chapter Six

Byron stared at Agnes and fought the urge to blush. She had a way of making him feel like a recalcitrant school boy and today was no exception.

She looked like she was his great-great-grandmother. She was an amazing witch, and one of the most respected members of the Council, but she was also downright mischievous.

“Don’t tell me she isn’t here,” he warned, trying hard to keep his tone respectful. “I can hear her breathing and I can smell her. I won’t leave.”

Agnes smiled and took her long cloak from the peg beside the door. “I’m thinking I’ll be going into town. For a day or two. The inner rooms are safe from sunlight . Come on inside…no reason to just stand there, is there?” After a quick wink, she threw the cloak over her shoulders and moved away, much quicker than a woman of her age should have been able to move.

Byron crossed the threshold and moved inside. He was tired, he was fucking hungry and he was pissed. The Council hadn’t told him a damned thing and he had been reduced to asking individuals.

Fortunately, the first one he had asked had known him, vaguely, but known him all the same. Malachi had looked at him, narrowed his ancient eyes. “You’re a friend of Eli’s.”

“Yes.” He hadn't been interested in chatting about old acquaintances. He just wanted to know where Kit was. That was all he wanted, damn it.

And something of that must have shown in his eyes, because Malachi's smile took on a decidedly devious slant.

“Fucked up, did you?” he'd asked. “Go ask Agnes. She has a woman at her place. A wolf, if my sense of smell serves me. And I’d say it does. I’m smelling the same woman all over you.”

Byron had dashed out without even hearing Malachi’s soft, “Good luck. Lucky bastard.”

Now he was searching for her. Her scent filled the large house, it was everywhere. And she was nowhere.

“What are you doing here?”

He turned and saw her staring at him, wearing a big man’s shirt. Narrowing his eyes, he realized it was his shirt. He moved and had her around the waist without even realizing it, kissing her hungrily, greedily, his hands sliding up the shirt to find her naked little body warm and soft.

“You left me,” he accused, pulling away to glare at her.

“You sent me away,” she snapped, her eyes hot with indignation. “And get off of me before I hit you again.”

“You weren’t supposed to leave yet, and I’d changed my fucking mind,” he snarled back, catching the hands she was shoving against his chest and pinning them behind her back. “I hadn’t told you to leave yet, had I? Stubborn little brat. Have you forgotten yourself? Forgotten me?”

Kit refused to struggle once she realized she wasn’t getting away. His big, heavy body had her effectively pinned against the wall at this point, his cock cuddled against the softness of her belly, one hand holding her wrists behind her back. Staring at his chest, refusing to look at his face, she said, “I wasn’t going to be thrown out on my ass. I’ve got more pride than that.”

“Damn you,” Byron snarled as he released her wrists and caught her face in his hands, tangling them in her dark hair, kissing her roughly. “I wouldn’t have thrown you out. You would have been put in a fucking limo, driven to the fucking airport, and flown to fucking France on my fucking plane. And you fucking know it! Why are you doing this?”

She tore her eyes away from his chest and made herself meet his furious eyes. They were hot, wild and gleaming. His fangs had slid down and were flashing in his anger. The air in the room felt thick with it. Her own anger had burned out on the flight here, but staring at him now was causing a different kind of heat. “Why?” she asked softly. “You want to know why ?”

“Yes. I want to know why,” he growled, lowering his face until they were mouth to mouth. “I did not want to take you into my service. You were my ward, and I did not want you to have to serve and obey any Master, even one who would indulge you. But you chose to enter our world and now you are openly and flagrantly violating our laws. You left me without my consent. You could very easily be punished by the Council, whether I will it or no, so, yes, I want to know why.”

“You had already made the choice to send me away, Byron. The fact that the act wasn’t yet complete doesn’t mean that much. You didn’t want me anymore,” she stated simply. “I couldn’t stay there anymore.”

“After the night we spent together, you can actually think I don’t want you?” he rasped, his fingers tightening in her hair to the point of pain.

She smiled sadly. “Not enough to keep me.”

Byron felt his heart break as a tear rolled down her cheek. “Damn it, Kit,” he rasped, bending down and catching it in his mouth. “You’re coming back. You’re mine.” He grabbed the edges of the shirt and jerked it off of her, exposing her body.

“I won’t come back if you think you can just send me away for a year. Two years. Even two fucking weeks,” she swore, folding her arms over her breasts and glaring at him.

“You haven’t heard a thing I’ve said, have you, Kit?” he muttered, taking her wrists and forcing them down to her sides. He knelt in front of her small, sweetly scented body and caught one rosy nipple in his mouth, raking her flesh with a sharp fang and groaning when a drop of blood appeared. He licked it away and suckled on the tiny wound until no more flowed. Then he pulled away and stared up into her eyes. “I changed my mind. You’re coming back with me. You belong with me, to me. As much I belong to you.”

He released her wrists, grabbed her hips and pulled her to the floor, feasting on the taste of her, catching her clit in his mouth and suckling it until she was moaning and crying his name. He stroked downward from her cleft, using the natural lubrication from her body to probe her rosette and he shuddered when she opened for him, when she started to rock helplessly against him as he drove his tongue inside her pussy while he screwed his finger in and out of her ass, then added a second.

He worked her close to orgasm before he turned her onto her knees and shredded his clothes. A hot musky power seemed to be filling the room, pouring from him, and Kit shuddered with it as it washed over her. She knew too much about vampires not to realize what it was. Byron was coming into more of his power, and his call was increasing. She just hadn’t realized how very susceptible she would be to it.

Her body was too hot, too tight, too hungry for him and she was certain she would die if she didn’t get him inside her. When she felt him probing the entrance to her bottom, she quivered and tried to shift, force him inside her pussy, where she needed him. He snarled at her and she felt his dominance roll over her, just like his call and she stilled, her head falling forward, her torso dropping to rest on the floor while he continued to draw the moisture from her cleft to her anus.

Byron hadn’t ever felt anything like what was breaking loose inside him—he couldn’t fight it, couldn’t question it. He had to be inside her, had to do it this way, had to do it now. The shuddering, creeping power inside him was almost as arousing as the sight of her slick, wet folds and the scent of her arousal and sex as he prepared her ass for his invasion. It rolled from him, like waves from the ocean, and it affected Kit almost as much as it affected him.

He gripped the cheeks of her ass in his big hands and pulled her apart, stretching her a bit as he pressed his cock against her. She whimpered. Byron said roughly, “Hush, now, Kit. Give me this now. You can take it, I promise.” As he spoke, the subtle power increased, and when it did, she became more aroused and forgot the burning pain as he pushed inside the tight virgin hole that he had lubricated.

He whispered to her again, and when he did, she cried out, as though his voice was touching her. “You’re tight, hot, sweet. Push against me. You will like it.” She bore down and he slid deeper inside.

Kit cried out. The more he talked, the hotter she became. It felt like his voice had developed a hand of its own and was touching her clit with every word he spoke. As he pushed deeper inside her ass, he spoke and whispered and she whimpered and cried, until he was completely seated inside her. He was too big, stretching her too tightly, too full and even his whispering roughly to her didn’t help. Then he started to pump inside her, and the burning, tearing pain increased. Kit screamed and said, “Byron, stop, please!”

She started to beg even as the pain turned into sweet, glorious pleasure with each hot, deep thrust. Then she begged even more, begged for him not to stop, as he pushed her hips lower and filled her with hard, rough digs of his cock.

Bent over her, he licked her neck before sinking his fangs into her, his weight carrying her to the floor.

Her hot blood flooded his mouth, rolled over his tongue and down his throat as his balls grew tight and tingled as the orgasm rushed closer. She felt like silk around his cock, dragging and clinging with each thrust, pushing that sweet little ass against him, moaning and crying and begging, “Harder, Byron, oh, please, again!” He lifted them back up a little so he could drive deeper inside and he shuddered as she screamed. She gripped his cock like a silk fist, tight, hot and he pushed back inside as he reached between her thighs and pinched her clit, found it tight and hard and swollen, and he drew his fangs from her neck so he could rumble at her ear, “Next time, I’m going to find somebody to fuck your sweet little pussy while I fuck your ass. Will you like that?”

She shuddered and pushed harder against him, clenching her buttocks around his cock and mewling when he started to fuck her dripping vagina with his fingers. “Tell me, Kit, will you like it?”

“Yes!”

He pushed inside, held there just as she started to come, screaming in short, hard peals that echoed off the walls.

Byron pulled his hand from her pussy and shifted, crouching over her on his knees so he could drive inside her, hard, deep and fast, as his climax built and exploded out of his cock and he flooded the tight, hot little rosette that held him so snugly. Something inside him broke open, echoed inside her. He roared out her name and she cried out his while her convulsive climax milked the semen from his shaft.

Byron came to rest atop her body and then he rolled to the side, drawing her into the curve of his body and burying his face in her hair. He felt something inside his heart that hadn’t been there before.

Her. Kit.

Kit smiled sleepily. Through the new bond, she felt his surprise. “I told you,” she said, squirming against him. He still hadn’t withdrawn from her and she could feel him pulse inside her.

He pushed against her and she felt his renewing arousal, then his alarm as he felt the burning pain that she was feeling. She clamped down on his arm and held tight. “I’m fine,” she whispered. “Need a bath. Then you can take me to bed and put your cock to use in a little more traditional manner.”

“You really did know,” he whispered as he braced a hand on her hip and gently pulled out of the sweet embrace of her ass. She flinched, tried to hide it, and Byron cursed himself viciously, then he scooped her into his arms and carried her into the bathroom. “I’m sorry, sweet,” he murmured against her hair. He knew now what had happened. It wasn’t just the mate-bond, but his own power increasing. The call tended to get stronger with age, and usually happened gradually, not in the middle of sex. His shouldn’t have increased for a good fifty years. But that was what had happened. His had just taken the mother of all leaps, and with Kit, of all people. He couldn’t fight it, neither could she, but he damn well could have just found a better way to fuck her.

“No, you couldn’t have,” she said as she gingerly settled down on the edge of the bathtub. He glared at her.

She grinned cheekily at him. “Not very fun having somebody know your every waking thought, is it, Master Vampire?” she asked. Then she slid him a hot, smoky look from under her lashes and purred, “You know how hot it made me, dreaming of you doing just that to me some day? I loved it, every second. How hot you were, the way it felt when you opened me and just stared at me before starting to slide your cock inside me—”

Byron felt himself harden as she spoke and he growled, “Enough, Kit.”

“Even the way it hurt at first, and how you told me I could take it,” she whispered.

“Enough,” he groaned, glaring at her. “Right now, I can’t,” he snapped, moving closer and jerking her hips against him. He stroked one careful finger against her bottom and she arched against him, crying out at the burning pain and he said, “See? You can’t do this again, not here. Not yet. So stop teasing me.” The signs of her very obvious pain and the sympathetic backlash through their new bond were enough to cool his burning lust, and he released her slowly.

She pulled away and went for the cabinet where Agnes kept some of her more basic ointments and brews. She found the oil she needed and added it to the bath. “I’ll be right as rain come morning. Between this, and my own healing—”she ended with a shrug and started to step into the bath but he lifted her and gently put her down into the slowly rising water.

She watched with lifted brows as he started to shuck his own clothes. “You’re going to smell all herbal,” she told him, admiring the long, muscular lines of his body. He had the widest damn shoulders, with a vee of hair on his chest that thinned down to a fine line over his muscled belly before widening just over his sex. His cock was long, thick, softer now, and smooth, hanging over his furred sac. As she stared, his cock started to harden and Byron snorted out a muffled half curse, half laugh.

“Damn it, Kit, how am I supposed to not fuck you again if you keep looking at me like that?”

She tossed him an arch look and said, “I expect you to fuck me again. I just said we’ll use your cock in a more traditional manner.” She scooted forward a little as he moved into the tub and eased down behind her, wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin on her crown.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you,” he whispered.

She knew he wasn’t talking about the sex. He had finally gotten it through his old-fashioned head that sending her away had damaged her pride and her heart. A smile curved her mouth. “Did it make you mad when you realized I had left?” she asked.

“Mad? No. Insanely furious? Yes.” He gripped her tightly and rasped, “You won’t do that again, Kit. I mean it.”

“I’m your mate, now, Byron. You’re no longer my Master. The Council will no longer recognize that tie,” she reminded him.

Byron groaned and slammed his head back against the wall. “Are you trying to drive me crazy?” he demanded.

“No. I’m trying to get you to see you’ll have to start treating me as your equal. Shouldn’t be too hard. You’re only a century old. You’re not as antiquated as some of the other vampires. But I’m your mate, your equal. No longer your second, or your servant,” she said, squirming and wriggling until she was facing him. Then she kissed him, pushing her tongue hungrily into his mouth, reaching down and massaging his cock. She blindly sought out some soap and added it to the massage and once she was certain he was clean, she straddled him and drove herself down on him, sucking his tongue into her mouth and shivering as his hands came up to cup her breasts.

He drove his thick shaft up inside her, head falling back so that he could stare up into her sweet, heart-shaped face as she rode him, her slim, muscled thighs lifting her body up and down, working her pelvis against his. He reached between them and stroked her clit and she sobbed out his name.

He felt her orgasm and he started to push harder up into her sleek wet pussy, water splashing onto the floor over the rim of the tub. Her eyes swirled and glowed in her lust, burning hot with her power and her need, her nipples stiff and hard. He groaned and leaned forward, catching one in his mouth and biting, suckling, feeling her pleasure through the bond until it mingled with his own as their combined orgasm rushed at them.

She was still gasping for breath. He had something he wanted to ask her, but he was going to wait. He’d let her rest. He’d rest. They’d go into town tonight and he would buy her dinner at some fine restaurant, where he could watch candlelight dance on her mellow-gold skin. Maybe dancing. And he needed a ring. Maybe Agnes could help—

Her slim fingers threaded through the longer hair that fell from the top and sides of his head and she tugged his face up from her breasts where he had been pondering how to propose. After more than a century of living, he wanted to make sure the one time he did it, he did it right.

“Byron, I was thinking…you want to get married?”

Her laughing eyes met his, and he started to laugh. Equals. She had beat him to it.

He kissed her and laughed into her mouth. “Why the hell not?”

The Hunters: Jonathan and Lori

by

Shiloh Walker

First digital printing 2004

Please note: This is the original 2004 version—it has been revised, but no new material has been added.

The Hunters: Jonathan and Lori

© Copyright Shiloh Walker, 2004

Cover Art Angela Waters

Chapter One

Jonathan wasn’t having a very good day.

His back was aching, his head ached, he was hungrier than hell, hornier than he had ever been, blood was seeping from a ragged gash in his side, there was a full moon coming, and he was itching to go run.

And Lori was staring up at him with those wide sea-green eyes and her hair was spilling down around her shoulders as she tended the deep gash in his side that he’d received while out on patrol.

As she deftly probed the injury with gentle hands, she said, “This isn’t healing like it ought to. What made it?”

Curtly, he answered, “Something sharp.”

Clucking her tongue, she placed her hand over it and he winced as burning, healing heat leapt from her body and into his.”No need to get nasty. What made it?”

“Silver.”

Her full mouth firmed into a thin, narrow line and her eyes went flat.”Have you told Eli?”

“Not yet.” He clenched his teeth as her healing magic intensified and spread upward from his side, and down, chasing the myriad aches and pains, seeking and finding them, soothing them away.

All but one…

His cock ached, his body hungered for hers. Sweet, sweet Lori, with her wide green eyes and that fall of red curls…too soft and sweet for him.

“You need to let him know.”

Her soft, throaty voice broke into his reverie and he glanced down into her eyes.”I will. When he gets back from Paris with Sarel. They haven’t taken any time alone together in years. They need this.”

“I can—”

“No. I know you can speak to both of them and I don’t need you to. Eli is my master and if I needed him, he would know, whether I wished it or not.” He narrowed his eyes at the young witch staring up at him and said warningly, “He left me in charge, Lori. Contacting him is defying me. Defying me is defying him.”

With a muffled, “Harrumph,” she turned on her heel and stalked away to dispose of the rags she had used to clean his wounds.”He needs to know it’s happening again.”

“Damn, girl, do you think he doesn’t? This is his territory. It happened here. He knew the moment it happened.” Jonathan stood slowly, stretching his arms overhead, feeling the pull of newly healing skin and passing aches. Sliding Lori’s rounded backside a look as she bent over her cabinet and tidied up, he muffled a groan.

“Eli knows everything that happens on his land. He is connected to it, in ways we will never understand.” Jonathan felt blood start to pound slowly through his veins, in slow hot waves. A growl was building in his chest and he ached…

An itch settled along his spine, in his palms, as the beast inside him tried to rouse in response to his hunger, but he pushed it down inside.

“Jonathan?”

He lifted his head and met her eyes, staring at her in silence. Her scent—soft and sweet—vanilla, lavender, and woman. Damn it.

He wanted her. He had for the past seven years, since she had first come to Eli’s enclave. In the depths of her sea-green eyes, he could see his reflection as he stared hungrily at her. The pulse in her neck leapt to life as she looked up at him and licked her lips, the room filling with the scent of her body growing ripe with arousal.

She was far too aware of him, Jonathan knew that. And he wanted her far too much for his own good.

He always had, always would.

He adored the fiery little hellcat, that sweet little minx.

And she was too damned innocent for the likes of him and his damned black soul.

Without saying a word, he turned on his heel and left.

“What was that?” Lori whispered into the suddenly hot room.

Pressing her hand to her chest, she dragged a breath of air in and caught his scent again. Jonathan’s scent, wild and uniquely his. The scent of pine and sandalwood, earth and male, all blended together.

She closed her fist around the drying drops of blood in her hand, his blood.”Safe,” she prayed, lifting her eyes heavenward.”Keep him safe, dear God.” Heat smouldered in her hand, and when she opened her eyes and her hand, the blood was gone. A smile danced on her lips as she went about setting her workroom to rights.

Keeping Jonathan safe was something that would take divine intervention, all right.

The werewolf courted disaster, it seemed.

Or it stalked him.

This was the third time he had been the target of some unseen attacker. wolfsbane had been filtered into their water the first time. Declan had been visiting and he had fallen prey to it before Jonathan had returned from his prowling. But since Declan was only part were, he wasn’t as susceptible to it and didn’t fall into the painful convulsions, the coma, or any of the other nasty symptoms that were a prelude to death.

Sarel and Lori had used magick to find the source of his sudden, mysterious illness as one other shifter suddenly fell to the floor in convulsions and died only thirty minutes later. They’d lost him, but it had been they’d known something bad was going on and they’d been able to save the rest of the wolves, including Jonathan.

Of course, finding the unknown attacker had proven to be difficult.

Furious, enraged, and unable to strike, Eli had damn near torn his entire territory apart looking for the unseen attacker. There had been no trace, no sign of who had done it.

More than a year had passed since they had buried Philippe.

And three months since the last attack, one that had been directed solely at Jonathan. Jonathan had been sleeping after the night of a full moon, and spending that day in bed with Sheila, the sweet, sassy Southern vamp who had been with them for the past eight years—Lori had nearly died with envy.

That evening after Sheila had left the safety of Jonathan’s little cottage to hunt—and to Hunt—he had fallen into a deep sleep, exhausted, sated, sleeping like the dead. And a witch had crept into his dreams as he’d slept and held him caught in the grip of an unnatural sleep while another attacker tried a more silent approach, a death spell.

But magick couldn’t be done on Eli’s grounds without his witches knowing, especially when he was wed to one, and one was deeply in love with Jonathan.

Lori had felt it before Sarel and had sounded an alarm, but she wasn’t sure how to protect him. She wasn’t a warrior.

That was her sister.

Sarel had launched an all-out attack.

But little good it had done them.

Their enemy had stolen away into the night yet again.

But this time, Sarel had caught something, a trace of him. And she had announced that it was the same bastard that had captured Jonathan and Lori years before as bait for Eli.

“So four times, truly,” she said to herself.

“Talking to yourself, now?”

Turning her head, she saw the petite blonde standing behind her. With a welcoming smile, she gestured to Sheila to come on in.”Just pondering. Jonathan was hurt again.”

“So I gathered. I smell his blood all over the place. Normally, it would be an enticing smell.” Wrinkling her pert nose, Sheila sauntered into the room, her rounded hips swaying from side to side beneath the long, slim denim skirt.”I smell…silver. Rosemary, earth from the grave, how very lame. Foxglove. The smells are very, very faint. But I’d bet they tried to curse the knife that cut him. Do you think it carried weight?”

“Shit.”

Lori blew her bangs out of her eyes and flopped onto the lounge, staring up at the ceiling bleakly. No wonder it had seemed so easy. Healing him had been a walk in the park, but she hadn’t he hadn’t lingered long enough for her to do anything more and in order for her to check for spells, she would have had to examine him.

Jonathan would have loved that.

They gathered around, staring up into the dimly glowing orb. The past death spell hadn’t been subtle enough. The warrior witch had sensed it coming from far off.

They could feel her kind and they’d known the minute she’d reacted. Two had died in the backlash of her retaliation. They wouldn’t make such a mistake again.

But they wouldn’t give up, either.

So they’d waited.

This time, they’d taken a more subtle approach.

A simple fight.

Hunters got into them all the time, after all.

And this one was even more prone to them.

Hot-headed, rash, and easily provoked, it hadn’t taken much to lure him to violence.

The knife had steeped in the curse for a long time. They had taken pains to be subtle with it, a necessity. There wasn’t any warrior witches around now, but there was still a witch. She was young. Strong enough, but young.

If the spell was subtle and didn’t go to work right away, she wasn’t likely to sense it until it was too late.

Once the spell had its hooks in the young wolf, he’d be theirs.

He already had enough darkness in him. All it would take was be tripping the right switch, they figured.

Jonathan couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see, and couldn’t speak.

Opening his eyes, he struggled to sit up, feeling something alien inside his mind.

Something foul, evil.

Flipping onto his side, lungs aching, he reached for the knife at his bedside table. The instinct was to attack. He didn’t know what he wanted to attack, where the fight was, but something was wrong...

Then he scented magick. Something else inside him besides that darkness. It smelled of green things and spring time and woman. Lori—

He felt a rush into his mind, something clean and pure. Her power flooded his mind and the weight left his chest. Sucking air into his lungs, he opened his eyes and saw the ceiling above his bed.

Don’t move, Jonnie. They aren’t gone yet, Lori whispered into his mind.

The insidious creeping evil lingered inside him as Lori continued to push onward inside, forcing the blackness out, her light, easy power overtaking everything inside him until he could breathe, could move without feeling the pain, the suffocating evil that was trying to control and become him—be him.

Trying to claim the wolf. The beast that had become part of him when he’d become were.

Let them try, little brother, the wolf offered, laughing. The wolf inside him gaped his mouth in a lupine grin, but Jonathan was enraged.

Not in this life.

He changed. The wild, edgy, raw power that was werewolf exploded inside him, untamed and rampant, so close to the full moon. Long brown hair thickened, changing to a pelt as his head fell back, a muzzle forming, teeth lengthening and exploding from his gums, blood pooling inside his mouth as they tore through. His muscles flexed as fur flowed and rippled along his skin, bones breaking and reforming. Ebony claws shot out from his nails, hooked and deadly, flashing in the light. He dropped to his knees, a ragged growl rolling from his throat as the rain of fur raced down his spine, his clothes falling in tatters to the floor.

The lean, muscled wall of his chest rippled like water as those muscles started to shift and change, becoming obscured by the flow of fur. A deep, dark brown fur flowed across the length of his body as he shuddered and slammed his hands against the floor, his legs popping and shifting as the change continued. The fur on his thighs was thicker, but shorter and silkier, continuing down his legs until it ended in slightly longer tufts around his ankles, and very short stubbly fur on the top of his feet.

Changing was painful, but the adrenaline dulled the worst of it and when he rose to his feet, he was ready to fight. Ready to tear into whatever had tried to attack him.

Thicker, more heavily rounded muscles rippled as he looked around. Nearly a head taller now, at six feet eight, he searched the room, his eyes glowing gold.

The evil presence in his mind faltered as the wild power of werewolf permeated the room and forced her suffocating presence back.”What do you want?” he growled.

“You…” He felt a seductive stroke caress him, rippling through his body, around it, over it.

Jonathan snarled and jerked back, away from the power, and the evil beauty it offered.”Too fucking bad. You can’t have me,” he rasped, forcing the words out. Speaking the words felt alien and awkward on his tongue.

“Darling, I already have you.”

Jonathan would rather not admit that he was a bit afraid that she wasn’t lying, or bluffing.”Yeah? Then where in the hell are you?”

The drifting music of a woman’s laughter came floating to him.”I’ll be around, my wolf.”

The wildness inside him exploded and the wolf inside him took control. He threw his head back, baying, howling, the sound rising and falling. A dozen weres answered him throughout the enclave and Jonathan snarled savagely, triumphantly, as he felt the evil falter inside him.

Jonathan banished the creeping, wild power, and the wolf receded as it recognized that Jonathan was once again himself. As the fur melted away inside his skin and the power faded away, from his human form Jonathan looked up, smiled and said quietly, “Yeah? Well, I’ll be waiting.

As he spoke, he rose to his feet, easily, in a smooth lazy motion, his naked, golden body gleaming in the dim light.

“Insolent dog,” she hissed into his mind. Something slammed into him—her power, dark and cold. Like she was trying to rip him apart. Rip him apart from the inside out, using nothing but her magic and it hurt.

Bellowing, his hands clutching at his head, he went back down, this time to his knees, writhing in agony as she rummaged through his soul like a box of clothes. He felt her picking up bits and pieces and tossing them aside as each one proved to be empty of what she sought.

“Change, you fucking dog.”

Gritting his teeth, Jonathan bared a mean semblance of a smile at her and said, “Go fuck yourself,” before his eyes rolled up and his back arched as a spasm of agony raced through him.

“Change, change, change!”

Lori felt the angry flow of power in the small cottage from outside in the yard. She leaped the fence and narrowed her eyes at the door. It opened accordingly and she darted inside. She really should learn to knock, maybe tomorrow…

That foul, evil presence permeated the air, almost choking her as she raced down the hall on bare feet. Staring through the dim light, she studied the shadow that was Jonathan and waited as darkness gathered around him.

The shadows were of people who weren’t truly there, though their presence was real enough. Lori could hear their whispers to him, faintly, very faintly. Turn you fucking dog. Change now!

Change, change, change!

That high-pitched, miserable ear-piercing shriek—Lori shook her head and threw off the echoes of the voice she couldn’t really hear.

“He doesn’t belong to you,” she said firmly, certainly. “He made his vows, his allegiances long ago. And none were made to you.”

Unholy shrieks filled the air and eerie eyes pivoted and locked on her as she pushed through the heavy presence that filled the room, striding confidently to his side. Kneeling beside him, she placed one hand on his shoulder.

“Come on, Jonnie...listen to me,” she whispered, using her own magick to push the darker threat away.

It tried to cling to them both, but Lori knew dark magick. She wasn’t a warrior. She didn’t have to be a warrior, though, to burn through the oily taint in the air. Flooding the cottage with her own power, she burned through the awful magick until it was all but gone.

Only seconds after she’d started, color returned to Jonathan’s face and he surged from the floor. Evil, dirty power lashed through the room and struck at him as he rose. He swayed, but remained upright.

He is tainted. We can take what is tainted.

Jonathan’s mouth twisted in a pained smile. “Unworthy, perhaps. But not tainted.” His voice was twisted and hoarse with pain, and it tore at her heart to hear it.

“You deny yourself. Deny what’s inside you. Come join us, brother…”

With narrowed eyes, Lori fought the terror that threatened to swell inside her. They weren’t just witches. They were recruiting for the enemies of the Council. Long had the Council spoken of an unknown enemy that assassinated and murdered, poisoning the minds of young wolf packs and turning them against humanity. The Hunters would then have to wipe out entire packs because they had begun hunting humans. Enemies who sought out young witches on the streets and groomed them to suit their own purposes.

“I’m not your brother, bitch.”

Bitch—

Lori started. The voices she heard were like a chorus, almost sexless. Didn’t seem that way to Jonathan.

“You question your worth to the pussy vampire you serve. If you joined me, you would never doubt that worth—”

“I’d be worth kicking aside when you were done having me fetch whatever bone you threw my way,” Jonathan snarled, baring his teeth. “Get the fuck out.”

He brought his wrist to his mouth and tore open a vein with sharp teeth, gathering blood on his fingers as he strode over to the door.

Painting a simple X over the door, he said in a flat voice, “Be gone, I say. Return no more. From my house, my blood bars your return ever more.”

With a violent shriek, they cursed him as the simple chant of the home’s owner cast them out.

Long brown hair fell over his shoulders as he lowered his head, watching the skin already beginning to knit as he applied pressure to the gash on his wrist.

Lori stared at him, wide-eyed. Now that the moment had passed, she was excruciatingly aware of a few things. He was naked. And damn, he was hot.
The golden flesh gleamed richly over firm, muscled flesh, the columns of his thighs hard and sculpted. Her heart started to pound as heat pooled in her belly.

Seizing on the easiest distraction she could think of, she focused on the door. It was basic warding. If he’d been human, it wouldn’t have worked, but since he was a werewolf, he had enough elemental power in him, it would carry weight.

Between his blood, the magicks cast around Eli’s home by Lori and Sarel, and Jonathan’s own power, it was enough to get rid of them...for now. It might not last, but it gave them a temporary respite.

But how had he known about it?

“How did you know about that?”

Over his shoulder, he slid her an amused look. “I’ve been living around witches for several years now. I’m gonna learn a few things, sweetheart.” He turned away and headed down the hall.

And she watched, enjoying the view every second of the way.

Lori sighed in disappointment when she could no longer see those wide muscled shoulders, those narrow hips and that lean, naked body. She licked her lips and wiped her mouth, just in case she was drooling.

When Jonathan returned a few minutes later, she was sitting down, her hands folded around a steaming cup of tea as she stared into nothingness. “Why do they think you are tainted? Whoever they are, they seem to think this gives them a hold on you.” Lifting her eyes to him as he lowered himself into a chair, she studied his rather pale, grim face as he took the mug she had prepared for him.

“I’m not gonna like what’s in there, am I?”

A small, amused smile curved her mouth. Damn his talented nose. “No. The knife that stabbed you was cursed. Rosemary, sage, graveyard dirt. I’ll have to rub some herbs—acacia and Angelica root and such—into your wound, but first you need to drink that. It has bergamot and Blessed thistle in it. And a whole lot of prayers.”

“Did you pray to your Goddess about me? I’m touched,” Jonathan said, his mouth quirking up in a smile.

A streak of hurt lanced through her and she lowered her head to keep him from seeing it in her eyes. He knew enough about witches to pick up some basic protection. But he didn’t know that she didn’t believe in any Goddess.

“I don’t worship a Goddess, Jonathan. I never have,” she said softly, scooping a necklace out of her shirt, displaying the golden cross she wore around her neck. “I believe in the same God you do, and go to church on the same day, and worship the same way the average American does. I go to the church across the street from where you and Erica ago, as a matter of fact. You’re much more devout than I am.”

She dropped the cross back inside her shirt and nodded to the glass. “Drink your tea. The reason they work is because I believe they will, and also because they fight the toxins the other herbs put inside your body to make you susceptible to their touch. That is fifty percent of faith, and science.”

“What is the other fifty?” he asked as he reluctantly lifted the mug. He took the first sip and Lori smiled, taking some small nasty pleasure as he gagged at the taste.

“Magick. God giving me the gift, and me using it wisely. And magick is my gift, plain and simple, like you have yours, Sarel has hers, and Declan and Tori each have theirs.”

Jonathan arched a brow at her as he downed the rest of the contents in the mug. Suppressing a shudder, he set it aside and walked over to the fridge, fishing out a jug of juice and washing the taste of Lori’s brew from his mouth. Lori studied him from under the fringe of her lashes, the lines of muscle and sinew, the lovely gold of his skin, the way his belly clenched and moved as he moved. Something hot and molten shifted inside her and she took a slow, deep breath through her nose, forcing herself to relax.

I can’t do this, not here, not around him. He’ll know.

Grabbing two glasses in one hand, he carried the juice to the table. “Okay. I noticed that you left Eli out.” As he lowered himself back into the seat, she studied the angry, red gash in his side. It was a wound that would never fully heal.

With a forceful shake of her head, she met his eyes and said, “Did I leave Eli, my beloved brother-in-law, out? How terrible of me.”

Eli wasn’t exactly the kind of soul you could overlook. But up until a few years ago, he would never have considered himself a lucky or gifted man. Now, as he rose from a long, restful slumber and stretched his body, the thoughts that drifted through his mind were those of a man contented, no, happy with his life.

His gift lay behind him, already sleeping. The watery rays of sunlight that slid through the drapes he threw open coming in to paint her body with an array of colors. Her name was Sarel, she was a witch, with the heart of a warrior and the only soul on the planet that would ever be a match to his.

Eli felt the spilling of blood as he walked away from the bed they shared, with the stir of power, the scent of were and the warmth of witch all building inside him.

Without deepening the connection, he knew what was going on. Lori. Jonathan. Magic. A fucking mess.

Jonathan was wounded, and vulnerable. And being the stubborn bastard he was, he hadn’t called for help, Eli brooded.

Lori was handling it, which was what Lori did.

It wasn’t enough.

With a light touch, Eli reached out down his line and found Sheila and Rafe. Both of them were out—Sheila out shopping, having a couple of drinks, and just having fun in Charleston, as the young vamp loved.

Rafe was out doing what he did best, brooding and hunting. With a silent summons, he ordered them both back and then focused his attention on Jonathan and Lori, trying to get a deeper understanding of what had happened, without any luck.

And then the connection solidified and he found himself wrapped in a warm grasp, the bonds of magick guiding him into Lori’s mind. His psychic abilities were adequate, but Lori, like most witches, had a natural resistance and he couldn’t go where she didn’t want him going. Besides, it was impolite.

“If you truly want to know what is going on, did it occur to you to ask?”

“Lori, you grow more impudent every day, sweet, did you know that?” He settled more completely into her mind, watching through her eyes as she worked.

“What is going on?” Sarel’s voice, hot and angry, echoed behind him.

His mind was in one place. His body was in another.

And now Sarel was forcing herself into that link in the way only she could—his mate, and a witch.

Lori sighed. “Sarel. My brain can only handle so much. Would you mind?”

“Fuck.”

The connection wavered and he split his attention, glancing at his wife as she slid out of bed and strode to the mirror hanging over the carved bureau.

Red hair flowed down her naked back, and started to blow back from her face as the window first glowed gold under her touch and then went opaque, reflecting first her face, then her sister’s profile as she knelt over Jonathan’s body.

“Well,” Eli said, easing away from his connection to Lori’s mind. “That’s better.”

Moving to stand by Sarel, he eyed Jonathan. The werewolf was a pale wreck, lying on the couch. And although Eli knew he must be hurting, no sign of it showed. His face was impassive and he watched Lori from under his lashes.

The gash on his side was long and ugly, puckered, an angry, bright red, and at one end, the vicious mark of a scythe was forming.

“Lori, stop, you need to make sure you’ve—”

“Sarel, aren’t you supposed to be on vacation?” Lori asked as she continued to rub more Angelica root into the open wound on Jonathan’s side, from the bottom up.

“If you haven’t made him drink one of those nasty potions first, you’re wasting your time,” Sarel said, ignoring her.

Eli sighed, reaching up and rubbing his forehead as Lori continued to work. The younger witch never slowed, nor did she let Jonathan feel any of the pain she was inflicting on his body, Eli noticed. He could feel it, some of it, a distant echo, through the link he had to both of them, but the were felt none of it as he lay watching Lori with dark, dangerous eyes. The pain was nauseating, just that echo that Eli could feel. What Lori was feeling must be unreal.

“You cannot fight it forever, pup. You know that.” Eli’s words were soft, spoken directly into Jonathan’s mind, only for him to hear.

Jonathan turned his head eastward, following the distant sound of Eli’s voice as he softly said, “I’ll fight it for as long as I have to.”

“Hush, Jonathan,” Lori murmured, and with a thought, she urged him into a healing trance. Eli winced as he recognized the herbs she reached for with her bloody hand, acacia, blessed thistle, and good old fashioned earth from his home, the cottage where he had lived. Fire glowed hotly in her hand as she held the earth in one and used the other to rub the herbs into it while she whispered under her breath.

“Damn it, Lori—”

Eli laughed gently. “Sarel, love. She made him drink it, the bloody bitter brew, down to the last drop before we had barely realized there was even a problem.”

Eli could almost see the anger and worry that deflated her, and wasn’t sure what to make of the nerves that replaced it. “All of it? Without arguing?”

With the slow, characteristic curve of his lips, Eli said, “Jonathan doesn’t argue with Lori, love. He did exactly what she told him to do and then lay down for the healing like a good boy. And she’s a bloody good witch. Your equal, in fact. She’s just not the warrior you are. She’s a Healer.”

Lori studied the mark on Jonathan’s side. It was closed, scarred but closed. And faded, nearly normal looking on the lean, smooth golden skin of his muscled body.

Except for the Scythe.

The Scythe.

With a deep, sighing breath, she rested a hand above it as Rafe and Sheila moved in behind her. Eli had called his people home. She wasn’t exactly sure why, but it was a good thing.

That Scythe couldn’t stay there on his skin. It was something evil, and draining—foul. Trying to mark him.

“Jonathan, love,” she whispered absently, tracing her fingers along the rough, ridged skin of the mark, shuddering as the cold skin there tried to leech into her and grab. It was the cold of death, true death, a poison under the skin that would slowly drain the life out of him, maybe even any who touched him and tried to save him, as it pulled everything under its cold, evil spell.

And held you there.

Forever.

“They’ve marked you, some kind of binding spell. I have to break it,” she whispered, lifting up and looking at him, her hair falling about her face as she stared down into his eyes, those dark eyes she had dreamed about for years.”I don’t know what will happen if I don’t.”

“And exactly how do you break it?” Rafe asked, moving up out of the shadows. Inky black hair spilled into his eyes and he flicked it away with an impatient hand. “You’re a young witch, kid. Eli will not be happy, Sarel will not be happy if anything happens to you.”

Flicking the dark-haired vampire an impatient glance, Lori smiled. “Stop worrying,” she said, turning her eyes back to Jonathan. Bending down, Lori opened herself to the magick and just let it fill her.

Chapter Two

Those soft golden-green eyes were glowing and fiery, with little flames licking around the irises. Jonathan felt her hands land on his sides, just above his hipbones. The palm of her right hand lying over the fresh, newly healed skin of the scar on his side, still feeling so cool, until she touched it. It was hot, very hot, under her touch—the skin quivering as she settled her hands on it.

A deep growl rumbled in his throat as her head lowered over his abdomen and her hair tickled his belly. His cock ached, swelling in the confines of his jeans as blood started to pound more heavily in his veins. The scent of woman and magick mingled in his mind until they were one, and both were Lori.

At her touch, Jonathan arched up in agony as burning, tearing pain ripped through him. Lori was tearing something evil from inside him and it didn’t want to let go. Taking him over wasn’t something she would allow this evil to do. But to take a place inside him and slowly force him aside, well, that it might accomplish.

“Hold him—”

Through the pain that racked his body, Jonathan heard that harsh barking order that came from her mind but he couldn’t move to help her. What had the little witch gotten into now? And damn it, why couldn’t he move his arms? What was wrong with his head?

His head—

“Son of a bitch!” he roared, arching his back and bellowing as agony arced through him.

Then a gentle billowing kiss of cool, soft air brushed over his skin and he gasped, sucking breath in desperately as he felt a hand reach in just under his skin, working at the small, hard little knot, like a root. But the tree was trying to grow inside.

Two pairs of hands, vamp-cool and hard, came down on him, pinning his shoulders and legs. Hair, scented with plumeria, fell across his face and her voice, soft and gently soothing, came to his ear. “Easy, Jon…easy there. Lori’s nearly done, ‘kay? Just…damn it…calm down.”

Power trickled and rolled through him, starting to pulse in the room as a deeper voice said, “Damn it. Lori, you’d better hurry. The animal inside him is getting mad and the wolf is getting worried. Jonathan will not be able to keep from changing for too long.”

“Rafe, five seconds. Shhhh…”

“Lori, if he changes like this—” a deep, muttered grunt sounded through the room.”Unaware, in pain, he may attack.”

“He won’t hurt me, Rafe. The wolf won’t let him. He won’t let himself,” Lori murmured. Then a soft, ragged gasp and silence.

“Let him go. It is gone,” Lori whispered.

Jonathan felt her hand on his side again, hot and open as the pain faded and blew away, like ashes in the wind. Fisting his hand in her hair, he opened his eyes on a ragged sigh.

And then wished he would have caught his breath first.

Sheila and Rafe had backed away, both with eyes shuttered, but glowing under the hoods of their lashes.

And there was Lori, lifting up from her knees and staring down at his side, tracing her hand over the mark on his skin.”Their mark is gone,” she whispered softly, then she lifted her gaze and met his, her pale green eyes glowing, soft, sweet, but strong and confident—powerful.

He felt the punch of that look in his gut as he grabbed her.

Lori...whom he had always wanted.

Lori...whom he had been so careful to keep his distance from. And here she was.

He forgot about Sheila, forgot about Rafe. Control was a forgotten thing as he tumbled the pretty witch onto his chest and rolled. He pinned her under him, pushing his tongue into her mouth and groaning hungrily at the sweet, dark taste of her. Wedging a knee between hers, he pumped his cock against the damp cleft there and skimmed his hands up her sides, palming one breast, rolling the nipple between his thumb and forefinger.

The sounds of ragged breathing, increased heart rates and the scent of aroused female came to him as he kissed his way down Lori’s neck. Sheila’s shuddering sigh caressed his skin, a sound that normally would be so welcome, but now was an intrusion.

Pulling his mouth from Lori’s, he glanced to the side and growled to Sheila and Rafe, “Go away.”

Rafe flashed his fangs. “Watch your step, pup. I’m not yours to command.” His eyes slid down and rested on the soft curve of Lori’s hip, where Jonathan’s hand gripped it, and the vampire moved forward, his lids drooping. “And maybe she doesn’t want to be here with you, damn it.”

“If she doesn’t, then she can say. Now get the fuck out,” Jonathan snarled again. He ached. Lori’s scent filled his head, and his blood pounded heavily in his veins, surging and throbbing in his cock as he stared into Rafe’s gleaming eyes.

Rafe just watched him for a minute and then flicked his gaze to Lori. “You okay, kid? If you want to leave, just say the word.”

Lori sucked in a breath. But she said nothing.

Sheila smiled, a bit of envy in her gaze as she ran her eyes over Lori who was still gasping and reeling from the effects of the magick coursing through her veins. Then she stepped in front of Rafe, tossing her long blonde hair over her shoulder, offering him a teasing smile as she slid her hands up his chest. “It looks like we’re not welcome here. Why don’t we go and find something to amuse ourselves with, sugar?” she drawled, stroking her finger over his full lower lip.

When he reached to grip her waist and move her aside, she stumbled into him and Jonathan smelled the musk of vampire blood filling the air. “Oh! How careless of me, Rafe, I’m sorry. I hope you’re not hungry,” Sheila murmured as she moved aside, holding up the finger she had sliced against one of his extended fangs.

Sliding it between her lips, she licked the blood away, smiling a coquette’s smile at him as she drew the gleaming finger out, and cocked her head at him. More blood welled and he focused his glowing eyes on her, a deep, shuddering breath racking his large frame.

“You like to mess with fire, little Southern Belle?” Rafe murmured, moving a little closer, his eyes locked on the bead of blood that hung on the tip of her finger.

Locking his fingers around her wrist, he brought it to his mouth and slid her fingertip between his lips, sucking it as he stared into her eyes.

“Take her and go, Rafe,” Jonathan growled as he turned back to Lori.

He didn’t hear them leave, but he knew they had all the same.

Sucking air into his lungs, Jonathan focused inward and sent the animal back inside. With a soft sigh it retreated, to once again slumber as Jonathan turned his head, staring over his shoulder at Lori. Her hazy eyes, still glinting with lights of gold as she blinked sleepily at him, were just now clearing of the magick.

He crawled over to her as she sat up, eying him warily. “I can feel your magick inside me, Lori, your touch, your breath, your taste. I want more.” All this time, he’d kept it under control. All this time...and now he was breaking.

Breaking. And he didn’t fucking care.

Rising onto his knees, Jonathan caught her behind the neck and pulled her up against him, sealing his mouth to hers and tasting her deeply, fully.

Sliding his tongue into past her lips, stroking it across the roof, the insides of her cheeks, across her teeth—every part he could touch, Jonathan touched. Every part of her mouth he could taste, he tasted. Moving his hands down her shoulders and arms to cup her breasts, he massaged them restlessly as he urged her back to the floor.

Gasping in her throat as he wedged his thigh between hers, she rode the muscled length with her warm, wet cleft. Sweet, soft little moans built in her chest as Jonathan kissed his way down her chin and throat, along the loose neckline of her T-shirt. Through it, he could smell her skin, her arousal, her need.

And he wanted to taste it all.

Closing his mouth over the pebbled crest of one nipple, he swirled his tongue around it, sucking it deep into his mouth. Damn…her taste, it exploded on his tongue—honeyed innocence, power, seduction, purity. Everything he had wanted and needed from her for years, but refused himself. Ever since Lori had come to Eli’s enclave, Jonathan had wanted her, an innocent woman-child of nineteen—and for seven long years he had ignored that want.

With his hand flat against her torso, he slid it down over her belly, her pubis, until he cupped her, feeling her hot, molten wetness through the thin layers of the chiffon skirt. Sliding the wispy material back and forth over her, he groaned around her breast as he felt the wet heat of her through her clothing.

Lifting his head, he stared down at her, blinking slowly. Power rippled through him and rolled down his spine, shuddering off his skin as he watched her face. Her eyes opened languidly as she licked her lips, as though tasting him. Jonathan groaned, and forced himself not to take—

Maybe she doesn’t want to be here with you, damn it. Fuck. If he took this from her without knowing, he’d skin himself with silver. No. He’d let Rafe do it.

Not yet. They couldn’t do this yet. Not unless she wanted it. Her. Not just her body.

Forcing the words through his tight throat, he slowly rubbed his sex against her, once, then again. Watching as she arched toward him, he whispered, “Look at me, Lori. Do you want this? Me?”

A slow, female smile—that Mona Lisa smile that had been driving men insane for centuries—curved her lips and she slid her hands up his chest, behind his neck, and then fisted them in his hair, bringing his face down to hers.

“Would I be here if I didn’t?” She rolled her hips against him, and Jonathan bit off a ragged cry as her damp heat caressed his covered cock. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to be right here, Jonathan? Just like this? For months and months, years and years…if you don’t touch me now, I just might turn you into a flying cockroach.”

His control shattered. Gripping her shirt in his hands, he ripped it from her. Flexing his hand, claws emerged and he slid them under her bra, slicing it away as he stared into her eyes, looking for any sign of fear. The claws slid back into his hand like water evaporating as he reached for the skirt, taking both skirt and panties in hand and pulling them down her hips in one long, smooth slide.

Kneeling at her feet, his hair falling around his shoulders, Jonathan stared at her body. Gazing along the ivory length of it, so soft, as perfect as carved alabaster, and the scent of her filled his head and made him drunk. His mouth was watering as he reached for her ankles and slowly pushed them apart, sliding his hands up the length of her legs.

As he moved them apart, he lay forward until he was kneeling between her thighs, his face hovering just above the junction of her thighs. He stared with unconcealed hunger at the naked mound of her sex, topped with a small, neatly trimmed patch of red curls. “Soft, smooth…just how I like it…sweet,” he growled, breathing in the scent of her. He slid his tongue up the gleaming wet seam, lapping the sweetness that glistened there, letting it linger on his tongue before parting her flesh with his thumbs and piercing her, and sliding his tongue into the deep, dark depths of her pussy.

“Jon—”

“Aww, fuck, you’re sweet,” he growled, lifting her higher against him, holding her ass in his hands and catching her clit between his teeth. He tugged it gently before thrusting his tongue deep inside the wet channel again.

Lori shrieked and Jonathan fucked her with his tongue, in, out, until she was rising to meet him, her hands fisting his hair as though she feared he might stop.

Not in this life...

He didn’t stop until he had her writhing and whimpering in climax and only then did he pull back and lower her hips to the floor.

“You’re so damn tight, so sweet,” he muttered, pressing a kiss to her hip. “Have you been with anybody since that fool from college?”

But her eyes were still blind and her mind too muddled. Gasping for air, not hearing him, Lori reached for him, blindly, burying her fingers in his hair and pulling him back to her.

Jonathan couldn’t resist the siren call of her body, even as rage ripped through him as he remembered that night.

“Has there been anyone else, Lori?” he whispered as he settled between her thighs. “Another man? One? Two?”

“Damn it, Jonathan,” she moaned in frustration, arching her hips up, wrapping her legs around his waist and locking them just above his butt so that his cock was firm and snug in the cleft of her thighs. “Please, I want you inside me. I’m so empty.”

Unhooking her ankles, he rose up onto his hands and knees, hovering over her. Staring down into her eyes, Jonathan pushed two fingers back into her silky wet depths.”Feel how tight you are, how wet and sweet?” He circled over the nub of her clit with his thumb and smiled as she whimpered, following the circle of his caress eagerly.

“Damn it, Jonathan, take your jeans off. I want you inside me, I want to feel you against me,” Lori whimpered, reaching for him.

Jonathan smiled slowly, looking into her eyes, seeing the desperation there, revelling in it. His pure, innocent little witch was hungry, so hungry for him. Drawing his fingers from her snug, tight sheath, he brought them to his mouth, licking the spicy sweet tang from them as he watched her.

“Not…just yet,” he decided as he started to lower his head to her breasts.

He wanted her hungrier. As hungry as he had been for the past seven years of his life.

Lori could have levelled the house with her frustration. The devious, devilish glint in his dark eyes had her narrowing hers. Wind whipped through the room and she snapped her hand up and flicked her fingers, staring into his eyes with challenge written all over her face.

Jonathan’s eyes widened as his jeans were rent away, much like her clothes had been. The unseen winds of magick continued to blow and Lori lay, staring at him and smiling, watching as the wind blew his hair around him, winding it about his shoulders and chest, teasing her with the sight of the small scar on his side—shaped like a phoenix.

Her mark, replacing the mark of the Scythe.

Rising from the ashes…like I did.

Her eyes trailed over his body—the golden, muscled length of it—so smooth and perfect, except for that shining scarred flesh of her mark. His cock rose, ruddy and perfect, denuded of any body hair. It was thick, full, and curved just slightly at the top, over toward the right. Lori felt a shudder roll through her as she imagined feeling him inside of her.

Her gaze moved down the rest of him and she licked her lips before looking back up to lock eyes with him.

With a smile, she trailed one finger down the center of her body and started to stroke it over the hardened nub of her clit. With a rough gasp, she plunged a finger deep inside, feeling her own flesh, hot, slippery and wet under her strokes. She had to force her eyes to stay open as she watched his face. “I’ve been watching you, waiting for you, wanting you, for years. Since I first saw you standing outside Eli’s room when Tavis brought me here. I’d just left the school.”

She watched his eyes as she climaxed under her own touch with a sob. Jonathan growled, catching her hand and lapping at it as he stared down at her with narrowed, glittering eyes. Opening her mouth, she raggedly whispered, “I’m tired of waiting for you.”

Jonathan’s mouth was sealed against hers before the last word had left her lips, and she could feel the blunt, rounded tip of his cock probing at the wet opening to her core. Arching her hips up, she wound her legs around him, opening her mouth eagerly under his as he started to forge his way into her tight pussy, working his cock ever so slowly inside her, until she thought she’d scream.

Tears started to burn her eyes and she gasped as he pushed relentlessly deep, forcing his way completely in. Seating himself against the bud of her clit and holding there, rocking against her, he started to kiss her deeply, restlessly massaging one breast with his thumb and forefinger.

“Tight, sweet, hot little pussy, I can smell you,” he murmured against her lips, pulling back before moving to lick away the tears. “Tasty little thing. Let me feel you move under me.” Propping his weight up on his elbows, he pumped in and out of her lazily, almost absently, staring down at her expectantly. The golden muscles of his chest shifted, playing under the smooth perfection of his skin as he watched her, those dark, dark eyes so rapt on her face.

His silken hair fell across her body like a cape, sliding, caressing as he moved against her, and Lori fisted her hands in it as she lifted up against him, shuddering, quivering as spasms of pure, electric sensation raced through her. With the curved end of his cock…ah…angling against her, Jonathan was now stroking the head of his cock directly over her G-spot. Lori stiffened, throwing her head back as she tightened her legs around his hips and started to piston against him, harder and harder. Taking his hard, hot length deeper and deeper, she stared up into his eyes, feeling them engulf her.

“So soft and wild,” he rasped, stroking one hand down her hip, cupping her ass. Lori wailed as he pressed his fingers against the seam there, spreading the cheeks of her ass, letting the cool kiss of air caress her rosette as he started to slow his thrusts, fucking her deep, rolling his hips so that he was caressing her G-spot thoroughly with each deep stroke.

“Scream for me, Lori.”

Lori shuddered as his dark head lowered to the soft mound of her breast. She sucked in a ragged breath of air as he sank his teeth into the pink crest of one dark, rosy nipple, suckling deep, nipping gently before swirling his tongue around it.

A liquid storm was building, molten and steaming, as he pushed himself inside her, angled so that he rubbed against her clit with each deep thrust.

“Jonathan, please,” she gasped, digging her nails into him, staring blindly into his face. His eyes were gleaming, more golden than brown now, as an animal in human skin stared down at her, long fangs pushing down past his lower lip.

Lori didn’t care as she wound her hands into his hair and pulled him down to press her mouth hungrily to his, driving her tongue deep, drinking down that dark male taste—the taste of the woods, of honey and mead, and the wild. He arched his back and pumped his hips against her, his cock burying inside her, his balls slapping against the crevice of her bottom as they both started to come. Lori coming in slow, rhythmic pulses that grew in strength and duration, while Jonathan started to furiously fuck himself into her. Burying his hands in her hair and groaning against her mouth, his cock jerked and pulsed as hot, rolling waves of semen jetted free, deep inside her sheath.

Lori sobbed into his mouth, her entire body trembling, feeling his heart pounding against her, the slow darkening of his thoughts, the quivering of his powerful, lean body as he went rigid against her.

As he pumped the last of his come into her, her body went slack, and Jonathan bussed her mouth gently. Easing to one side before rolling to his back and taking her with him, he cuddled her against his side and yawned.

Lori was still lying there, cold and naked when he slid into sleep.

The magick had taken a toll on them both, but on Jonathan more than her. As she napped briefly, in the back of her mind, she was thinking. And hoping, but wondering if she dared to dream while she slept.

Her taste was on his tongue, and her scent filled his head.

Lori…

Curled against her back, his cock was cuddled against her softly rounded ass, tucked snugly between the cheeks in the sweetest way imaginable as he drifted awake. Damnation…what in the hell have I done?

And then he rolled and slid his hand up her side, cupping a small, firmly rounded breast in his palm. Pinching the nipple as he sank his teeth into the soft pad of muscle that topped her shoulder, he gently laved the slightly reddened love bite with his tongue. Rolling his hips, Jonathan groaned as the soft, silken skin caressed his cock before he eased away and urged her onto her back.

Leaning over her, nipping at her mouth, he stroked his hand down the center of her torso, slowly, teasingly, until he had her cupped in his hand. Sliding his hand through her wet folds, he pierced her with one finger, pushing deep and listening as a cry of rapture fell from her lips and her eyes fluttered open.

Against her ear, he said roughly, “I’m going to fuck you hard and deep, until you scream my name, Lori. I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted to do this to you.” Rising to his knees, he brought her body with him, bowing her back over his arm and feasting on the rosy crests of her breasts as she stared up at him with sleep-dazed eyes, her face flushed, her lips parted, and the scent of her arousal perfuming the air all around them.

With quick, short motions of his hands, he moved her onto her hands and knees, bringing her soft, sweetly rounded ass back against the cradle of his hips, trailing the tips of his fingers down the line of her spine and smiling as she shuddered. Rocking against the damp cleft of her ass, he grimaced, banding his arm under her waist and bringing her back against him, raking her neck with his teeth and piercing her slick pussy with his fingers.

A wailing cry echoed through the room and Jonathan bared his teeth in a feral, triumphant smile as she climaxed into his hand, while he stared down the length of her lovely body. Her breasts, pale and perfect, heaved with each ragged breath, as she sobbed and screamed his name, reaching behind and twining her fingers in his hair, so that she was arching her breasts up.

“Look at you,” he rasped.”So damn pretty, so perfect. Pretty rose nipples, so hard and pink, and those soft white breasts, all that creamy skin. I’ve been dying to taste it, taste you. I can smell you, how hungry you are, how much you want, how much you need. You’re wet, so damn wet…sweet, wild little witch.”

Lori shuddered as the climax finished rippling through her and Jonathan grinned hotly as he painted one nipple, then her mouth, with the slick moisture from her body.

Arching her head back and taking her mouth roughly, he lifted her up and pierced her, pushing his cock deeply inside her. Lifting her hips up and down on his aching cock, tearing his mouth away from hers and urging her to her hands and knees, he bent over her to whisper in her ear, “Are you ready?”

“Huh…what?” she whimpered, her body still shaking.

Jonathan smiled, taking her hips in his hands, drawing out slowly, staring down at the glistening wet length of his cock before driving back into her, hard. A harsh, surprised gasp fell from her lips, and her scent grew stronger in the room, filling his head—hungry, aroused woman. And magick, wild wanton magick, only the kind a witch possessed and could release when she was aroused. It prickled along his body, teased the skin of his sac and heated his blood in a way he could never have imagined.

The tight, wet glove of her sex clung to his cock as he pulled out slowly, listening to the sound of her heart and her breathing. Jonathan’s hands stroked teasingly over the silken skin of her ass before anchoring her as he started another hard, relentless drive deep inside her. Shuddering as the wet, silky walls clutched at his cock, stroking over him, caressing him, hugging him, he planted himself balls deep into her.

A weak little scream fell from her and she arched up, the line of her spine curving.”Jon, I can’t stand it…” she sobbed, pushing her ass back against him and trying to hold him inside her.

He pulled out and slammed in again—harder and harder—the wet, silken stroke of her pussy over his cock driving him insane. The sound of her voice moaning his name, the sight of her bending over in front of him, spread out, taking his cock as he had wanted and needed for years and years…

“Fuck—” he gasped, crouching low over her, pounding into her, sweat beading on his brow as he stared down, watching his cock, wet and shining with her juices, disappear back inside her sweet cleft again.

The muscles of her pussy started to shudder and clamp down around him as he forged inside, resisting him as she started to come. Jonathan hissed, his head falling back, the veins in his neck standing out as the climax built in the base of his spine.

Lori’s slim, supple body was quivering, shaking underneath the power of his thrusts. His balls drew tight against his body, fiery hot as they slapped against her clit teasingly and she started to scream. The sound of his name on her lips sent him over the edge, and he howled her name to the heavens as he raked her hips with the claws that had unwittingly emerged from his hands as he started coming. Flooding the silken depths of her pussy with his semen, he pumped deeper and deeper, stroking the head of his cock over the buried bundle of nerves in her core.

She milked him, tightening around him, drawing the climax out until they were both sweating and gasping for air as they slid to the ground.

“This isn’t good, Lori.” Against her nape, Jonathan nuzzled her damp salty skin and nipped her gently.”This isn’t good at all.”

He pulled back.

While she watched, he pulled away, drew back inside his skin, and went totally aloof on her.

With cool, impassive eyes, he watched as she gathered her clothes and walked naked to the bathroom, unsure of what to make of his sudden turnaround. After twenty minutes in the shower, she changed her mind. She knew what to make of it.

It was safer—to him, to her—at a distance.

Leaving the safety of the bathroom, her damp hair woven into a tight cable, Lori came out, watching him with blank eyes, studying his face closely.

“Last night shouldn’t have happened,” he said as soon as she sat down. “I know what magick can do, it affects your head, your thinking, and it can make you so damn hungry. We both lost our heads.”

“Is that what it was?” Lori mused, folding her hands around the mug of tea he held out to her. Tea. He always kept tea on hand for her, even as rarely as she came by, the kind she liked. And it was fixed the way she liked. Yet…he was so damned blind. Didn’t know she wasn’t Wiccan, didn’t know what kind of movies she liked.

Or that they belonged together.

“Yes.”

“Hmmm. Funny. I’ve used magick quite a bit. On Eli, around him, around Rafe, and Declan, damn near everybody. And I’ve never slept with any of them. Never paid that much attention to my body while I’m doing it. I was so aware of you though. Always so aware of you. Maybe that is it. I was so damned aware of you, and that sexy body of yours, and I was so hot for you, I couldn’t help but be aware of how turned on I was. So I guess from now on, I’ll pay more attention to my body, and when I’m aroused, I’ll just start looking to get laid. After all, last night was sooo…pleasant.

“And hell, Rafe was here. Maybe I should have just jumped him. He’s a hot piece of work,” Lori murmured, smiling slyly, watching Jonathan from under her lashes. A muscle ticked in his jaw and something wild flashed through his eyes. But nothing changed on his face, in his demeanor.

If she hadn’t been a witch, she would never have felt the power that trembled through the air as she spoke.

Never would have known how downright furious her words made him.

“Just because the magick makes you want to fuck, doesn’t mean you have to do it,” Jonathan growled.

With large innocent eyes, Lori asked, “Well, why not? It isn’t like any of the people here are bad guys. Now, Eli is off limits. But he’s the only one here who is hooked up. But Rafe is quite available. And then there is Ben Cross and so many others. That’s the beauty of an enclave, Jonnie. Always plenty of men.”

With a smile, she put her cup back on the table and rose, strolling to the door.”Take care of your side, okay? Their mark is gone, but you did lose some blood.”

Their mark was gone, but Lori’s wasn’t. Under his fingers, he could feel the smooth slick skin of scar tissue, and inside him, Jonathan could feel her.

He hadn’t been expecting this.

No wonder he had been able to touch her so easily, no wonder her body primed so readily. As she walked away, he could feel her smug satisfaction. Damn it.

This couldn’t be permanent.

Could it?

Maybe distance would help.

But the distance to the house didn’t help, and neither did the walls between them, because he was aware of her through damn nearly everything she did. Not enough to distract him from what he was doing, but all he had to do was stop, and think of her, and he was aware of her.

Stalking into the bathroom, he stripped his shirt off and stared into the mirror at the odd, birdlike shape.

A phoenix.

Rising from the ashes.

Lori had learned of her origins, how Eli had rescued her from her father’s house only moments before the man would have raped her, and most likely then have killed her. Sarel hadn’t wanted her to be told, but Eli had known the witch would find a way to learn.

So they had told her.

“A brave Phoenix, you are, my sweet,” the Master Vampire had told her.”You and your sister rose from the ashes of a bitter life and look at what you have become.”

Jonathan rubbed his finger over the mark and closed his eyes, shuddering as the touch of it brought back ultra intense memories of the night before. Her mouth on his, her body moving under his, over his, the tight, wet, slick muscles in her pussy as he rode her hard.

It was just the magick, he wanted to think.

But he knew better.

“Sarel, do you know anything about a Scythe mark?” The mirror glowed softly as they spoke back and forth through it, a faint humming echo following their voices.

The reflection of her sister wrinkled her nose and the taller woman shrugged.”The scythe can have a lot of meanings, sis. Why?”

“I’m looking for one in particular,” Lori murmured, flipping through her ancient book. Kelsey had left several with her, but so far, none of them had yielded anything. She just might have to contact Kelsey or Agnes. “It was what the witches left on Jonathan, it wasn’t on him at first, but the curse the knife held had carved it into him later, as they tried to take him. It did something to him, tried to take hold of his wolf, of him. Called him brother. Made it seem like they had a right to him or something…”

“There were rumors,” Lori whispered, lifting her eyes to the reflection and meeting Sarel’s eyes. “Rumors of enemies who were stronger than the ferals, you know. They band together and work against us. But I haven’t heard anything about them that wasn’t rumor.”

Sarel’s eyes flashed with fire as she stared at her sister. “I’ll talk to Agnes. Kelsey is in the States. Find her. And for God’s sakes, keep that damned wolf out of trouble. He courts it, for crying out loud.”

Sarel’s image flickered from sight as Lori breathed out a sigh. Indeed he does. But how am I supposed to keep him out of trouble?

Then she settled herself and started the time-consuming task of searching for Kelsey.

It wasn’t exactly as easy as calling the woman on a cell phone.

If only…

Kelsey didn’t like them. Moreover, they didn’t like her. High-tech gadgets didn’t like the magickally gifted. They tended to…malfunction. In earnest. And the more gifted one happened to be, the more they malfunctioned. And the older the witch got, the worse the problem got.

With Lori, Kelsey and Sarel, well, cell phones, pagers, and computers, were pretty much out of the question.

Fortunately, they had other means of communication. They just weren’t quite as fast.

But they were untraceable.

Wind filled the room and Lori’s face was lit from within as she fell into a light trance, searching for a path inside her that would lead her to Kelsey. Kelsey, once a teacher, now a friend.

A wise woman, quick-witted, with a dry humor and vast knowledge that belied her youthful looks. You’d never guess by looking at her that she had seen decades come and go. Witches were a long-lived species, and the more powerful the witch, the longer they lived.

Kelsey was going to live long indeed, even if she never bonded to another paranormal creature.

Soft, musical laughter filled Lori’s mind as she heard Kelsey say, “Tsk, tsk…don’t you know better than to think about a woman’s age? What’s going on, little sister, why are you looking for me?”

Lori’s eyes opened and when they did, she could see Kelsey’s form standing in front of her, nearly solid, wearing her standard flannel shirt, unbuttoned over a T-shirt and jeans, her hair in her characteristic pigtails. Like Pippy Longstocking.

“The Scythe…who are they? They mean something. Something dangerous, and I need to know what.” Lori wasted no time on pleasantries, didn’t smile and tell Kelsey how much she had missed her. The burning in her gut wouldn’t let her rest until she knew more.

Kelsey’s eyes darkened, her head inclining imperially. “Why do you ask?”

“They’ve paid us a visit.”

Kelsey’s form wavered in and out of view, her jaw clenching, light shooting around her form. “Can’t happen. Malachi wiped them out ages ago. Nothing in written history even remains about them.”

“Oh, come on, Kelsey.” Lori rolled her eyes. “You know better than the ‘can’t happen’ stuff happens every damn day. They were here. They marked Jonathan, tried to take him over. They were here. They’ve been haunting our steps for months, Kelsey. I think this is who has been preying on the Hunter enclaves.”

“Lori, sweetie. Malachi destroyed the Scythe. It just isn’t possible—” Kelsey broke off mid-sentence.”I’m being foolish. Of course it’s possible. Just because he destroyed the first band, doesn’t mean that they won’t arise again. Evil has always existed, and will until the world spins no more. I’ll find Malachi and bring him to you. He’ll know better than I if this is truly the Scythe.”

Kelsey took damn near a week tracking Malachi down. The bastard knew she was looking for him. He just didn’t bloody care. As she lit upon his home in Nome, Alaska, she shook her head. “Why in the world is a vampire living in Nome in July?”

The sun rarely set here. His feeding choices would be limited; the human population was only around thirty-five hundred people. Wasn’t like there was a happening nightlife crowd here.

Pounding a fist on his door, she waited until he opened the ramshackle thing before she finally released her pent-up exasperation and spat out, “You have got to be one of the strangest creatures known to man. You have next to no prey here. The sun hardly ever sets, and there’s nothing to do.”

Malachi lifted a bronzed brow at her.”Is that what you’ve been tracking me over half the bloody continent for? To tell me that, little witch?”

“How can you possibly Hunt here? I’ve seen a handful of people. What is there to Hunt? Deadbeat dads? Jaywalkers?”

“I’m on vacation,” Malachi drawled, leaning against the doorjamb, folding his arms across his bare chest as the sun shone down, painting half of him a cool gold. His face was in shadow, but Kelsey saw no pain, no fear.

Sweet heaven, it’s all true.

“Vacation? You’re here on vacation? In the middle of nowhere?”

“Yes, the middle of nowhere, where I’m not bothered by a bunch of thugs, murderers…mouthy little witches who won’t mind their own business.” His eyes dropped to her mouth and his lips curled up mockingly. “Though, of course, there is something to be said for having people ‘round. I do miss having a woman in m’ bed, pretty little Kelsey. Care to join me?”

Kelsey snorted.”Not hardly. I need to talk to you.”

Malachi shrugged, not looking the least bit put out.”Either way, darlin’. Talk away.”

“Inside?” Kelsey asked, arching a brow.

“Weelll, I don’ know ‘bout letting you come inside. Unless I can come inside of you,” Malachi murmured wickedly, trailing his eyes over her, heat flashing through his dark, midnight eyes.

And for the first time in decades, Kelsey felt it, the sexual pull of a vampire. And his was like no other she had ever felt, running over her skin like a hand covered in raw silk, tweaking her nipples, dipping between her thighs to pluck at her clit and thrust inside her cleft. A ragged sigh left her lips and she blinked, once, twice, slowly.

“Don’t,” she whispered. He’d done it on purpose, dropping the shields he always kept up, those he had to keep up, otherwise, women would flock around him in droves. As a witch, Kelsey was more immune. As a powerful witch, even more so.

No vampire, not Eli, none had done this to her for more than three decades.

Malachi’s eyes remained on her face as he reached out and stroked his thumb across her lip. Kelsey shuddered, her entire body going liquid and soft as moisture gathered in her pussy. Gathering her focus, she reached up and flattened her hand in front of her, just an inch in front of the rather magnificent chest he displayed as he moved closer, lowering his head, his mouth hovering just above hers.

“I said don’t,” she said, more harshly.

An unreadable smile curved his lips. What drove him, she didn’t know. But Kelsey wasn’t about to fall into bed with this vampire. She wasn’t getting addicted to him. She had too much going on, too much and too many depending on her.

Heat flooded from her, through her. Sunlight may not affect him, but fire would.

Malachi disappeared.

Reforming on the other side of the room, his eyes wide and furious, his fangs down as he glared at her. Fire still hovered over her palm.”I said don’t. I don’t say things I don’t mean, Malachi.”

“I’ve killed for less than that, witch.” The menace rolling off of him had the blood in her running cold.

“I don’t believe you’re willing to kill a fellow Council member,” she said softly, tossing the ball of flame back and forth in her hands, eying him warily.

“I’ll kill any damn soul who tries t’ touch me with fire. I don’t bloody care who he or she is.” He studied her as she tossed the flame in her hands, as though trying to figure out if she was going to lob it at his face. “Council member o’ not. Woman or not. I’ve done it before, and dealt with the consequences later.”

Kelsey had no doubt he meant it. None at all. But showing her fear would only further arouse the creature in him that craved blood and battle. No matter how good his soul, he was a predator. “Perhaps you should keep your hands to yourself, then. A woman wouldn’t be forced to defend herself.”

His face went blank. It was almost comical.

“Are ya telling me that I was forcing my advances on you?” he snapped, stalking closer. Like a door was slammed, the menace he exuded was sucked back inside him, along with the sexual call. All he exuded now was pure and simple anger and righteous indignation.

“Damn right.”

“And you would burn me, even though fire is death to a vampire, for daring to touch that pretty mouth o’ yours?” Malachi asked, his eyes narrowed.

His accent could go from being untraceable to pure Scots in seconds. And it was pure Scots when he was angered, she mused, shaking her head.”Get over it, Malachi. I knew you’d get away. I didn’t believe for a second you’d burn. And you were doing more than touching my mouth. With the call you have, you were all but stripping my clothes off of me. And I already told you to stop. I don’t want to sleep with you. I don’t want to have sex with you. But with you touching me, how much choice would I end up having? It’s about the same as date-rape.”

Malachi snarled at her.

Smiling angelically, Kelsey said, “I’m not wrong. Am I? Wanting to have sex with you, would be me coming to you with you still shielding, and me asking you. Which, of course, is not why I’m here. I don’t even know you.”

He eyed her narrowly.”I believe you are quite the biggest bitch I’ve met in a very long time.” After a moment of silence, a slow smile curved his mouth and he decided, “I think I rather like you.”

Kelsey arched an eyebrow and said, “Well, I’m still not sleeping with you.”

Heat rushed into Malachi’s gaze and he studied her with hot intense eyes. “You will.” Then he settled down on the chair behind him, watching her as she slowly pulled the flame back into her hand.”Okay, then. That decided...why in the hell are you here?”

“I’m seeking information on the Scythe.”

Chapter Three

The Underground

“You let him get away.”

“Mistress, there was a witch. Strong, and she’s got the feel of the Council to her magic. She shielded him and there was no way we could get to him. Otherwise, we would have had him.”

She did not give voice to the doubt in her mind. The one of the man’s power, of the strength of his will. The Mistress was so certain of this man, of the wolf, certain she could command him, and control the power of the wolf. But Leandra was not so certain. Not at all.

“I do not care if there were a thousand witches. You let my prey get away from me.” She paced away from the three witches gathered in front of her, her hips swaying under the beaded belt she wore over her naked hips. Her long hair, blonde, lush and thick, fell in loose waves to her ass. Over her shoulder, she said coldly, “You shall have to find a way to compensate me for this loss. If not with his body, then with your blood. I shall give you time to think of a way to deliver him. If you fail this time, prepare to offer up your blood in payment.”

Her voice was the pure, clear bell of a young girl’s, sweet, innocent, charming. Gazing around the room, she beckoned to one man and then curled against his chest after he came and pulled her to him, cuddling her. She rolled her hips against him, pouting a bit. They needed more strong ones.

She had Leandra. There were a few others. But most of her followers were sheep. She needed lions and wolves.

And she really wanted that wolf.

Her ladies-in-waiting had failed her. Leandra had never failed her before, so she’d give her another chance, but damn it. She wanted Jonathan.

Directing them a chilly look from her icy blue eyes, she said, “Go now. And prepare to fetch me my wolf. Do not fail me again.”

The oldest of the three ladies bent low, her long black braids caressing the leader’s feet before she turned, her trim, naked bottom swaying as she led her two sisters away.

Turning her eyes to the man who held her, she licked her lips and smiled, a sweet, pleasant smile that belied the evil in her eyes. “I ache.”

He smiled in return as she pushed him to his knees in front of her. “I’ll soothe all your aches, Mistress. All those, and more.”

Jonathan stalked out of the house. The effects of the mark on his side weren’t lessening.

All he had to do was think of her and he could feel her, almost see through her eyes what she was doing.

He had thought of her just now, and what she had been doing had shaken him to his core. She had been in the shower, but her mind hadn’t been on hygiene. Unless she was very concerned about washing her sweet little cleft extremely well, since she was holding the handheld spray full-force against her pussy. The pulsing and pounding of the water on her clit had her sighing raggedly as she trembled through her climax.

Hunger, lust, and power shuddered and slid through him, a dangerous mix with the full moon not far away. Flexing his hands, Jonathan waited until he was sure he could control it before he opened his eyes. The werewolf, the animal inside him, hadn’t controlled him since he had been young, not since his teens. Eli had seen to that, had saved him from becoming one of the ferals.

With the power of the wolf being as strong in him as it was, the wildness could have overpowered Jonathan at some point, if he hadn’t learned the precious gift of control.

Jonathan had a monster in him. The monster was the creature that just want to hunt, run, chase, feed. But he also had the wolf. The quiet, calm animal that whispered to him, spoke with him...guided him. He’d connected with the wolf and learned control.

He wouldn’t lose it now.

Lori studied the vampire in front of her with wary eyes. He had been here before. She’d had little contact with him then. He’d avoided her. Right now, he was studying her with dark, ancient eyes. Yeah, she had heard stories about him, but the actual vampire was something she couldn’t have prepared for.

Intimidating wasn’t quite the word.

His eyes were wise, deep and ancient like nothing Lori had ever experienced.

And sad. Sadder than anything Lori had ever known. Shaking that feeling off, she turned and looked back at Kelsey—the safer of the two—and tried to throw off the odd discomfiture that being around Malachi caused. Kelsey smiled easily.”Don’t worry, honey. He has that effect on a lot of people. You actually are handling it better than most,” Kelsey said, tossing Malachi a bland look.

Lori arched her brows. She would have said something but an odd ripple raced down her spine. Jonathan. He was coming.

Turning her head, she eyed the door. “Jonathan’s coming. They’re looking for him, for some reason. They want a wolf, but not just any were. Him in particular.”

Malachi eyed her appraisingly. “How do you know he is coming?”

“I can feel him. I took their mark away, but it wouldn’t completely heal. I had to leave something else in its place. My mark.”

Kelsey nibbled her lip.”We can’t be sure this is the same sort of people that Malachi wiped out before.”

“Either way,” Malachi said slowly. “If they are tracking down ours, they are a problem. We deal with problems.”

Something flickered in Mal’s eyes and he glanced at Lori. “I hear your wolf now. Odd, he is just now approaching the house. I can smell him. He is disturbed, hungry, frustrated. Yet, you knew he was coming before I did. Remarkable.”

“I can feel him. I’ve been able to feel him since the mark. I don’t know if it will last, but all I have to do is think of him.” She wondered what would happen if they thought of each other at the same time, and then she decided it would be wise if they didn’t find out as Jonathan came into the room and his gaze moved to hers, slid over her face, down her neck and roamed over every visible inch of her body, tightening her skin.

I can’t do this now, damn it.

Blood rushed to her cheeks as Jonathan’s gaze locked on hers and try as she might, she couldn’t look away from him.

He stalked over to a chair and dropped his long, lean body into it. His eyes never left her face until he had settled into place. Once he had claimed his spot, he flicked his eyes briefly to Malachi before looking at Kelsey.

“Milady,” he murmured, inclining his head to her gallantly and smiling warmly. “You’re looking gorgeous as always. I hate that my sorry tail is what had to bring you for another visit.”

“I’m not,” Kelsey replied cheekily. “You’ve got such a fine one. I never regret having a chance to check it out.” She wagged her brows at him teasingly before leaving her perch on the window seat and walking over to him. Kneeling in front of him, Kelsey grinned up at him. “Jonathan, I swear, you’re about the sexiest thing I’ve laid eyes on in ages. I’ve just got this thing about being a cradle robber.”

He flashed her a wicked grin.”Doll, nobody needs to know you’re more than twice my age. I wouldn’t know if you hadn’t told me. Maybe you can teach me a thing or two.” As they flirted back and forth, she intertwined hands with him, her eyes going cloudy as she read him, searching inside him.

He had a darkness inside him, but it was his own darkness, his own demons, nothing evil. Nothing treacherous. There was no sign of anything evil taking root in him, like Lori had described.

But there had been. As Kelsey searched inside him, she found it, the empty, hollow core where something had been forced into him the night he had gone patrolling. Kelsey relived it, forcing him through it with her, the Hunt, the kill, the trap, the fight. A woman all in black launching herself at him, a grim, blank look in her exotic amber eyes as she lashed at him with a knife, not to kill but to cut.

And a tattoo on the outer corner of her left eye.

A Scythe.

Opening her eyes, she smiled into Jonathan’s and murmured, “So, when are you going to talk me into it?”

“Baby, I’ve talking my best talk for years. And you keep turning me down flat. I just can’t handle that kind of rejection anymore.” Both of them were breathing slightly harder, and smiling raggedly at each other.

Tossing Lori a look, Kelsey said, “You did a good job, hon. No trace, no sign of them anywhere. They won’t be able to take him, mark him, call him at all. I’m sure that is going to infuriate them. They’ll try something else, and soon.”

“I want to know who they are.”

Malachi asked quietly, “Isn’t that why Kelsey dragged me here? I thought you had some questions for me, young witch. If not, I’d just as soon leave.”

“Yes,” Kelsey said, rolling her eyes. “He was in the middle of a fascinating vacation.”

Lori slid Malachi a look and asked, “Who are the Scythe?”

Malachi’s entire face went cold and blank. He gave Kelsey an odd look. “The Scythe?”

“She’s the one who asked me, Malachi.” Kelsey shrugged. “I know the laws. I told her nothing of them. She asked, so I would think it would be wise for you to tell her.”

“The Scythe were destroyed a millennia ago. Their knowledge and how they were formed, their history and all they knew were eradicated with them. I saw to it. Now, how did you even hear of them? Who told you about them?”

“They marked Jonathan. Nobody told me. He just had a mark on him—a Scythe. I was researching it and couldn’t find much, but...” She shrugged. “There are always rumors. And we’ve been having problems. Attacks. Poison. Other shit. Plus I’ve heard somebody has been striking out and taking down masters at some of the smaller territories.”

Malachi looked at Kelsey. Slowly, he rose from his seat and moved over to where she still knelt by Jonathan. Going to one knee beside her, he laid his palm on her face and stared into her eyes, his own eyes glowing with an eerie, pulsing blue light as he looked into hers.

Kelsey opened her mind to him and shared what she had seen in Jonathan’s mind.

And by the look in Malachi’s eyes, she knew he was not happy.

Chapter Four

Malachi sat on the roof of Eli’s house, staring at the moon, his mouth grim. The wind tugged at his hair, blowing his clothes around his large frame as he listened to the night.

A shadow slipped away from the house—Jonathan.

Why did they want him?

Anger and resignation vied for control inside him. Malachi had hunted down the last of a dark mess of witches and vampires ages ago. But even then, he’d known there was a possibility the Scythe weren’t dead. Evil never wanted to die, after all.

But why had they focused on Jonathan?

He was a powerful were. Was that all it was?

No. He was a powerful were with a streak of darkness in him. He’d been Changed young. Too young. Still a boy, only thirteen when he’d been attacked and the ones who’d Changed him and thought to make him into a plaything.

Instead, he’d killed two of them during his first Change.

Their deaths still haunted the young wolf. The first kill was always the hardest, Malachi knew.

That, perhaps, was the draw. The power...and the darkness. The guilt.

Malachi jerked himself out of his reverie and watched as Jonathan disappeared into the woods. That had been just a handful of years ago. Seconds in Mal’s eyes, but a lifetime for one as young as Jonathan.

Still, the boy had changed. Aged. Gotten stronger. Yet he still carried the darkness. He had fully achieved his potential and then some.

His body had the witch’s scent through and through. And he watched her with the eyes of a wolf guarding his mate.

The part of Mal that just liked to pull a tiger’s tail, or in this case—a wolf’s, made him want to find the pretty little witch and see just how easy it was to make her purr. And he imagined she purred rather nicely when stroked the right way. A gleam made his eyes glow brightly in the night for a moment as he pondered it, watching the spot where he had last seen Jonathan.

You are up to absolutely no good, mate.

A smile crooked his mouth. “Hello, Eli,” he said into the darkness. “I didn’t know you knew I was here.”

This is my land, my home. I am Master here. Of course, I knew. The dry sarcasm in his friend’s voice made him want to laugh, but Malachi just smiled. “You have trouble brewing here, lad. Might be best if you came home.”

It cannot be that bad, Eli replied. There was the impression of a shrug and a dismissal. Nothing feels wrong. If things were wrong, I would know.

“I’ll say it again,” Malachi said slowly. “You have trouble. It would be best if you returned home. Something is after your wolf.”

There was a stillness from Eli as the younger vampire realized how serious Malachi was. Jonathan is no easy target. He may court trouble, but he doles it out just as well.

“Aye, I believe that, I do. But he can’t fight an army of evil. And there’s more...your little witch made the call, and I think she’s right. This might well be connected to the deaths of some of our Hunters. It’s bigger than we think, Eli. Come home.”

Eli’s rage started to surface and Malachi stood. “I’ll not be going anywhere soon. But you are Master here. This will be your fight.”

I am already leaving.

Lori lifted her eyes as a presence disturbed her.

There was no sound, no change in the air, no scent. Nothing. But she wasn’t alone in her chambers anymore.

Running her eyes over the room, she sighed and said softly, “Malachi, these rooms are spelled against everybody but Eli. I don’t know how you managed to slide under them, but show yourself.”

Her brows rose as the mist pooled in a slow spiral, forming so that he was settling at her feet, with his arm draped across her lap. A long, deep-red braid, shades darker than her own, even darker than Sarel’s, spilled over his shoulder as he stared up into her face. “Caught me, didn’t you?” he murmured.

His accent was so impossible to place. Earlier, he had sounded like he was from Scotland, but now…vaguely European, but nothing more. “What do you want?”

A rakish grin crooked his lips as his eyes trailed over her face, settling on her mouth. Lori felt blood rush to her cheeks and cursed herself as his nostrils flared.

“Hmmm, well. What do you have to offer?” he asked teasingly, sliding his midnight gaze to her neck, settling on her pulse. In response, it flared and beat faster.

“Coffee, tea or brandy,” she said tartly, pushing his arm off her lap and sliding away from him. His scent was stronger, had filled the room, and it was intoxicating, like something from the woods and fields of Ireland, the lochs of Scotland and Welsh moors. Lori had spent one long, wonderful summer there, and it had called to her, every bone in her body, just like his body was calling to her now.

Deep in her belly, heat pooled and she felt his call, banked and shielded, but it was still there.

Sliding him a narrow look, she slammed shields of her own in place. Not all witches would be able to do it, and have a chance in hell of it working, but since she was a Healer, empathy ran strong in her.

Blocking him out was something she was able to do. She saw the knowledge in his eyes as her shields clicked into place, firm and solid as a steel wall.

It wouldn’t keep his sexual call out if he decided he wanted her, but at least she wouldn’t have to feel that low level tug from him.

“Hmmm, well, a wise little witch we have here, don’t we?” he mused, settling down like a big mountain cat, watching her with patient, amused eyes. “In all my years, only a handful have figured out that little trick.”

With a smile, she replied, “I’ll send out a memo.”

“A memo?” he repeated, narrowing his eyes thoughtfully. “Ah, yes. A note. You’re going to take all the fun out of my life.”

Lori smiled a little sadly. “You have no fun in your life, Malachi. You’re one of the saddest creatures I’ve ever seen. When was the last time you ever felt true joy, your own true joy, not something you experienced through another?”

His eyes flashed. The rage she felt explode through him had her blood running cold as he slithered up from the floor, leaning closer as his eyes started to glow and gleam, his fangs dropping down. “Watch your words, witch. I’ll not be havin’ you analyzing me. Don’t be forgettin’ who I am…”

His hands closed around her waist and he pinned her against the chair, leaning up against her as he growled into her ear, “I smell fear, and woman. And witch…young hot witch…”

Lori’s pulse rabbited in her throat as the menace filling the room grew to mammoth proportions. Bad mistake. Do not allow the big, ancient vampire to know you could feel his torment. Never, never, never…her eyes widened as he bent low over her face, his hands bringing her hips into contact with his pelvis as he rocked his cock, hard and swollen, against her belly.

Jonathan felt the menace flood his brain as he patrolled the perimeters of town. There was a drug deal going down. He needed to stop that.

A gang fight…

But Lori…

His fangs dropped, ripping through his gums as he turned and raced through the streets. Anger, rage, possessiveness gave his feet wings as he raced to the edge of town and shifted in mid-lope, from man to wolf-man to wolf in three long strides, tearing through the woods in moves faster than the human eye could track.

He had scented Malachi’s presence even as he left home, just a few miles from town. Too far away. Springing into the trees, he shifted, and was half-wolven again as he caught the tree limb, climbing the trees that led up the cliff face.

Do not touch what is mine, Malachi.

Malachi’s mouth hovered over hers, his hands lifting up the edges of her shirt as his body forced her back along the overstuffed top of the chair. Lori turned her head aside and snarled, “Damn it, Malachi, get off of me.”

He laughed.”But I am lonely…needy. You are a Healer. Don’t you wish to end my pain?” he mocked lightly, his voice belying the half-mad light in his eyes.

She had gotten too close, hit a little too close to home, and he didn’t like being stripped bare, not at all, Lori realized. In all his years, it hadn’t happened. None had ever realized his torment, and now he was all but naked with it. And he didn’t like it.

“Loneliness is the curse of the vampire, Malachi. There is no shame in it,” she said quietly, lifting her eyes to his.

“No. No shame. But in more than two thousand years, I can’t find a heart mate. There is no love for me in this world. I am cursed to walk it alone,” he purred roughly, moving away from her gaze, kissing the pounding pulse in her neck, raking it with his teeth but not breaking the skin.”So many, many women…yet not one who is the one for me. My shame…my shame is in fucking as many and as often as I can to take some respite from this aching loneliness. And now, I wish to add you to that list.”

Lori’s incredulous response ended in a gasp as his mouth closed around the tip of one breast, taking it deep. He had her arms locked behind her back, wrists held easily in one hand. Forcing the hot surge of need to clear from her mind, her loins, she said, “Stop it, Malachi. This isn’t right. Not for me. And not for you.”

“I couldn’t care less,” he murmured, lifting his head and studying his work. Her nipple was red through the sheer white cotton of her camisole.”‘Tis right for me. For now…that is enough. And you are wanting, and needy. Isn’t that enough for you? Besides, if you truly didn’t want me touching you, why not scream for help?”

Lori’s head fell back as a sound caught between a laugh and sob fell from her lips. His cock settled between her thighs, thick, hard, perfect. As he cupped and massaged her breast, working the nipple with his fingers, she forced the words out of her mouth. “If I scream, Eli’s people—loyal people—will come rushing. Werewolves don’t always think. They act. And how do I know you will not kill first? Those are my friends. And Rafe, Sheila, the other vamps in this enclave, they can’t possibly fight you.”

Malachi’s lips quirked. “There is that.” Of course, if she’d just scream…he’d stop. Though he didn’t tell her that, she was sooooo sweet.

“I love Jonathan. He is right for me,” she rasped, jerking against his hold.

Malachi lifted his head, meeting her eyes. “A noble thought, that.”

Jonathan eyed the edge of the cliff, his lips peeling back in a snarl. Hot waves of lust, confusion and fear were flowing from Lori. He could feel them. And Malachi’s hands, all over her. He lunged forward and raced over the grounds, covering the half mile that lay between him and Lori in a moment that flew by so fast he never noticed it, yet it dragged out forever.

He could hear them now…soft whispers of movement. Malachi’s voice, then Lori’s steady, certain words...”I love Jonathan.”

Jonathan leaped toward the windowsill and hauled himself up as Malachi replied, “A noble thought, that. Though the wolf doesn’t see himself as worthy. He doesn’t think himself worthy to serve the Council, so why would he see himself as worthy of your love?”

Jonathan gripped the windowsill and gathered himself, then lunged, flipping up and through her window, landing on his haunches, snarling at Malachi.

Mal’s eyes lifted from Lori’s, though he didn’t rise from his position, bent low over her firm, supple body where he held her over the back of a chair.

“Get the fuck away from her,” Jonathan growled. His hands flexed, the glistening ebony claws catching and reflecting the light as he fought the urge to attack.”What in the hell is wrong with you?”

“Wolf, you are truly a brave soul to involve yourself where you cannot possibly win,” Malachi mused, rising slowly, still keeping Lori hugged tightly against him.”She is a sweet thing, your mate. I can’t help but crave a taste.”

“I’ve no mate, vampire. But Lori doesn’t want you, I feel it. And I wouldn’t bet that I can’t win. Every man must fall. Even the very ancient.”

Malachi’s eyes slid to Lori’s face, suddenly so pale. His lips crooked gently. “He’s a young fool, love. Give him time.” Lowering his lips, he kissed her forehead gently. “I beg your forgiveness. My pride is bruised, such a young thing seeing so clearly through me. Those eyes can see much.”

Jonathan snarled as the vampire’s mouth touched that ivory skin, but Malachi turned glimmering midnight-blue eyes his way and said obliquely, “Young fools, old fools. We’re both fools here tonight.”

And then, he was gone.

Lori met Jonathan’s eyes, her soft green ones, troubled and bruised. Her mouth was swollen from Malachi’s, her nipples still erect, a damp spot on her shirt where he had been suckling on her.

“He touched you,” Jonathan rasped, as he banished the wolf. He was kneeling naked on the floor, a ragged gasp hissing through his teeth as the change receded.

Rising, he stalked over to her, his nostrils flaring. He could smell another man’s touch all over her, and rage twisted sharply through him. “His touch, his scent is all over you.”

Lori said quietly, “What do you care?”

His lips peeled back from his teeth and he reached out, catching her against him, one arm at her waist, his other hand buried in her hair. “Do you want him to come back and finish what he started?”

“No. But you obviously don’t want the scent on me to be yours, so why do you care whose scent is on me?” Lori asked, lifting her hands and pushing at his shoulders.

Jonathan stared down at her, breath heaving in and out of his lungs. Her hands, those slim, warm hands, so exquisitely soft, pushed against his shoulders, and her eyes glared angrily at him, and under the anger, was pain. Groaning, Jonathan leaned down, catching her face in his hands, pushing his tongue inside her mouth.

When she tried to turn her head aside, he stopped her. When she bit him, he bit her back, sinking his teeth into her lower lip and suckling at it until she whimpered and yielded to him. Her hands curled into his shoulders, her body softening against his in welcome. Pulling back, Jonathan rasped, “Take my hair, rub it against you,” before bending low over her, kissing her neck, rubbing his cheek against her shoulder as he reached for the hem of her shirt, stripping it away.

Eli wasn’t happy.

After settling down on the plane, he tapped his fingers on his thigh as Sarel told him what she had learned while he had slept. Her eyes, those golden green eyes, were weary, bruised, but snapping with the fiery light of battle.

The Scythe.

“They are the ones who attacked you seven years ago,” Sarel finished, running her hand over the smooth skin where the bullets had ripped through him. “They nearly took you from me. They kidnapped my sister, and tried to kill Jonathan. And they’ve been exterminating the Masters, brainwashing the younger packs. We’ve been out battling our own people and waging war on them, because of these people. I know it.”

“Indeed,” Eli murmured, taking her hand and lifting it to his lips. “We’ve a score to settle there, don’t we, love?”

Drawing one leg up, he stared into the distance, focusing on his land. There was a strain there. New ones, old ones. But a weakening in the links that bound it to him.

“They are hunting Jonathan with a vengeance now, Eli,” Sarel said quietly. “Agnes said something like it had happened once before. A young, powerful were with a dark past was converted. He led them on a bloodbath. They want him—his soul, his body.”

“They cannot possibly hope to have him,” Eli said smoothly, confidently. “Jonathan has his demons but he’s got a good heart. One of the best men I know. He won’t go the wrong, darling. He can’t. It’s not him.”

Sarel looked troubled. “He’s a warrior, yeah. But he’s shadows in him, baby. A lot of them. Shadows. Pain. Sometimes, I’m amazed it hasn’t overwhelmed him. I was surprised he was accepted into the Council.” Her mouth firmed and she shook her head. “If they are after him, it’s for a reason. Monsters can recognize monsters easily enough. We should watch him. If they get in close enough to break him, he could a problem.”

“Jonathan will die before he breaks,” Eli said flatly, rising. He moved away from Sarel. “I know him, love. His soul has darkness in it, but he was tormented in his youth, even more than you. It’s a war he wages daily. Of all in my enclave, I can see any of them breaking before Jonathan. He will not yield.”

Sarel’s eyes narrowed as Eli spoke. “Even me?”

Eli sighed, running a hand through his hair, impatient. “You do not know Jonathan. The…power of magick is more easily corrupted. The power of the wolf, once bonded to the person’s heart, it…it isn’t. Jonathan’s path is set.”

“Then explain why we have had to kill entire packs of weres,” she snapped.

“Because they were simply weres. They gave into their madness and went feral,” Eli replied. “Jonathan is just simply were. He’s been touched, and heavily, by the power of the wolf. If you bothered to speak with him, or look at him, you would see. The wolf only lays his touch where he sees fit, but once he lays his touch, he is bonded to that person. The wolf and Jonathan are bonded. Jonathan is as likely to be corrupted as your sister, or as any true empath.”

Sarel’s eyes went flat and she folded her arms across her chest. Eli met her eyes squarely.”I’m sorry, love. Touch the wolf, let it touch you. Or talk with your sister, though you still insist on seeing her as a child.”

Eli felt the ice settle in the cabin and he sighed, draping himself in a chair across from his wife, watching her with opaque gold eyes. But his trust in Jonathan was unshakeable.

And the were deserved to know that.

* * * * *

Leandra studied the pretty young child, her head bent low over her schoolwork as she flipped a page back and forth, lips pursed.

She had the wolf’s scent in her room.

Though she lived in the main house, it was strong here. A picture of him hugging her, pictures of them riding horses together. That was where Leandra had first seen the child. She was watched closely, escorted to and from the private school she attended twenty miles away by guarded limo. Licking her lips, she decided this was it.

The way to draw him out.

The guarded limo would be a task. The weres who travelled with it weren’t fools, or weaklings by any means. Which was why the Scythe had made sure to convert weres of their own.

But this was a task for their inherent.

Erika glanced up, frowning. A cold feeling ran down her spine and she slid from her seat. Most would have gone to glance out the window. But she moved away. She resisted the urge though, to call out to Sheila.

There were monsters in the dark, she knew. In her twelve years of life, this was something she knew as fact. Monsters that ran on two legs as well as four, monsters that could grab you and pinch you and whisper terrible things, and then smile at your teachers the next day. Monsters that could be human or not, that could be a creature of magick or of human blood.

But the most revolting creatures were sometimes those standing right in front of her.

Like her own monster had been.

Jonathan had saved her from that, years ago. Uncle Jon, her best friend, her buddy.

This was her home now, and Jonathan was her adopted dad, though they had decided he was more like a brother, or an uncle. He was, simply put, her guardian angel, Erika thought. But she had stopped screaming out to him every time something spooked her years ago.

Squaring her shoulders, Erika settled down at her desk and went back to her calculus homework. She needed to finish this. She wanted to finish up early again this year. Jon and Eli had promised a surprise if she did well.

* * * * *

Lori gasped as Jonathan slid his hands down and cupped her ass, lifting her up against him, rocking his naked cock against her through the thin cotton of her pajama bottoms. She was wet, and felt him sliding against her, over and over her clit as heat pooled in her belly, tightening and tightening until she thought she’d go mad with it.

His mouth fastened on her nipple, where Malachi’s had been only moments ago.”I want his taste gone from you, his scent. I do not share,” he rasped, pumping his hips more forcefully against her.”If he had fucked you, I would have torn his head off.”

Lori shuddered, even though her heart felt broken. I’ve no mate…
Tears welled in her eyes against her will, and she turned her head as they burned hot, wet tracks down her cheeks.

His head raised, scenting her distress, and Jonathan lifted up. Gathering her in his arms, cuddling her against him and taking her to the floor, he held her in his lap. Cupping her cleft in his hand, he slid one finger back and forth over the erect little bud of her clit, murmuring against her face as he licked the tears away, “Why are you crying, sweet thing?”

“Because you don’t care,” she whispered, unable to still the hungry movement of her hips, even though she wanted nothing more than to tear away from him and lock herself in her room. The slow, almost lazy movement of his finger circling her clit was driving her to distraction and Lori groaned, her head falling back against his shoulder.

Her breath left her in a rush, as he savaged her lips. Her pajamas fell in shreds around her as he tore them off, tumbling her to her back and looming over her. Snarling into her face, he demanded, “Don’t care? What in the hell are you talking about?”

“You don’t want Malachi touching me. You may enjoy fucking me, but that’s about all you feel for me,” she said, glaring up at him. Between her thighs, his erection throbbed, and she hissed out a breath as he settled between them, his chest crushing her breasts.

“That’s all?” he repeated, his face going blank. Then his eyes narrowed as he caught her hands and pinned them above her head, the corded muscles in his arms bulging as he leaned over her. “I left patrol because I felt your fear, your confusion, and your lust…yes, your lust. You wanted him even though you didn’t want to. I left patrol and ran here to keep him away from you. Malachi. Most people would think that’s enough to have me certified simply for squaring off against him. But I would fight to the death to keep him from having you, and you think I don’t care?”

With one savage thrust, he buried himself in her pussy, growling with pleasure as she enveloped him eagerly, a hungry cry falling from her lips, her body arching up as he burrowed in to the balls. “Little fool,” he rasped, capturing her head and forcing her eyes to meet his.”Open your mouth, I want your taste.”

Glaring up at him, Lori stubbornly closed her lips and lifted her chin.

He bared his teeth in a grin, and whispered, “A wolf loves a dare, baby. You ought to know that by now.”

Lori quivered deep inside her belly as he started to pump in and out of her cleft with slow, deep thrusts. His hand still held her wrists pinned high over her head, as he rubbed his chest, his hair, his entire body against hers, replacing Malachi’s scent with his own.

He lowered his mouth to hers, nibbling away, licking at the seam of her lips. One hand slid down the long line of her side, cupping her ass for a moment before clasping her knee and lifting it up, opening her wide for his thrusts.

The long silken skeins of his hair slithered over her body, teasing her nipples, her torso, all the bared inches of skin as he released her wrists and settled back on his heels, gripping her hips and staring down at her with hooded eyes. The play of muscle under skin as he moved deep inside her had her eyes fluttering wide. Drawing her forward, he draped her thighs over his, and with a roll of his hips, Jonathan had her shuddering as he surged upward into her, his cock caressing the bundled nerve bed of her G-spot. His teeth raked the cord in her neck and he crooned, “Sexy little witch. I love the feeling of being buried in your wet little pussy. You’re so tight, so hot, like a silk glove, all wet and covered with honey. I’m gonna lick that honey dry in a bit…but first…I’m gonna make you scream.”

A sigh escaped her lips and Jonathan’s mouth swooped down on hers, plundering the depths triumphantly, rampantly as he started to fuck her with deep, hard strokes. Her spine arched as his fingers breeched the seam of her ass, separating her, exposing the pucker of her rosette. Moisture from her pussy slid lower, coating her, and Jonathan gathered it, sliding it around and around, until he could probe that tender hole easily, a caress that had her shaking, quivering, while heat and chills racked her body.

The broad, rounded head of his cock left her sheath, stroking over her clit teasingly, and Lori threw her head back, screaming. Jonathan pushed his finger into the tight little pucker of her anus and surged back into her pussy, sinking his teeth into her lower lip as she came.

Growling in savage triumph, Jonathan bore her back down onto her back, pumping into her, he rode her hard, grinding his pelvis against her clit as she came, and Lori saw hot little flashes of light as her vision went dark. Hot splashes of come scalded her as Jonathan ejaculated and Lori whimpered, shaking in his arms. His balls slapped against her in a rough, quick caress as he reared up, planting his hands beside her head and thrusting with a series of hard, deep drives into her sheath, his head falling back as his mouth opened and a long, eerie howl filled the room.

To Lori’s ears, it was the most beautiful song she’d ever heard.

He collapsed against her with his head between her breasts, sliding his arms under her and holding her against him.”Don’t ever cry because you think I don’t care,” he panted out. “Hate me because I won’t make promises, if you have to. But I do care. More than I want to.”

Lori wanted to know why he wouldn’t make promises. She really wanted to ask him that.

But she let it go, snuggling against him as he carried her to the bed, laying her down and spreading her thighs. Pressing his face against her and sliding his tongue between her folds, he shocked her speechless as he cleaned the seed from her pussy, her thighs, before returning to suckle gently on her clit, working two gentle fingers inside her slippery, swollen sheath.

Lori’s eyes fluttered closed in heavenly bliss as he took her to a slow, lovely orgasm that welled inside and lingered, melting through her veins like candy. He moved up and lay on his back, growling against her neck as he draped her body over his, “You are so damn sweet, so pretty and soft. I think of you, yearn for you, all the time.”

Tears burned her eyes as he steadied his cock and whispered roughly, “Ride me, sweet. I want to watch you.”

Catching her lower lip between her teeth, she worked herself down on his swollen, engorged length, staring into his dark, deep eyes, her hands planted on his chest, nails digging into the sleek, golden skin there. Rolling her hips slowly, she shuddered as she felt him throbbing inside her, the thick blunt head of his cock caressing the nerve bed by the mouth of her womb. Her lashes fluttered and she moaned weakly. “Oh…” licking her lips, she stared down at him and lifted her hips slightly before sliding back down on him.

It sent a lightning streak of hot pleasure through her, and she shuddered before repeating it, arching her back and leaning forward to deepen the caress on the upstroke.

“Sweet thing,” Jonathan purred gruffly, reaching up to cup her breasts in his hands, rolling her nipples, plucking at them, as he stared up at her face. His eyes had started to glow, gleaming and swirling with colors of gold and brown as his hunger grew. His hands flexed against her breasts, his nails scoring her lightly as he arched his back, driving his cock deeply inside her.

“Hmmm,” Lori hummed in her throat, her head falling back.”I like that.” The air in the room grew thicker, and Lori stared into his eyes, watching as the glowing increased and his eyes continued to brighten.”Jonathan?” she whispered, shakily.

“Shhh…” he murmured, reaching up and burying his hand in her hair, pulling her face to him.”It’s all right. I feel your magick, your heart—it’s intoxicating.”

Magick was breaking free, rising from her skin like faerie dust and evaporating into the air, lighting up the dim room with occasional puffs of light. The magick from her, the power from him, tightened the air in the room, and the bond between them—tighter and tighter—as Jonathan thrust deeper and deeper, while Lori rocked against him. Sealing her lips eagerly to his, she pushed her tongue into his mouth, greedy for that unique, wild taste that was his alone.

His cock pulsed and throbbed—hot, burning—and her nipples stabbed into his chest…so much sensation…too many focus points of pleasure. Jonathan reached down and stroked the small puckered rosette of her bottom, and Lori arched her back and screamed as he pressed against it, her belly and loins tightening.

The muscles in her pussy clenched around his cock, milking it greedily as she came, shuddering in his arms and thrashing when he sank his teeth into the fleshy part of her breast and growled. Gripping her hip with one hand and holding her still, he ground his pelvis against her, arching up and jetting off inside her—hot, molten seed flooding her womb.

As she collapsed against his chest, she closed her burning, tearing eyes. No. She couldn’t keep doing this.

Something this beautiful and he wouldn’t let them have it for always. Wouldn’t let them claim it as theirs. She wouldn’t hate him for not making her promises.

But she might start to hate herself for not demanding it.

Chapter Five

Jonathan sat across from Erika, grinning at her as she chattered away. His adopted daughter was the one person in life he made promises to, the one person he allowed himself to love.

His eyes wandered briefly to the ceiling. The other female he loved was upstairs, silent and still. His sharp ears knew she hadn’t left the bed yet.

Yeah, he loved her. But he would never tell her. Especially not now. And he couldn’t ever touch her again. The wolf wanted to claim her as his mate, his one and only.

Dragging his attention back to Erika, he shrugged when she asked about a shopping trip.”Don’t see why we can’t. You’ve been doing great in school, and you always help out and do your chores. Shelby says you’re wonderful out in the stables.” He couldn’t understand that particular fascination himself, but Erika adored the horses. “We’ll go this weekend.”

“I kinda wanted to go with some friends,” Erika stalled. “Just friends.”

“No can do.” Rising from the chair, he carried his bowl and plate to the sink and dumped them before turning around and facing her across the gleaming expanse of the kitchen. Folding his arms across his chest, he met her eyes.”We’ve talked about this, honey. You’re twelve years old. A brilliant twelve, but still twelve. Walking around a mall alone is not wise. Especially not now. We’ve got some new trouble brewing and it isn’t gonna happen.”

“Jonathan, I can’t go shopping with friends with my big brother around! It just isn’t cool,” Erika sulked, poking out her lower lip and aiming her baby-blues his way as she sat back in her chair, suddenly completely forlorn.

“Then we’ll have one of the ladies go with you. Hell, it is winter. Wait until five and Sheila can take you.”

Erika’s brows lifted and she perked up a bit at that. None of her friends knew a darned thing about her life, or any of her odd…housemates. Just the thought of taking a vampire with her to go shopping would be so cool.

Jonathan shook his head as the thoughts rolled through her eyes. Those pretty eyes were always so open, so easy to read. “Think about it. Sheila would love it. Or I can ask one of the ladies. And Sarel is going to be back sooner than expected. Maybe she could do it.”

Hell, if things were as bad as Malachi was suggesting, it wouldn’t surprise him if Tori and Declan came strolling up the walk.

His lips curved at the thought of Tori.

Okay, there was one other female he let himself love.

But she was safe. Not only did she belong to somebody, the Huntress was more than capable of taking care of herself.

Tori held down the struggling, snarling were and flashed fang at him. “That’s not very nice. You’re as good as dead and you know it,” she said when he attempted to gouge out her eyes before she managed to get his hands pinned. Whipping out the reinforced cuffs, she cuffed him and sat on his chest, drawing a long, nasty looking silver blade from behind her neck and flashing it at him.

“You know, Cooper, I’ve been Hunting you for a month now. You led me and Declan on a merry, merry chase,” she said quietly, shaking her head. “So many deaths, so many shattered lives, battered bodies. You like them young and pretty, don’t you, Coop?”

He spat at her.

Declan moved up from behind and knelt by the man, offering Tori a handkerchief as he said, “Now that was just plain not nice. Don’t go doing something so rude again. You knew the risk you were taking, and you knew the consequences when you left your pack and went rogue. Cuss and fight all you want. But you had best watch how you carry yourself with my wife.”

“With your bitch, you mean,” Cooper Manning panted, his blond curls spilling into his face as he bucked and struggled uselessly. The one hundred thirty pound woman on top of him wouldn’t be budged. And her scent…damn it, her scent was intoxicating. Scared as he was, frightened as he was, furious as he was…he was also damn near drunk with hunger for her. “Is she a good piece of ass? When I get outta these damn cuffs, I’m gonna gut you, and find out for myself, fucker.”

Declan’s face went blank and he bent to pull Tori away but she batted at his hands laughingly. “Now, now, Declan. He’s just pissed because he got caught by a girl.” Leaning down, she asked, “Is that it? Do you have a superiority complex?”

He lifted up as though to bite her, and she drew back quickly. A mark on his cheek, no…by his eye, right at the corner, caught her eye. Something curved, like a crescent. “Nice tattoo,” she mused.”I didn’t think the were could take tattoos very well.”

Declan’s eyes caught it too. “We don’t. Unless it’s helped out by magick. We heal too fast, and our bodies reject the ink. What this for, Cooper?”

Tossing his head back, laughing, Cooper said, “Oh, wait. You’re gonna see, very soon.”

“You like stars and moons, puppy dog?” Tori jeered, leaning down in his face as menace started to flow from her, a frightening menace that rolled from her body in waves.

His eyes widened and a cold sweat broke out on his body as those pretty blue eyes started to look like what they really were. His death.

“It’s not a moon, love. A scythe, it is, for harvesting.” Cocking his head and staring at the suddenly frightened man, Declan smiled charmingly. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, mate. Tell me, what have you been harvesting? Or were you harvested?”

His eyes rolled back wildly in his head as he moved his gaze from the woman on his chest to the man standing behind her. He had thought the inherent was the one to fear, not the woman. What was she anyway? Human? Inherent? Not vampire…couldn’t be. She had tracked him during the day, too many times.

Tori smiled, gently, sweetly, leaning into his face as she caught his thoughts. Her gifts had grown over the years, expanding and developing to dimensions she had never dreamed. His jumbled, skewed thoughts weren’t easy to keep track of, but she did it well enough. Smiling, nose-to-nose with him, she whispered, “I am what I am, Cooper. And you should have stopped when I gave you the first warning, darling.” Stroking his face, rubbing her finger over the mark by his eye, she purred, “Now tell me, what is this?”

“It’s your downfall. The end of the Council,” he snapped. “The Scythe has gathered, reformed, bitch. We’ve got an army of our own and we’ll swallow the Council and the Hunters whole. We will annihilate them all and feast on the blood of the newborn Huntress before she takes her first kill.”

Tori waited a blink and then she started to laugh. “Wow. That’s dramatic. Who in the hell wrote that bit of dialog?”

“Laugh if you will. But we know about your so-called Huntress. And we’re already looking for her. We’ll find her. We’ll kill her. And we’ll take out the Council, the Hunters, all of you.”

“Well...you’re a little late taking me out. I had my first kill years ago.”

Cooper stared at her, his eyes wide. “What...?”

“You won’t be my first meal. But you’ll be happy to know you just met your bogeyman, Cooper...I’m the Huntress.” She lunged for him, smashing his head into the pavement as she fed.

“Who is the Scythe?” Tori asked, a frown on her face as she watched Declan remove the cuffs from the body. Catching them, she slid them back into her waistband, watching with blank eyes as he moved things away from the body.

Burning this one. Well, it’s better than watching him cut the heart out. Too much of Tori was still far too mortal.

Declan tossed her a glance and shrugged restlessly as he stalked around the body, making sure nothing could be traced to them. Of course, Tori McAdams and Declan Reilly had died a few years ago. He had, regretfully, seen to that, once he realized how badly they were needed by the Council. Completely by the Council.

It had just taken some fancy computer work, and some money—rather a lot of money—to erase certain details from the computer files. Nothing was foolproof, no matter what the FBI thought, no matter what anybody thought. Declan O’Reilly’s fingerprints had been replaced with somebody else’s, as had Tori’s. They had new identities, new passports, new everything.

And each other. Always each other.

“Never heard of them, darling. I’ll be calling Eli. I’m not sure if he’s home from Scotland though. Maybe he’s heard of the Scythe, whatever or whoever they are.”

“Agnes may know. Or Sarel.”

“They may,” Declan said with a nod.”Can you fetch me the petrol?”

“Gas, Dec. It’s gas. And I don’t care to be a help to—oh, all right.” She yielded as that flinty green gaze skimmed over and settled on her face. She really needed to get over this part of the job. They couldn’t go leaving paranormal corpses intact, really. And if they left too many of the predators they hunted, untouched except for her bite, sooner or later, people would start hunting them. Damn it, though, sometimes she felt like she was…well, Tori couldn’t even explain it to herself.

She didn’t like committing a crime to cover her Hunting. She didn’t see the Hunting as a crime. It was justice. Vigilantism, yeah. But still, it was justice. And the police would have been slaughtered if they had gone after Cooper. And Declan wouldn’t burn the whole building, just the body.

“Well, well, well, what have we got here, boys?”

In her thoughts, Tori hadn’t paid that much attention to what lay outside the warehouse where they had cornered Cooper. The stink of his blood on her clothes, and in her mouth had tricked her nose a little, though not that much.

The only thing she could blame it on was sheer distracted. She hadn’t been paying attention and now…she was smiling angelically into the eyes of three very big, very brawny men, dressed in worn biker-style jeans, one in a leather jacket.

He had spoken, eying her with hot, hungry eyes. The rag on his head held back oily hair from his face, and he stank from a body not washed in several days. How she hadn’t smelled it, well, Tori would now have her own ass to beat. And Declan would enjoy yelling at her thoroughly over this one.

“Looks like a little lady, all alone. Are you lonesome, sweet thing?” the second asked, laughing a little as he jabbed one of his friends in the ribs. His eyes had fastened on the breasts showing under her tank, the smooth expanse of naked skin, and as she met his eyes, he licked his lips and winked at her, reaching down to cup his crotch.

“No. Not at all. Why don’t y’all go on about whatever you were doing and I’ll finish up my business as well?”

“Business, huh?” Tall, Oily and Ugly asked, grinning nastily.”We’re here on business, too. Meeting a friend right in there. You oughta come with us. We can have a…get together.”

Oh, shit.

They had been meeting up with Cooper.

The third one still hadn’t spoken. Meeting his glittering brown eyes, Tori felt a shiver run down her spine.

Not human…and as she watched, one lid dropped in an easy, friendly wink, as his mouth curved up in a smile. His body, tall and rangy, powerful, was clean under the rather ragged, filthy clothes, and as she took a deep breath, she scented it on him. Magick…and…inherent…narrowing her eyes at him, he mouthed the words, Hello.

Well, either they had a new friend, or more formidable foe than they had been expecting. Smiling in challenge, she lifted her chin before looking back to Tall, Oily and Ugly before saying in a falsely coy voice,” I’m sorry but I’ve already got a date. I’m afraid I’ll have to decline that charming offer.”

Turning on her heel, she swayed back into the warehouse, ears pricked. She heard two sets of footsteps. The third, she did not. Of course, she really didn’t expect to.

Declan didn’t like the glitter in his wife’s eyes. So he wasn’t surprised to see there was no petrol in her hands.

She hadn’t even moved five steps into the warehouse when he heard the others. Oh, he had heard them outside, and kept a good ear on the conversation, but, bloody hell, Tori could handle it. He was busy stripping the signs of Tori’s fight away from Cooper. The skin under his nails, hair, all of that had to go.

But when two men rushed his wife…well, that was just more than a man could tolerate. Even when she did pivot, delivering a swift sidekick into the solar plexus of the first before squaring off with the second. A third hung back in shadow, not even glancing at the one who lay semiconscious on the ground.

“Now come on...didn’t I tell you that I had a date?” she demanded, her voice impatient. That was his Tori, charming to fault.

The second one eyed her narrowly, slowly his rush as he took stock of the situation.

So far, Declan hadn’t been noticed. Why in the hell did he fade into the background around her, he wondered.

Of course, Tori was also pretty good at commanding attention. Since one of her would-be attackers lay eight feet away, Declan didn’t rightly blame the man for giving Tori a bit more attention.

Tori had also pulled her kick. She could have killed him.

“Mouthy little bitch, ain’t ya?” he asked, sneering a little as he eyed her. In her tank and form-fitting pants, Declan knew she was a very delectable looking mouthful. But, well, the fucker had just called his wife a bitch.

Moving away from Cooper’s corpse, Declan rolled his shoulders and suggested, “I’d be watching my tone if I were you, mate. That’s my wife you’re talking to.”

Tori’s lashes fluttered and she pressed her hand to her half-naked breast.”Oh, be still my heart. He always gets me weak when he gets protective.”

As the six foot ex-cop moved into the light, the shaggy looking biker’s face tightened, moving away from the lone woman. She wasn’t looking like such a fun target anymore, but he still had four guys here, didn’t he?

“No, you have three. And one of those three is just about unconscious, with broken bones,” Tori supplied, smiling.

“Stop showing off, sweet,” Declan said, shaking his head.

Now, confusion was starting to enter the man’s eyes as he looked at Tori, and then looked beyond Declan and saw the corpse of Cooper. His eyes narrowed. “Was that your business partner for the night?” Declan asked.”I heard you talking. Sorry. We had a meeting with him before you did. It didn’t end well for him.”

Tall, Oily and Ugly was now getting pretty pissed, Declan decided. He slid his eyes to the man still in shadow. Nostrils flared as he studied him. There was something almost…familiar about that scent, the slant of those shoulders, the build. Friend or foe?

“C’mon out, Ben,” Tall, Oily and Ugly shouted over his shoulder as he reached behind his back. But his hand never touched his gun. Of course, Declan never got close enough to stop him either.

He was at his shoulder, but Tori was behind him, with his arm shoved high between his shoulder blades, as she purred in his ear, “Don’t. That would be such a bad, bad idea.”

Menace was rolling from her now, and the man’s eyes were wide with fear and confusion as he rolled his head over his shoulder, trying to see her face. But she was so small, he couldn’t. Turning, he faced Declan.

Obligingly, Declan grinned, flashing a toothy display of his canines, much, much longer than they had been only a second earlier.

“Ben!”

“Oh, shut up,” a deep, almost growling voice said from the shadows. Moving away from the door, and into the light, the third man said, “I’ve really no desire to help you get yourself out of this mess. Especially since the entire reason I was following you was to find Cooper. And he’s dead as a doornail now.”

Declan cocked his head, studying the man before him and feeling like he had been flung through time. Michael Cross…but no…his father, second lieutenant to Connor Reilly, had been one of the men who had been killed protecting him. Narrowing his eyes, he studied the powerful, rangy form, trying to remember. There had been a boy, just a babe, really, that William had secreted away to another pack. Where he’d be safe, both the boy and his mother, a pretty fae-looking witch who used to tell Declan stories.

“Benjamin Cross,” Declan said quietly, shaking his head.”What a small, small world we live in. I’d heard you had joined the Council.”

Lowering his head, the inherent nodded in acknowledgment to Declan as he moved around Tori, aware of how nervous he was making her by being at her back.”Yeah, a few years back, a big eerie vamp tracked me down. Malachi. Don’t suppose you’ve heard of him, have you?” he asked drolly.

“Bastard,” Declan replied affably.

Ben chuckled.”Yeah. Well, I told him to go fuck himself. Then they sent this pretty little witch, Kelsey…well, her…I had a harder time saying no to. That, and duty called.” With a sigh, he rubbed his hand over his chin and studied the sweating, swearing man as Tori forced him to the ground so she could glare at them without the big, ugly bastard blocking her view.

“He looks a little petrified,” Ben decided.

Declan laughed.”Why don’t you put him out of his misery? You probably know his crimes better than we do, and my Tori still has a soft stomach.”

“I do not have a soft stomach,” Tori said as Ben and Declan later put out the flames.

“Of course, you do. That’s one of the things I love about you,” Declan whispered against her neck. Then he turned his eyes back to Benjamin and said, “We have to get out of here. We need to make some calls—but I would like to have you come. It’s been a while…since I’ve talked with people who knew of my father.”

Benjamin nodded as he scuffed the ashes with his shoes. “I was hoping…” he smiled rather sadly.”I don’t remember Dad. I was too young to remember much more than how big he was, how full of life.”

“He was an honorable man, big and funny. He loved you, I remember that. And he took me for rides on his back,” Declan said as his eyes grew distant. Tori lay a hand on his arm, rubbing it gently.

Ben closed his eyes and sighed, shuddering faintly as he scrubbed his hands up and down his face.”The bastards that stole our fathers from us, all of them are dead, I know. But it isn’t enough.”

“It can never be enough. But we do what we can to keep people from poisoning other packs and robbing more children of their fathers, Ben. That’s what we do.”

Ben nodded slowly.”Duty, that’s what called me here.” He met Tori’s eyes over the distance and studied her.”The Scythe—they thought they would gather before you came.”

Tori eyed him narrowly.”What are you?”

He smiled, a rather, grim disturbing smile.”Something that the Scythe really didn’t want running around. Any more than they wanted you.” Lifting one hand, he stared into her eyes as a gleaming ball of fire formed, spinning rapidly in his hand.”For some reason, when a witch mates with an inherent, it seems to cancel out one gift or the other. But not always.”

Tori stared, mesmerized, into the gleaming ball, as the fire seemed to thin out and become transparent, until she was staring into a golden orb, filled with faces of children, of women with lost, broken eyes, of young boys who wandered the streets, homeless, and then a place she knew. Excelsior.

Where the young and gifted went to be trained.

Then the Hall of the Hunters and Malachi, and another Hunter, vaguely familiar, Byron. Eli, so many faces. Agnes, Kelsey.

Then she and Miguel, the bloody bastard who had sired her, as he stalked the streets, taking down his prey and laughing at their terror. Swallowing, she tore her eyes away from the gleaming orb that had grown and grown until it was nearly half the size of a VW bug. “A witch. How can you be both a witch and a wolf?”

Through the gleaming golden-orange glow, she could barely make out his outline, though his voice, that deep growling voice, was powerful, almost palpable. “How can a woman be human and vampire? And smell of wolf as well?” he asked as the orb started to melt away.

“I am what I am. What the Council needs me to be. God has a habit of sending down what is most needed, when it’s needed,” he said, lifting one broad, heavily muscled shoulder as he studied her face, which Tori was certain was even paler than normal.

“God?” Tori repeated.”How quaint,” she mocked lightly as she tried to steady herself. Hell, she was being a bitch.

“Yes, God. You believed in Him a few years ago,” Benjamin said softly as he moved a little closer, studying her face with penetrating eyes. “Has a few years of Hunting changed that?”

Sliding his eyes to her husband, Benjamin said, “I think I’m disconcerting your wife.”

“I’m thinking that you have a habit of doing that to many folk,” Declan said, moving up behind Tori and stroking his hands up and down her arms.”Tori doesn’t…care for expediency. Tonight has been a night for it, and we’ve more yet to do.”

“Hmmm. Indeed.” Benjamin smiled slowly, almost sadly. “I lost that innocence a long time ago.”

Chapter Six

Erika cuddled up in the limo for the drive, nibbling at the cinnamon roll Sheila had cooked during the night. Though the vampire no longer ate, she still loved to cook, and Erika was a big fan of her cooking.

A crumb fell onto the romance novel she had sneaked out of Sarel’s room and Erika flicked it away, glancing to make sure Mike wasn’t paying attention. Her eyes caught something and her breath lodged in her throat. Mike glanced up, ever alert. “Okay, brat?”

Just before the silver bullet ripped through his shoulder. If he hadn’t shifted position, it could have been his head. As they slowed at the intersection, Erika had seen somebody in the car next to theirs lower the window and aim…and now, they were rushing the limo.

Mike bellowed with rage, leaping for her and tucking her body protectively under his as he shouted to Brad, “Take off!”

But the bullet aimed at him hadn’t missed, and he lay slumped over the steering wheel as his heart’s blood pumped out of his chest.

Drawing from his boot the gun Eli had ordered all to carry, Mike rolled, working them back against the seat, waiting and calling out to Eli. But it appeared there wouldn’t be enough time.

And Erika had no bond with any of them. No blood bond, no soul bond. She was just a sweet, innocent kid.

As the exotically beautiful face swam into his vision, he raised the gun.

“Put the gun down, wolf. I’ll let you live, so you can tell Jonathan where to be finding the girl. It’s him we want.”

“Fuck you,” Mike rasped as he pulled the trigger.

Leandra swore into the darkness of the alcove as one of the clumsy idiots pressed too hard on the bullet wound in her side, tearing it and causing more blood to flow.

“You should have let me kill him.”

“No. He is a warrior, protecting his charge even in the face of death. No warrior should be killed like a sick dog. He deserves to die in battle,” Leandra said, lifting her gaze back to Vincent and staring him down.”And he will tell the tale to Jonathan. He’s the one we want...not some innocent girl.”

“The girl is a pain in the ass, too much trouble. When can we dump her?”

Leandra narrowed her eyes.”She goes back to her home when Jonathan turns himself over. I fight honorable battles.”

“You cling too much to honor. We are the Scythe, not the Hunters.”

“I am a warrior,” Leandra said, rising slowly. Rage pulsed inside her as she glared at him. He towered over her, but she didn’t care. His face was pale, tight and angry as she glared up at him.”I fight with honor. I don’t care what side I fight on and you don’t tell me how I fight.”

Slowly drawing the long wicked blade from the sheath at her back, she cocked her head, studying him, her amber eyes flashing in the flickering light.”Do you understand me? I’d hate for there to be a misunderstanding between us,” she said.”I don’t want that.”

“Don’t threaten me, Leandra. I don’t care what kind of Voodoo shit you know—”

A slow, cool smile curved her mouth up and she flexed her free hand, before curling the fingers in a slow, easy fist.”I am no Voodoo priestess, Vincent. Being from Jamaica doesn’t make me a Voodoo priestess. I am a witch, born in the blood of it.” As she spoke, she watched with clinical eyes as his face grew paler and paler as his air supply was cut off by the slow flexing of her hand.

Finally, as he started to get first red, and then blue, she opened her hand and he fell, gasping, to the ground.”Make no mistake, Vincent. I am a warrior, a witch. And I don’t make threats. I do not need them. And you will not touch that girl. If you do, or if anybody else does, I’ll kill you, nice…and slow,” she purred.

Turning on her heel, she stalked away, catching the eyes of two of her ladies and nodding to the girl.

“Poor thing,” she murmured, stroking her forehead as they brought the terrified little hellcat over.”It will be over for you soon. Jonathan will come and I’ll send you home.”

“Liar. Why would you?” Erika spat, struggling even though it was useless, jerking her arms, kicking at the knees of her captors and damn near catching one of them.

Leandra eyed Constantine narrowly when the woman went to jerk on the girl’s hair for insulting Leandra. “I do not blame you for not trusting me. I wouldn’t, either.” Inclining her head regally, Leandra walked a slow circle around them, careful not to let them see how much the wound in her side bothered her. “But I’m not a liar. You’ll go home, kid. My fight isn’t with you. It’s with those hypocritical Hunters and their pathetic Council.”

Erika shook her head forcefully.”The Hunters are brave, and strong, and proud, you stupid…stupid…bitch.” The word popped out and seemed to surprise the child as much as it surprised the women holding her, but Leandra just laughed. But she didn’t stop her tirade .”Hypocrites? If it wasn’t for them, my father would have raped me. You kidnapped me. And you call them hypocrites? You’re the pathetic one.”

And Leandra could only stare at her in shock when the girl had the nerve to spit at her.

Jonathan’s hands were flexing, the nails darkening to black as the claws slid out from under his skin.

Mike lay pale on the bed, in pain, suffering, but not dead.

The silver was slowly working out of his system, and he would recover.

Brad was dead.

And Erika was missing.

Lifting his head, he met Malachi’s gaze for one brief second before he rose, leaving the room.

Lori took a deep breath before turning and meeting Kelsey’s eyes.”I’m going with him. If he does this alone, he won’t come back alive. Erika will, but he won’t. My gut is rather insistent on that,” she said quietly as the other witch mixed up yet another poultice to press to the wound on Mike’s shoulder to leech out the poison.

It had taken them far too long to get Mike out of the hospital. Far too long to convince them that he would recover better at home. Even the inherent Doctor who had taken over the case had had trouble convincing the emergency room physician who’d admitted Mike that he was an old family friend. Their network of people was vast, but sometimes…hell, the verbal acrobatics they had to perform to get one of their people out of a place was nothing short of mind-boggling.

Now, during the night, Eli would slink in and stare into the person’s eyes, and simply hold their mind sway, pull them under with a vampire’s abilities.

Somebody would die for this.

Lori dug her nails into her palms as she stalked into her room, away from the workroom that smelled of the were’s blood, and the poison the silver had infected him with. When silver entered the body, it changed chemically, slowly melting away as it filtered into the were’s bloodstream, setting off an allergic reaction. Since the bullet hadn’t stayed in his body, it wasn’t likely to kill him, but he had lost a hell of a lot of blood waiting for the medics to arrive. The wound wouldn’t close on its own, and the poison was still there. A weaker, younger were, Mike would just have to heal slowly.

And Erika…where was their baby?

A snarl twisted her face as she took down a knapsack and filled it with a few supplies, some herbs, and a small vial of water that would have quite a few people laughing at her. No. It wasn’t holy water. It was pure and simple spring water that came from a spring in Ireland, a place that had more earth magick than any she had ever seen.

Full of potent magick. Something to bind the herbs together when the time came, if she needed them.

Strapping a long fighting knife to her hip, she flipped her braid back over her shoulder and tossed some energy bars into her bag on her way through the door. And timed it just right. Colliding with Jonathan, she smiled innocently, fluttering her lashes at him.

“Where do you think you are going?”

Glancing down at her clothes—the dark sturdy clothes she wore when she occasionally took a patrol with a partner, something Eli required to make sure she stayed in shape and able to fight—she lifted her eyes and cocked her head. “Hmmm, out to a soiree?”

“No, Lori,” Jonathan said, striding past her and shaking his head. He had woven the long golden brown fall of his hair into a tight cable that nearly reached his firm, excellent ass and Lori hummed under her breath in appreciation.

“My, my, my…now, Jonathan. You can’t tell me no. Eli doesn’t allow one-man rescue missions. You know that.”

“My daughter, Lori. My baby they took.” Jonathan’s voice was a deep, rough growl as he leaped the stairs and strode out of the house.

Lori jogged out after him, tossing the rest of the household an expressive look. She caught him by the truck and snagged him by the arm, whirling him around. When he moved to brush her aside, she simply pressed herself against him, crowding him against the truck. His eyes slid to the low-fitting scoop-neck of her tank before moving his eyes back up to hers. “Move, Lori. They have Erika. I’ve raised her for seven years, I’ve taken care of her. Promised nothing bad would ever happen and I let her down. I have to find her.”

“How?” she asked simply. “By scent? They took her in a car, in town. You can find her, and will. But I can do it and faster. And if they’ve hurt her, you’ll need me. Jonathan, I’m a Hunter as well, just not as strong as you. And I’m a fighter. You trained me yourself. Take me with you. You need me—Erika needs me. My gut tells me this.”

“Tell me where she is.”

Stepping back, her eyes never left his. “I’m going to where she is. Even if I have to go by myself. And if I go alone, I’m likely not to make it out alive. Even though I’ll make damn certain Erika does. I’ll send her home in one piece, but I’ll pull the place down on top of me in the process. You know I can do it.” Her voice rippled with the power and passion of her words, and her throat felt tight as she stared into his dark eyes.

Because if she didn’t go, he’d die. So she’d get there before him, and make damn sure the one who was sacrificed would be her instead.

“Damn you,” Jonathan rasped, shaking his head, his eyes gleaming red with his rage. His fangs slid down and, as she watched, his skin made a slight ripple, like water moving on a lake.

Turning away, he stalked around the truck. “Get in. Fuck.”

Now he had two females to save, to protect. Because Lori could damn well find Erika. All she needed was to focus on Erika’s face and she could find her anywhere on the planet. And the witch didn’t even need a car to get there.

The teleporting was an unusual gift, Jonathan had been told. A rare knack among witches, and it only showed up, as most rare witch gifts did, when it was going to be needed the most.

All she had to do was focus on their face and she could take herself there. Whoever had taken Erika hadn’t been counting on Lori. Too bad Jonathan couldn’t count on Lori being able to stand in a fight—

“I damn well can stand in a fight, you brainless moron,” Lori interrupted, her voice cold.

“You’re a Healer. You may be a member of the Hunter’s Council, but that doesn’t make you a true Hunter.” Jonathan jerked, startled as he realized she was fully aware of his thoughts. “Fuck, the mark has affected you, too, hasn’t it?”

“Jackass. How many vamps do I have to take down in front of you? How many rapists, thugs?” she demanded, ignoring him.

Jonathan sped into town, following some distant feeling from Lori. If he went the wrong way, she’d tell him. “It touches you just like it touches me, doesn’t it?” he asked gruffly, thinking of the night before when he had thought of her again, as she was dreaming, sweet, hot dreams of him. The dreams had sent him prowling into the night, stalking and then shifting and running, higher and higher into the cliffs until he could howl his frustrations to the sky and she wouldn’t hear.

“Fuck off.” Her voice was cold and clipped, harsh. Crossing her arms over her chest, she glared out the window and ignored him. Totally, completely pissed.

Sighing, he rubbed one hand down his face. “Lori, you’re a woman, a powerful witch, but you’re not a shifter. You are in incredible shape, more than any human, but you’re not as strong as we are. You can’t run as fast as we can and you can’t hide, you don’t have as powerful a sense of smell, and—”

“You were smoking in here about three days ago,” she said coldly. “And sometime in the past week, Sheila was driving your truck. I can smell her shampoo. I also, very vaguely, smell Rafe. I bet they are fucking. But not sleeping together. He probably won’t let it happen. He doesn’t want attachments.” Lori smiled sadly. “Poor Sheila. I hope she dumps his vampire ass.”

Jonathan reminded himself that sitting there with his mouth hanging open didn’t look particularly intelligent. Closing it with a snap, he drew a breath. He had smelled all the scents the moment he opened the truck door and filed them all away, the way he always did.

No mortal should have been able to smell any of them, not even the bleeding cigarette he had smoked out of desperation a few days ago. It had been one damn cigarette and he’d opened the window for crying out loud, and left it open that night while he slept.

Sheila’s scent had faded, and Rafe’s scent had been so faint, just barely clinging to her clothes.

No way in hell Lori should have scented it.

“You don’t know much about witches, do you, Jonnie?” she asked, sadly, curling up against the door.”And hardly anything at all about me.”

Suddenly, he felt his chest tighten.

Lori would leave. He felt it in his gut. Once Erika was home, was safe, and this danger, whatever this new danger was had been eliminated, Lori was leaving Eli’s home.

“A witch has refined hearing and a refined sense of smell. My eyesight is that of a normal woman’s, but my hearing is almost equal to a vampire’s, though not as good as yours. But my sense of smell, well, it’s damn near close. Most people who know anything about the witches of the Council know that, I thought. You need to turn up here. They’ve gone into Virginia. We need to get on the turnpike,” she said quietly, pressing her brow to the cool glass of the window.

“I know what I need to know about you,” Jonathan said softly, frowning at the slim line of her back, her lowered head.

“And what is that? That I can heal your body when you break it? Close up the cuts you get when patrolling? That I can help Erika when she gets a pimple right before picture day?” She laughed, a dry, brittle sound.”You know you like fucking me, and you know your baby, the little girl who calls you Uncle loves my cooking, but you don’t know what kind of movies I like, or what kind of books I read. At my birthday, you bought a gift certificate to the mall, so you wouldn’t have to pick out anything.”

Because I won’t let myself get close to you…

“You don’t know me. You don’t want to,” Lori said softly. A long, shuddering sigh racked her body as they climbed higher and higher into the mountains that would lead them out of West Virginia. “And that’s fine. I won’t keep waiting for you to see me, Jonathan. Malachi will help me find a new Master to serve. I’ll have him see me to the Council when this is all said and done.”

Blind, pulsing fury started to build. Claws ripped through his nail beds and a growl echoed up from his throat.

Leashing the animal, he continued to drive. Now wasn’t the time to confront this.

But he would see the ancient bastard dead before he’d let him see Lori to the Council.

No fucking way.

No fucking way was she staying.

She was a Hunter, damn it. So what if I chose to devote my gifts to healing the Hunters rather than working alongside them? I’m more gifted, more suited for that. But I’ve taken my share of killers off the street. I’ve taken down ferals before.

Damn him.

She felt a subtle touch on her mind. Over the past week, she had learned to sense him when he was reaching for her through the mark, thinking of her. And she had learned how to block it. Solidly, she blocked it, refusing to let him touch her mind, think of her and possibly interlace his thoughts with hers right now.

So what if she was acting like a brat?

Even Healers were entitled to it every now and then.

Lori was tired of being the sainted one all the time. Tired of being the sweet and quiet one that nobody expected to be upset or pissed or disturbed. Well, she was not upset.

She was so fucking mad. And hurt.

She hurt so much, her entire body ached with it.

Forcing a deep, slow breath into her lungs, she forced herself not to breathe shakily, not to sob. But she couldn’t stop the few tears that trickled out, seeping from beneath her eyelashes in slow, hot trails.

He had no faith in her.

She could have lived with that alone. Hell, even Sarel doubted she could stand in a true fight, though Eli insisted she could. Sheila believed she could.

Lori knew she could.

But Jonathan wouldn’t ever love her.

Jonathan had all but closed his heart to everybody. Everybody but Tori and Erika.

Erika…she pulled the face into her mind and focused. “She’s sleeping, her belly is full and somebody is being kind at least. They wait underground for you.

“The cave is by a lake in the mountains,” she murmured as her voice trailed off and she pressed her fingers to her brow. “A big, big lake. Stretches out farther than the eye can see.”

Lifting her head, she met his eyes. “They think the cave will make you nervous, intimidate you. No animal likes to go underground. And they are so certain you will come alone. The bypass into the Blue Ridge Mountains. That’s where you need to go. She’s there, somewhere.”

Shaking her head, she jerked herself out of that deep reverie and forced her eyes to open, staring at the cars and trees that sped by as they climbed ever further into the mountains. Over, let this be over and soon. She wanted to be alone and away from this.

Chapter Seven

“Stop it,” he growled.

His voice slithered down her spine, wrapped around her body like a caress and she stiffened, shoving out the hot, shaky feelings it inspired in her.

“Leave me alone.” Her voice was soft, nearly soundless in the quiet of the truck, but she knew he heard her.

“Don’t, Lori. Your anger, I can handle. Even though you are wrong. You are not the warrior your sister is. You’ve never had to be. You don’t know the warrior magicks. Even Sarel doubts you…I’m sorry. I know it hurts to hear that. But you are a powerful Healer, that is where your talents lie, in the witch healing.

“It’s your pain that tears at me. You’re hurting, I feel it, I know I caused it…I can’t take it. Stop,” he repeated, his voice softening. Heat, a soft, silken heat started to fill the truck and Lori’s breath caught in her throat.

Curling into herself, she turned her shoulder away and stared out the window, refusing to even acknowledge him as he whispered softly to her. She was half in a daze, focused totally on herself and soothing her pain. A meditative state that was so complete, Lori didn’t even realize when Jonathan pulled off the road, away from the traffic, as the road started to wind down the mountain. Taking one of the roads for runaway trucks, he followed it to the end, to a small fork that wound back.

She was still staring blankly—not seeing the green of the trees, not hearing the birds call or smelling the forest—only aware of the gnawing pain in her soul that just grew bigger and bigger every time he turned away.

Big, warm hands came to rest on her shoulders.”Where is Erika now?”

Her lids lowered.”Sleeping. Safe. Somebody there is watching over her. Protecting her. Whoever it is, she doesn’t belong there. She wants to make sure Erika makes it home,” Lori whispered roughly. Her lids lifted back to half-mast and she stared into nothingness.

She had to see this through. See Erika safe. See Jonathan safe.

Then she could leave and find someplace where she was needed, where it didn’t hurt just to live there.

“Lori.”

Her lids lowered again and her head slumped, her body shuddering as she sighed. A gasp tore from her lips as he pressed his hot open mouth to her neck and slid his arms around her waist, pulling her back against him, into his lap. The warm, strong, flat of his hand pressed hard against her belly.

“Look at me,” he rasped. “I don’t want to see such stillness from you.”

She pushed and tugged at his hands. “Stop it, Jonathan,” she said softly. “Stop it, now. I won’t do this again, sleep with you and then let you walk away until you feel the need to touch me again. If I can’t have you for always, I don’t want you at all.”

“Liar,” he said easily, sliding his hand down the center of her chest, her torso, until he could cup her crotch. And when he did, he ground the heel of his hand against her clit until she arched hungrily and lifted herself weakly against his hand.

“Sex is easy, damn it,” Lori hissed, and whimpered. “I could have slept with anybody. Hell, I could have slept with Malachi and then you would have been nothing more than a memory as he led me away from you forever, with me in his thrall. But I am not—”

Lori’s words died in her throat as Jonathan pressed his mouth angrily against hers, driving his tongue into her mouth, down her throat, arching his head around and growling when she tried to push him away.

One hand captured her wrists, while the other cupped one plump firm breast, massaging the nipple, rolling it between his fingers, milking it until it throbbed and ached as he ate at her mouth greedily.

Lori’s head spun, her pussy growing wetter. One slow, aching throb moved through it as she arched back against him, her eyes fluttering closed as she whimpered deep in her throat.

Finally, he tore his mouth away from hers, “One thing is saving you now,” he said raggedly, leaning down and whispering gruffly into her ear. “And that’s Erika. If she wasn’t alone and in trouble, I’d throw you down onto your hands and knees, and mount you, fuck you, until you screamed my name and swore you’d never let another man touch you. Sex is easy, yes…” His voice was a rough purr against her flesh as he caressed her throbbing, yearning body with skilled hands. Dipping his fingers between her thighs, he stroked her clit back and forth until she was keening in her throat. Her face flushed as his other hand pinched her nipple roughly, milking the hard, pebbled flesh. “What I feel for you is not easy.”

“Breaking my heart certainly is,” she said raggedly, tearing herself away and hurling her body against the truck door, cowering there, pressing her face against the window as her body trembled.

Her voice rough and shaky, she said, “Don’t touch me again, Jonathan. I mean it, don’t do it.”

“I’ll touch you, and stroke that sweet body of yours to a fever pitch and have you begging for more,” he said, reaching for the gearshift and throwing the truck into reverse.

“Even when I tell you no?”

“Your body says yes.”

“My heart begs no.”

“I’ll make your entire body—your heart and soul—scream for more,” Jonathan swore heatedly, sliding a hand toward her.

“Then you would rape me. Because my mind will never say yes. My mind knows this is not good for me,” Lori said, wrapping her arms around her knees. “No matter what my body asks for, or begs for, my mind is smarter. And so far, when it comes to you, my heart has led me astray, but if I had listened to my head…” a harsh laugh left her lips. “If I had listened to my head, I would have left Eli and this place a long time ago. And you would have never hurt me this badly.”

Jonathan slammed on the brakes and Lori went flying forward, only to have a long steely arm shoot forward, bracing her, then whipping her in front of him. His eyes were gleaming red with his fury and his canines had lengthened as he stared at her. “I’d never hurt you like that. Have I ever taken you against your will?”

“You just threatened to,” Lori said simply, lifting her lashes and staring into his eyes, those bottomless, soft eyes of chocolate silk. “And every time you’ve touched me without really caring for me, without loving me, without wanting me the way I want you, you’ve broken my heart. I don’t want empty sex, Jonathan.”

His face went wooden, impassive. Moving her away from him, he eyed her with cold, blank eyes. “Then so be it. I won’t touch you again until you beg me. But the day will come that you will beg me. But I won’t make you the promises you want, Lori. I’m not the man for them,” he said flatly. “I told you years ago. You want a fairy tale prince. I’m the monster from the fairy tale.”

Lori suspected Jonathan had believed it for so long, he was starting to become it.

His words echoed in her ears.

“But the day will come that you will beg me…”

His precious Lori really believed he could hurt her, take her by force—no—against her will. A difference, slight, but still a difference. Jonathan’s hands flexed as he followed the road down the mountains to the bypass in Virginia. And his rage only grew.

Her resolve to leave was firm.

It was for the best, wasn’t it?

A deep throbbing growl built in his chest as his hands tightened and his nails darkened, the claws showing and lengthening as his rage called to the soul of the wolf within. He heard the ancient, wise creature rouse and felt a questioning from him.

So very few were could communicate with the wolf on such a level, and the creature was amused at Jonathan’s frustration. The wolf simply thought the one word that would shatter what was left of Jonathan’s composure.

Mate…

Jonathan adamantly thought, No. Even though the word resounded through his soul, his heart, his gut. And the wolf was ancient, wise…

Mate…lose your mate, lose yourself, brother.

Jonathan sent images of himself to the creature, his dark, shattered soul, while glancing at Lori out of the corner of his eye. I have no right to take a mate with all this darkness in me. I may not be tainted, but I have too much darkness, too much unrest. She’s got too much goodness inside her for me. I’m still fighting my demons. I don’t deserve her.

He felt a chuffing in his head, the wolf’s laughter. Personal demons? The only demons you have are inside your head. If you had that much darkness, you wouldn’t hear me.

The were can be tainted. How many feel the call of the werewolf and go feral? Jonathan said.

They don’t hear me. You do. What a person does with the soul is his choice. Know that, if nothing else.

Jonathan stiffened as the wolf’s words, so easily understood, sank home. Tavis could bespeak the wolf. A handful of others…Declan, on very, very rare occasion mentioned feeling his touch. But he was inherent, only part were, so the touch wasn’t as strong.

Tell me this, young brother…can you see yourself without the witch in years to come? Can you see her with another?

Bleakness filled his soul at the thought of a life without her—years stretching on into forever—year after empty year without the sight of that lovely face, her enchanting laughter. It wasn’t even that physical contact that he’d grown crave. It was just...her.

Fury twisted through him as an image of another man, faceless, nameless, appeared in his mind.

Another Hunter…she would go to the Council. Her sense of loyalty ran deep, and she would continue to help those who had saved her. Rage—hot, deep and pulsating—worked through him, pumping in his veins as his mind’s eye saw them together, laughing, working…fucking…

And then, years down the road, her lovely face finally starting to show slight signs of age, she was walking. Alone, and lonely, down a cold and empty road on a blustery day, her long hair whipping around her as she looked back, and Jonathan could have sworn he was actually seeing her, and she him, through the span of time.

Their eyes met—hers older, wiser, sadder.

A scar marred her face now, thin, from the corner of her eye down to her mouth as she stared at him. And her voice, when she spoke, was substantial, but only inside his head…”I wish it had been you, Jonathan. I really wanted it to be you.”

“What?”

She laughed sadly, wrapping her arms about her and looking around the cold wintry plain that surrounded her. “This.”

Frowning, he shook his head and said, “I don’t get it.”

She smiled, sadly, an echo of what it used to be as she stared into his eyes. “I know.” She stared around her, turning in a slow circle, her gaze moving over the landscape, leaves rushing around them, pausing as her eyes rested briefly on a trio of stone markers. Her face flinched with pain and she turned away too fast for Jonathan to see the names. He couldn’t take his gaze too far from that face…he couldn’t.

Moving her gaze back to his face, she smiled at him before she looked away. “This was my life.”

The word “NO” was working its way past his tight throat even as her body started to fade away. Jonathan lunged for her, but she was already gone and he fell, shaken, to his knees.

Grimly, he rose and walked to the stone markers and found her there, resting. With two babes, twins. Dropping to his knees, Jonathan rasped, “No.”

“She didn’t choose her life, or her death.”

Turning his head, he watched as the wolf padded into the dreamscape he had woven. “It chose her after she walked away. It was the only thing she could do. There were other paths, true. Other paths she could have walked. And paths she may walk still. But none hold any true joy for her. Except the path that lies with the man she loves.”

The sound of baying wolves, their cries full of sorrow started in the distance. Jonathan’s throat tightened and trembled with the need to release his own howl, but his teeth clenched shut as he refused to give voice to it.

“A woman’s heart can only take so much bruising, brother.” The wolf spoke softly yet again, and though his mouth didn’t move, the words were spoken aloud.

“What happened?”

The wolf stared sadly at the stones. “She married a Hunter from the enclave she joined, a rather formidable psychic. They were together nearly twenty years before they decided to have children. He never…quite felt he had her heart. Knew he did not. And he fell prey to a witch like the one who struck you, only his heart was full of anger, and doubt.”

Jonathan felt the anger, and the horror rising. A Hunter turning on his wife and children…

“This isn’t real. This is the dreamscape, one of the ways you taught me control.” Shaking his head, he rose and stalked away, the howl building inside his throat, seeking release.

“It very well may come to pass...it is one of her paths, if she walks away. Know that it will be her choice.” The wolf sighed, gazing around him at the bleak, empty desolation. “This is one of the darker roads, but there are...others. Few of them hold pleasure of her.”

The howl erupted from his throat and Jonathan fell to his knees, his fingers sinking into the earth. “He killed them.”

“Yes. First the babes, one night while she was out Hunting with a partner, training to stay in shape. He had gone insane, through the curse’s touch upon his mind and heart. It was easy for the witch to break him, his heart was so full of self-doubt. He was a powerful man, big and strong, more powerful than any human the Hunters there had ever seen, and his rage infused him with a strength that was unreal. When she came rushing home, feeling their loss…she found him. She was the only witch there other than him, otherwise, somebody else would have felt it, stopped it.

“Dirke had insisted they have their own home away from the main house, so by the time he had torn her body to shreds as she tried to bring her babies back, it was too late to help her.”

Jonathan’s howls rose and fell in the dreamscape, eerie, forlorn, that of a wolf seeking a mate who was lost to him.

“She was a WITCH!” His words came through a thick throat and the tears that all but blinded him refused to fall, as though the release was refused him.

The wolf nuzzled his arm gently. “The dreamscape, brother. Not reality, not yet. Yes, she was a witch. Did she fight back, you want to know? She flung up spells to hold him. But…once she saw her babies couldn’t be saved, that they were indeed gone, smothered by the hands of their father…she let them fall. And she did not fight. She knew he would not leave the enclave alive. And she wanted to be with the two souls who had given her joy, her children.”

“So he just fucking killed her,” Jonathan rasped. “And she just let it happen?”

“She wanted it. She waited for it and welcomed it and in the end, screamed for help loudly, blocking off his retreat so that he couldn’t possibly run, spells that bound him even through her death. The Master slaughtered him, but it was too late for her.”

Jonathan’s entire body shuddered, and the wolf curled his great body—three times that of a normal wolf—around him, nuzzling his neck. “The choice, always, my brother, is yours. But you’re keeping yourself apart from her because you fear your own demons. The only demons you have are the ones you’ve imagined for yourself. And they create a bigger threat than anything in your past because they are about to cost you everything you’ve ever wanted…”

And then the ancient creature sighed, and as the dreamscape started to fade, Jonathan realized the wolf had guided him to pull over and wait, and he was half in a daze, his eyes slitted, hands relaxed on his thighs.

Lori’s scent filled his head, and he whipped his head around as hunger clenched his body.

A brief, lingering laugh from the wolf echoed through his mind as he reached for Lori. Her cold voice filled the truck. “Don’t touch me, you bastard.”

“But you had best wait to stake that claim…until she is more willing to hear it.”

Jonathan wasn’t so certain such a brief talk with the wolf could change what he had always felt. But…the lingering memories of what he had seen, his rage, and even the pain he had felt before he had walked to the stones. How desolate her eyes had been when she had looked around the dreamscape at the emptiness and said, “This is my life.”

They had to stop at the base of the mountain. Lori insisted. Refueling the truck, eating, and then she just wandered around, staring up into the air, her eyes slitted and thoughtful. “I’m so confused by this woman who holds her. She is the one who took her, who planned this. They defer to her. Yet, as I touch her mind through Erika…I feel nothing but honor. She’s got to be one of the most conflicted people I’ve ever encountered.”

“She organized an attack on the Hunters, has killed Hunters, and kidnapped a child. That is the epitome of evil.” Jonathan swallowed down a growl as he paced. He could smell his daughter. Faintly. Erika hadn’t been outside, but somebody who had touched her, and recently. And Lori…damn it, he needed to touch her, hold her, assure himself she was real. And safe…that she would stay that way.

Damn it all to hell. What in the name of heaven was he supposed to do?

“A man came into the cavern where she is being held while the woman was out. Touched her, scared her badly. Might have done worse, but the other woman…this warrior came in and she went ballistic. Not because her orders were disobeyed, and not because merchandise was soiled.”

In an eerie voice that sounded like somebody else’s, Lori said, “A child...you’d harm a child...”

The passion in that voice was that of anybody who was repulsed at a child being hurt.

“Erika was…pulled under magick after that so I don’t know what happened, but the woman came back and whispered that the bad man was taken away forever and wouldn’t hurt her, and wouldn’t ever be able to touch her again. And she feels remorse for the…necessary casualties in a just war, is how she thinks of this.”

Shaking her head, Lori glanced at him, meeting his eyes for the first time. “I don’t think she understands the Hunters.” Brief, very brief amusement lit her eyes for the first time in hours as she showed him something beside blankness. “Something the warrior witches of the world might have in common.”

Erika felt the hand on her head, urging to eat and drink. She accepted the milky drink, knowing the witch had put extra stuff in it to keep her healthy, but she didn’t want to eat. “Why are you being so nice? Kidnappers aren’t nice.”

“I have no reason to harm you. I just want Jonathan,” Leandra said.

Erika shoved the cup away, curling into a ball. “I need him more. He’s my dad, damn it.”

“Wars are important, child,” Leandra said, sighing and shaking her head, her exotic eyes showing too much pain, too much sympathy. Erika didn’t want to feel sorry for her. Didn’t want to like her. “My mistress needs him. We are preparing for a battle.”

Turning away, Leandra paced, her long, loose clothes flowing around her lean body. Erika bit her lip and hid her face in her arms, hoping the woman wasn’t what Lori was.”The Council wants all witches, all weres, all vampires who are not with them to be dead. It’s wrong, kid. We can’t let it happen.”

Erika sat up, outraged.”That is not true!” she shouted furiously.”If you didn’t go around eating people and killing people and drinking blood till they died, they’d leave you alone!”

“I had never killed a soul,” Leandra said, amused, glancing at Erika with indulgence an adult shows a wayward child. “And they came, looking for me when I was just your age. An old witch and a big red-haired vampire, down in Jamaica. And why…if not to kill me? They had already killed me father. Not that he didn’t deserve it…but I saw that redheaded vamp kill him myself, just a few days earlier as I hid on the roof of the house across the street, glad I had been out picking pockets. My father liked to bring home…friends who sometimes felt I should be part of their parties so I was never there. But he smelled my magick. And he came Hunting me.”

Erika started giggling. It was probably because she was hungry, and scared and the panic was making her crazy. But she started to laugh and she couldn’t stop. “Hunting you? You’re so stupid. They weren’t Hunting you. You weren’t dangerous, especially not to Malachi. He could have eaten you for breakfast—shoot, he probably knew where you were hiding but brought the old witch there to make you feel better.” Wiping the tears away, she snorted and giggled again, staring into the dark eyes that just glared at her with anger.”I bet that old woman was Agnes. They weren’t Hunting you. They were probably trying to get you into Excelsior.”

“A breeding ground for killers.” Leandra hissed.

Erika hiccupped a little and tried to stop laughing. “Somebody really did a number on your head, didn’t they?” Shaking her head, she added, “You are a killer. Call yourself a soldier all you want, but you’re a killer all the same. Because you don’t really know about the people you’re killing. You know what those people told you.”

“Hunters are just a bunch of killers.”

“They hunt down those who won’t stop killing or hurting others,” Erika said quietly.”They are heroes.” Reaching up, she lifted her shirt, pulling it out of her waistband, showing what she never showed anyone. The brand her daddy had put on her shortly after birth—shiny, smooth, and flat. His initials. M.B. “My dad did that to me. And my mama. He killed her a few years after I was born. I don’t know for certain, I didn’t see it. But Eli searched the records and he knows. Jonathan saved me. My daddy would have raped me. Jonathan didn’t tell me that—I just know it. I remember it, all of it. And Jonathan saved me. That is what the Hunters do. They save us. Protect us. From whatever we need protecting from.”

Leandra’s mouth snapped shut at the sight of the scar on Erika’s belly.”Your father did that? Your real father?” Moving closer, she brushed her fingers over it, and as she did it, Erika could feel her touch on her mind.

“He did. And worse. But I’m okay now. Jonathan made sure of it. Eli made sure of it,” she said, smiling. “I don’t even have nightmares. Lori and me talk a lot. She worries, but I’m fine.”

“Lori…the Healer.”

Erika nodded, keeping her mind and eyes blank even though Leandra’s hand had fallen away. “They are killers, girl.”

“Yes, they are.” Erika sighed, letting her shirt fall. “Maybe they are. But some people, don’t they deserve to die?”

Leandra didn’t like it when people made her rethink her way of life.

Particularly a young, guileless child with big innocent eyes. A child who talked like an adult, with a sure, certain way of looking at her, a way that said, I’m right. And somewhere inside, I think you know it.

Calling her ladies, she assigned them guard over the girl, and stalked to the men, harshly reminding them, “I’ve already killed one who touched that girl. The next one won’t die easily.”

Once she was safe within her chambers, she closed the manmade door, locked it…and left…smiling and laughing as the freeness of it moved around her. It was almost like flying without wings. For the few brief seconds that it lasted.

None knew she could do this. She kept few secrets…but this was one. She kept it, holding it fierce and close. None she knew could do it. None she’d ever heard of could come and go with a thought, simply by concentrating that person’s face.

Leandra focused on the mistress and as her hair whipped around her face, her body weightless, she was suddenly there, back in the commune where she had landed more than fifteen years earlier. She pressed against a wall, making sure none had seen her rather unusual arrival.

And then she turned and strolled confidently down the corridor to the Mistress’s hall and her quarters. It was when she heard Marick’s voice that she stopped. Halting, she slowly and cautiously moved against the wall.

Marick. She didn’t trust him…especially since he had left her command last night without her permission. He was supposed to be out patrolling back where Leandra had set up camp. And he hadn’t returned just yet. She had sent others out looking for him, but she hadn’t notified the mistress…

Hadn’t thought he would be here.

The bastard.

“She’s kidnapped a child, which surprises me. You know how Leandra is about what she considers innocent bystanders,” Marick’s deep voice echoed through the chamber.

“Yes…we call them fodder. But she is a very capable witch, and warrior. Plus, she came to us already fearing the Hunters.” Mistress sounded disgusted.

“But she intends to free the girl once the dog comes to her. And she killed Joseph over touching her.”

“Leandra is beginning to cross too many lines with her talk of righteous war. I have lost too many good soldiers to her hands. And the little brat will make a tasty treat for a good soldier.”

Leandra heard the sound of a hand hitting flesh and Marick’s gasp. “As to the wolf…do not call him a dog. He is a pure wolf,” Mistress said, her voice level and cool. “Do not insult him so. We have enough mongrels around here that you should see the difference,” she purred.

Leandra shuddered as she heard the sounds of leather striking flesh. Mistress so loved to beat. Her body recalled that.

“We shall have to either cull Leandra from the Scythe or pull her teeth,” Mistress mused as the leather thwacked him again.

Leandra moved up to the door, her eyes dark and angry. Cull. They meant break or kill.

“Perhaps, once we’ve turned the wolf, he shall want her,” Mistress mused. “After we’ve banished that wretched Hunter’s heart. That soul of his.”

Leandra stepped into the doorway, her eyes narrowed and watchful. Surely enough, Marick lay face down, nude and stripped. Lines marred the sweet golden perfection of his body, some still oozing fat, lazily flowing drops of blood. And he was loving every painful second of it as Mistress flogged him.

“Cull me, will you? It’s a damn good thing I’m not so easily broken.”

They both whipped their heads around to look at her, with looks of incredulity on their faces that were nothing short of ridiculous. It might have been wiser for Leandra to flee in silence.

But when had she ever taken the easy road?

“Lady, how dare you,” Mistress rasped, tossing the whip down as Marick rose, his eyes flashing and gleaming red. His skin rippled like water and Leandra could all but hear the growl rumbling in the inherent’s throat.

“How dare I?” Leandra scoffed.”How dare I wish to speak with the Mistress I have served loyally for fifteen years? Am I not permitted to ask you questions? Not permitted to think for myself? No, I am not, I see. You wish to cull me like I am one of the brainless fools you like to keep underfoot.”

Tossing her long braids over her shoulder and lifting her chin, her amber eyes flashed with pure fire.”You are a fool if you think I will be so easy to subdue, Mistress,” she hissed in a low, mean voice. Behind her, she heard creeping footsteps and caught a familiar scent. With a slow curl of her lips, she whispered, “Inferno.”

A gleaming ring of fire surrounded her, just barely there but as two hands tried to seize her from behind, the fire raged and the were bellowed as it singed his skin, solidified and blocked his grab at her.

“You fool,” Mistress whispered.”You think you can get away from us?”

“I think more than that…I know I can,” Leandra challenged. Laughing, she angled her chin at them and said, “Besides, I have the best bargaining chip in the world. The girl. I can have the wolf…all mine. And you cannot stop me, either.”

With that, she drew the long wicked knife from her side and lunged through the people gathered at her back, the flames singeing the people who tried to grab and hold her. She thrust the knife into somebody’s gut, and pivoted, delivering a sidekick into Marick’s belly. Smiling viciously at him, she slashed her knife across his exposed throat as more people barreled into the ring of flames, screams and growls filling the corridor.

“Damn it, she’s one fucking witch,” Mistress shrieked.

One of the ladies hissed, “But it’s Leandra, Mistress.”

And Leandra dove through a narrow opening in the wall of people, tucking and rolling, running for all she was worth, her knife clutched in her hand. The moment she hit the door, she focused…the girl’s face and she was gone. The vicious screaming and furious curses were still echoing in her ears.

“Damn it, did she tunnel into the ground?”

“Witches can’t run that fast.”

“Do you think she has a bleeding broom, mate?”

Leandra materialized in Erika’s room with her breath coming in ragged pants. Eying the girl, she ran her tongue around her teeth.

Choices…she had several. The question was, which was the right one?

Erika stared, frightened, into Leandra’s eyes. They were glowing, the way Eli’s did when he was furious. Or when he stared at Sarel too long. And sometimes Jonathan and the other wolves would come in after a night, and she’d be up getting a drink and their eyes would be hot and gleaming red…full of stress, rage, anger…

But Leandra’s were glowing gold, almost like a cat’s.

A panther’s.

Blood splattered her face, and a long, thin cut marked her chin. Her chest was heaving with ragged, panting breaths as she studied Erika.”Something tells me we have trouble coming, girl,” Leandra said.”In the form of the Mistress in all her glory and the ladies and men who serve her.”

“Doesn’t that mean you?” Erika asked, frowning.

Leandra laughed.”No. Not anymore, it don’t. Cull me, will they? We’ll be seeing ‘bout dat. We’ll see. They think I’ve been showing my teeth? Well, I haven’t even taken a nibble.”

Erika felt those eyes, full of anger, full of power, land on her and an odd, eerie feeling rushed down her spine. It wasn’t fear, not exactly—more like, she had let a panther out of its cage, thinking to turn that panther free. But the panther had decided she wanted to adopt Erika.

And Erika really didn’t know how to handle a small cat.

Much less a big one.

Leandra tossed her long black braids out of her face and smiled—a small, almost gentle smile—at Erika.”Don’ be afraid, Erika. Okay, then. You mentioned a witch. Agnes, you tell me about. I want to see her. Come. We have no time left.”

Erika jumped when Leandra strode forward and wrapped her arms around her. But she screamed when the room around them just vanished.

Agnes had dealt with a lot of odd happenings in her life.

But that phone call, placed in the middle of the night from America, well, she was quite certain it would never be topped.

“Erika, I cannot just come and meet you without telling Eli and Jonathan.”

“You have to. If you tell them, they’ll come. She has to talk to somebody alone, and they’ll kill her—or try to. I don’t think she’s bad.”

“Who, child?”

“The woman that kidnapped me,” Erika said on the other end of the line.

A kidnapper, not evil, but she had helped kill other Hunters. But Erika wasn’t a fool. She was actually very insightful. So Agnes was flying across the Atlantic at 2 a.m., her old bones weary and wanting her bed. She didn’t usually fly to the States, hadn’t in years. Her last flight across the ocean had been for Malachi, to Jamaica, for a young witch-child. And what a waste that had been. The girl, a wild, powerful young thing had gotten away.

Away from them.

It haunted Agnes…what could have happened to her, what awful things could have become of her, or what awful things she could have been pulled into.

There had been such a flux of residual magick lingering in that house from that girl. Agnes couldn’t comprehend what the woman must have grown into. For a twelve year old child to dodge and dart and evade a witch like Agnes. And Malachi. Not one, but two Hunters and members of the Council.

It should have been laughable.

But it had filled Agnes with a sense of foreboding.

Shifting, she sighed and tried to make herself rest.

But she was too edgy.

None of it sat right.

None of it at all.

Chapter Eight

“Call for help,” Lori said quietly at the mouth of the cave.

There was too much life underneath the surface of the earth.

“There are too many people here for us to hope we can counter them all,” she said, turning to face Jonathan.”Two against what feels like eighty. It is madness.”

“Is Erika there?”

“Jonathan…”

“Is Erika there?” he demanded, crouching low to the ground as though he’d be able to see her through the dirt. His eyes were swirling, glowing red around the edges, and his skin rippled with power.

“No. She’s not. Both she and the woman who took her are gone. There is some sort of…illusion that the woman placed that makes them think they are still there, barring themselves in the room. She is very good. The less powerful witches there don’t realize it is illusion. I don’t believe anybody who isn’t a Master of the craft would see through it.” Lori ground her teeth and thrust her hands through her hair.

“Damn it all! This woman is a bloody mess—she is a member of a fucking lunatic horde of monsters. Yet if I didn’t know better, I’d think I was dealing with one of our own. Erika is safe with her, I know that. Even I couldn’t protect her as well as this woman.”

“Lori, you’re making me very angry—when I find this woman, I’m going to kill her,” Jonathan rasped as he rose and paced in a tight circle, his hands clenching into fists. He tossed her a harsh, angry glare, one that let her know all he wanted to do was to fall upon something and rip its throat out. To feed and bathe in the blood of whatever had taken the child he loved so.

Lori smiled gently. “No. You won’t. Erika is falling in love with her—you’ll see it. You’ll see her. She’s a warrior, just like you, she understands you far better than you think, and she respects you more than you believe. And even if she didn’t, she cares for children and she’s protecting Erika. You owe her for that alone—”

Never piss off an angry werewolf.

A very important rule.

Lori’s bemusement over this woman had her letting that rule slide to the back of her mind and she didn’t even feel or see him coming. Which would explain how she ended up with her back against a tree and Jonathan pressed against her. His eyes were more gold than brown as he struggled to remain human, a red rim surrounding the irises. His fangs dropped down as his body trembled with suppressed rage.

“This bitch killed Brad. This bitch shot Mike. This bitch took Erika. I owe her pain. I owe her death. Whether she is a misguided soul or not, I don’t give a flying fuck,” Jonathan snarled against her ear.

“As you say, Erika is being treated well, and is not hurt. That alone is keeping the bitch from being turned into a hide I’d like to stretch out on that blasted cave wall, over there. That alone is keeping me from showing that little cunt what happens when you piss off an Alpha. Nobody takes what belongs to me,” he growled.

Lori jerked her head away as he scraped his teeth along the cord in her neck and turned her mouth aside when he pressed his lips roughly to hers.

“Mine,” he snarled.

“Not fucking likely,” she snapped, pressing her hands to his chest and using the leverage to work her way back. “The only time you want to pretend interest is if you’re pissed, or too fucking horny to ignore me.”

“Mine,”
he growled, and power shuddered through the air so loudly it was amazing none below the ground noticed.

Lori narrowed her eyes and rasped, “Not until you face some cold hard facts, Jonnie.” She started to whisper under her breath, focusing her mind, herself, her magick, as she lifted one hand. Jonathan was running his hand down the middle of her torso, and as she cupped her hand in front of her mouth, he cupped her, rubbing his thumb over the covered bud of her clit. Taking all of her strength, she breathed in through her nose and blew air into his face.

Jonathan went flying back, losing his grip on her as though he had no strength. Head over heels, he tumbled back, landing on his ass, and then his head flew back and hit the sandy earth behind him, the water from the lake coming up to soak his hair.

Lori tossed her hair back and smoothed her shirt down, watching as he slowly sat up. Running a hand over her hair, she quirked an eyebrow at him and said, “Still under the illusion that I can’t handle myself, wolf-boy?”

“You are no warrior.”

“I just laid one out easily enough,” she said with a shrug. In challenge, she turned her back on him and eyed the entrance to the cave. There was a labyrinth below ground, a veritable catacomb of caves. A near perfect stronghold. Only one way in, so none could spring a sneak attack upon them. But only one way out as well. Which meant if the way out was collapsed…smoothing her hand over the tree, she listened, thinking what a fool he was if he thought he could sneak up on a witch.

No. She may not hear as well as he did. But why did she need to? The land spoke to her. The cave, the lakes, the air, the trees…

She ducked and rolled just as he lunged for her. She came up smiling as he landed empty-handed, scowling.

“You’ve always wondered why Sarel was such a good student to Eli. It’s not just because she’s a natural born fighter,” Lori said, dusting her hands off. “Witches have a connection to the earth, love. We’re so difficult to spring anything on. Well, one that hasn’t wronged the earth at least. It whispers to me…”

Her eyes closed and listened, absorbing.”There’s several deer feeding not too far away…they were going to run when they scented you. But I told them they need not fear you. You hunt other prey. Coyotes in the woods are heading south, they don’t like your scent. The cave…ancient, used to be a habitant for passing Indian tribes. I can still feel their shaman magick. And you…don’t try that again.”

Jonathan lowered back into his crouch, his eyes narrowing as he studied her still, peaceful face.

“If it’s that easy, then why not tell me where Erika is?”

“Because she isn’t around here.”

Jonathan snarled and slammed his fist into the ground. Lori felt the impact reverberate through her feet and her heart ached for him. How could she convince him that Erika was safe?

“Follow the blood path, damn it. She’s a fucking blood witch, has to be, falling into that pack of killers. Are they blood killers?” he asked, skimming his eyes to the cave below.

Lori’s entire body shuddered and she nodded. “Yes, they are. But she is not like…them. She hasn’t spilt another’s blood for her magick. And though the land was suffering for the past few years, it has been recovering, through her.”

“There has to be something, some kind of path you can follow. No witch like her can travel like that and leave nothing.”

Lori smiled sardonically. “She has no blood path to follow. The woman has never used the blood of another to complete her magick, or to start it. What little blood she has needed, has come from her own veins,” Lori said, turning east, studying the vague direction her heart pulled her toward. “There is no blood on her soul, on her heart, save for those she has killed in what she felt was a righteous battle. And those souls torment her.”

The worst thing about an empath, they could see clear into a person’s soul. Jonathan knew she had already caught a glimpse of this woman’s soul, and he didn’t like knowing it wasn’t somebody twisted and evil. He wanted blood on his hands. A woman’s blood was something that twisted his stomach anyway. In order for him to kill her, she would have to be an evil, foul woman.

And Lori was insisting she was anything but.

As they stood in the woods, arguing in hushed, quiet tones, he had to deal not only with that, but with his wounded pride as well.

She had knocked him flat onto his ass.

Quickly, easily, and without laying a finger on him.

A gleam had lit her eyes, and for a brief moment, he had seen more of her sister in her than he had ever realized.

But Lori was a Healer, she wasn’t a warrior.

She wouldn’t be able to stand in battle. Of course, now he was carefully shielding his thoughts, the way he did when he was thinking around Eli and wanted his thoughts kept private.

Lori’s eyes were cool and blank as she studied the cave. Her lashes lowered, her lovely face going quiet, thoughtful. Jonathan didn’t like the look on her face. It was too…eerie.

“I can collapse the cave,” she said quietly.

“Excuse me?”

“I can collapse it. Totally. If I get inside to the middle, I can collapse it. The structure that holds it up. If I crumble that support, the cave will go.”

“No.” He narrowed his eyes as he studied her face, looking for any sign that she wasn’t serious. “Too dangerous. You aren’t sliding in there and relying on yourself to slide out. If you get caught, get hit in the head or something, you’re trapped. You don’t go anywhere without me.”

Turning his back on her, he studied the mouth of the cave. Collapsing it though, had possibilities.

“You still haven’t figured it out, have you?”

Her voice was a ghost of a whisper behind him, but a hot, angry woman was whispering it. He could feel it, could feel the heat, the hot wash of her anger. “I may not bloody be Sarel—Eli took me out of hell before I had to run from it. But I was placed in Excelsior, and I was trained by fighters from childhood. I am not the soft, weak little flower you think. I do not have to be protected from all the evil in the world.”

“How lovely…”

The low, laughing, purring voice that slithered around them was the only warning they had before he launched himself out of the woods at them. Jonathan shifted and lashed out at the man who seemed to explode in a burst of fire from the woods.

“Oh, it’s the dog the Mistress wants so badly,” the newcomer snarled, his blond hair blowing around his face from some unseen wind. With a sulk, he flung his hand toward Jonathan. Jonathan swore furiously, the words falling from his muzzle in low growls as a series of gashes appeared across his furred belly, leaking blood down his groin, across his naked sex, before trickling down his thighs.

Paying it no heed, he reached for this new witch, only to have his hand frozen, just bare inches from its target. “I’d best not hurt you too bad, eh?”

Lori moved into the line of fire as Jonathan went stock-still, unable to move, his mind all but frozen with fear. Her lips were curved with a small, pleased smile. “Well, well. What have we here?” she mused.

“Pretty little piece you are,” the witch smirked, running one hand down his flat, naked belly, the ring in his navel winking at her.

Casting Jonathan a dismissing glare, he said, “You’re in the way, mate.” Jonathan grunted as air whooshed from his lungs and he slammed into a tree. Limber, rubbery branches came around to entrap him, like something out of a poorly written horror film. Blood was oozing down his belly and legs, matting in his fur, trickling down the bark of the tree, and pooling in the grass, although he could feel the flesh already starting to knit together.

Cupping his groin, the witch flashed a wolfish grin at Lori and said, “Be good now, an’ maybe this could be fun, huh?”

“Oh, I’ll be nice. I’ll leave your skin attached, which is more than you’ve done, isn’t it?” she responded, lifting one hand, palm out.

He narrowed his eyes, cocking his head as he studied her. His long, narrow face darkened and he licked his lips. “Hmmm…a witch. What a pretty little witch you are, too, luv. But you can’t hope to fight us, girl.”

Curling her fingers, she beckoned to him, she said, “Prove it.”

A volley of fire flew toward her and struck something only inches in front of her face, melting into it like water, fading into it and flickering out to the edge before dying away. As it faded, Lori looked up from under her lashes, a cat’s smile curving her mouth.

“Lovely fireworks,” she smirked.

A snarl curved the man’s lips and the ground shook, wind snapping through the trees. Lori’s eyes took on an unfocused look, and Jonathan swore roughly as his gut ran cold when her eyes started to glow, hot, green and fiery with anger. “You’ve done enough damage here,” she rasped.

“You can’t stop us,” the witch snarled as winds converged on them.

“Watch me,” Lori declared, falling to her knees.

Lori’s hands were steady as she reached into the bag at her waist. Oh, she had no qualms in shedding blood for magick. She had shed her own enough times. And today, she had every intention of shedding his. This land, these trees, they reviled him, rejected him, but were inexplicably bound to him.

He had sacrificed women here, slaughtered men here.

Her eyes met his as she sliced her palm open and pressed it to the earth, whispering under her breath.

Power rose to her call, flooded her.

And the man in front of her went pale as the earth started to shriek.

It was when the trembling started at his feet that he tried to back away. Launching the golden ball at him, Lori watched it strike him square in the chest, propelling him into the nearest tree. Expanding, flattening into a thin shield that bound him to the tree as it slowly and inexorably pulled him, screaming, within it. Then it held him silently within that golden shield.

“What the fuck…” the words were low, guttural, forced from a throat not human.

“The land takes back what it has lost. Always.” Lori didn’t need to turn to know that Jonathan was back on his feet.”Come on. We can’t stay here now. I don’t know if they know we are here, but we can’t risk it now. His loss will be noticed soon.”

With a rapid touch, she swept the area clean of the signs of battle, releasing more bursts of magick than Jonathan had ever seen. When she turned, he was in human form once more. Long, lean, naked, his sable hair falling around his body like a cloak, he gathered up the shreds of his clothes before turning and striding toward her, his eyes grim. The healing gashes on his belly still bore traces of blood, and his sex hung thick and heavy between his thighs, thickening and lengthening as he stared at her.

Lori turned away. Before she could fall to her knees and beg.

“No damn hotels,” Jonathan growled as Lori drove toward one. He shifted, arching his back to relieve some of the pressure on his stomach. Damn it. Getting a slice from a fucking witch was never a good thing. But this one wasn’t healing right.

Shit.

It had pulled together inside, but then it had stopped.

And that meant only one thing.

“I still smell blood,” Lori said quietly, as though she could read his mind.”You’re not healing. You heal fast, faster than any were I’ve ever seen. He didn’t do anything other than an elemental trick. No poison, no curse.” Her breath slid out between her teeth in an angry hiss. “It’s his touch. His magick is fouled. I can’t think of any other way to explain it.”

“I know.” Arching a brow at her, he said, “I can feel it inside my veins. It’s cool, murky, oily.”

Lori poked out her lip, a thoughtful little pout before she blew her bangs out of her eyes as she headed back down the lane, her look dark and brooding. It wasn’t a look he normally associated with Lori. Lori was light and laughter, wasn’t she? Lori wasn’t a warrior—yet, she had battled like one.

“You’re going to need a Healing,” she said grimly.

“What of it?” Tension raced up his spine as a sulky snarl formed against his will. She didn’t have to sound so damned unwilling. So what if he hadn’t been too thrilled a moment ago that she was going to have to lay those slim, wonderful hands on him? It was okay if he wasn’t real thrilled about having to fight down the need to touch her, especially after she had made it clear that she didn’t want him touching her anymore.

And he had said he wouldn’t…not until she begged. Damn it, why had he gone and said that? Gnashing his teeth together as his cock started to throb and swell, Jonathan wondered exactly when he was going to start listening to something other than his dick and his pride, and his fool excuse of a brain.

A soft, growling chuckle echoed through him. The wolf was awake. Something had roused him, most likely the lingering pain in the wound that hadn’t healed.

‘Tis high time you started thinking with your heart, brother. High time. Didn’t think the day would come. A warm soothing presence settled around him, like the wolf had wrapped his great body around Jonathan, and he felt the pain and the aching cold recede some, his mind clearing as he focused on Lori.

She is a warrior, the wolf whispered. Stop doubting her so much. It’s insulting to us, and her.

Blood started to pound thickly in Jonathan’s veins. The knowledge had been brewing dimly within him for some time. He hadn’t accepted it, for reasons he couldn’t face, but it had been there. My soul is too dark for her.

No. The wolf shook him mentally. Your fears are too dark. But they are groundless. There is nothing of the evil that spawned you inside of you. Lori and Sarel came from evil—do you see the dark inside of them?

Nothing dark lived inside Lori.

And though Sarel battled her demons, her soul was not dark.

And neither of these women could love a man of darkness, not after what they had lived with, been through.

With eyes that glowed, Jonathan turned his head, studying Lori. Leave us, wolf. I think I understand what you are saying now.

The wolf laughed, deep and heartily, his presence stroking over Jonathan’s body like the warm brush of faerie wings as he slid away. Yes, I see you do.

Lori swung off down a path, her eyes vague and unfocused. She didn’t even seem aware that he was there, watching her, his eyes moving over her face, down the line of her neck before following it to the neckline of her shirt. Her rounded breasts were full and smooth, the nipples soft. He could smell her, the scent of vanilla and jasmine, delicately scented skin, sweet on the air.

And the scent of sweat, the smell of the earth and adrenaline still pulsing under her skin. The scents of battle. She had fought, and she had done well. He hadn’t stood a bloody chance against the witch—witches had something against the other paranormal creatures that many of them couldn’t fight. Sarel could only be in so many places at once.

Lori had done more than prove her worth as a fighter.

Hell, she had been trying to get out of the safehold of the Enclave for months, and Jonathan had refused it. Not soft, pretty Lori.

The firm lines of her face right now looked anything but soft. She looked strong, serious, and capable—and damn it, that was just as arousing and intriguing as the soft Lori.

“We’ll be safe here.”

Her voice broke into his intense study of her face. Looking up, he glanced around the small clearing.”Where is here?”

“Shenandoah National Park,” she said shortly. “Nothing’s wrong in here. I can feel it. If one of them comes, it will disrupt the flow of things and I’ll feel that. It will give us enough warning to prepare.”

“What do you mean, nothing is wrong?” he asked, reaching over and catching her arm before she could slide out of the truck.

“They haven’t tried tapping into the land here, or done anything that’s screwed up the earth. If they move in around us, the earth will feel their evil—and I will know. We’ll have plenty of warning,” she said, tugging her wrist free. “Come on…let’s make some sort of camp.”

Jonathan slowly loosened his grasp on her wrist, a smile curling his lips as he met her eyes. He’d have her whole body under his hands soon enough. Whether she begged or not.

Lori met his eyes, and her cheeks flushed, her gaze dropping to his mouth. He heard her heart rate kick up, saw the stiffening of her nipples under the shirt she wore and scented the sudden sharp rise in the unique smell that was her. Meeting her gaze, he saw that she knew it.

Smiling, he lowered his gaze to her lips, a touch as gentle and light as a kiss. He climbed out of the truck, reaching behind the seat for the camp gear. Every Hunter who owned a car had a similar pack. He made damn sure of it. Never knew when it would come in handy. There was water, basic food and other stuff back there as well. He might not have been a Boy Scout, but he sure as hell studied a similar handbook.

Lori eyed him nervously when he didn’t argue with her about helping with the camp set-up. Jonathan could scent her anxiety, hear her heart rate as she moved into the tent to unroll the two separate bedrolls. His lids lowered and his mouth started to water, his ears tracking her movements.

“I’m done. Get in here so I can deal with your stomach,” she said shortly.

A slow, heated smile curled his lips at the sound of her voice. Jerky, short sentences, when she usually sounded so calm, so confident. Ducking his head under the flap of the tent, he met her eyes and dropped to his knees, crawling over to her, pausing a long moment to stare into her eyes.

She met his gaze, her lips parted, their noses nearly touching, the light kiss of her breath touching his mouth as they watched each other. Jonathan could all but taste her now, wanted to taste her, wanted to grab her to him and rip the clothes from her body as he sank his cock deep inside her sweet, wet pussy.

But that lingering, cold ache in his side was getting worse, and he could feel it spreading to his bones.”Such a pretty little witch,” he murmured, lowering his head and stroking his tongue across her lower lip in one slow pass.”So sweet.”

Her breath left her lungs in one slow, shuddering rush as he shifted and lay down, rolling onto his back. Staring up at her through the fringe of his lashes, he gripped the bottom of his shirt and slowly pulled it up as he watched her face. She was staring at his hands, watching as he bared his belly and chest, a flush spreading up her neck, her cheeks going rosy, her eyes clouding.

Jonathan could smell it as her arousal grew. Shifting onto the elbow of his uninjured side, he pulled his shirt off and tossed it away before he lay back down, still watching her.

Carefully, she probed the cold skin around his wound. “It must be his signature. Some witches can leave one in their wake. Some leave a poisonous, almost gangrenous stench. Others, an acid-looking burn. His is cold. Icy. And it spreads.” Flattening her hand against his belly, she hummed with sympathy, deep and low in her throat. “Very cold. This would have killed a mortal. Could kill lesser weres. Weres are so hot-natured, this cold would be a big danger.”

Heat started to chase the cold away as her hand pressed harder and harder against his flesh. It arced through him and his breath hissed through his teeth as it punched him in the gut. Hot, fiery licks of magick sought out every icy-cold corner of his soul where the malignant magick had taken up hiding. The pain swelled, intensifying, and Jonathan swore raggedly and bellowed, feeling something putrid and evil flee his soul as her Healing flowed through him.

Darkness washed over him from above as her hands, and her soft, soothing whisper guided him into a restful slumber.

Chapter Nine

Jonathan could feel her eyes on him as she finished the task of closing the wound as he drifted up from the healing slumber, feeling revived, refreshed, hungry. The major healing had been removing the ice of the other witch’s magick from his body.

Closing the wound was child’s play to her.

Opening his eyes, he met her gaze and felt his mouth curl into a hungry smile.

“I like the way your eyes feel on me—I like knowing you watch me,” he murmured. Taking her hand, he pressed it flat to his belly and held it there.

“Stop it.” She swallowed thickly as she slowly moved her eyes up the line of his body, tugging her hand out from under his, trailing the tips of her fingers over his side before folding her hand into a fist that she held in her lap. “I’ve been watching you for years. You’ve never given a damn before. And on the rare occasion you did, it only pissed you off.”

“Because I wanted you too much,” he said hotly, reaching out and sliding his hand up the side of her thigh where she knelt beside him. “And those sweet, innocent eyes that followed me everywhere.”

Her eyes sliced across to meet his, narrowed and angry. “I am tired of being called sweet and innocent.” The air between them was all but vibrating with her anger, Jonathan could feel it. “I lost my innocence years ago, once I realized what I would be expected to do when I joined an enclave. And I’m only sweet in your eyes. Eli knows I can be a veritable shrew. Sarel thinks I’m a bitch and a half. To everybody else, I am just me. Only you label me as sweet and innocent and then bother to call me by name. Bloody hell, I spent several years wondering if you even knew it. All I ever heard was she is too sweet, too soft for this life.”

“I always knew your name. I’ve been whispering it in my sleep from the time I met you,” Jonathan rasped, rolling to his knees and catching her face in his hands, tilting her chin up. Her lips parted and she tried to jerk her head away, but he covered her mouth with his and plunged his tongue inside, sliding his hands down the line of her back and rocking his cock against the soft curve of her belly.

With a furious, muffled curse, she tore her mouth from his, and wedged her hands between them. “Whispering it, and probably cursing it,” she laughed bitterly, her eyes sharp as glass as she stared up at him. “I’ve lost count how many times you tried to send me back to Excelsior, how many times you tried to convince Eli and Sarel that I wasn’t fit for this life.”

“Because you were too damn tempting, and I didn’t want to give in. I didn’t want to have to fight myself every time I saw that pretty face or smelled your sweet body,” he growled, lowering his face and burying it in the curve of her neck, raking his teeth along the curve. Against his chest, he could feel the hot burning stab of her nipples and hear the pounding of her heart, feel her pulse against his mouth as he sucked a patch of delicate skin.

“I’m not begging you, not now, not ever,” Lori rasped, trying to arch back out of his grasp. All she succeeded in doing, though, was pressing her pelvis against his cock and making him groan as she wiggled and undulated against him.

Moving his lips up to her ear, he murmured, “What about if I am willing to beg you? What if I say I was a fool, a blind dumb fool?” Sliding his hand up her side, he cupped her breast and massaged the soft, malleable flesh there, pinching the nipple, milking it as he told her, “I’ve always wanted you, needed you, loved you. I never opened my eyes to see how much, though. Never opened my eyes to see just how much you are the other half of me.”

Her body tensed, as though folding in on itself, a rabbit going still and silent as a predator started to stalk the woods. “Don’t. Don’t do this to me,” she said quietly.

Shaking her head, she slowly started to work herself out of his arms and Jonathan let her. “I’ve been waiting for you for weeks, months, years. Only hours ago you told me that it would never happen. That there would be nothing but sex. I will not let myself start to hope only to have my heart broken,” she said, moving away from him in the tight confines of the tent. Sinking down on her pallet and drawing her knees to her chest, she rested her chin on them and stared blankly at her feet.

“I didn’t think you were strong enough—I was a fool. My eyes were opened in a very harsh way, admittedly. But even before that, I knew I was wrong,” Jonathan said gruffly, drawing in a deep breath, taking the scent of her body into his lungs and shuddering as it flooded him. Crawling across the tent to loom over her kneeling form, he murmured, “I will have you, Lori. Make no mistake of that. You’re mine, forever.”

A tiny smirk crossed her lips.”It’s odd…up until just now, you didn’t even really want me for more than thirty minutes.”

A wolfish smile curved his mouth, and his eyes flashed. “Don’t push me, Lori. I’ve wanted you for years and you’re the only one who’s been too blind to see it. Push me, and I’ll push back.”

He pulled away, moving faster than her eyes could track, leaving the tent before he gave in to what they both wanted.

Lori felt the strength drain from her body.

Damn it.

Sagging back on the blanket, she pressed a fist to her breast, feeling her heart pound there as she sucked air into her lungs. Had she really just passed up a chance to feel Jonathan’s warm, naked body against hers?

Yeah, and damn him to hell.

He was the one to blame.

If he hadn’t been so difficult lately, she wouldn’t have been so on edge and felt so guarded, so desperately needing to watch her every move with him. Otherwise, maybe, just maybe, she could have given in.

With a sulk, she settled down to rest.

Leandra eyed the rocky shoreline.

“Why here?” she asked, shaking her head.”‘This place, it is cold, and dark, and dreary. I don’ like it.”

“You just don’t like it because you have less chance to take off running. Agnes will blunt your powers, I’m betting. She did it before, just by being around you. She’ll do that and more,” Erika said, smiling with satisfaction.

She loved this beach. Here, on this rocky shoreline in Maine, she could feel the wind on her face, taste the salt in the air, and she felt free. She didn’t feel quite so…normal here. She didn’t feel quite so human when she stood here. Something in the ocean had always called to her. Jonathan had brought her here for the first time after he had saved her.

They used to come here all the time. Lately, he hardly brought her at all, but Erika remembered this place. And so did Agnes.

The wind started to calm.

Erika smiled as Leandra’s topaz eyes narrowed. The Jamaican had expected the wind to pick up around Agnes. But the earth loved Agnes. It didn’t go into turmoil at her arrival. It calmed. Except for the ocean. Nothing and no one of this earth could calm the ocean. So as the water crashed onto the rocky beach, the wind died down around Agnes Milcher as she made her way down the beach toward them, eying Erika with faded blue eyes, shaking her head mildly.”You’re a naughty girl, calling me when you’ve your whole family worrying themselves mad about you.”

Though she was still more than a hundred yards away, her voice sounded all around them, as though she was above them, next to them and within them. Erika noticed that Leandra jumped, and then the black woman scowled, her eyes flashing. The young girl just smiled and laughed, running over the rocks and sand with her hair flying like a golden banner behind her as she flung herself toward the old witch, her arms wrapping around the woman’s neck.

Of an equal height, Agnes looped her arms around Erika, holding tight and firm, her old body still strong and powerful after more than five of walking the earth.”Ah, child. We worried so. We knew Lori would find you, but by the time she and Jonathan reached where you had landed, you and this lady were already gone,” Agnes murmured, her hand smoothing down Erika’s hair.”And then, lass, you call me with this bit of news.”

Erika turned and watched as her eyes met Leandra’s over the distance.”She’s not evil. I know what she did was, but she’s not evil. I know too much about evil to not be able to see it,” Erika said anxiously, holding tightly to Agnes’ arm as the witches studied each her. Agnes narrowed her eyes, her pale, lined face taking on an eerie, otherworldly glow, her eyes gleaming like pale blue pearls in the moonlight.

“No…evil, she is not. But what she is, I’ve yet to decide. An unknown quantity, I dare say,” Agnes murmured.”So powerful, so full of courage, pride. And very protective of you. She gives her heart quickly, and wholly.” Sliding her eyes to Erika, she smiled.”Ahh, pet. None who loves you that truly can be so bad, can they? So what does she want?”

“To know about the Hunters. She doesn’t understand them,” Erika said, flushing as she looked back at Leandra and saw that the woman was indeed watching her very closely, very protectively. She paced back and forth on a small section of beach like a caged panther, her long black braids swaying down her back as she moved.

“Hmmm. We are easy to misunderstand to the outside eye. But I see the mark of our enemy on her. They have worked strongly within her. This may be beyond what words can say, pet,” Agnes murmured. With a sigh, she linked hands with Erika and they walked together down the beach toward the other woman.”I feel so much anger from her, so much resentment.”

“I can hear you, old woman. And my anger is my own damn business,” Leandra drawled, facing them with her arms folded across her chest and her legs planted wide apart.

“Good ears you have,” Agnes mused, pursing her lips thoughtfully. And not just the ones on your rather exotic head, either, pet. Over the crashing of the waves, the woman shouldn’t have been able to hear. Even a very refined witch-sense at this age most likely wouldn’t have heard that. Sarel wouldn’t have. Now, Lori might have. Though Lori wasn’t a match for this witch, not this one.

Sarel, maybe. But not Lori, though she was not the soft, sweet innocent thing some mistook her for.

This lean, dangerous woman was a warrior through and through, from the top of her black, braided head, to the bottom of her black-booted feet, with a long wicked knife on her hip. The aura radiating from her flickered from gold to blue to white to red, enough to make Agnes wish she had a pair of sunglasses, so bright were the lights.

“Old woman, I’ve seen you before. With the big vampire, in Jamaica,” Leandra said, her expression closed and tight. “I know your face.”

“I know many vampires,” Agnes said with a smile. “Many. And I’ve been to Jamaica several times, though none in recent years. You’ll have to be more specific than that, child.” Though Agnes was quite certain she knew who she was facing…so that is where you landed, child.
Ah, Mal. We should have looked longer and much, much harder.

“I think you know who I am,” Leandra smirked, arching an eyebrow. “I’m a little older, but something tells me that doesn’t matter to you, old woman.”

Agnes laughed, the rich laugh carrying through the early morning air.”Oh, my. I think I like you. So fiery, so proud.” Her eyes sparkled with mirth. “Why don’t you tell me why I’m here? I have to be frank, child—I’m not please to be here with a woman who gave loyalty to those...monsters. I’ve no love for you. None at all. But I have Erika back at my side. And she looks whole, happy and uninjured. I can manage a few questions.”

“That girl here,” Leandra drawled, tossing her head at Erika. “She insists I am wrong about the lot of murderers you threw in with. I want you to convince me I am wrong.”

“Murderers, is that what we are?” Agnes mused, tapping a finger to her lips.”Hmm. We’ve been called vigilantes quite a bit. But not usually anything so harsh as murderers. How is murder to stop monsters from killing children, stopping rapists?”

“I don’t care ‘about the scum. They deserve whatever happens. I care about de ones who don’t scurry to do your will. What ‘bout them? You take them away and they are never seen again,” Leandra snarled, tossing her braids back. “Young children, men, women, you don’t care whether they want to join you or not. If they don’t, you kill them.”

Agnes frowned and pursed her lips.”My, my, my. You are definitely rather confused, aren’t you?”

“You came hunting me. If I hadn’t ran, I would be dead, too. Don’t tell me that I am wrong—I can feel the lies just as well as you.” As though she could no longer stay still, she started to pace, her long body tensed and angry.

“Very well,” Agnes said agreeably. Linking hands with Erika, she held a hand out to Leandra and smiled serenely. “I shall not tell you anything. You would not believe a word I told you. So I shall show you.”

Agnes could not stop the laugh that bubbled up from her lips as Leandra cursed, long and loud. But she did clap her hands over Erika’s ears.

Eli slid his eyes to Sarel’s face. She was lost in deep thought, her eyes unfocused, faraway, her lips moving on occasion as though she were speaking. And he suspected she was. A faint scent clung to her skin that wasn’t truly hers, and a magick moved through the air that wasn’t hers either. The scent of lavender, powdered skin…Agnes.

Bloody good news, for once, I hope. He blew a harsh sigh out as he rolled over onto his side, laying his hand on the flat of her belly, stroking the smooth, warm skin there, focusing on the soft hum of voices he heard in the back of his mind. But he couldn’t hear anything more than those voices. Not unless she wanted him to.

When her body went lax, he opened his eyes and lifted his head, staring into her golden-green eyes with an arched brow. “What did Agnes want?”

“She has Erika. She is safe,” Sarel said, a shudder racking her body.

“Jon? Lori?”

“Still where the Scythe have settled in; they know she is gone. I suspect Lori wants to go in and destroy everything. She’s learned too much of the Scythe.” Sarel’s eyes started to gleam. “Lori is no warrior. She can’t handle a battle on her own—not even with Jonathan. But I can’t reach her. She’s blocked me.”

“Lori isn’t a child, or an inexperienced witch, sweet,” Eli said, sitting up, looping his arms around his legs as he stared into the night. His eyes gleamed dully in the night as he pondered the way to tell her that her sister wasn’t the child she still thought she was. “I’ve never doubted Lori’s abilities as a witch, a Healer or one of my Hunters.”

“She’s not a Hunter.”

“She is. She always has been. You just refuse to see. Bloody hell, Sarel, I trained her. Jonathan trained her. She’s a damn fine witch—”

“She’s a Healer.” Sarel’s mouth was set in mutinous lines as she glared up at him, folding her arms over her naked breasts.

“To be a Healer, she must first be a witch, and a damn fine one at that,” Eli said with a frustrated sigh, flopping onto his back and flinging his arm over his eyes. This was an old, tired argument. “Your sister is a woman grown, a talented, powerful woman. She can take care of herself, handle herself, Sarel.”

“No. I won’t take that chance. Damn it, I’ll have to go after her,” Sarel muttered, sitting up and swinging her long, slim legs over the side of the bed.

Though the sun was moving closer to the horizon, it was still several hours before sundown. Eli eyed her naked back narrowly as she strode over to the closet, her rounded ass swaying from side to side as she gathered up dark, tough clothes. Hunting clothes.

“You plan to go alone.”

“My sister, Eli,” she said softly.

“Your sister isn’t alone. Jonathan is with her. And if you insist on this, wait so that I can go with you. Mal can remain here and we will go out together,” Eli said, sliding from the bed and moving up behind her, resting his hands on her shoulders.

“I can’t trust my sister to one man. He’s just a werewolf, Eli. And he barely tolerates her,” Sarel snapped, shrugging Eli’s hands off.

Eli bit off a harsh laugh. Her action, that small rejection of his touch, caused a hot, biting pain to lance through him. He turned away, stalking through the room and snagging a pair of pants. Donning them, he turned and glared at her, his eyes flashing eerily in the dim light of the windowless room.

“How can such an intelligent woman be so very dim?” he asked drolly. “Jonathan would lay down his life for any woman, but he would slay every last dragon known to man for Lori. He has been in love with her since he laid eyes on her. Rather odd that you are one of the few who do not realize it. And I wouldn’t call him just a werewolf. That is like calling you just a witch. Don’t make light of his gift. It’s more powerful than you know.”

Sarel, though, didn’t really appear to be listening to him, Eli decided. She seemed to be focused on what he had said right after mentioning Jonathan slaying dragons for Lori. Something about the boy being in love with her sister.

“You truly didn’t know, sweet? Be honest—he has watched her like a bleeding hawk since she first stepped foot onto my lands. Hell, closer than that. She couldn’t sneeze without him knowing about it.”

“Then he’s obsessed. That doesn’t mean he is in love with her.”

Eli shook his head. “No. He is in love with her. I know Jonathan. And I think you know him a bit better than you admit,” he murmured, moving a little closer, waiting until she was staring into his eyes before he started to circle around her. “What is more, you know Lori. She is in love with him. Together they are quite powerful.”

“Lori is young. She is sweet, she knows a lot of potions and she can close up cuts. She isn’t a fighter,” Sarel sneered, brushing past him. He felt her shiver, though, as her naked arm brushed his.

Eli shook his head.

Bloody hell.

Retreating to a corner, he watched as his little know-it-all finished gathering her belongings and then, just as she was getting ready to sling her pack over her shoulder, he lunged.

Judging the time, he figured he just needed to stall her for an hour. Then he could venture outside without danger and follow Sarel while she tracked her sister down. Not that Lori couldn’t handle it. He suspected she could handle it very well.

But he wasn’t so sure Sarel was ready to handle seeing her baby sister all grown up. And most likely pissed at Sarel’s very condescending attitude.

Jonathan flopped onto his belly, burying his face in his arms, wanting to howl. He could smell her, hear her breathing, hear her heartbeat, all but feel the satin of her skin under his hands again. He should have pushed. Damn it, why in the hell was he being nice?

Because she was right, damn it. He had no fucking right to push her after months of being an ass.

Damn it, he wanted her. He wanted to spread her thighs wide and fuck her again. Wanted to hear her scream his name.

Needed to hear her say she loved him...and then he needed to tell her that he loved her, the way he had never said before.

A soft whimper reached his ears.

Lori lay across the tent from him, sleeping on her bedroll, her head pillowed on her arm.

Her face turned toward his and as he watched, she moaned again, faint. So very faint.

The stuttering skip of her heart. A broken little sigh. Shifting on the bed. More movement.

When a muffled scream rent the air, he wasn’t ready. Jackknifing up in the bedroll, he rolled onto his knees and was across the tent before the scream had even died on her lips. Pulling her into his arms, he scooped her onto his lap, murmuring her name with no thought to how dangerous it was to waken a nightmaring witch from her slumber.

“Shhhh, shhhh, it’s okay, baby, it’s okay,” he whispered against her damp brow.”Come on, come out of it, love. Come out of it.” His hair spilled around them as he cupped one hand around her cheek, lifting her face to him as she tried to shy away.”Look at me, baby. Look at me.”

Her body continued to tremble and shudder, her lips parting only to let another weak sob forth before she clamped her mouth closed as though she feared making another sound. Tears leaked from under her closed lashes, and Jonathan stroked them away with his thumb. Threading his fingers through her hair, he lowered his mouth to hers, pressing a gentle, soothing kiss to her lips.”Wake up, baby. Come on, wake up,” he whispered.

A deep racking shudder tore through her and her eyes flew open, leaving her staring up at him, his face only inches from hers as he lifted his mouth from hers.”It’s me, Lori, it’s just me,” he crooned as he rubbed his thumb gently across her lip. Sweeping one finger across her cheek and drying the tear tracks away, he lowered his brow to hers. “What were you dreaming about?”

The woman was as lovely as a faerie, with a soft, lilting voice—but malice filled every word, while her eyes were lit with the fires of hell. Lori stood staring from the shadows as Jonathan was dragged, bound and unconscious, into a deep, dark pit of a room in the lowest cavern in the network of caves.

They called her Mistress.

And she intended for Jonathan to do the same.

He did not submit the way she wanted. With the gleam of madness and evil in her eyes, she told them to beat him to death, that the blood of his passing would work as well as his willing soul.

She intended to create a twisted version of the Hunters. Somebody she could subvert, that could slide back into the Hunters and wreak chaos. From the inside, she wanted to break them. Break the confidence of one Enclave and you could shatter the bedrock of them all.

She’d selected Jonathan. But if he wouldn’t do what she wanted, she’d just kill him and find another.

The bitch used blood magick, and she was strong. It could possibly work if she found the right soul to break. It nearly had worked...once. They had almost succeeded in subverting a broken witch, a lost soul, who had too much darkness in his life, and in his heart.

But Jonathan didn’t have darkness in his soul, or his heart. And the were never walked alone.

She fell to her knees, one hand at her mouth to hold back her screams as she saw his face, battered, bloodied and broken. Somebody grabbed him by his hair and forced him to look up at Mistress. She held his chin up with one dainty foot, turning it first one way, then the other, her lip poked out in a petulant scowl.

“Stupid dog,” she drawled. “You had such a handsome face and now it’s ruined.”

“Make him bleed,” she said quietly, cocking her head as she pulled her foot back. Her voice was as calm as though she were saying, “I’ll wear pink today.” As she walked away, dozens and dozens of people launched themselves at Jonathan’s inert, helpless body.

No! Lori shot to her feet and slammed her palm against a barrier that blocked her from them, light exploded from it as her hand connected.

This won’t happen!

As she screamed, she heard the triumphant howl of a wolf.

And then Jonathan’s voice, Wake up, baby, come on…

Her eyes opened and he was leaning over her, eyes gleaming faintly in the dark from his distress. His scent filled her head and she could taste him on her lips. Damn it, Lori thought desperately, that image of him nearly dead, bloodied and bruised, was burned on her mind. I can’t let it happen…

Reaching up, she buried her fingers in his hair and slanted her lips against his, licking along the seam of his lips. Feeling them part as he took a deep, startled breath, she pushed her tongue inside his mouth when they did. Shifting, she straddled his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck, that long, gloriously silken hair of his spilling all around them like a dark cape. Jonathan…

A deep, warning growl rumbled in his chest. His hands clamped on her waist, fingers digging into the soft flesh there as he dragged her back and forth on the hard, thick ridge of his cock, even as he pulled his head away, dragging air into his lungs.

“Aaahhh, sweet. Don’t. You don’t want this, not really. You’re upset from the nightmare,” he groaned. “If you do this now, you’re gonna be madder than hell at us both in the morning.”

Lori pushed up onto her knees, planting them into the ground, staring at him with stark, hungry eyes that still stung with tears.”No. If I don’t do this now, I’m gonna be madder than hell at both of us. And I think I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. I’ll make damn sure you do,” she whispered roughly. Pulling back, she tugged the camisole over her head, freeing her breasts to the cool night air. She felt desperate to see his face as well as she knew he could see hers.

“Illunmari,” she spoke, her voice throbbing, magick slithering through the air. Hot, burning little licks left her as it gathered there, hovering above them, the heat fading away until it was nothing but a luminous ball of light. Golden and soft, it highlighted the gleam in his eyes, and the sensual hungry curl of his mouth.

“I know what I want, no matter how screwed up my dreams are,” she murmured, leaning down, pressing her lips to his mouth. Against her naked breasts, she could feel the hard, muscled wall of his chest. He felt so hot, fiery, the scent of the woods and the earth coming from him as he banded one arm around her waist. The other hand buried in her hair, tugging her head back, arching her neck as he plundered her mouth hungrily.

When he pulled back briefly, Lori smiled serenely up at him. She revelled in the sight of his glowing eyes, tawny and gleaming like a wolf’s in the night, as he growled, “Be certain, baby. You be very, very certain.”

Lori chuckled. Sliding her hands down her torso, she cupped her breasts, rolling her nipples as she arched her back. “Hmmm…I’m certain that I’ve never wanted anything more. I’m certain…very, very certain.”

Air flew from her lungs as Jonathan moved like lightning, rolling her onto her back, pinning her under his body and tearing her panties away. Lori was still trying to catch her breath, her eyes sliding down the lines of his lean, muscled body as his hands jerked away to free the button-fly of his jeans.

Mouth dry as the desert, she licked her lips, reaching one hand out to trail her fingers over his flat belly, circling one over the dimple of his navel before his hands caught hers. Pinning them above her head, he wedged his thighs between hers.

“I won’t wait this time,” he warned her, growling. “I have to have you. Have to. I’ll fuck you softer, slower, sweeter later.”

She already ached for him, but at his words, the need twisted through her, tightened, until she wanted to sob with it. “Damn it, I don’t care how you do it, I just want to feel you inside me,” she whimpered, wrapping her legs around his waist and lifting her hips.

Lowering his head, he caught one swollen nipple in his mouth, and Lori mewled as the hot, wet cave of his mouth enveloped her. Tossing her head back and forth on the bed roll beneath her, Lori sank her nails into the hard muscles of his shoulders.

He pushed the blunt rounded head of his cock against the entrance of her wet aching cleft. Trailing a path of hot, biting kisses in a line from her nipple to her mouth, he plunged his tongue deep inside. Lori groaned, swallowing down his taste, as he buried his thick, burning cock inside her.

Oh, the heat… She arched her back as he pierced her, burying himself to the hilt, his balls slapping against her ass as he drank down the scream that rose from her throat. The heat from a were’s body was so intense just to touch, but to love… Lori whimpered as he pulled out and surged back inside. She could feel herself stretching around him and she loved it.

When he finally freed her mouth, Lori’s head fell back and she sucked in air. Whimpers replaced her frantic search for air as he shifted his grip on her hands. From holding one wrist in each hand, to pinning them both in one of his big hands, he reached down and circled his thumb tauntingly over the swollen bud of her clit.

“You’re so tight, so sweet,” he crooned against her mouth.”I can smell you…you’re almost ripe, you know that? In a few more days, you’ll be ovulating and I could fill that flat little belly with my baby.” As he spoke, he circled his hips against the cradle formed by hers, riding higher on her body as he did so, and burying the head of his cock against the mouth of her womb. Lori couldn’t stop the hungry moan that fell from her lips any more than she could stop her next breath. Her hands opened and closed convulsively, straining uselessly in his firm but painless grip.

Sobbing as he withdrew slowly, Lori shuddered as he drove deeply back inside in one hard, heavy thrust. His hot, heavy length forged through the slick, swollen tissues that started to ripple and convulse around his invading length.

“Scream again,” he purred. “Do it. Scream again, and let me hear my name.”

His name fell from her lips in long ragged sobs, and Jonathan felt the shudders that gripped her body as she started to come in hard, racking convulsions. Her snug little pussy tightened around his cock, he knew he was going to explode from the sheer, painfully sweet pleasure of it. Sinking his dick into her was like sinking it into a silk-swathed electrical outlet, and he was still buzzing from the shock. The scent of her filled his head, making his mouth water and his gums ache as he hungered for a taste.

He should have tasted her—he would later.

But not now. Pulling out, he pushed back into her and felt the hungry press of her hands on his shoulders, her heels digging into his ass. The diamond-hard points of her nipples burned into his chest, and with a growl he dipped his head and caught one in his mouth, pulling it completely in and sucking deep. The soft, sweet taste of her skin flooded his mouth, the tight grip of her pussy hugged his cock. Shuddering, he rose onto his knees, gripping her hips as he slammed into her, staring down at the long, pale length of her body. His eyes trailed up the length of her torso—the berry red of her nipples, her pink mouth as her tongue trailed over her lips, her eyes gleaming, dazed and glassy.

“So damned pretty, so damned hot,” he muttered. “I love you.”

Lori gasped, shuddering and arching her back, her hands coming down and grasping on his wrists as she worked her hips against him, her eyes locking on his.

“Jonathan—” her words broke off into a ragged scream as her vagina clenched on his cock in a slow, rhythmic series of convulsions, a flush working up from her breasts to her face.

Jonathan growled. Balls pulled tight against his body, he flexed his hands as his nails started to lengthen, his control shattering as his climax rushed up. Blood flooded his mouth as his teeth lengthened and fangs broke through his gums, lust calling to the animal inside him.

The soft, silken, wet sheath clutched greedily around him yet again as he drove deep inside one last time and exploded. Coming inside her, he bent low over her body and sank his teeth into the soft fleshy pad of her shoulder.

The tangy sweet wash of her blood spilled down his throat, and her nails raked his back as she screamed out his name yet again.

Wrapping his arms around her, he rolled onto his back, cuddling her against his chest as he licked away the blood from the bite at her shoulder. “Damnation, I love you,” he whispered.

“‘Bout time you admitted it,” Lori muttered, rubbing her cheek against his chest.

Chapter Ten

Lori revelled in the sweet aches of her body as she stood in the shadows of the woods. The wind tugged at her hair and dark clothes, as the moon rose over the lake. The water lapped at the rocky beach as Jonathan moved up behind her. “We won’t be alone much longer.”

Lori smiled slowly. “I know. I can feel her, too. She is not…happy.” That was an understatement. The anger she felt pumping off Sarel was unreal. The anger, the fear—the paranoia—in Lori’s opinion. “She’s wrong. I don’t care if you agree with her or not.”

“I don’t. Whether I want to put you in a tower is beside the point. You’re not helpless,” Jonathan said, forcing the words out through a tight throat. Moving up behind her, he rested his hands on her shoulders as she stared out over the empty space between them and the dark mouth of the cave. “You’re not going to barrel headlong into danger like your sister would either. You’re smarter than she and I combined. And a Hunter, through and through.”

The hair that stood up on her arms was all the warning she had before Eli said coolly, “Indeed. Like I’d allow somebody who couldn’t take care of herself into my home. Unlike your stubborn sister, I’ve never had any doubts about you, sweet. Not one.”

The slim-hipped, blond vamp strolled out of the woods, his golden hair glinting in the pale moonlight, his eyes as gold as doubloons. A small, amused smile curved his lips as he studied the way Jonathan’s hands rested on Lori’s shoulders.”Now your sister, though, that is a stubborn lady. Very stubborn, and very convinced she is right.” His eyes moved to study the way the wind started whipping through the trees, and a sardonic smile curled his mouth.”No doubt she will be trying to peel the skin from my flesh for not taking what she calls ‘her side’.”

“Sides?”

Eli blinked. “Unfortunately, she’s going to see this as taking sides. I have to take the side that will protect my people. I’m a Hunter and I owe my loyalty to the Council. I’d die for my wife, and I’d leave the Council in a moment for her I had to. But I won’t endanger lives just because she’s...in a snit,” he mused as the ground started to tremble.

Lori rolled her eyes.”Sarel likes to make her presence felt.”

“Yes,” Eli said drolly. “She does. Just know—regardless of what Sarel says, you stand your ground, Lori. You’re more than she thinks.”

The ground didn’t actually shudder under her feet—though Lori wouldn’t have been surprised if it had—as Sarel strode into the small clearing. Her flaming red hair was blowing back from her face, and her eyes were shooting sparks as she gave her husband a narrow look. “In a hurry?” she asked sweetly.

He lifted one broad shoulder and just smiled his feline smile at her, lowering sooty lashes over his eyes before looking back at Jon and Lori. “Wouldn’t you like to say hello to your sister, pet?”

“No. I want to tell her to take her ass back to the house. This isn’t something she can handle.” Turning her flashing green eyes to Lori, Sarel smiled sharply and snapped, “Lori, take your cute little ass back to the house. You can’t handle this.”

Lori laughed. “Sarel, you have such a way with people.” Turning her attention back to the cave, she closed her eyes and focused on the unrest, and the frenzied, hungry energy coming from deep within.

When the hand closed over her arm, Lori sighed. “Sister dear, you need to get a grip. I’m not going anywhere. If you think otherwise…well, go check your arrogance at the door.”

“Damn it, Lori. You are not a fighter,” Sarel snarled, jerking her around.

Lori went with the move, meeting her sister’s angry eyes with cool, blank ones. Reaching around, she caught Sarel’s wrist, her fingers seeking out the nerves there and squeezing. “I fight when I need to. I’m staying.”

Sarel’s lips went white before she finally gasped and jerked her hand away. “Damn it, Lori. I can’t lose you—”

Lori smiled.”I’m needed here. If I leave, we all lose. I’ve been pulled here—I knew to come here and not just because of Erika. If it was just because of her, I could have left once she was safe. But I can’t,” she said quietly, turning her attention back to the cave. She had been pulled here, to this spot, maybe for her entire life. “And if I leave, I lose what I need the most. I can’t take that risk.”

It was then that she felt it, a slight shift, a break in the air. Taking a deep breath, she looked to Jonathan. “It’s time.”

“Time for—” Sarel’s words died in her throat as Jonathan fell to his knees, his head slumping forward as the muscles and bones in his body started to shift in preparation for the change. His hair rippled and flowed, blowing back from his body as the clothes shredded and fell. A rich musk—wild and earthy—poured from him as he lifted his eyes to meet hers.

“Don’t…watch…me…” he rasped through gritted teeth as his face started to lengthen, a muzzle forming, hair changing to fur and flowing like water down over his body. The bones under his skin popped and reformed into a new, more powerful shape.

Eli’s lids drooped, though the vampire knew Jonathan didn’t give a damn about him or Sarel. Catching his wife’s eye, he arched a golden brow, and she snarled but stalked toward him, her eyes full of biting fury and rage.

Lori crossed the space that separated her from her wolf, her eyes dark and watchful on his face. “I’ve watched you every day for the past seven years of my life, as much as I possibly could. Why wouldn’t I watch you now?”

Reaching up, she laced her fingers through his hair as the change took deeper hold, as his eyes went from dark, sinful brown to amber, and the bones in his legs broke and changed from human to werewolf. Covered with short, silken fur, his long rangy body crouched on the ground, his powerful head level with hers as he stared at her with glittering, unreadable eyes.

“I adore you, everything about you. Don’t think that you have to hide the wolf from me,” she murmured, stroking her hands down his silken pelt.”You’re so soft, so silken. I’ve always wondered…”

A growl rumbled out of Jonathan’s chest and his hands, large, tipped with ebony claws, closed convulsively over her arms.”Lori…”

“Shhh,” she murmured.”Go. We don’t have much time. They already know we’re here.” Her lashes lowered, and she felt the bittersweet ache fill her heart. Just in case…”I adore you,” she repeated.”You’ve always been my heart.”

As Jonathan loped off into the woods, Lori rose, keeping her eyes on his gleaming dark hide, ignoring the ache in her heart. God willing…closing her eyes, she whispered a brief prayer.

Be willing…

“Since we’re here, and you obviously intend to keep your ass here,” Sarel said coldly. “Would you mind filling me in? Or am I gonna fight blind?”

Eli laughed. “Darling, you were going to do that anyway. Remember? You just tried to send her away.”

Lori followed Jonathan through the bond that had formed between them when she had replaced the Scythe’s mark with a mark of her own. As he ran through the tunnels on swift silent feet, following the scent of blood and magick, and frenzied, fucking bodies, Lori told Sarel and Eli what she knew, which was little.

“They use blood magick—were planning to use it to screw with him and hopefully get inside his head and curse him,” she said softly. “They had planned to subvert Jonathan somehow. But he can’t be subverted. I don’t know how they ever imagined it would work. Now they spill their own blood, and having a nice little orgy. I don’t know what their goal is, but if they can’t get Jonnie, they’ll go for another target.”

“And why do they want a Hunter?” Sarel said.

“They want to break us. Weaken us...if we can be broken from the inside, they think we’ll be easier to take down. I think. I don’t know. The woman in charge isn’t entirely sane.” Rubbing the flat of her palm against her chest, she turned and watched. And waited.

“What is the purpose of Jonathan going in there alone?” Eli asked, narrowing his eyes.

“Bait,” Lori said, honestly. “They wanted him. I’m going to let them think they’ve got him. If they all go into one certain area, I can collapse it, but I need them all in there before I do it.”

“I don’t want you going in there,” Sarel said narrowly, striding forward.

“You can’t do it. You can’t get there fast enough,” Lori said, blowing her a kiss. Eli was reaching for Sarel’s hand even as Lori closed her eyes and felt the wind whipping past her…

“Love you, sis,”
she whispered. She wanted, desperately, to throw her arms around Sarel’s neck. But if she did that, Sarel would know. She’d see. So she just settled for the whisper, and the knowledge that taking the band of the Scythe out was something that had to be done.

Leandra fell to the ground, reeling in shock, her head pounding. Her stomach clenched and heaved as bile tried to force its way up her throat. Swallowing the hot, sour taste, she pressed her forehead against the cool tile under her brow. I won’t be sick. I won’t.

She had done this to herself, damn it. She would damn well deal with it without humiliating herself.

All around her, wherever she was, she could feel waves of hostility battering at her finely tuned shields. Dragging a deep breath of vanilla and jasmine scented air in her lungs, she focused.

A second later, she knew where she was. At the enclave for the Hunter.

The Hunter called Elijah Crawford, where she and her sis…no, where she and other murderers had plotted to kidnap Jonathan Wallace.

“Oh, child, you aren’t a murderer. You were close, a time or two, weren’t you?” Agnes murmured, lowering her ancient body. “Something always stopped you. You didn’t aim as well as you thought. Something didn’t feel right. The women who travelled with you, eh, they can’t claim the same. And there is blood on your heart, that is true.”

“Stop, old woman. This isn’t helping,” she said rawly, keeping her head down while she swallowed again. I’m not going to be sick, she thought. I’m not. “You pulled me through the hearts and souls of too many people—I know the truth now.”

The raw hostility battering at her was making her edgy. She was used to animosity. Competition. Dislike. Fear. But not this righteous anger, this need for vengeance. She even knew why—she had led the attack that had killed two of their wolves, and so many of their traps had been set against them, all orchestrated by her.

And Erika. She had taken Erika.

Erika—

The girl...where was the girl? “What did you do with the girl?” she whispered.

The thought hadn’t even circled through her mind and Erika came flying out of the crowded room, before the blonde woman at her side could even react.

“ I’m here! I’m fine!” the girl said, curling up against her side, wrapping her arms around Leandra’s waist and snuggling against her.”I know Agnes did a poof on ya, but I was just zap…and here I was. Plopped right down next to Malachi, too—and he yelped.”

“I did not,” a dark, accented voice snapped.

“Did too,” Erika said, grinning. “I wasn’t supposed to tell.”

“Children these days have no sense of honor.”

That voice sent shivers down Leandra’s spine—foreboding, fear…hunger…but mostly fear. Slowly, as he came around the room and into her line of view, she lifted her head and stared into his gaze. Watching his eyes, she waited. Over her head, he met Agnes’ eyes and Leandra felt the unheard conversation taking place. “I could not care less that she fell into the wrong group,” Malachi said silkily. Lowering his eyes to her face, he said, “What I want to know is where my friends are now. What good is your ass to me now? Have you any worth to us?”

But before she could answer, his eyes went vague and blank, and he turned around and left the room.

“She says they are just raising energy,” Eli murmured, staring into the darkness. In the back of his mind, he was painfully aware of the voice of another—Malachi had always been able to speak to him and distance was no obstacle.

“They are doing just that. But they plan on doing it through very nasty means, old boy. Blood sacrifice.”

Fear and fury slammed into Eli. “That doesn’t make sense...Lori said she saw something, picked it up somehow. They wanted to convert Jonathan—”

“More like the evil bitch in charge just wanted to fuck him before she killed him. Or while. I don’t know. Or maybe she thought to kill the kid once she had Jonathan there, thinking that would break him. But they need blood, powerful blood...and they want his. It’s not his body they want. It’s his blood, and that little witch of yours probably knew it.”

“She knew,” Eli muttered.

Whatever else he might have said was interrupted by the burst of magick as Lori reappeared. But it was unlike anything he had seen from her before. Her magick had always been quiet. Subtle. This was anything but.

In front of her, held by her magick, was a massive wolf. A still one—quiet, unmoving—but breathing.

Threading her fingers briefly through his fur, she whispered, “My heart, always.” Then she let his body drift to the ground.

As she knelt beside him, she locked eyes with Eli, then Sarel. She placed her palms flat on the ground.”Stay,” she whispered eerily. “Until my word or death releases them…”

“Lori, no.”

Sarel fell to her knees to try to counter the simple earthspell, but it was too late. The earth here knew Lori’s blood, Lori’s magick—that Sarel couldn’t hope to copy. As Sarel tipped her head back and opened herself to her own magick, they watched as Lori turned away. A second later, she was gone.

Jonathan felt her go. The little witch had tricked him.

The wolf was trying, desperately, to work past the sleep spell she had thrown on him in the cave.

But it wasn’t going to be easy.

And even then, the final spell, the earthspell…only two things would unlock that.

Little fool…why?

Malachi exploded through the door, his eyes blazing with flames of blue.”Our little witch, the sweet innocent Healer that the lot of you think is so bloody innocent, so fucking helpless, has gone and sacrificed herself so she can kill the Scythe. And the fools, the bloody braggarts are no smarter than their arrogant predecessors. So she’ll likely be able to do it…but she’ll die in the winning of it.”

He had grief written in his eyes as he knelt in front of Agnes, taking her face in his hands.”That girl is going to die. They’re working serious blood magick and she knows it and plans to stop them. She doesn’t care if it means she has to die.”

Agnes stared at him, her face grim. “We need to stop her.”

“We can’t,” he said gently, reaching out and catching her arm before she could let her magick tear her away. If he was any less than who he was, she could have just taken them both, but Malachi had enough strength in him to fight her magick. “Whatever they want to raise that kind of power for...we can’t let them do it. And she’s already got the best plan for stopping them.”

“Let me go, Malachi,” she said.

“No.”

She jerked against him, but her bones were frail from age and even as strong as she’d been in her youth, she couldn’t match a vampire. “Damn it, Mal!”

“They can’t be allowed to succeed, Nessa,” he said gently.

He had thought he had already lost all of his self-respect.

How sad to realize he had been wrong.

Lifting his gaze, he met the amber eyes of the young witch Agnes had presented them with.

“I would think that a vampire as old as you would have lost so many people that one more witch would not matter,” she said, a bitter smile. On her face. “It seems that I’m wrong all over the place today.”

Malachi opened his mouth to snarl at her.

But before he could, she was gone.

And he was left cursing himself for being a fool.

Should have known the little bitch was a bloody flyer.

Chapter Eleven

As Leandra came to rest on the land, she felt the touch of another witch on her earth. It was a powerful, healing touch, a good one, feeling much like her own, the magick meshing with hers, overlying it.

Laying one palm down, she listened to the whisper of the spell…until my death or word releases them…

“Breaking my own spells, you little witch,” she muttered.

Flexing her hand, letting her fingers dig into the earth, she whispered, “Not her death, but her need…”

The ground trembled as the two witch’s spells battled. But Leandra had been there so long, battling the ill effects the bad magick had on land. Even though she hadn’t understood why the land was taking ill, she had battled.

She thought she understood a bit now, though. The Scythe—the people she had lived with, worked with, lived for—were wrong, living against nature, and the land didn’t like it.

With a brief sigh, she stood straight, feeling the wind whipping her braids around her shoulders as magick exploded through her. Before her heart could beat three more times, she was within the great chamber. Hiding within one of the recessed alcoves, retreating deep, her eyes locked on the center dais. Mistress waited with Marick, bound and struggling, staring at her with disbelieving eyes.

She so hated failure.

But there was also Jennifer, a young witchling they had brought in just a year ago, only twelve years old. Staring all around with wide, scared eyes, confusion written all over her face as she struggled against the two men who held her. Leandra withdrew further, whispering a silencing spell as she waited for the red-haired Healer to show herself.

It wouldn’t do for anybody to notice her now.

She had a feeling that it wasn’t Jennifer they’d wanted up on that platform. It would have been her and Jonathan, Leandra thought. Or perhaps Jonathan and the girl.

But she couldn’t be seen. Not now.

Lori didn’t make her unknown audience wait long.

The sight of another child down there sickened her. A child. Erika’s age. What kind of monsters were these people? Her heart tore open as she studied the child. Her eyes wheeling around in terrified circles as she struggled against the men who held her.

Damn it. I don’t have the time!

They had been fucking the day away. That and cutting into their own flesh.

The scents of so many frenzied copulating bodies, and so much spilled blood. First, one started to notice her…then another…then a few more. One man tried to grab her and drag her into an already crowded ménage a quatre. Purring roughly, he slid his hands down to cup her ass, “You waste time, bebè, wearing the clothes. Veins ici, let me have a taste.”

“Taste this,” she said sweetly. Slamming her hand against his chest, she released a bit of the illness she had felt from the land—the cold, barren impotent wasteland sinking into him, into his healthy, hungry body and changing it.

The shrieks of horror from his partners were joyful music to her ears as she continued her walk to the dais.

But it was no longer an unnoticed walk.

A blonde woman sat curled in the lap of a black-haired inherent who was driving his fingers into her pussy as they watched Lori approach. Lori felt a blush stain her cheeks as the woman shuddered and whimpered in climax. She was licking her lips like a satisfied cat as Lori leaped onto the dais.

“I don’t know you, witch. You’re a foolish thing, entering my territory. And on such a bad day—you’ll be lucky if you only end up fucked within an inch of your life.”

She had such a sweet, innocent voice, Lori mused.

Innocent, sweet voice. Evil in her eyes.

An empty smile curled Lori’s lips.”I’m not too worried about that.” Blinking slowly, she skimmed her gaze over the calming crowd. Oh, they were still busily fucking, but less screaming and moaning. More sighs, more were just holding still against their partners as they stared with blank, curious eyes at Lori. Trying to determine her place, what she meant to them.

“I bet you are the one who took one of my offerings. I must have an offering,” the woman said, poking her lip out.

Arching a brow, Lori said, “Does that ‘poor me, she took my toy’ act really work?”

Red flags of rage appeared high on her cheeks. Lashing out with an angry hand, she hissed at Lori in Latin before settling back against the man, and wrapping her hand around his thick, heavy dick.

Lori felt the swipe of her magick, and only smiled as it barely even rippled her shields. Chuckling, she said, “It’s going to take more than that.”

Lori braced herself for the more.

Jonathan exploded out of the furred hide, into his human skin, with a furious roar. Grabbing Sarel’s arms, he leaned down nose-to-nose and snarled, “Break the damn spell, Sarel!”

“I can’t,” she whispered softly. Her eyes, glassy with shock and tear-bright, met his.”I’ve been trying. I’ve got the warrior magicks. But the spells, the earth magicks—it looks like Lori has me beat. I had no fucking clue.”

Jonathan felt her body wilt in his hands as Eli moved up behind her, wrapping his arms around his wife’s waist. “Lori somehow knew what was being planned, Jonathan. She tricked you, and us as well. Lori is inside, alone. And we are stuck out here.”

Jonathan felt his throat close up. “She is going to collapse the cave. From the inside.”

“Hello, wolf.”

That voice—Jonathan’s head whipped up and he searched all around, though there was nobody else there with them. That voice, though. He had heard it. And this wasn’t the first time. The first time he’d heard it had been only weeks ago, when he had taken that slice in his side.”This is for my Mistress, wolf. Your pretty hide is what the lady wants, not your death.”

Eli’s eyes were narrowed, the rim of gold flickering. Both he and Sarel had heard it as well.

“Just how brave are you, though? Will you walk into that cave, knowing you’re pretty damn certain to die, I wonder?”

“What do you want, you evil bitch?” Jonathan hissed as his fangs broke through his gums, his rage calling to the wolf, his control in tatters.

“Your strength, your speed. I’m a channeler. I need a conduit. I can’t do it alone. But if you help me, I can save her.”

“It’s a bloody trick,” Elijah rasped, reaching out as Jonathan started to turn.”As your Master, I refuse to allow it. Bad enough we lose Lori—”

“I can’t lose her,” Jonathan snarled, grabbing Elijah’s silk shirt, whirling and slamming the centuries-old vampire into a tree. The great oak shuddered under the impact. “She is my life. She’s everything. If I lose her, I might as well die, too. So if this is a trick, it doesn’t matter.”

He was gone, shifting to full wolven form in heartbeats, running so fast, Eli could hardly track him with his eyes. Jonathan leaped through the protective spell like it wasn’t even there, but when Eli he tried to follow, Lori’s shield spell stopped him.

Sarel pounded against it with her fist. “The witch changed the spell. I can feel it. She changed it somehow.” Swearing, she slammed her fist into the shield again and again before stopping, resting her hands against the unseen wall as she slid to her knees.

Eli curled up behind her, wrapping his large, golden body around his wife’s still frame.”Take heart, love. Perhaps there is hope. Jonathan is the luckiest bastard I’ve ever known in my life,” he murmured.

A channeler…how very odd…

Her other secret. The reason Leandra never seemed to fail, never seemed to tire, was because she always had a vast reserve of energy. Or so it seemed. Rarely did she rely on her energy reserves. She could always find energy from the land around her, or from her victims, the thugs she hunted and preyed upon on her own.

She had also siphoned energy from those in Scythe who were unworthy and unfit for the cause. Men like Marick…though she should have drained them all dry, including herself.

Not the time for this, she thought sourly. Granted, if she ended up dead, she had a problem, but she couldn’t waste time with grief, guilt, regrets and all that shit.

Though she heard no sound, she knew when the wolf was at her heels. She pivoted swiftly, knife in hand, just as he was shifting, and reaching for her with a big hand.

Staring at her with fury and rage in his dark, bottomless eyes, he smelled of the woods, and man. A light shone about him that was so true, so crystal-bright, that Leandra wanted to weep. “Kill me if you want, but you won’t save her then,” she whispered simply. Then she held out her knife.

He backpedaled away from her and the blade, a look of disgust sliding through his eyes, across that golden face. The muscles in his chest and belly spasmed as he moved a hand in front of his face, shaking his head. “Keep your blade, witch. What do you want me for?”

“I need your hand.”

He lowered his lashes. “Literally?”

Leandra chuckled.”No. Flesh to mine…just your flesh to mine, werewolf. And then be ready to fight. This won’t go unnoticed.”

“And I’m here alone,” he muttered.

She smiled. “Not for long. Her need, not her death.”

Sarel fell forward as the wall of the spell disintegrated. Catching herself on her hands, she gasped as rocks dug into them. Her eyes narrowed and she rose to her feet. Elijah was already at the mouth of the cave.

“If she collapses it while we are in there…” Elijah murmured, looking back to her. “Will you please stay out here?”

“That is my baby sister in there. I thought once before that I had lost her. And I have a better than average chance of surviving a cave-in. Not as good as you, handsome, but better than average.”

“She means for this to kill an army of witches and weres—she’s not going to rely on just a cave-in. Lori knows better,” he said, turning to stroke his hands down her back. “Please.”

“I can’t. Don’t ask me,” she said, cupping his face. Pressing her lips to his, she sent a brief prayer heavenward, and then strode into the dark maw. Eli closed his eyes briefly.

And then he followed her, his eyes on the shining dark-red banner of her hair.

* * * * *

Jonathan felt the heat of the witch’s hand on his, and something rifling through him. And the wolf, rousing, raised his head, studying the intruder. Jonathan prepared to battle the wolf down—

But he only sighed at her presence, settling his muzzle on his paws as she siphoned the vast reserves a were held. “A wise witch would take better care, girl,” the wolf said lazily, his tongue lolling out.

Jonathan stiffened.

The woman only said, “Hush, you fool animal…want me leaving marks all over your bearer?”

“If I thought you were likely to do that, do you think I’d be letting you touch him at all?” the wolf asked.

The witch sighed as she reached up and cupped Jonathan’s face with her free hand—not staring at his face, but at his chest, as though she could see into his heart. “He hardly understands, you know. After all this time. He don’t know what to make of you and you don’t help him figure it out, either.”

“And do you think you understand me, child?”

“I understand a totem animal when I see one,” she said, smirking. “That’s a bit of what you are at least. I can even see your aura, all over him.”

With a shudder and a sigh, she took her hands away, flexing them. Blinking, she opened her eyes and stared up at Jonathan. “You all but breathe his power. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Jonathan stared into her glittering, gold eyes—into the face of the woman who had sliced him open and felt fine.”Are you the one who killed Brad?”

“No. But I did shoot the other one. He lived, to tell you about your child. I also organized the attack. If you want blood when this is done, it’s yours. But there’s no time now.”

Jonathan felt it as Eli and Sarel approached. Staring into her eyes, he said roughly, “If you don’t save her, you’re going to do so very badly.”

She smiled sardonically. “If I don’t save her, I’ll be dead anyway,” she said obliquely.

Jonathan was still staring at her as she winked out of sight.

Lori didn’t plan on taking abuse or showing any false bravado. Staring into the sweet, blue eyes of the woman who called herself Mistress, she started to gather the energy that supported the bedrock beneath her. It was already weakened. Somebody had been trying to slowly heal the land, and had been doing a good job of it, but too many others were undermining her.

Collapse the cave, and flood it with fire. That would kill all of them. The energy she pulled from the bedrock would make one hell of a fireball. And it would incinerate her body completely, freeing Jonathan, Eli and Sarel right away. They would be able to get away in plenty of time to get Eli inside before full daylight.

“Why don’t you tell me who you are, Red?” Mistress said, tossing her blonde curls back. At the same time, she started to stroke the cock of the man beneath her.

Wow. Lori didn’t consider herself a prude, but that was...wow.

Lori smiled—a tiny, humorless smile.”Nobody too important.”

The woman laughed, a deep, throaty chuckle as she impaled herself on her lover’s dick, her back against his front. Big hands closed over her hips and started to drag her up, then down.

And all the while, she stared at Lori.

It was fucking creepy.

Having this woman watch her. Talk to her. While she fucked a guy. It wasn’t the sex, exactly. It was the dispassionate way she did it.

“You lie…you shine with power. It’s too pure for my taste, but I love the challenge of corrupting that. Saul likes the innocent and he’s a seductive bastard. Maybe I’ll let him have you.”

Closing her eyes, Lori whispered softly, “Not in this lifetime.”

“What?”

“Mistress hates being told no,” a soft, exotically accented voice whispered in her ear.

Lori didn’t move a muscle, although the voice was as real as the couple fucking right in front of her.”You realize how this plan is going to end, right?”

Lori gave a tiny nod as she said easily to the lady in front of her, “I said, no thanks.”

Coldly, “I wasn’t offering. I was stating. You come into my territory and I’ll do as I please. If I tell you to come over here and lick my pussy, you will.”

Lori started to laugh.

“No. Not likely. You see, I came here to kill you. All of you.”

The woman started to laugh. “Like you think it will be that easy?”

“Yes.” From under her lashes, she watched them as she grabbed the rest of the energy. The power. From the corner of her eye, she saw the girl. It hurt her stomach to think of it, but she didn’t want that girl to suffer. Her first, she thought. She’d take the child out first.

A silvery sheen started to form in front of her. “Personally, I wish there was another way.” Her throat started to tighten.”But you all can’t leave this place. None of you can.”

Opening her soul, she took the energy inside as the foundation of the cave started to shudder and the witch in front of her started to understand. “Stop!”

Her voice trembled as she tried to invoke the power of the earth.

But the earth wouldn’t heed one who had gone against it for so long.

“Hmm…so ya did know.”

Somebody lunged for her and slammed against the shield she’d cast around herself. Then another. To the voice she heard whispering, she said quietly, “I don’t know who you are, but you don’t feel the way they do. You can’t save me. But you can help that girl. Do it, and do it now. Because this cave is coming down.”

She felt the shields around her shudder as more bodies slammed into it.

“The girl is already gone.”

Lori was barely aware of anything else as the power swelled inside her. Her skin was too small to hold it all. Far too small. She ached with it, her skin stretched far too tight, and itched, and hurt, burning…all around her people started to scream. They were rushing closer and closer as somebody screeched, “Stop her, damn it!”

Jonathan shifted, exploding into his larger, wolfman form, swiping out with a clawed hand as two men rounded the corner—a wolf and a witch. Taking the throat of the wolf, he slammed the man into the wall as he started to shift, ripping with his claws before he could complete the change. The smell of blood on the air fueled his anger, his rage, and he turned to face the witch, only to see him facing off with Sarel.

Eli strolled up, his fangs sliding down past his lower lip, his golden eyes glowing in the dim chamber.”My lady wife will be greatly pissed if you interfere here, lad,” he said easily, though the heat of anger heated his voice.

Sarel’s hand flew up only moments before the witch’s volley of fire hit her in the face. She caught his flame with a shield that she flung back at him, wrapping him in a vortex that encircled him and ate at his flesh. She smiled coldly, striding past him, the wolf and the vampire at her side.

The ground started to tremble beneath their feet as they entered the next corridor.

“I hope, my love, that your sister is not in too big of a hurry,” Eli murmured.

“I’m hoping that Jonathan’s new friend is what she claims to be.”

Jonathan said nothing as he followed the scent of Lori. He could taste her fear.

Leandra eased Jennifer’s still body to the ground, stroking her hand down the side of her face and murmuring softly, “Sleep a while, will you?” Breathing a whisper of magick over the sleeping child, she stood and lifted her face to the sky.

Feeling everything rush past her, she went flying through time and space, back inside the cave, just as Lori was forging the energy into fire.

She paused to whisper into the werewolf’s ear, “I’m gonna get your woman now, turn around and get out of here. She’s not gonna be…right after this. It’s too much magick she is taking inside. She will be needing your hand.”

He stumbled as she allowed only a whisper of her body to form in front of him, nodding to the entrance.”The witch can put hold spells to hold anybody back. It won’t hold me,” she said, grinning widely. Nodding to Sarel, she added, “Don’t bother with anything subtle. Big, flashy, dangerous. We don’t need more than a few more minutes. And do it now, then get out.”

She left them, flying through to hover behind Lori. The light around her had coalesced into a silver so bright and shining it nearly blinded Leandra, as she settled her feet on the ground.”Come on, girl. Do it and be done!” Leandra shouted over the roaring of the rocking, shuddering earth.

“I told you to get out of here. Where is the girl?”

“She is safe, unlike me and you.” Evilly, Leandra leaned in and whispered, “Not to mention your friends. They broke your spell, girl And they are trying to get in here to get to you.”

The end is what matters, Leandra told herself.

Lori hissed, throwing her head back.”You bitch, what the hell…”

But the fire inside her had grown beyond what Lori could control. As it exploded, Leandra felt it. It was all the young Hunter could do to push it outside of her body, and that racked her with pain.

Wrapping her strong arms around Lori, Leandra felt her go limp.”There now,” she crooned as she pulled them out, her magick carrying them away as the cave collapsed and fire exploded through the earth. Screams rang in her ears before going silent. “That was all I needed. For you to let go for me. Your people are okay, hush now…”

Leandra settled down at the edge of the forest, stroking Lori’s hair back, staring in bemusement at the streaks of white that now threaded it.”You went and had the mother of all highlighting treatments done, didn’t you, girl?” she murmured, shaking her head.

At her side, Jennifer slept on, her dark hair spilling around her pretty, young face. As she continued to stroke her dark hand through Lori’s white-streaked hair, she sensed it as Jonathan, the vampire, and the witch’s sister spilled out of the cave. Mere moments later, the fire started to boil up from the main chamber.

It lit up the darkness as the three Hunters came to kneel in front of her, staring at the woman lying cradled in her lap, almost afraid to look at her too closely.

The fire at their backs came almost too close. Jonathan could feel the heat of it as he stared at the three women in front of him. No…two women and a girl. He had no clue where the girl had come from.

The exotically beautiful witch looked up at him as she stroked her fingers through Lori’s hair. Her hair…

It was streaked with white. Shot through with streaks of pure white. Closing his eyes, he sank to his knees and reached out, afraid to touch her.

“It is okay. She’s alive and she’ll be okay,” the witch said quietly, a gentle smile on her face. The faint moonlight glimmered off the dark scythe mark on her face. “It was too much magic and it almost did her in, but she pushed it out just in time.” Stroking her fingers through Lori’s hair, she whispered, “I don’ know if her magick will ever be the same again. But she should be mostly fine.”

Jonathan laid a hand on her breast, feeling the steady, slow pounding of her heart. Alive…

“Oh, God,” he whispered brokenly, feeling a hot wash of tears rush to his eyes. “Thank God.” He gently took Lori’s limp body in his arms and cradled her against him, meeting the odd, amber eyes of the witch across from him. “Thank you.”

They reflected the light of the moon back at him, like a cat’s.

“Why thank me? If it wasn’t for me, none of you would be here,” she said dryly, folding her hands in her lap. Lifting her eyes, she stared up past Jonathan’s shoulder, at Eli.

“Who are you?” Jonathan asked, forcing the words out through a thick, tight throat.

“Do you need the name for my death certificate?” she asked calmly, drawing her knife from her hip and tossing it aside.

Jonathan’s blood ran cold at the calm, easy way she spoke of her own death. And she truly expected it. He could see it in her eyes. Slowly, he shook his head, flashing fang as he spoke.”You saved her. I owe you my life.”

Leandra followed the Hunters into Elijah’s home. The members of his Enclave stared at her with suspicious, watchful eyes. Too many of them would know her, simply by her scent, the feel of her magick. She had the aura of wrongness to her, when she stood next to Lori. She knew—her soul was unclean.

Not evil, as the Mistress had been.

But unclean.

They would know.

What are you doing here, girl? she asked herself, shaking her head. The wooden beads on the ends of her braids clacked, and she rubbed her hands together, flexing them. The soothing scent of jasmine rose to her nostrils and she breathed it in. Slowly, she lifted her lashes and met the gazes of those who stared at her.

“What have you brought us?” a long, lean vampire asked, his dark Italian eyes moving from the top of Leandra’s head to the bottom of her leather-booted feet.

Lori, still tired, still weak, but cocky and calm, arched a brow and said, “Nobody brought you anything, Rafe. I think Sheila is more than you can handle, anyway.”

Snickers filled the air and Kelsey said easily, “Sheila declared a few days ago she was rather tired of his…bullshit, is how she phrased it. With some more…definitive terms thrown in. For all to hear. Safe to say they are no longer speaking.”

Leandra remained silent, pulling her eyes away from the vampire, not meeting the gaze of the other witch who had entered the conversation—not looking at any of the vampires or weres.

“You…”

Breathing in slowly, Leandra lifted her eyes and met the gaze of the man she had shot only seconds before she had taken Erika. She had never thought herself a coward—but staring into those pale-gray eyes was making her belly pitch and roll, making her cheeks flame, and she wanted to turn and flee.

The worst possible thing when she was surrounded by predators.

And witches far more powerful than she.

“Me,” she said, lowering her head, slowly.

“Mike?”

Leandra didn’t know where the whisper came from. It didn’t matter.

All eyes moved to the were. His eyes were glowing, swirling with power and rage, the scent of blood filling the air. He stalked through the room, his eyes on her face. And all other eyes followed him, tracking his movement.

Then settled on her.

Like they had one mind, connected to his. They all now knew.

“Elijah, why is she here?” one were asked.

A softer, cooler voice said, “She is here to die. Let me do it. The blood of a witch is a sweet prize.”

Leandra refused to let her body shake, and she tried to keep her fear from showing.

Jonathan stepped in front of her. “No.”

Mike continued to move closer, closer still, until he could reach out and touch her, his palm coming up and cupping her face, all under the watchful eye of the vampire and two witches at her back. Jonathan stood in front of her, separating them from the others.

For a long, long moment, Mike stared at her. She was painfully aware of the burning feel of his hand on her skin, the intensity of his eyes. Too painfully aware of him.

Then, without saying a word, he let go and turned away.

Jonathan’s voice was a low, rough growl as he said, “The one she hurt here the most was Mike. She didn’t kill Brad. This will concern Mike and her. Not her and the entire enclave.”

“She attacked us—”

Jonathan snarled, his eyes flashing at the were who had spoken, menace rolling from him. All of the wolves fell silent.

“Nice trick to silence the wolves, pup. It doesn’t work on me,” Rafe said darkly. “She is a threat to us. All of us. What are you gonna do to me, piss on my feet?”

“I’ll rip your fucking throat out,” Jonathan said, flexing a hand that displayed ebony claws. “She saved Lori’s life, she protected Erika. The scales are balanced.”

“She kidnapped Erika. Does one life saved equal the many evils she has done?” Rafe asked silkily, as he crossed the distance that separated him from Jonathan. Bloodlust, the need to end the life of the one who had served their tormentors filled his eyes, his face. His fangs had dropped and his dark eyes gleamed with red and gold pinwheels as he stood nose-to-nose with Jonathan.

“Rafe, you overstep yourself,” Eli warned, his voice soft, but no less powerful as he moved out of the shadows. “The girl risked her life, not just once, but several times. And her freedom, as well. She knew what coming here meant, but she came nonetheless. Remember yourself.”

Rafe narrowed his gaze, tearing his eyes away from Jonathan. Meeting Eli’s look, he demanded, “Do you think I’m going to just sit here while this murdering bitch walks free among us?”

“The lass is no murderer.”

Finally, she was able to tear her eyes away from Mike’s mesmerizing gray gaze. Swallowing, the dry click in her throat audible to everybody around her, she dragged her eyes to the man who had spoken.

Malachi stared back from his perch on the bottom stair as people all around him parted, clearing a path between him and Leandra. “Oh, her soul isn’t the cleanest one I’ve ever seen. She’s got demons to spare. But she’s not evil.” Then he blew out a breath. “Maybe if Agnes and I had been more watchful, she wouldn’t have fallen in with the wrong crowd.”

Then he flicked a look at Rafe. “Assuming you’re stupid enough to go toe-to-toe with your Master...and I’m hoping you won’t break those vows, are you really so foolish as to try it with me?” Malachi asked softly.

A muscle pulsed in Rafe’s cheek as he stared at the ancient one.

But he gave no answer.

“Jonathan?”

The small voice was one Leandra didn’t want to hear just then.

Closing her eyes, she lowered her head to stare at the dusty toes of her boots as Erika came into the room.

“Yeah, kid?”

“You’re not going to let them hurt her, are you? You tell me all the time that sometimes people just have to do stupid shit to figure out who they are in life. That’s what she was doing.”

Erika reached out and caught Leandra’s hand. “You were just figuring out who you are...it takes some people a while, you know.”

“And who am I?” Leandra asked softly.

“I think you’re supposed to be one of us, of course,” Erika said, sliding her eyes sideways to watch as Agnes came closer.

Agnes studied Leandra with solemn, serious eyes before turning to study the still angry, still hostile faces. “We went to Jamaica, Mal and I, fifteen years ago. To find a child. She was a strong witch, especially for one so young. And she was in a very, very bad situation. But we were too late to save her...she had to save herself and she was already running when we arrived. She hid from us, eluded us, for weeks and months. We didn’t search long enough, or hard enough. It’s not that child’s fault that she landed with some very, very evil people. If Mal and I had looked hard enough, or arrived sooner, things might not have played out like this.”

As Agnes spoke, she moved around the large foyer studying the gathering of Hunters, some great, some very minor. Many were studying Leandra with looks akin to pity, while others continued to glare at her with outright hostility.

“She has wronged a few people here more than others. And those are the ones who will speak,” Agnes said, sliding Erika a narrow look. “One has already made her opinions clear. And Jonathan was rather emphatic. He will rip out the throat—I believe, he said—of the person who touches Leandra. So, the only other person who needs to speak is Mike. Beyond that, none of you need to worry.”

“Brad can’t be consulted,” one of the wolves said, her voice too close to a growl.

“She didn’t kill Brad,” Agnes said.

“I’m not innocent, old woman,” Leandra said, rolling her eyes and stepping forward, away from Erika’s clinging hands. “I did what I was led to believe I had to do and I made my own choices, right or wrong. I don’t hide behind children or old women. Or ancient vampires.” Sliding Malachi a narrow glance, she faced the young inherent who had spoken. “I’ve got demons, just like that vampire said. And if somebody wants to hand out my punishment? I will take it from whomever is man enough to dole it out.”

“That would leave you out, Brielle.”

That quiet, level voice came from Mike.

Leandra turned slowly, her eyes lifting and meeting his.

“Go on, witch. I won’t ask for your life,” he said softly. And then he turned on his heel and walked away.

“You don’t have to leave,” Lori said quietly, watching as Leandra finished plaiting her long ebony hair.

“Yes, I do. You think I can stay here, with so many people watching me with such angry eyes?” Leandra asked. Tossing the last of the braids over her shoulder, she sighed.”Maybe that would be fitting punishment—for me to never know another restful night of sleep.”

Lori touched her fingers to Leandra’s shoulder and gently said, “I suspect you’ll be doing that to yourself.” Her green eyes met Leandra’s haunted ones, and Lori felt her heart squeeze. None but her could understand just how tortured this woman truly was.

Even from the beginning, Leandra’s heart had been pulled apart. Struggling to serve those she thought were right. But following the path her heart recognized as right.

“I hear their screams. All the people they killed...people I should have saved,” Leandra whispered, staring blankly into the coming night as a tear rolled silently down her cheek.”I can’t help but wonder to myself. Were there others like Jennifer? She’ll fine, I know, at Excelsior. But were there others like her?

“Where will you go?” Lori asked, trying to distract her.

“Away,” Leandra said absently.”Someplace where maybe I can try to figure out how to come to grips with what I’ve done. Maybe forgive myself. The good Lord knows nobody else ever will. But I, well, I have to live with myself.”

* * * * *

Lori was still standing there, her arms wrapped around herself, watching Leandra’s tall proud profile as the black woman walked away, alone, from Eli’s enclave. Malachi had hailed her briefly, and she had stared stonily into the night, shaking her head once or twice. He had brushed a gentle hand across her arm, an almost fatherly touch, before he moved aside.

Lori couldn’t see her anymore.

“She’ll be okay.”

Jonathan’s voice was a deep, hypnotic growl that sent shivers racing across her body. Lifting her eyes, she studied the moon as it rose higher in the sky. It would be full tomorrow. Earlier, she had glimpsed his eyes, and she had seen the near wildness that started to gleam in the eyes of the were when the full moon neared.

And the hunger. Complete and total hunger.

“She’s never been okay,” Lori said quietly. “This is actually the closest she’s ever been. And that’s the scariest thing.”

“The scariest thing was sending a woman who had just kidnapped my baby to save the woman I love,” Jonathan whispered from the doorway. “Why are you here? Instead of in my house?”

“Because it’s your house,” she said quietly, lifting one shoulder. “These are my rooms. We came home, so I came home.”

“I want you in my bed. Our bed.”

He was closer now, at her back. Lori shuddered as he lowered his head and kissed her neck, gripping her waist with his big, strong hands and dragging her back so that he could cuddle her ass against his cock. Folding his arms around her torso, trapping her arms against her body, he lowered his mouth to press it against her neck, scoring it with his teeth. “My mate. Mine.”

She felt enveloped by him, that large, lean body cuddling, protecting, guarding hers. Hungering for her…she could feel his hunger rolling off of him in waves.

Pressing the flat of his hand against her belly, he slid it down until he cupped her mound in his hand, stroking his finger back and forth over her clit, bringing a whimper to her lips. She gasped in shock as he grabbed her skirt and tore it away, the paradise flowered material falling in pieces around her feet. Whirling her around, he took her shirt and pulled it over her head before grasping fistfuls of her hair, and lowering his face to bury his nose in the red and white wealth of it.

“My little redheaded hellcat has turned into a sweet little candy cane,” he teased, smoothing his hands down the long line of her back, cupping her ass and lifting her against him.”Let’s see if you still taste as sweet.” Slanting his lips against her mouth, he pushed his tongue in, devouring her taste, swallowing her down hungrily as he pinned her back against the wall. Rocking his cock against her cleft, the rough material of his jeans abraded the sensitive flesh of her thighs.

“Moan for me…scream,” Jonathan whispered as he lowered his head to take one swollen nipple into the hot cave of his mouth. Swirling his tongue over the hard crest, he rolled his eyes up to stare at her, the dark chocolate of his gaze shifting to a warm, burning gold. Against her belly, she could feel the hard, warm muscles of his chest—and he rocked against her, dragging his thick, rigid cock over her aching cleft time and again.

Lori felt her breath catch in her chest as she arched against him, her hands fisting in his hair. Bringing her legs up, she locked her heels just above the firm muscles of his ass. The cold wall bit into her back as he massaged her butt with his hands. Lori quivered as he breached the seam of her ass, probing the rosette with a blunt fingertip.

She felt the room whirling around her and blinked, dazed, realizing he had moved, positioning her on her knees by the bed. “Stay there,” he ordered gruffly, running his hands over the rounded curve of her ass. “Damn, you’ve got the sweetest ass.”

A hot flood of need washed through her and she lowered her brow to the cool floor, hardly able to support her body. She was shaking all over, fine little tremors ran through her entire body, and an aching emptiness filled her. Damn it, she needed him inside her. Her clit was pounding, pulsating, throbbing. Ohhh…

Jonathan pushed his thigh between hers, naked now.

And something slick, wet and warm pushed against her anus. Lori whimpered. “Jonnie!”

“This is mine,” he whispered roughly. “You are mine. I will have every last part of you. Push down—” as he spoke, he pushed his finger inside, and Lori sobbed, arching back against the burning pain of his invasion. But as he entered her, he reached around, pinching her clit and stroking her, until she was rocking against his caress as he worked her ass. And then he pushed a second finger into the tight ring of muscle, nipping at her neck and groaning when she climaxed into his hand with a ragged scream.

Lori was still shaking when he pulled away and mounted her. Driving his cock into her aching pussy with one long, ruthless thrust, he gripped her hips and held her steady, as she screamed her way through a second orgasm. The ever tightening muscles in her sheath hugged greedily at his cock as he forged his way in and out of her convulsing sheath.

“Damn it, that’s it,” he purred raggedly, rolling his hips and rocking against her as he seated himself completely inside her. “You’re softer than silk, sweet and wet…I love it. I love you.
My heart and soul.”

Lori moaned as he bent over her, and whispered the last of the words against her ear, hugging her tightly. Holding still and deep inside her, repeating softly, “My heart and soul, damn it, I love you. I always have.”

“Jonathan.” Lori sank her teeth into her lip, her breath tearing in and out of her lungs as she struggled to breathe past the emotion lodged inside her. Reaching behind her, she wound one arm around his neck, burying her fingers in those long silken tresses falling around her. He wrapped one brawny forearm around her waist and pulled his cock out slowly, burrowing just as slowly back inside.

“I love you…” her words ended on a ragged moan as he surged back in, his thick, burning-hot cock dragging over the swollen tissues of her pussy. The curved end stroked over the nerve endings by the mouth of her womb just right there, and Lori arched back against him. She screamed as the room started to shake around her, lava pooling inside her loins, and heat exploding from the surface of her skin.

Tossing her head back, she screamed as he pulled out and drove back inside again—harder, and harder—pushing her hips lower and digging in with more force, his hands going to her buttocks and spreading her open. As if his gaze had actual weight, she could feel him staring at her as one hand left her hip, then returned, spreading a warm silky-slick substance all over her tight, puckered hole. Lori shivered as Jonathan started to probe insistently with his thumb as he rode her harder.

“You can use your magick to tease your body, baby,” he murmured, his voice hot and smooth as whiskey as he pushed the tip of his thumb past the tight ring of muscle.”Do it…let me feel that.”

Lori flushed, barely understanding, even as she felt some distant part of him reaching for her—not with his body—but with his soul. Wailing, she released the tenuous hold she had on her magick and let it pour through her, rolling over her skin, dancing down to stroke and tease her clit as Jonathan pulled out, leaving her.

“Play with yourself,” he murmured, guiding one hand between her thighs even as a myriad of tiny, rainbow lights danced over her skin. The lights caressed her skin, kissing it, reflecting off him as they spun over and around her.

Jonathan settled back on his heels, his cock ruddy, wet and glistening from her cream. Stroking it absently as he studied her, a growl rumbling out of his chest as Lori trembled and sobbed. Her head rolled as the wild magick inside her ran free and loose over her aroused body. The exposed line of her ass, the opened folds of her sweet, wet cleft, the scent of her… Jonathan licked his lips as he picked up the lubricant, wanting to swallow her whole.

He shuddered as he slicked the silky substance over his sex and stared at the tight, puckered entrance of her ass. Warming more of the lubricant in his hands, he rubbed the rosette teasingly. He steadied her as she jumped, and watched as it flowered open, groaning as the satiny confines gloved his fingers tightly.

Moving so that she was between his knees, he finger-fucked her ass and pussy with alternating hands, until she was rocking back and forth, her mouth desperately seeking his. And when she was begging, he moved behind her. Pulling his fingers from the clinging silk of her bottom, he spread her wide. Pushing against the tender, soft flesh, he watched as it gave way under his possession. Tight…

“Damn it, you are sweet,” he groaned, pushing relentlessly deeper as she froze beneath him.

Pulling out just a bit, he surged back in, shuddering as she involuntarily clenched the muscles in her buttocks around him. Her head fell low and Jonathan reached around, circling his fingers on her clitoris. Pulling out, he rocked against her with slow, steady motions until she was panting under him again. Then he started to push deeper.

Lori arched back, biting her lip against the burning, ever increasing pressure in her bottom. Her eyes tea red and she whimpered involuntarily as Jonathan continued to push in, even as his fingers stroked and circled her clit. “Take a deep breath, baby and push down for me,” he murmured, pulling out, just slightly rocking against her…

Oh, that’s nice, Lori thought.

Rocking back to meet him, she barely heard him as he repeated, “Push down for me,” and she tried to focus on the exquisite sensations it caused as he stroked just barely into and out…mom…

Then he pulled out, just barely breaching her, his hands tightening on her hips.

“Push. Down.” His voice was low, rough, a deep, primal growl that called to everything female and primitive inside of her. Lori quivered and bowed her head, pushing as she lowered her torso and braced herself.

A hoarse scream filled the air as he filled her, seating himself inside her ass to the hilt. Jonathan filled her completely with a brutal, driving thrust that had her screaming with the glorious, sweetly painful pleasure even as she shuddered from the brutal assault to her senses.

Whimpering, she had to fight to keep from pulling away as he pulled out, then drove back in, again and again. The pressure was building to a crescendo that would surely be more than she could handle.

It broke, exploding over Lori in a wash of glorious, sweet pleasure and she pushed back, sobbing, “Again, damn it, Jonathan, don’t stop, please.”

Her nipples drew tight, her breaths became more and more ragged as she moved hungrily against him, under him. Taking more of his thrusts, and feeling the hungry, hard drives of his cock into her ass, the movement of his body against hers, she sought her climax, just as he sought his. They fell together, each pushing against the other and tensing, a long, eerie howl rising from Jonathan’s mouth. Lori sobbed his name out as she collapsed, feeling the hot, scalding wash of his seed flooding her.

Long moments later, she was still trying to slow the sobbing breaths that raced in and out of her lungs, when he cradled her against him and gently lifted her to the bed. Easing her down against him, nuzzling her neck as he lifted the blankets over them, he murmured, “The next time I take you will be in our home, our bed. Say it, say yes.”

Lori shuddered, opening her lips to agree to anything he wanted, but the words wouldn’t come out quite that easily. “I haven’t heard you ask me for anything yet,” she said raggedly, her head falling forward, the streaked curls of golden-red and white mingling with his deep brunette locks on the pillow.

“Hmmm, you still don’t know how to give an inch, baby, do you? First, I tell you to go away and you won’t. Now I tell you to come to me, and you won’t. You want me to ask,” he said, with a muffled laugh of frustration. His voice deepened and he wrapped his arms around her, cuddling her against him. “I love everything about you, you adorable, stubborn, brave witch. Tell me you’ll marry me and get it over with.”

“I’ll do better than that,” she whispered, a smile curving her mouth. “I’ll marry you…so we can get started. With our life.”

Epilogue

It was the sound of wild magick, broken moans, and hot sex that drew her to Lori’s rooms. Against her will, but damn it, if she didn’t do it quick, others were going to be gathering up there soon. Or the whole house might shatter around them. Sarel felt the heat rush up her neck as she started down the hall toward Lori’s rooms.

Lori’s voice, high and keening, as she cried out Jonathan’s name, came loud and clear through the door, and Sarel stopped. Whirling around she headed right back down, but then she heaved a sigh and hissed, “Bloody hell.”

Her amused audience of one let a wolfish smile cross his face as he glided back into the shadows. He had been about to take care of it for her…but she was rather adorable, looking so embarrassed.

Sarel turned back and marched up to Lori’s door, shoulders straight as a nun’s, placed her hand flat against the wood and closed her eyes, not letting the fire and light that was seeping out from underneath distract her. And the miniature earthquake that followed didn’t make her pause either as she settled a spell to block the sounds coming from the room.

Well, she works pretty good for a very embarrassed older sister, Ben mused as he slid out of the shadows and stood in the middle of the hall.

When she turned around, her cheeks were still flaming and she was swearing under her breath. He cocked a dark eyebrow at her and said, “Being Elijah Crawford’s wife, I can’t believe you’ve never heard people having sex before. I imagine you’ve even done it once or twice yourself.”

Her eyes narrowed.”Leave me the hell alone, Cross.”

“Aren’t you grouchy?” he mused, as he forged a little ball of fire and started to toss it back and forth in his hands.”I had been planning on taking care of that for you. How was I to know you would insist on checking on baby sister so damn soon?”

“Go fuck yourself,” Sarel suggested pithily.

He merely smiled at her, catching the fire in one hand, and pressing it between both palms until it was absorbed as he stared into her stormy eyes. “You witches are the oddest lot.”

“You’re a witch, too, Cross. Remember?”

A sad smile flickered across his face. “I don’t know what I am, Sarel.” Then he turned, walking away from the sounds of loving, and the suddenly understanding woman standing in front of him.

Ben had another witch to deal with.

The oddest of them all.

But first, he had to find her.

The Hunters: Ben and Shadoe

by

Shiloh Walker

© Copyright Shiloh Walker, 2004

2012 Edition

First digital printing 2004

Please note: This is the original 2004 version--it has been revised, but no new material has been added.

The Hunters: Ben and Shadoe

Cover Art Angela Waters

Dedication

For my kids…my husband, I love you!

Prologue

Marcus could see her leaving the dorm, smell her. Something about her seemed oddly familiar. She smiled shyly at the golden-haired boy walking next to her, ducking her head, scooping her hair out of her face, acting coy—an act. Just an act.

He had come to see the boy, his newest recruit; a new werewolf. And this one showed such promise. But Marcus lost all interest in Jimmy as he stared at the young woman.

Her scent… Damn it, why was it so familiar?

Sweet, hot, potent…

Potent.

Then he knew.

Inherents smelled something like that. Inherents…the natural shifters. They didn’t rely on the pull of the moon for their shift. Their shift came as easy as the sunrise. And that’s what this girl was, he realized.

But there was more. She smelled like a wolf. Like a shifter, almost.

There was something else, too. Magic. Almost.

She didn’t move like a wolf. Didn’t act like one.

And she didn’t have the feel of a witch about her.

She was a puzzle.

And he would just have to solve her.

Jimmy Duncan stared at the ground as Marcus paced around him. The fear the older, more powerful wolf could induce disgusted him almost as much as it called to him. He wanted that same control over others. Too bad he didn’t realize it was a power the average werewolf just couldn’t have.

“I saw your little girlfriend,” Marcus murmured as he flopped onto the couch.

“Tiffany?” Jimmy asked, lifting his eyes slowly. “She’s not exactly—”

“I don’t care what she is. I want her.”

“But—”

A low, dangerous growl rumbled out of Marcus’ throat and Jimmy immediately dropped his eyes. He knew what happened to those who questioned the dominant wolf. He had seen it, right after he had been changed. He knew, all right. And while it had amused the hell out of him to watch it, he had no intention of seeing it done to him.

“I understand,” Jimmy said slowly, bitterly. He had looked forward to feeling that hot little pussy. Probably virgin. Definitely an innocent—he could tell, just by her scent. He could smell her uncertainty, her fear, her young lust. It was amazing, the things he could read now.

Marcus smiled. “Good. And maybe I can even be generous enough to share,” he responded.

Jimmy nodded, and forced a smile. After all, seconds was better than nothing.

Marcus watched, with a smile on his face, as she followed Jimmy into the house. His pale gray eyes glittered as he shifted against the railing upstairs, resting his chin on his fist, listening to her soft murmur. Her voice was as clear as day.

“Such a pretty house, Jimmy. It’s so big,” she mused, amazed. She had big eyes. Soft skin. The pulse in her neck called to him like a siren’s song.

As Jimmy stood aside to let her pass, he slid a look upstairs and caught the older wolf’s eyes. And smiled.

The entire left side of her face burned as if it were on fire. Her lower lip throbbed, oozing blood that trickled down her chin and neck to stain the silk blouse she’d been so proud of. Now, her only conscious thought was to burn it, if she made it out of this damn house alive.

Her rapid breathing sounded impossibly loud as she made her way down the back steps, listening for any sound that they might have found her. From somewhere inside the house, she heard Jimmy bellow out her name as she took the last step and rounded the corner into the kitchen. And freedom, just a few feet away, if she could only make it to the back door in time.

Time’s up.

His heavy footsteps sounded down the hall, heading her way. She flew through the room, hands closing around the doorknob just as he entered the kitchen.

“Stupid bitch,” he panted, wiping the blood away from his mouth with the back of his hand as he came for her.

Jerking frantically on the doorknob, she sobbed in frustration as it refused to open.

When it finally did, she tore through it with a relieved sob, moving fast, too fast. But it wasn’t Jimmy she had to worry about. The other man was there. Waiting for her. His eyes… Oh, God, she prayed, desperately. Help me. His eyes were glowing.

Backing away from him, she edged her way around him. But Jimmy was at her back and he grabbed her arms and laughed, his voice deeper, rougher. And the way he laughed…the bastard was amused. He loved every second of her fear. She knew it, could feel it. Somehow, she could feel it.

Tiffany struggled and smashed her head back into his, the back of her head crashing into his nose—she heard it crunch, felt the hot wash of his blood as he screamed.

“Stupid bitch!” he screamed in a garbled voice. “You broke my nose!”

“One soft, practically human female doing such damage?” the other man asked, laughing as Jimmy shoved her away. “She’s not even one of us, really. She has the scent, but just barely. She’s more mortal than wolf. How can you let her hurt you?”

“She’s a strong little bitch, go see for yourself.”

He was so strong—Tiffany thought, catching herself just in time to keep from falling. Both men looked surprised that she was still on her feet and she lunged around Jimmy’s kneeling body, back into the house, slamming the door behind her and locking it.

A weapon.

A fist came crashing through the door. How in the hell? It was solid wood. She yelped, then bit back the sound before it could turn into a scream as a hand came through the hole in the door and unlocked it. The door swung open and the other man stood there, watching her.

He stepped toward her, laughing softly. She plunged her hand into the sink and her fingers closed around the smooth wooden hilt of a kitchen knife. A heavy one. Whipping it out, she sidestepped the stranger and thrust it in front of her. “Get away from me,” she whispered through clenched teeth.

Jimmy moved into the room, blood and mucus streaming down his face as he glared at her with angry, evil eyes that gleamed in the harsh kitchen light. Why did they look red?

“Take the knife away, pup,” the stranger said softly, leaning against the counter and folding his arms. “I’d like to see her naked.”

“Come near me and I’ll gut you,” she warned.

“Bad, stupid little bitch,” Jimmy said, ignoring her. Wagging a finger at her, he said, “I’m gonna hurt you now.”

She jabbed at him and cried out when he hit the side of her wrist, shooting a jolt of pain up her arm, knocking her weapon away. Then he lunged for her, taking her down to the cold tile floor, grinding his pelvis against her.

“Go ahead and cry,” he whispered as he leaned down and bit her neck. Wrenching both hands over her head, he said, “It only makes it better for us. We love fear.”

Whimpering, she turned her face away as he used his free hand to rip aside her blood-stained blouse. “Too damn little of you,” he muttered. “But you got enough fight to make this fun.”

Humiliated, frightened, and angry, she jerked again on her hands, sweat making them slippery enough to almost slide away. At the same time, she brought her knee up as he was shifting to straddle her thighs. His howl of pain echoed in her ears as she scrambled away from him, sliding on her butt as she clambered to gain her feet. One hand locked around her ankle and he brought her back.

“I’m not gonna hurt you now,” he rasped. White-faced, pupils dilated, he hissed, “I’m gonna kill you.”

His face…oh, hell, his face… The bones were lengthening, stretching, the skin pulling tight over it, darkening, and his teeth as he struck—not at her neck, but at the fleshy mound of her right breast—the white-hot pain ripped through her as he tore the flesh.

And then he was gone, flying through the air and crashing into a wall.

“Pup, she is mine, not yours.” And the other man was there, his eyes hot and burning, hungry. Some deeply buried instinct whispered, Run. You have to run…the smell of blood…the fight has stirred his lust.

One hand reached out, striking him in the face, his neck, anything to keep her from being pinned again. Her other hand frantically searched the floor as he jerked her skirt up. As he ripped her panties away, her fingers closed once more around the smooth wooden hilt.

“No,” she whispered when he reached down to free himself from his well-pressed khakis. He never paid any attention to her hands, not the one shoving at his face, and not the one holding the knife that she shoved into his ribs, parting the flesh like butter.

Scalding waves of blood poured over her as she took the knife out and struck home a second, and then a third time. By then, blood was bubbling out from his lips as he stared down at her with wide, shocked eyes. Angry eyes, as he whispered, “You’re going to regret that, little wolf.”

With a strength born of panic, she pushed him away and cowered against the counter as he shoved to his feet and staggered to the wall, pressing his hands against his numerous wounds, wheezing gasps of air filling the room. “Jimmy… Make her pay,” he rasped, staring at her with a nasty light in his eyes.

Jimmy lunged at her and took her down. Tiffany fell, screaming, feeling her head strike the floor. She clutched the knife and drove it upwards as hard as she could, twisting, shoving it higher and higher, feeling bile rise in her throat as her hand entered his body… His heart, if you don’t destroy it, he won’t die. Something was burning in her hand, something hot, like fire and as she screamed, it exploded outward from her hand.

A gray puff of smoke drifted out of Jimmy’s mouth, then a froth of blood. His eyes went dim, that angry, swirling, glowing light gone. And he fell lifeless on top of her.

She turned her head just in time to see the other man fall to his knees and groan as a wolf seemed to leap out of his skin. And then she passed out.

Chapter One

Tiffany awoke with the scream trapped in her throat, sweat covering her body. For a moment, she thought it was the blood that had flowed out of Jimmy’s body after she had damn near gutted him.

The light from the corridor poured in through the tiny window of her cell door.

Her eyes instinctively sought the clock on the wall, marking away the time as she had for the past six years. After midnight. The anniversary, she thought with a ragged laugh as she sat up, dangling her skinny legs over the side of her cot. Her feet rested on the cold floor.

Six years to the day since she had killed Jimmy Duncan, a man guilty of raping more than seven young women in the tiny rural town of Buxley, in southern Mississippi. That particular fact had not come out until his picture had been flashed in so many papers that one, then another, and another of those girls had slowly stepped out of hiding. Coming forward only because their attacker was dead and couldn’t make good on his threat to kill them.

A man who was the grandson of a state Senator, the only son of the town mayor, and the heir to the Duncan millions.

His body had been missing. The attorneys had gone at her, and hard…who is your partner? Who were you working with? What did they do with the body…

But she didn’t know where Jimmy’s body was. And she didn’t know where the second man was. The one who’d run away in the form of a wolf.

Werewolf…

“Damn it. I’m going crazy,” she muttered.

You’re going to regret that, little wolf. His deep, gruff voice rose out of her memories to torment her. Little wolf? What the hell…

It was a question she was still asking herself, years later. One of many. How had he turned into a wolf…had he turned into a wolf…was she crazy? Where was Jimmy’s body? Was he even dead?

If the state cop who had found her hadn’t been relatively new to the area, and unaware of the hold the Duncans had on southern Mississippi, she probably would have been serving out a life sentence, or sitting on death row. But Beth Starkey hadn’t been aware that she’d stumbled into the house of the local golden boy. And if she had been aware, it was unlikely she would have cared. All she had seen was the battered, beaten little thing who lay unconscious on the floor, her clothes ripped off her body, bruises forming everywhere, blood all over her, too much blood. They hadn’t been able to run DNA tests on it because they claimed the blood was screwed up…contaminated or something.

More work of her so-called partner.

Besides her battered body, the knife, and Tiffany, the only other evidence had been a pile of bloody clothes lay off to the side. Clothes that had been torn apart, at the seams. But the second attacker hadn’t been found.

If it had been any other of the state cops, or any of the locals, the scene wouldn’t have been meticulously recorded. She wouldn’t have been hand-delivered to a sympathetic young resident who didn’t give a damn about the Duncan dynasty.

Instead, thanks to a cop with an unbendable code of honor and a medical resident with kind eyes; she was being released in three days, after serving her time for manslaughter.

Of course, if it had been anybody other than a Duncan, she would never have served any time. Though she only recalled bits and pieces of the final minutes right before Jimmy Duncan died, she knew he had tried to rape her, knew there had been another man in the house who had been a willing participant in the game. The judge and jury had known it—she had seen it in their eyes.

With a scowl of disgust, she forced the self-pity aside. Tiffany had no time to feel sorry for herself. Easing her body up from the cot, she rolled her neck and shoulders and went to the small desk with a stack of books.

Three days. Three days, and she was free.

Free? That thought made her pause.

Free to do what? Live out the rest of her life as a convicted felon. So what that she had earned her college degree? Who cared that she was fast on her way to becoming one of the bestselling horror writers in the country, thanks to her own nightmares about Jimmy and the unknown stranger?

She flipped open a book on local ghosts and sighed. Get to work, Tiffany. Just get to work.

* * *

Tiffany Morgan.

No. Her real name is Shadoe. Shadoe Wallace.

“Tiffany,” he told himself. She had been Tiffany for more than twenty years. He didn’t expect his appearance in her life to change that. Hell, she probably didn’t want anything to do with her heritage, not after what the monsters had done to her.

His dark golden-brown eyes locked on the woman who walked slowly down the street, looking around as if unsure of what to do with herself. She had her arms wrapped nervously around her body and she jumped at every little sound.

And her heartbeat… He could hear it as it jumped and quickened every time somebody walked too close.

So full of fear.

If she had consented to see him five years ago, they could have started to work on that. He had been trying to talk to her from the beginning but she had never once allowed it.

And damn it, if he’d found her just a little sooner, he could have saved her from all of this. But until the bizarre story about her attack had emerged in the papers, he hadn’t even known where to look. Not that such a thing had stopped him. He’d look…a lot. All over the place.

By the time he’d found her, she’d been in jail.

But now, she was on the outside. And she couldn’t run far enough. Her soft brown hair blew gently around her sweet, heart-shaped face as she slowed to a stop in front of a bookstore, smiling absently. He could see what she was staring at, even though she was a good hundred feet away.

A display of Lorelei Dubois books. Have No Mercy. He knew who she was, knew exactly how long she had been writing for the small electronic press, how she’d managed to catch the interest of a bigger publisher. He knew each book, each story almost by heart. And he had no doubt where the nightmares behind the books came from. If he had gotten to Marcus just a little sooner—

His breath slowed as she stretched, almost absently, like a lazy little cat. The motion thrust her pert, rounded breasts against the cotton of her shirt, the crowns of her nipples peaking against it, and Ben’s throat went dry. She started back down the street and his eyes focused on the round, firm ass so nicely displayed by her jeans. His body went on red alert. Her scent drifted to him on the wind, warm, ripe female and his cock started to throb.

Damn it.

This could be a problem.

He was here to protect her, to warn her, to teach her. And considering she had been living with her head in the sand for more than twenty years, that wasn’t going to be an easy task. Being attracted to her was going to make it even more difficult—but if he felt the wolf inside him, felt the call of hers…

There was no if.

She was an Inherent born, if not yet changed. Inherents didn’t have to shift, and those early changes had to be coaxed out. She had no idea what she was, and there had been nobody there to help coax the wolf out of her. She might even be one of the few that couldn’t shift.

She had the blood, though.

Ben was a powerful Inherent, a Hunter to the Council, and one of the few who had a touch of witchery through his mother’s side of the family. His magic was adept enough, and that was how he had found her, but he suspected what he had in his veins was nothing compared to what lay untapped inside the woman in front of him.

Tiffany had more than a touch.

Her mother had gifted her with such powerful witchcraft that it was amazing the earth didn’t tremble as she walked. It was nothing short of a miracle one of the darker magic workers out there hadn’t found her.

Amazing that he had found her first.

Why was he thinking that their powers and magics wouldn’t call to the other?

There was no if.

Stop it, Ben. We don’t even know if she has the abilities, he told himself, shaking his head. He could smell something other than human on her, but that didn’t mean she was an Inherent like her father had been. And the magic he smelled on her didn’t mean she was a witch like her mother had been. She had gone more than a decade past the time when she should have first shifted. And no witch could ignore the call of magic for more than twenty years.

Hell, if she was a witch, an Inherent, she would have changed when that werewolf attacked her years ago. If she had…and if she had still been sentenced to jail…

Shaking his head, he muttered, “Stop creating trouble where there is none. Wait and see what happens. See if she truly is gifted before you start planning.”

He was also trying to fool himself.

Oh, she was a witch all right.

And an Inherent.

But somehow, she had kept herself from changing.

Somehow she had suppressed her magic.

Or somebody had done it for her. From beyond the grave, perhaps?

For years.

She was the daughter of Carrick Wallace, one of Declan O’Reilly’s father’s right-hand men. He and Adrienne had been murdered and their young daughter had gone missing twenty-three years ago. After Declan had walked away so many years before, the pack had reformed, restructured, and had executed the rogues.

They had searched high and low for Shadoe Wallace, the young babe mourned by so many.

And that child was Tiffany, the woman who had fought off two rogue shape-shifters, a werewolf and an Inherent, and killed one of them.

She had done time in jail for protecting herself when she should have been coddled and praised, loved, adored, worshipped—shit, it made him furious just thinking of it. If he had found her just a little sooner, none of it would have happened.

Hell, maybe he was wrong. Maybe she wasn’t an Inherent in truth. How could she have resisted the call of the moon, the call of the hunt, the magic of feeling the Wolf’s call for more than a decade?

She may not be a true shape-shifter, but she was more than human now.

He just had to figure out exactly what she was.

And soon. Before their enemies arrived.

* * *

The dream came again… Struggling on the floor, screaming as he lunged at her, biting with a face that seemed to shift and change and grow as his teeth sank into the mound of her right breast, tearing away flesh and branding her, hot waves of blood streaming from the bloody little hole. Then the stranger, his weight crashing down—

Tiffany forced herself to wake up, gasping for air. The remnants of the dream were stark and clear. For the first time ever.

“He bit me,” she said slowly. Why haven’t I remembered that before now? She jerked the vee neckline of the men’s shirt she slept in aside, and stared down at her breast, at the smooth flesh of it. It had never borne a mark. Not now, not the morning she woke in the hospital under arrest, the day after she had killed Jimmy.

“I’m losing my mind,” she whispered, shaking her head, running her fingers over the smooth flesh. She could remember it, the tearing, searing agony of it, the pain, the hot wash of blood, the pleasure in Jimmy’s eyes, and his thirst for more. The ragged, bloody hole where he had torn the flesh away from her body.

But there was no mark. If he had truly bitten her, she would have carried that scar for life.

And his face couldn’t possibly have been changing the way she remembered.

It just wasn’t possible.

So she was losing her mind.

“Ms. Morgan.”

She went stiff.

Tiffany knew that deep, almost growling voice. That voice had fueled a couple of very interesting dreams during the long, empty years in jail.

Ben Cross. Slowly she turned and met a pair of golden-brown eyes across a distance of a few feet. She hadn’t even considered that he would try approaching her. And now she realized just how foolish that had been. His persistence had known no bounds, so why had she suddenly expected that to change?

“I’ve no desire to speak with you, Mr. Cross. I don’t give interviews,” she said firmly, stifling the urge to stare as she gazed upon the man who had been calling her on a monthly basis for five years.

The phone calls had started within a month of her incarceration. At first, he’d just offered to come in and speak with her about her ordeal. Then he’d offered to “interview” her for a book deal. Then he’d offered to interview her regarding her books. Although how he had discovered that piece of knowledge, she didn’t know. Then he’d just started calling to pester her.

Politely. Always politely.

But the phone calls never stopped.

A year into her sentence, letters had started coming, along with research books on magic and shape-shifters, and ghosts. The majority of her better books had in fact come from the man staring at her with those mesmerizing golden eyes.

Holy hell. It was a damn good thing she hadn’t known what he looked like, otherwise she just might have given in to those interviews. Just for writer’s curiosity…but damn.

His dark brown hair fell into his eyes in loose waves and he absently brushed it back. Head cocked, he studied her intently. “You didn’t really think I would just up and leave you alone, did you?” he asked, curiously.

She had the odd impression of a pup staring at her with his ears pricked. Or a wolf… Shaking her head, she focused on a point just beyond his shoulder. “Actually I hadn’t thought of it.” Her eyes cut back to him as she added, “Or you.”

“Ouch,” he said mildly, those amazing eyes dancing with humor.

Of course, if she had known what he looked like… Oh, that would have been torture in there, she thought helplessly.

Underneath the green chamois shirt he wore, there was a ribbed undershirt that stretched across his wide chest, his skin gleaming gold, muscles clearly evident beneath the clinging fabric. Worn jeans clung to his lean hips and long, muscled thighs as Tiffany cursed her peripheral vision and forced herself to meet his eyes.

They looked…hot, hungry…

Hell, his eyes—gleaming, glowing… The striations in his eyes were starting to swirl and shift…

Unbeknownst to her, a soft whimper escaped her as she stared hypnotized into those eyes. She had seen eyes like that once upon a time and fear arced through her. A gasp fell from her lips and she retreated, her eyes wide and unblinking on his face.

And as she watched, the look left his eyes, his lids drooped, the odd tension seemed to leave him, and a gentle smile curved his mouth, the full lower lip curving just slightly. “I’m no threat to you, Tiffany Morgan,” he said softly, his voice intense.

He turned and left.

Ben had to force down the rage.

She had more of their kind inside of her than he had suspected. She had scented his hunger—it was too much like Marcus’, and she didn’t know Ben. It had frightened her, the sharp, biting scent that had filled the air all around her, making her slim body go stiff and her pretty blue eyes go wild.

And the scent of magic had strengthened. Witch. She had witch in her as well, how much, how powerful, he wouldn’t know until he got closer, touched her, searched her. Tiffany had been suppressing the magic, and the wolf, for so long… She had pushed it deep. Or her mother had.

He was starting to suspect it was the latter. Adrienne had been oh so powerful. And very desperate, he imagined, to protect her young babe.

Stalking around his car, he waited a moment before climbing in. He didn’t want to drive. He wanted to run…to hunt…to attack…

His hands clenched into tight fists as he lifted his head to the sky, the ends of his dark brown hair waving in the soft breeze as he battled against the rage and hunger in him.

The wind blew, bringing with it a familiar scent, and he growled menacingly. Marcus. He wasn’t here. Not now. The scent was old. Days old. The rogue Inherent was stalking Tiffany again.

The son of a bitch was going to die this time.

Sliding his eyes to the store, he felt a shudder roll through his body as he tamped down the urge to shift as a familiar friend raised his head and whispered, Shall we go Hunting, my friend?

Ben smiled tightly as he closed his hand into a fist, banishing the wild power of the change as he responded to the Wolf. “No. There is nothing there to Hunt right now. My duty lies here.”

The Wolf chuffed and Ben laughed slightly as he slid into the truck. “I got us this far, didn’t I?”

There was no comment from the ancient creature as he settled back into whatever resting space a totem spirit called home, but Ben could feel his mirth. Shaking his head, he settled back to wait on Tiffany.

I’m no threat to you.

Tiffany didn’t understand exactly why she believed him. Why those words meant anything. Why his anger had suddenly felt…comforting. But it had.

“I’m totally sick,” she muttered to herself as she slid her groceries into the car.

The more she thought about his words, the more they disturbed her. But not that way… They should have frightened her, because she could feel the raw energy inside the man, and knew damned well she should be worried about him.

Men were a threat. Men capable of violence? Even more so. And he was capable of violence.

He should have just bothered her. Scared her. Worried her. And he did…but it was worse than that. More than that.

In the best possible, most delicious way imaginable. Squirming on her seat, she bit her lip and started the engine.

“I need to stop thinking about this,” she muttered. Needed to stop thinking about him. Definitely needed to stop thinking about how hot he was…

An image of him surfaced in her mind, that wind-tossed brown hair tumbling into those golden eyes, his skin dusky, that sexy five o’clock shadow that was so enticing on a man. Big shoulders, brawny and wide, a chest she suspected would feel oh so nice, powerful arms, a flat belly…

Her writer’s imagination kicked into play as she recalled just how hot he was.

Tiffany smothered a laugh and laid her head on the steering wheel of the car, snorting in laughter. “Oh, man. I’ve lost my mind.”

After snickering to herself for a few minutes, she sighed, and just rested there. Safe. Something about him had made her feel safe for the briefest instant. That was incredibly freeing.

Lifting her head up, she focused on the drive back home. And another long, empty, sleepless night.

She couldn’t sleep without the nightmares plaguing her.

* * *

Ben prowled the town.

Marcus’ scent was there. And more wolves. Tilting his head back, he drew the scents in, remembering them, filing them away. A wolf pack in this town… That wasn’t right.

There were no wolves around here. At least, there shouldn’t be. No packs were allowed to settle without letting the Council know.

It was law.

There was a Master Vamp an hour to the south, with a well-situated enclave and Ben knew the guy patrolled up here on an infrequent basis. No pack would have escaped the vamp’s notice.

No pack would move into an area protected by the Hunters, would they? It was foolishness. Except it did happen. Too often. That’s why the Hunters existed.

He checked the air again and then sighed. Five different wolves. In a town as small as this? Five wolves living together and not knowing the other wasn’t likely. Thus, a pack.

They hadn’t registered with the Council and that bothered him. Especially with Tiffany around now. If they were here for her…

“Marcus,” he muttered.

That wolf really, really did need to die. But hunting him had proven to be a damn near impossible task.

It was something he knew, all too well. He’d been hunting Marcus for years. But the search was over—Marcus had come to him.

And he would pay.

* * *

Tiffany’s eyes opened.

She forced her breathing to remain even, out of sheer instinct—the knowledge we all carry inside us, that if we move, if we breathe, the predator will hear us.

There was somebody in her house.

Breathing slowly through her nose, she scented something…rich. Like the woods at night. And something foul, like death lurking in those woods. There was no sound, not a squeaking floorboard, nor a breath of a sigh.

But there was somebody in her house.

Marcus?

“I hear your heartbeat, wolf. I know you’re awake,” a soft lilting voice called. “Come on out…let’s not make this any harder than we have. Marcus wants this over with.”

A woman?

Slowly, Tiffany slid from the bed, her eyes on the door. The fear inside her had her heart racing, and she forced herself to take a deep breath and let it out through her nose. Calm…be calm. In the face of our enemies, we show no fear. It feeds them.

Tiffany stifled the urge to laugh hysterically. That damn voice… It sounded so very real, and so familiar.

But her heartbeat slowed. She could actually feel it as she walked backward to the window. There was only one inside. Straining, she tried to listen for a sound outside, concentrating…focusing…

An odd image drifted in front of her eyes and she saw two men. One at the front door. Another at the back.

Caging her in.

Damn it.

Oh, shit…I’m so fucked, she thought. But she swallowed back the fear, and tried to think.

Good girl, the soft, soothing voice whispered. He’s coming…

Tiffany’s heart skittered to a stop. He’s coming? As in Marcus?

“I won’t go through that again,” she said aloud, her voice flat and firm. “I won’t. I’ll kill you first. I’ll die first.”

A lilting laugh sounded through the house and Tiffany knew the woman was on the stairs now.

“Chére, you don’t have a choice,” the woman said in a cheerful, easy voice.

Open your heart. Open your soul. The knowledge is there, safe and secure where I put it all those years ago…open…

Open…

Open…

Tiffany’s entire body was trembling and there was a cynical voice in the back of her mind, whispering, You’ve lost your mind, Tiff. Totally gone…

Then the voice became firm and it said strongly, Your name isn’t Tiffany. It’s Shadoe, and you aren’t insane. You are my daughter and you can fight this. Now, do it. Open yourself…

Tiffany felt something inside her break and shift.

Wind whipped through the room. Her eyes moved to the window. It wasn’t open. Her breath froze in her throat and she stared at the door. She shouldn’t have been able to see it so well. It was so dark… Need light…damn it, how can I fight if I can’t see?

Light blazed out of nowhere. Tiffany had to blink at the brightness of it. She searched for a source. Where had it come from? The lamp was off, and the light over her bed was off. Staring around, she saw that everything she looked at was in pure, bright focus. And when she turned her gaze away, it fell into the shadows.

The light was her.

And it was burning.

Ben felt the desperate plea as though she whispered it in his ear. It wasn’t exactly a sweet little nothing…shit, I’m so fucked…

But he heard the terror. Heard the fear. And he knew.

“Marcus…” he rasped as he felt the change tear through him, vicious and uncontrolled. He slammed one clawed hand against the trunk of a tree and fought the howl rising in his throat as the muscles inside his body shifted and changed, a flow of fur covering once golden, gleaming skin. His eyes gleamed yellow-gold in the dark as he rose to the full height of his half-form and took off running, following the scent of her fear, the scent of wild magic that was brewing in the air.

They hadn’t been expecting that, he imagined.

And they weren’t expecting him, either.

The magic was breaking open inside her, spurred by her fear, and as he lunged over the thick growth of bushes surrounding her home, he caught the scent of wolf. Inherent…female…sweet. The wolf was starting to wake within her as well. She can’t handle both right now.

As he hit her street, everything around him a blur from his speed, he focused and reached out. At his touch, the anxious animal, hovering just beyond her subconscious, calmed as he forced his own will upon it.

He slowed to a prowl as he came to her house, sliding his eyes to the man guarding the front door.

He then slid his gaze to the werewolf who only now realized he had company. The bonds he kept wrapped around the Wolf’s power, the power of fear, fell away and he stalked around as the man’s eyes went black with fear, and a urine stain appeared on the front of his jeans.

“I guess you’re not happy to see me,” Ben growled, reaching out and raking one wicked, deadly talon down the werewolf’s cheek, drawing blood. “What, didn’t any of you realize I was in town?”

A whimper, like that of a puppy, fell from the man’s throat and he gasped, “Please—I’m just following orders!”

“Sure. You follow orders, even if you’re supposed to kidnap, harm, rape innocent people…keep saying please. See how far it gets you,” Ben said, staring down at the small, human male. The man tried to change, tried to summon the power of the full moon only a day away and Ben laughed, slamming his own will down on the man. “Pitiful, don’t you know better? I own you.”

The man fell to his knees sobbing and pleaded, “Don’t fucking kill me!”

Ben knelt and reached out, gathered the blood on the bastard’s cheek.

“Oh, I won’t. That is too easy. You get to face the Council. And live out your years locked inside your body, unable to shift, unable to hunt. Until the needs and hungers inside you destroy your mind and your body.”

At the words The Council, the man panicked and screamed. “No—”

With a whisper the entrapment spell settled into place around the werewolf and he fell silent, unable to move, to blink.

“There now. All wrapped tight, and bound to me, for now. And once you face the Council, that spell will be changed to one where you can’t ever run, can’t ever hunt again.”

Rising, Ben faced the door and kicked it in, snarling and hungry for blood. Halfway up the stairs, he shifted from his wolven form and made himself calm, sucking in air desperately as the shift completed, leaving him naked and full of rage.

“…not fighting,” a laughing woman said. “There is no point to fighting. You can’t possibly hope to win.”

Ben moved into the doorway and asked calmly, “Why not?”

The female werewolf’s eyes flew to his face and she screeched, “Jude! Michael!”

“Hmmm… Jude can’t help you,” Ben said, a smile curving his lips. “Neither can the others, but if you think screaming will help…”

Turning his gaze from the wolf, he said quietly. “Tiffany. Let it go. Stop fighting what is inside you.”

Then he turned to face the charging werewolf who had come to answer the rogue’s scream, leaving Tiffany alone to battle the female.

Whatever was twisting inside her was wild, raw, and alive. It writhed and burned with a life of its own. Clamping it down now was out of the question, so she just had to release it.

* * *

Tiffany heard his deep, insistent voice echoing inside her head as she stared at the slender, almost delicate woman in front of her. Stop fighting what is inside you…

Lifting one hand, she stared at it. Damn it. That was her hand…ivory pale, and glowing? She could feel something burning inside her. Burning and clawing and desperate for release. Her breath came in ragged pants as she lifted her eyes to the woman.

“This is my home. Get out,” she snapped.

The woman laughed, a desperate, evil laugh. “Can’t do that. My boss wants you. He’s going to get you,” she said.

Tiffany fought the storm that was raging inside her. He…he… Who is she talking about?

The image seemed to explode from the woman’s mind into Tiffany’s, burning itself into her mind’s eye.

Marcus…

“Over my dead body.” And instinct took over. Like some unseen puppet master was pulling her strings, she felt those instincts guiding her—one hand jerking up as the woman dropped down in a crouch, ready to lunge. Tiffany could see it, the shadow of an animal lurking inside the depths of the woman’s eyes. The bitch would kill her if she could, but alive was better. Alive was pleasing to Marcus.

No. Just hell, no.

The heat inside her exploded and Tiffany couldn’t control it as it arced out of her hand and seemed to grab at the intruder, winding around her flesh like a lover, setting flame to her hair, her clothes, her very body.

A scream echoed through the air and the smell of burning cotton filled the air, the heat scorching her as Tiffany stood there, now facing the blazing, burning form of the woman. Shock and fear and disbelief raced through Tiffany as she stumbled back against the wall, the burning hot energy that had filled her now gone.

“Enough,” a soft, gentle voice said.

Tiffany quivered as Ben Cross walked naked through the door and lifted one hand just in front of the smouldering, flaming corpse in front of her. The husk fell to the ground and Ben stepped around it as the fire died, winking out of existence…as though he had made the fire die.

“I did.”

Tiffany couldn’t stop the whimper that fell from her lips. Gently, he smiled and said, “No threat to you.”

Then he stepped a little closer and said, “Welcome back, Shadoe Wallace. You’ve been hiding a very long time.”

Shadoe…

Images assaulted her mind—almost memories—a short, stocky man with a close-cut beard and laughing eyes, and a slender fey creature with hands that soothed and gentled. Shadoe, my pretty little Shadoe…isn’t she beautiful, Carrick? Voices with the lilting music of Ireland inside them…tears thickened her throat and she pressed her lips together as a dull, rushing sound filled her ears.

Tiffany stared at Ben, quivering as the images became too real, too vivid. “What in the hell is going on?” she demanded, then flinched as her voice echoed and boomed through the small bedroom.

“Come on…there’s too much to tell you, and we can’t do it here.” He held out his hand.

Wildly, she shook her head and moved further away, feeling the wall against her back as the spicy, bitter taste of fear tore through her, adrenaline starting to course through her veins.

Her fear was spiralling out of control and she couldn’t stop it, couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe…

Tiffany didn’t realize he had moved closer, until one hand was cupping her cheek.

“It’s okay, Shadoe.”

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head. Then a black fog rose and obscured her vision, taking her thoughts, her fears, her everything with it.

Chapter Two

Ben laid her on the bed, stroking her hair back from her face. “Pretty girl, you’ve been through hell, haven’t you?” he murmured. Rage still twisted in him.

But, damn…didn’t she do good?

Pure, raw, unrefined magic was coursing through her veins now, the well of power inside her wide open. It wouldn’t be closed off again.

And she’d had a rude awakening, too.

“Sorry for that, sweet,” he whispered, his gaze moving to the smoking corpse feet away.

Clean up.

Clean up first, then figure out what to do, he told himself.

Two corpses and a snivelling, magically bound wolf in the foyer, out of sight of passersby.

One thing to be grateful for…she lived outside of town. It would have been very hard to explain away the screams, the blinding lights that poured from Shadoe’s body as her magic erupted.

Shadoe. Closing his eyes, he muttered, “She might not like you changing her name.”

It was nearly an hour later when he had finished dealing with the mess. Not just the bodies, but the blood.

Neither soap and water, nor bleach could take the bloodstains off the wall, so he hadn’t bothered. Magic, however, could.

Most of the time was spent talking, however.

He made phone calls…to the Council. To the vamp in the south—the local Hunter would deal with the corpses.

Now he just had to figure out how to get the wolf to the Council. Somebody to watch over the pathetic, mewling wolf who still clung to the wall, begging, “Don’t kill me…”

Tossing him a disgusted look, he said, “Shut the hell up or I will, you idiot.”

A Hunter who wouldn’t kill his sorry ass just for existing. That would be difficult. This whining whelp would sorely try even the most patient Hunter… Ben stopped mid-step.

Or he could just kill two birds with one stone. There was another witch he needed to get to the Council. She wouldn’t go on her own, but she might do it to help another…something to ease the burden of the guilt she carried.

Crossing to the mirror hanging at the southern wall, he brushed his fingers over it, letting some of his blood smear the reflection as he sent the summons out. She didn’t answer right away, but he really hadn’t expected her to.

Leandra was fighting her fate, tooth and nail.

Shadoe…prettiest little Shadoe, a laughing, gruff voice said.

She could feel hands, big, loving hands lifting her up and cuddling her against a broad, warm chest. She felt warm, safe, secure.

And so loved.

Another voice, sweet and soft, but firm… “Carrick, you are going to spoil that girl rotten. I mean it, no more candy.” Then soft and loving hands pinching her chin lightly, a soft laugh. “Don’t pout so, Shadoe. ‘Tis bedtime, that is all, love. You can’t eat candy in bed, baby.”

The same voice, singing her to sleep at night.

And then there was terror, screaming, struggling, burning… “Adri, get the baby. Get out…” That deep man’s voice ordering, his tone brooking no disobedience.

“I can’t leave you!”

A ferocious snarl and the sound of breaking glass. “They have me trapped, a blood spell, I can feel it. Do you want her to die as well as me?”

The soft, lovely voice sobbing. “No. No…God forgive me, Shadoe…”

Hot swirling mists seemed to fill the baby, flood her, muffling her voice, and her soul. “Adri, take her and go!”

“No,” the woman said, her voice calmer now. “They can track me too easily. They know my scent, my blood.”

“She needs a protector, damn it. You know what can happen to a little girl like her…she’ll need you when the magic comes out. When the wolf comes out. She needs somebody. Go!”

A few moments passed and the baby Shadoe had felt something wrench the air, and a woman’s furious shriek. “Damn hem!”

Then the muffling, hot power, like the electricity in the air during a furious storm, continued to soak in Tiffany…no, Shadoe. Her real name was Shadoe and the woman who held her, who kissed her cheek and sang softly, only replied to the man. “I can’t. Don’t you think I’ve tried? I can’t. Not because I won’t leave you, although it would near kill me. They locked me to you. I cannot go where you cannot follow. They’ve killed us, Carrick, both of us.”

That furious snarl—hot, snapping rage—filled the room and a baby whimpered. “Shhh, my pretty Shadoe. Our pretty Shadoe. Damn it, Adri. We can’t let them kill her,” a tortured, angry man rasped. Shadoe felt his hands stroke down her hair, her small, shaking back.

“They won’t. They won’t even know where to look for her,” the woman said.

Mama…my mama…mine… The words formed in Shadoe’s mind, more than two decades later as she lay trapped in the dream, the memory that had been buried inside her.

“You will be safe,” Mama whispered. Something warm and wet splattered on Shadoe’s face. “My blood, my power, my tears…my magic. God watch over you, Shadoe…”

Something danced through her, under her skin, inside her mind.

“Adri, what are you doing?”

“What we have to do, love.”

Shadoe passed into strong arms and was clasped to that broad chest, a whisker-roughened face pressed against her tiny cheek as he kissed her gently. “My prettiest Shadoe, damn it, I love you. In your heart, know that, baby,” he said.

Daddy… “Yes, it’s Daddy, now gimme kisses, pretty girl, and then hug your mama tight,” he crooned, that big strong hand that had always protected, stroking down her back.

“It’s time,” Mama whispered, her voice muffled, tight. “Aww, my angel. My Shadoe. It’s all right. It will be all right…all in time…”

Then something inside the young girl known as Shadoe went out.

And she awoke. Twenty-six years old, and now remembering her true parents’ faces.

“Mama,” she choked.

“She suppressed the magic. Did what she had to. Your parents were—”

Shadoe sat up and turned her head, staring at Ben Cross in the darkened room. “How do you know me?” she asked, her voice trembling.

A tired, sad smile crossed his face. “Your parents had family, friends. People who’ve been looking for you. I’ve been looking for years. And when I found you, it was too late to keep something bad from happening. Marcus had caught your scent, your magic… It started coming out. If the magic had just waited—ah, that will get nothing accomplished. The rest you know. You were in jail when I arrived. And you wouldn’t even consent to see me, so I could see if it was really you,” he said as he moved out of the shadows, dropping to his knees beside her bed.

“That’s not an answer. How do you know me? Who am I?” she demanded, lifting her hands and staring at them. “How did I do that? What is going on inside me?”

“You know who you are now, I think. Your name is Shadoe Wallace,” he said. “And you are one helluva powerful witch. That is what kept Jimmy and Marcus from killing you that night. That is what saved you tonight. The magic your mother hid inside your body has broken free, love.”

Magic.

As if the word itself were magical, Shadoe felt something like a blindfold, fall away, and she could see. Far too much. Staring at Ben Cross too hard made his body gleam with a blue light, and when she jerked her head around to stare outside, shimmery, darting bits of energy seemed to infuse the trees, the air, the very night.

She could feel the sheets below her, almost each individual thread of the smooth sateen. Each stray hair as it caressed her cheek.

And his heart. She could hear his heart. Smell his skin, hot, warm, male. Smell the wildness of a thunderstorm, the woodsy pine scent of the forest, of sandalwood and sage and man. Saliva flooded her mouth and she felt a dam break open in her belly, moisture flooding her cleft as she breathed in his scent, an almost electric caress of air on her body.

“What is going on…?” she asked, terror filling her, control sliding far and fast from her grip.

“It’s you, what you really are, your magic coming out,” he said gruffly, his voice strained. “You have no idea what has been hiding behind the veil of your mother’s protection.”

Her gaze flew to his face and she saw his eyes, those golden eyes were glowing, gold and amber streaks that swirled and danced around his pupils. They were locked on her face, sending hot, skittering little rushes down her back, jolts of electricity that had her clenching her thighs together.

He closed his eyes, and shook his head. She could see—something—seem to fade from him, drifting from his flesh like fairy dust. “You are a witch, Shadoe Wallace, and much more. And it’s all coming out now. The power of what you have inside could drive a lesser person mad,” he said obliquely as his eyes opened.

“Who are you? Why are you here?” Shadoe asked, hearing the desperate ring in her voice, and unable to silence it.

He smiled, a sardonic twist of his lips. “I came to find you,” he said simply. “And I will be whoever you want me to be. Although I hope, for your sake, you’re ready for me to be a teacher…you need somebody to help get your magic under control. It’s out now…and it’s not going anywhere.”

* * *

Leandra stared at the mirror over the sink in the small, ramshackle cabin in Slade, Kentucky.

In this tiny, pretty country town, she had found a little bit of peace. And it had just been broken.

“Damned fucking Hunters.” Her hands clenched at the edge of the sink and she closed her eyes tightly. She had gone out west, to New Mexico and they had known her.

She had spent a year in Milan. And they had known her.

Everywhere she went, the damned Hunters knew her name, her scent, her magic.

But she no longer saw hatred or disgust in their eyes. Over the past few years it had changed. To pity.

Pity!

Like she wanted their pity. Like she needed anything from them.

Then what do you need… a gentle voice asked.

Lost in the pain of her past, she slumped, and her brow rested against the mirror, without her truly realizing.

The magic of Cross’ spell leaped to life, activated by her touch and his deep, gravelly voice filled the room, gentle, but hard at the same time. “What do you need? How about a purpose, Leandra? Ready to stop running yet?”

Jerking her head back, Leandra swore heatedly. “Damn you, Cross. Go away. Leave me be,” she snapped, backing away as she stared into his opaque, golden eyes.

Not Cross…please, not him. He had been the hardest to ignore, when he had come seeking her out. Not telling her that she had a duty, not ordering her into training, like some fools had done. He had looked at her and simply said, “Aren’t you tired of not being where you belong?”

Yes.

She had bitten that answer back. But as he met her gaze levelly, she knew he had seen it written all over her face. Leandra had fled to Milan after that.

His laughter drew her back into the present. “We’ve been leaving you be for years. And you’re still running. Still running…why? We could use you. You know that.”

She laughed harshly. “Use me? We? As in the Hunters…don’t you remember what I am? I’m evil.”

Ben sighed and the sound seemed to fill the room around her. “No, you’re not. You’re fucked up, but you’re not evil.”

“You’re wrong,” she shouted.

She was evil… she couldn’t forget what she’d done. It didn’t matter that why. It didn’t matter what she thought she knew.

“You’ve hidden long enough, Leandra,” Ben said softly. “Come out now. We need you.”

That simple plea, stated so very basically, hit home. Leandra touched the mirror with a shaking hand, breaking the spell, making his face go away.

You’ve hidden long enough.

We need you…

Damn it, even that bastard Malachi hadn’t bothered her so badly. And he had pestered her for nearly a month in Milan before he had given up. Of course, she had finally threatened him with a volley of fireballs, so that might have been why he left.

Not that she had actually tried to hit him—she just had to get him away from her. The longer he was around, the more she was tempted to listen to him, that soft sexy burr, the compassion she saw in his midnight eyes.

Of course, Cross didn’t even have to be around her. With that uncanny intuition, he had known exactly what to say to make her think, make her question…

Aren’t you tired of not being where you belong…

For the longest time, she had been convinced that she had no place in the world…not now.

But with just a few gruffly spoken words, and understanding in his golden eyes, he had made her question what little she had left to believe.

Damn bastard. She paced the room. Steamed a little more, fumed, and cursed him for a long, long time. Damn him to hell.

With a smirk, she thought, At least, then I won’t be so damned lonely…

Chapter Three

“I’m not a witch,” Shadoe said narrowly eying the brooding, sexy man in front of her. “Magic isn’t real. What I thought I saw happen the night Jimmy died isn’t real.”

“Oh, yeah? Then how did he die? What did you do earlier?” He turned away, running a long-fingered hand through his tumbled hair, the shirt he had gotten from somewhere stretching across those wide shoulders with the absent gesture. “How long are you going to ignore what you’ve seen with your own eyes?”

“What I’ve seen? I can’t trust what I’ve seen. It’s not real. It’s not logical. Fire can’t come out of thin air,” she argued, shaking her head and backing away from him as he turned back around to stare at her, a tiny smile on his face.

“Why not?” he asked reasonably, crossing his arms over his chest. Cocking a brow at her, he said, “It’s not like a normal person is doing it. It’s a witch. There are laws to it, just like with everything else. You take the wild energy in the air that comes from every living creature and you combust it. It’s perfectly logical. For crying out loud, listen to your head. It will tell you the truth. It tells you that you are a witch… It tells you that you can make fire, that you have made fire.”

“How can I possibly believe what my head is telling me? I think I’m going crazy!” Shadoe shouted, stomping away from him, staring out the window into the night. Taking a deep breath, she said quietly, “So maybe I did dream of my parents. But that doesn’t make me a fucking witch. That doesn’t mean I made fire.”

She froze in mid-track as Ben lifted one hand. “If you aren’t a witch, then neither am I,” he said casually. “But how can I do this?”

Shadoe’s eyes were trapped on the golden orb that Ben held. Locked on the two faces within it, faces that were distantly familiar, and a knot rose in her throat. Her parents… A delicate-looking woman with a head full of wild red curls, chopped to chin-length, cuddled up against a blond man, built solid through the chest and arms, his hair cut close, a neat goatee on his face. They were staring down at a baby the woman cuddled close.

That’s me…Shadoe thought, dazed.

As she stared, mesmerized, the child grew to a chubby little toddler who latched her hands onto Mama’s curls and laughed as her father tickled her. “I know them,” Shadoe whispered thickly, fighting the tears that threatened to fall.

“I know them,” she repeated as memory flooded her and tears stung her eyes. She remembered a slide, and a park, and a puppy…and them, the man and the woman, always the man and the woman, their voices, and the love in their hands, and in their voices.

“How could I have forgotten?”

“You had to, Shadoe,” he murmured, holding still as she reached out with a shaky hand to touch the images locked within the orb.

Her hand slid right through it and she jerked it back, clamping her lips together to keep from crying out in shock as the man turned his head and stared directly out at her, as though he could see her.

The man had the bluest of eyes, pure, clear sky blue. Her eyes. She had her father’s eyes. “I have his eyes. How are you doing this? I know them.”

“Your heart never forgot, Shadoe. Yes, you have his eyes. His eyes…some of his power, some of your mother’s,” Ben said quietly. “Ignore it if you have to, but it is what it is. You are what you are…and you’re a witch.”

Hypnotized, she lifted her hand to touch the orb again, her fingers passing through, splintering it. She fought the urge to cry as their faces faded away. “No, I’m not,” she argued, shaking her head. She could accept her parents, wanted to, even.

But the rest?

Ben arched a brow and stepped through the shimmering bits of energy that still hung in the air after the orb had shattered under her touch. “You are,” he murmured, reaching down and taking her hand, locking their fingers together and staring into her troubled blue eyes.

Shadoe felt something explode from her, as though leaping out to meet Ben, joining with his power. She felt it, a resounding hum that filled her very soul, flooding her from the top of her head to the soles of her feet. And her skin was gleaming again. A ragged gasp fell from her lips and she lifted her hands, staring at them, watching as the rich, gleaming flesh seemed to glow and shine. She turned her head and stared at her reflection in the mirror, seeing the deep, gleaming pools of her eyes.

A harsh male groan echoed in her ears and she tore her eyes away from her reflection to stare at Ben, the muscles in her belly tightening at the hungry look in his eyes, etched onto his face.

“I’d kill him again,” Ben whispered, reaching out and trailing one finger down her cheek. “The bastard who made you afraid. I want him dead, and then I want him alive again so I can kill him over again. I hate death, but I want to hurt him. I want to make him suffer.” A menacing growl, something that was totally not human, fell from his lips as he moved a little closer. “And Marcus—he’s going to die. I want him dead almost as much as I want…”

Shadoe’s heart skipped as he lowered his head. She saw it coming. She could have moved. Should have moved. Even as fear slammed into her throat, though, and even as it sent her heart to racing, she stood there, unable to move, unable to breathe.

It wasn’t terror that held her still though, as he cupped her face his hands. It wasn’t terror that kept her from turning away as he dipped his head and pressed his lips to hers. Lightly at first. So very lightly, his tongue tracing the line of her mouth, teasing the entrance before retreating. A slow, easy kiss…a seduction.

And when he lifted his head, she whimpered.

He looked down at her, hunger glittering in his eyes. Nervous, she watched him, but as he reached up to trace her mouth with his fingertip, she didn’t turn away.

“I think I’d like to do that again,” he murmured.

And she shocked the hell out of herself when she responded with, “I think I’d like to let you.”

The next kiss wasn’t so light. Wasn’t so easy and gently. This time, he pulled her closer and hunger ripped through her as he took her mouth, greedy and demanding.

She groaned as he pushed his tongue—hot, rough and seductive—into her mouth. One hand threaded through her hair. She trembled as he moved his body against her, bringing his heat, so seductively necessary that Shadoe wondered how she had ever lived without it.

He held himself back, touching her with just one hand in her hair, his mouth on hers, his other hand gripping her hip, strong and firm. Shadoe gasped as a shudder racked that big body and she was pulled completely against him, his chest crushing her breasts, a flat, hard belly coming to rest against the softness of hers.

He seemed to fill her, some intangible energy from him sliding inside her and filling all the dark, empty places she had lived with for so long.

Ben’s mouth ate at hers, his tongue rubbing seductively against hers, before he pulled back. Nipping her lower lip, he let his lips cruise down the line of her neck. A big hand, firm and hard, came up to her breast and Shadoe whimpered when he pinched the nipple lightly, teasingly as he lowered his mouth to feast on the other.

Cool air kissed her flesh and she cried out as she felt him tear the shirt away only seconds before the hot, wet silk of his mouth closed over her nipple. Drawing it deep, laving it roughly, he nipped at her again, rolling his eyes upward to stare at her face.

His eyes—so intent, so rapt on her face. Shadoe felt her knees buckle and his big hands caught her, bringing her into the air as he licked and bit and sucked on her. Her head fell back and she arched against the hot length between her thighs, instinctively wrapping her legs around Ben’s waist and arching, rubbing against him.

“Well, now… Not exactly what I was expecting to see when I showed up.”

Ben groaned as he pulled away. Sweet. Shadoe was every bit as sweet as he’d thought she’d be. A mocking laugh filled the air. So damn caught up in the sweetness of her, in her unexpected fiery response that Leandra was able to fly into the room without him taking notice.

Damn it, Malachi had pegged her as a flier, but Ben hadn’t really considered it, until the other witch appeared in the room in a blur of wind and motion.

Leandra moved across the room, her eyes focused and controlled, and lowered herself lazily into a chair. Her pale amber gaze flashed.

“Ever heard of knocking?” he asked drolly.

Shadoe yelped, her eyes shocked, wide and watchful, on Leandra’s face. “Shit…where did she come from?” Then she stiffened. “How did you get in my house?”

Leandra smirked. “Ask the wolfman. He’s the one who called me,” she replied, tossing the man behind Shadoe a sardonic glare. “Who in the hell am I taking to the Council?”

“Leandra, lovely manners as always,” he said tightly, stroking his hand through Shadoe’s tumbled hair before setting her on her feet and stepping back. “This is Shadoe Wallace,” he murmured, still staring into her eyes, those clear, indignant eyes.

The taste of her lingered in his mouth and he battled down the need to take…and take…and take…

Swallowing, he turned his head away from her before his control shattered. “Ahhh… Well, she may prefer to be called Tiffany. She’s been known as Tiffany Morgan for more than twenty years.”

The air was sparking.

Three powerful witches in such proximity, though Leandra and Ben had their magic tamped down deep inside them, Shadoe’s was dancing in the air like dust motes.

Leandra drew one long, black-clad leg to her chest and inclined her head. “Hello, Tiffany. Nice to meet you. Formalities done. Okay, Cross. Where is the wolf I’m babysitting? And why me? I’m no damn Hunter.”

“That’s just because you’re too damn stubborn,” he muttered, rubbing the back of his neck. He took a deep breath and forced the hunger down, forced the need down as he focused on the current problem. “They’d take you in a heartbeat, as I’ve told you…a dozen times.”

As he faced Leandra, she watched him with blank eyes. “They don’t want or need one like me. I’m a killer, remember, Cross? Or are you that blind? That forgiving? The blood on my heart doesn’t bother you?”

“Oh, I’m neither blind nor forgiving. But you made mistakes because a bunch of monsters warped a child’s mind. You going to let it haunt you while you hide the rest of your life?”

Her cat’s eyes glowed as she struggled with something inside.

“How long will you fight what you are?”

Leandra laughed, her eyes moving to meet Shadoe’s. “If they wanted me, they would have come after me ages ago. Like they did with her,” Leandra drawled.

Ben gave a low bark of laughter. “Darling, they are probably scared shitless of you,” he suggested as he drew Shadoe to the bed, urging her to sit, resting his hands on her neck and rubbing with the balls of his thumbs.

He wondered if Shadoe had even realized she was naked. Grabbing a sheet, he tucked it around her body, hiding it from sight—with regret.

Swinging back around, he faced Leandra once more. She stared at him with a sneer on her face.

“Some of them, maybe. But fear isn’t going to stop all of you.” A cool, humorless smile curved her mouth as she said, “I’m just another witch, after all. And not so impressive compared to this one.”

Finally, Shadoe’s silence ended as she surged up off the bed, moving to stand with her back against an interior wall, as though being near the window disturbed her. She demanded, “Okay…now… I want to know what in the hell is going on?”

Evil lurks around us. Shaking her head, the thought faded away. He could hear her chaotic thoughts as he tried to find the words to explain what was going on.

But Leandra beat him to it.

“He’s a Hunter. He kills all sorts of nasty creatures, like evil vampires, evil werewolves…evil witches,” Leandra said calmly. “And he hunts monsters. So why haven’t I died yet?”

Shadoe frowned. “You seem to be in a big hurry to die.”

Leandra’s lids flickered and she said quietly, “When you are left with the thoughts I live with, death would probably be a blessing.”

Ben’s hands flexed, his jaw clenching as he stared at the exotic woman sitting there.

They were losing her. Leandra was sliding farther and farther into her self-imposed exile. Although she battled the darkness inside her, she would lose eventually, seeking out her death willingly. If they didn’t stop it.

No. Damn it, no. “If we wanted you dead, you’d already be dead,” Ben said flatly, drawing her gaze to him. “There’s a difference between a screwed-up woman and true evil. You have seen evil, Leandra. That’s not what you are.”

Something moved in her gaze, and for a moment, he glimpsed raw torment before her eyes closed and her head fell back, the wooden beads on her braids clacking together. A sigh lifted her breasts as she laced her hands on her flat belly. “I do know what I’m, Ben. I have no place in this world.”

Then her lashes lifted and she focused that uncanny stare on Shadoe. “But I’m not the concern here now, am I? There’s a stink of something nasty here, Ben. It’s all around this place,” she said quietly, her nose wrinkling as she breathed in the stench of the cowering were. “He is all around this place.”

“Yesterday,” Shadoe whispered. “Yesterday, my life was normal.” Her heart was rabbiting in her chest and she could hardly breathe around the thunder of it. The woman sitting across from her was a total stranger.

Leandra laughed softly. “Your life stopped being normal ages ago. If it ever was. The magic inside you saw to that.” The musical lilt of her voice, rich with the islands, was oddly soothing, even as her eyes started to glow and swirl. “Stop fighting that, stop fighting your magic and it will guide you better than any of us ever could.” Something sad moved across her face. “If I’d listened to mine...” Then she shook her head and looked away. “But it’s too late now.”

The tension in the air thickened, building and building until the werewolf that Ben had secured in the hall started to howl and snarl.

“He’s an uppity thing, isn’t he?” Leandra drawled, rising from her sprawl on the chair and moving over to the hall. She peered at the werewolf who was bound hand and foot with reinforced cuffs.

“Bitch,” the man snarled at her as the fear inside him tried to induce the change. His face was lengthening, slowly, as though he battled it. Fur formed thicker and thicker on him.

Shadoe wrapped her arms around herself, rocking back and forth on her heels as she stared at him.

But he didn’t pay any attention to Shadoe, his eyes rapt on Leandra’s dark honey-gold skin. “Bitch. You’re no fucking Hunter.”

Stroking it with one slender, red-tipped finger, Leandra purred, “Then you should be more careful, stupid wolf. I don’t fight fair, like they do. My rules aren’t the same as theirs, so maybe you shouldn’t fuck with me.”

The spell Ben had wrapped around the werewolf splintered under the bastard’s fear as he stared up into the eyes of death.

Shadoe swallowed, hearing the dry click in her throat just before the thick, wet popping sounds coming from the man drowned out all else. He bellowed, the enraged, painful shout changing to a long, echoing howl.

Leandra’s eyes met Shadoe’s.

Then the other witch looked at Ben and quietly said, “She really need to learn about the world this way?”

Ben swore softly as he took in the pallor of Shadoe’s face, the haunted look in her cornflower blue eyes. But when he moved to block the shifting werewolf from sight, she pushed him aside. “That is what Marcus is,” she whispered thickly. “What Jimmy was. I really did see them changing.”

“Yes,” Ben said softly, moving to hold her against him, stroking her hair as she watched the change complete, her eyes stayed rapt on the tightly bound werewolf, his ankles and knees forced awkwardly behind his back, robbing him of the ability to move anything more than his head.

“And if I really saw them, then I really did burn Jimmy’s heart to ash,” she said, forcing out the words. “I’m what you say, aren’t I?”

Ben stroked a hand down her back. “Yes. You are.”

Across the room, Leandra sighed. “Now I have to travel with him as a damn wolf. So much for doing things the easy way.”

“Maybe I’ll change him back. Now that is painful, I hear. Not a nice thing,” she mused. Then she slid her gaze back to Ben, a sly look there as she smiled. “Of course…since I’m not a Hunter, I don’t have to use a Hunter’s ways, follow his rules… A nice person would let the bastard rest a while and change back on his own.”

A quicksilver grin lit her face as she drawled, “But I’m not a nice person.”

Chapter Four

Shadoe stared at the ball of heat and light that hovered over her head, panic in every line of her face. “Okay. I made it, but now how do I put it away?” she asked, fighting to keep her voice level.

Ben laughed. “Just let it go. Stop thinking so hard and let it go. It’s easier than you think.”

But she clung tenaciously to everything, including the magic, and it wouldn’t die. “Relax,” he ordered firmly, moving to stand behind her. “You don’t have to control it. Just let it exist, and it will come to your call when you need it. When you’re done, let it go.”

Just days had passed since her startling revelations—too much had changed. And she was expected to control this… Ah, baby, not control. Let it exist… The words were just there, in her mind.

Shadoe felt something inside her relax as the words reverberated through her. Not control.

Watching the golden orb, she couldn’t help the smile on her face as it simply faded away. “That was easy,” she said, disbelieving. “How could it be so easy?”

“That is the way it is supposed to be. You and I are going to skip the basics and go straight to the important stuff. You need to learn and I’m going to do whatever it takes to teach you,” he murmured from behind her.

His breath was warm on her neck and a hot shiver raced down her spine.

Her nipples tightened immediately and Shadoe’s breath skittered to a halt in her throat, for a long second. Her skin heated and she could swear she scented her own need in the air. “What else do I need to know?” she asked shakily, trying to focus again on the magic.

Ben laughed easily, and she wanted to turn to him and wrap her arms around him, lose herself in him as the sound rolled over her like a caress.

“There’s a lot to learn,” he said. “A lot. The question is where to begin…”

Ben could smell her, the hot, spicy scent of aroused woman and it punched him in the gut like a fist. Why it had come, he didn’t know, but damn it, she was going to drive him crazy.

Cautiously, he laid his hands on her shoulders, waiting for her to move away, to throw his hands off. When instead, she leaned back against him, he couldn’t stop the hungry sound that left him as he lowered his mouth to her shoulder. She shivered as he raked his teeth across the skin exposed by her tank top.

Sliding his hands down the length of her arms, he moved his grip to her waist and eased her fully back against him. “You feel perfect,” he murmured. “You smell like a dark autumn night, mysterious, wild, dangerous. And powerful. I want to taste it, taste you. All of you.”

Shadoe gasped as he set his teeth on her neck with a quick, fast nip. “Can I?” Ben asked gruffly.

She didn’t say yes.

But when she didn’t say no, either, Ben slowly turned her in the circle of his arms and covered her mouth, cupping her chin with his hand and touching nothing else. Nibbling first at the seam of her lips, he listened to her shaky, trembling sigh, her racing heart, scented the rich, sweet taste of hungry woman growing stronger in the air.

Hunger tore through him as her hands lifted to clutch at his waist. With a gentle tightening of his fingers on her chin, he urged her lips open and pushed inside, groaning deep in his chest at her taste. Like her scent—mysterious, powerful—but still somehow so…sweet, innocent. With his tongue, he flirted with her mouth, her lips, rimming it before thrusting deep. Her mouth opened wide under his as she gasped and her hands slid up his torso to grip his shoulders, the bite of her nails into his skin sending sparks of flame down his spine.

Against his chest, he felt the firm, rounded pressure of her breasts, the hot stab of her nipples through her bra and shirt. Her rounded, soft belly cuddled against his cock as he slowly stepped closer to her body. Her head fell limply back as he released her lips, cruising his way down her neck, pausing to lick at the pulse throbbing there.

Her pulse slammed against her skin so hard, it was a wonder it didn’t bruise her. Dallying at that soft, sweet spot, he licked, nuzzled, and caressed, then raked his teeth down her neck, feeling hot male pleasure course through him as she shuddered against him.

“You’re sweet,” he groaned against her skin, taking her hips in his hands and bringing her closer, pumping his cock against her, feeling hot satisfaction course through him when her knees buckled.

So damned sweet…he thought, desperate for more, for all.

Ben fell to his knees in front of her, still supporting her weight as he pressed his mouth to her belly, moving lower and lower until he could press his mouth against her mound through the layers of her clothes. Her body jerked and her hands fisted in his hair. Rolling his eyes upward, he met her gaze over the length of her body, seeing the dark storm building in her eyes, and the embarrassment. The curiosity…

Hooking his hands in the waist of her denim shorts, he eased them down, dragging her panties out of the way as well. Once he had her naked from the waist down, he caught one thigh in his hand and opened her. With a groan, he pressed his mouth against the damp cleft.

“Ben,” she gasped, tugging his head and staring at him.

“Shadoe…sweet, sweet Shadoe,” he whispered. He tumbled her to the floor. Pushing her thighs wide, he stared down at her, the damp silk of her sex gleaming, her folds wet and open.

“What are you doing?” She flinched away, trying to close her thighs.

“Looking at you, getting ready to taste you,” he answered, effortlessly keeping her from closing herself against him. Stroking one finger down the folds, he lifted it to his lips and added, “Teasing you.”

“Don’t look at me,” she demanded, her face flushing, her eyes sparking with embarrassment.

“Have to, you’re too pretty not to,” he argued gently, smiling wickedly. Lowering his head, he pressed his mouth to her and feasted, driving through her folds, entering her, before moving higher and rasping his rough tongue over her clit, suckling the hard little bud deep.

A harsh, desperate moan left her and her eyes widened as she arched her hips against him, rocking feverishly. He pushed two fingers inside her tight, slick passage, pumping shallowly and listening to her whimper. Damn me, Ben thought wildly.

He hadn’t ever wanted a woman this powerfully before, this quickly. His needs had fallen to the wayside next to his mission, the fire to find the child who had gone missing from his pack so many years ago. He had found her, and for the past five years, he had waited for her to leave the damned prison where they had sent her, fighting the urge to get her out, even if it involved tearing the place apart, stone by stone. Dying to tear the place apart stone by stone.

But that wouldn’t help things. So he had waited. He had been too close, and he wouldn’t mess up the mission, wouldn’t jeopardize things, wouldn’t call attention to their kind, not after they’d come so close to exposure already. He waited…and now she was out. Now he could protect her…

Too often, though, protect was getting mixed up. He still wanted to protect her. But not because she was the pack’s responsibility. But because he wanted her. All of her. For him.

Ben hadn’t expected to want her like this, hadn’t known he could want like this.

Hell, he hadn’t thought of wanting her at all, not until he had seen her walking down the street that first day, so lost, so confused.

The wet, sleek heat of her pussy clamped around his fingers as she tumbled closer to climax. The tight, hot grip of her sheath started to milk his fingers rhythmically as she moved closer and closer. Those delicate tissues, those little muscles, and damn it, her scent…all of it combining and threatening to drive him mad.

She was close to coming. Ben could feel it in the tensing of her body, in the glazing of her eyes, her erratic, unsteady breathing.

“Perfect,” he grunted against her, flicking his tongue across her clit. “Come…come, sweet, sexy Shadoe, come for me. Let me taste it.”

At his words, she erupted, her sheath contracting around his fingers as Shadoe pumped her hips harder. Working herself up and down on his fingers, riding him as she cried out, a short, choked sound. He sucked on her clit, harder and harder, as she rode the wave of climax, her face flushed, her mouth trembling and swollen.

“Hmmm…that’s good,” he whispered in approval. “Good…” A violent shudder racked his body and he felt the hungry animal inside him straining at his chains, to fall and ravage this sweet little prize. Sucking in air, Ben lifted his eyes, staring at her over the length of her body.

Levering his body over hers, he let her feel the light brush as he whispered, “Shadoe, look at me.”

Her eyes fluttered open, still dazed, still glowing with little sparks of untamed magic.

“Ben,” she purred, arching her back unconsciously as she rode the orgasm through, pressing hot, hard little nipples against his chest, rubbing her mound against him.

“Sweet, ah, hell,” he groaned. “Don’t do that, baby, unless you are ready for me to finish this.”

A hungry look slid through her eyes, one that called to the animal in him, and she dug her nails into his shoulders. “Finish it? Oh, you bet your ass you will,” she murmured, licking her lips. Then a hot flush rushed to her cheeks, as though she couldn’t believe she had said that.

Delighted, Ben grinned. “Oh, yeah. I’ll finish it.” Cupping the curve of her ass in his hands, he arched his hips against her, feeling the wet heat of her scalding him through his clothes.

It was amazing to feel that burning, driving heat from her, to see that punch of desire in her eyes.

Pushing his tongue inside her mouth, he groaned at the taste of her and his balls drew tight against his body as his cock throbbed and pulsed for her. The need to drive his aching sex inside her sweet, wet pussy was nearly robbing him of thought, of control.

But she had to be ready—had to think of nothing but this. Nothing but the touch of his mouth on hers, his hands on her sweet, sexy little body, his cock sliding into the tight wet glove of her sheath. He couldn’t take it if he saw fear come into hers eyes as he took her.

Shadoe rocked her hips up, shifting her legs to hook around his waist, parting the tender flesh between her thighs and cradling his denim-covered cock there. “Ummm…that feels so good,” she gasped, her lids lowering until only a sliver of dark blue was visible as she stared at him. “So nice.”

Ben grinned, albeit a little painfully. “We’ll make it feel better, Shadoe, promise,” he muttered against her lips, licking the full lower one and tugging on it with sharp, gentle teeth, shuddering when it had her arching against him.

Shifting to his knees, Ben tore his shirt away before shoving to his feet and tearing his jeans off, tossing them aside. The clink of loose change and keys sounded as his pockets emptied, and his jeans landed with a dull thud several feet away. A ripple rolled down his spine and he fumbled at the loss of control. Control was everything to him…why did it suddenly feel like he had none?

Kneeling before her, Ben slowly removed the rest of her clothes, staring at the smooth pale length of her body, the full, rounded weight of her breasts, topped with deep pink nipples. Her torso narrowed down to a slim waist, a full, female flare of hips, and short, curly wisps of hair covered her mound. Her long, sleekly muscled thighs shifted restlessly as she stared up at him, her eyes clouded and hungry.

“Ben, please,” she whimpered, her long, tangled hair spread under her shoulders like a blanket.

“Oh, I’ll please,” he muttered, lowering his body over hers, licking her lips, diving inside her mouth while lower, his hands cupped her hips and lifted her against him. “I’ll please you, baby. I swear it.” Wedging her thighs apart, he angled his hips and started the first slow, deep thrust inside her. Sweat beaded on his brow and he gritted his teeth. “You’re tight. Tighter than a virgin.”

She mewled deep in her chest, thrashing her head back and forth, trying to draw him deeper. “I’m a virgin, Ben…oh!” Her breath caught in her throat as she lifted her hips tentatively against him, trying to draw him deeper inside.

Ben stilled, locking his jaw. Bloody damn hell… Of course she was a virgin. The shy, private creature she had been before Jimmy wasn’t likely to have indulged in wild sexual flings. And she had spent five long years in prison. Staring down at her, he felt his heart stutter in his chest. Pretty pink nipples stabbed up at him, the pale ivory of her skin flushed with excitement. The pulse in her throat throbbed beguilingly and her eyes were wide, dilated, locked on his face.

So damn sexy, so damn soft.

Pressing his forehead against hers, he whispered, “I’m keeping you,” as he sank further inside her tight, wet pussy, the soft, silken hairs caressing his cock as he forged deep, through her slick, swollen tissues.

Her breath caught, and she stiffened against him, arching up as pain started to burn her pussy.

“Shhh…it’s almost over,” he crooned, nibbling at her neck, her chin, brushing his lips against hers. “Relax…open to me.”

Shadoe’s eyes burned with tears. Her pussy ached, burned, where before it had been throbbing with pleasure. Too deep, too hard, too much… She tried to pull her hips back but his big hands stopped her. “It hurts,” she groaned, her head falling back as she sucked in air.

“It’s your first time—I know it hurts…relax,” he ordered gruffly, shifting his weight until suddenly he was rubbing against her clit, and Shadoe flinched at the hot little jolt of pleasure that arced through her. He did it again and again until she was lifting herself to each caress, eagerly, hungrily. That felt…oh…too much.

All of it was too much.

He took her mouth in a deep, drugging kiss and Shadoe sobbed against his lips as he circled his finger around one stiff, tight nipple. Taking his mouth from hers, he met her eyes. “Pretty,” he whispered, holding her gaze as he pinched the hard little bud, plumping the soft flesh in his hand.

Her breath shuddered out of her lungs, and she lifted again for the slow stroke of his pelvis against her clit, the throbbing little mass of tissue swollen and aching. He slid deeper, and deeper, forging his way through her tight, slick tissues as she moved against him, seeking that brush of his body that made the ache in her belly draw tighter and tighter.

A startled, sharp cry left her as he sank completely into her, his pelvis pressed against her clit, sending hot sparking bolts of heat through her pussy, heating her belly, as she moved higher and harder against him until, with a sob, she climaxed around him.

Oh, she had come before. She wasn’t a child, but…this. Nothing compared to this… It echoed and tore and burned its way through her until she was left breathless from the intensity of it. Heat built in her belly, scalding waves of it that pushed her farther and farther into a blinding maelstrom where she couldn’t think, couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe without tasting Ben.

It even overshadowed that hot, glorious climax he had given her when he had gone down on her.

The muscles inside her pussy clung to his shaft as he pulled out and surged slowly back inside. When her eyes flew open at the stroke of his fingers on her clit, she could see him staring at her, his dark golden-brown eyes hooded, hungry, hot, almost a palpable touch as he watched her.

“Damn, you’re pretty,” he rasped, lowering his head to lick at her lips, nibble on the full lower one before he sought entrance to her mouth, driving inside with hungry motions that mimicked his hips against hers.

Her nails dug into the ridge of muscle along his shoulders as she lifted her hips to his, squeezing down with her muscles to hold him inside.

Ben drove inside again, harder, as he shifted his weight to one elbow and reached down, sliding one hand over her torso, leaving a burning path of sensation as he arrowed in on her clit, circling it with firm, steady strokes of his thumb. The need to come again slammed her, drawing and coiling tight in her loins, a gnawing ache that demanded satisfaction. Shadoe buried her fingers in his hair, kissing him ravenously as she started to pump her hips to his, taking him deeper, harder, quicker and he let her, levering his weight off of her and letting her work herself upward against his cock.

The thick, burning pillar of flesh scalded her and Shadoe gasped when he dropped his weight and started to pound her with deep, driving thrusts of his cock inside her sheath, fucking her desperately. He plundered her mouth, his hands sliding under her, fingers curling over her shoulders to brace and hold her still for his thrusts. Just before the night exploded inside her, flooding her with hot, whirling jolts of electric, liquid heat, he climaxed inside her with a muffled groan.

Her lids drooped and darkness swarmed in front of her for a long, brief moment as she struggled to breathe, to pull herself back together. After a long, futile fight to get oriented, she gave up and cuddled against him, feeling his hands come up to hold her lovingly against him.

“Sweet, sweet Shadoe,” he murmured.

The sound of her name on his lips serenaded her to sleep, and she basked in the comfort of finally feeling truly safe.

Chapter Five

When the wolves didn’t return as expected, Marcus seethed. Blood flew and flesh was shredded as he took his fury out on Linus, the older, soft-spoken Alpha who had once lived quite happily in this town.

Now the bloody, broken body of the Alpha lay in the corner and Linus suffered in silence as he waited for his body to heal enough for him to flee. Marcus Winston wasn’t leaving this town to Linus, ever again. The promise to move on had been empty. Something had drawn him here from the beginning and Marcus would stay.

The girl. Linus knew that much. Had something to do with her.

Marcus wouldn’t be leaving as long as the bitch was around. But the bitch was an even scarier thing than Marcus.

Not because of her, exactly. But Linus had an idea what protected her. Or who. Hunters. He hadn’t lived this long without avoiding their kind. He’d rather continue to do just that, thanks.

As he breathed in, the pain coursed through him with agonizing intensity.

The skin on his back hung in bloody strips, and breathing was pure torture, with his broken nose and broken ribs. But each breath healed him a little more. So he forced himself to keep breathing, to block out the pain as best as he could, and just breathe. Like water evaporating, slowly each wound became less and less. Several hours after the beating, he had healed enough to shift. The werewolf magic would heal the rest of his wounds during the shift and then he could flee.

His pack had deserted him, craving the frequent blood that Marcus promised.

But Linus wasn’t stupid.

Even if the girl didn’t have a Hunter already protecting her ass, he knew what happened when bloody rampages happened. Hunters happened.

Again, no thanks.

Bitter humor tore through him at that thought.

It wasn’t possible to stand against the Hunters. A soft, pathetic whine left his mouth, animalistic sounding even though he still retained his human form. For now.

Gathering his strength, Linus focused and felt the change slide through him, agonizingly slow as the were magic forced his flesh back together and knit the broken bones. He was a whimpering, sopping wet pile of wolf flesh when it was over—exhausted, hungry, and desperate to flee.

Only a handful of his once proud clan remained. All clinging to Marcus.

Screw them, he thought angrily.

They could die with Marcus.

Dragging himself to his feet, Linus swung his maned head left then right, listening, smelling… He was alone. Marcus had taken the females out, and the two betas remaining were most likely out chasing their tails. A great, heaving sigh left his powerful chest and Linus padded out of the room, his oversized wolf body making no sound.

He left through an open window, and didn’t stop, not even once, to look back.

* * *

Marcus found the house empty.

The scent of blood and pain was thick in the air, but stale.

The little fucker had dared to leave. The women clung to Marcus, their eyes wide with shock, fear heavy in their scent. Nobody dared to disobey Marcus. But Linus had. He hadn’t just disobeyed, he had left.

A furious snarl left him and he spun away from the women, the bitches. Two of them, only two left. And two good-for-nothing betas. They had next to no brains in their heads and even less power.

Should have pounded one of them—no, the blame for the failure went to Linus’ shoulders. Even though he hadn’t been with his wolves, he was their Alpha and should have trained them better.

But if he had beaten a beta, the Alpha, the only intelligent werewolf in the pathetic pack Marcus had taken over, would still be here.

The question was what to do about it.

If Linus had shifted before fleeing, and of course, he had, his injuries were all but a memory now. All he had to do was feed and he’d be healed completely, able to run as far as he wanted, as fast as he wanted. None of the remaining wolves could handle him. Marcus could, but he wasn’t about to leave the half-breed slut here alone. She needed watching.

No.

She needed breaking.

He was furious about the bastard sniffing at her tail. Who the hell did that shit think he was?

Nobody tried to touch what Marcus had claimed. He had marked that whore years ago and worse, she had hurt him. No mongrel bitch ever did that to him and got away with it.

She was going to bleed for that. And not just from a pitiful mark on her tit, either. Although he’d add to that one.

He’d take her. Mark her. Then kill her.

Oh, yes. Tiffany Morgan was going to suffer.

* * *

“Shadoe Wallace,” she whispered, staring at her reflection.

“My name is Shadoe Wallace.”

Tiffany no longer felt like her. Tiffany had lived in fear, in solitude for the past five years. Before that, she had been a wallflower, always on the outskirts, never one of the crowd. But now…

She was no longer the wallflower.

Staring at her reflection, nearly two weeks after Ben Cross had opened her eyes to life, Shadoe barely recognized herself.

She had taken a lover.

She walked down the streets with her head up and she didn’t feel like running at any small sound, or whenever somebody looked at her sideways.

Small sounds at night didn’t send her into a panic attack.

She felt free.

She felt…she felt like a witch.

Shadoe Wallace.

Tiffany Morgan was long gone.

And she liked who she saw staring at her from the mirror.

Lifting her hands, she cupped them in front of her face and breathed magic into them, the latest little power Ben had shown her. She could watch her entire life in her hands, from her birth, to now. And she could focus her thoughts on one person, somebody she knew, and be one with that person.

Leandra.

A guard at the prison who had befriended her.

A remembered favorite teacher.

Ben, that slow, sexy smile and the gold of his gleaming eyes… She sighed as his image shimmered into focus within her mind. Mmmm…Ben…

He was so amazing, so…magical.

And he thought she was magic.

How amazing was that?

“This is a rare gift. I can focus on a person long enough to link with that person for short periods. You can actually merge with them, be one with them. Follow their thoughts back to birth, know their deepest secrets,” he had whispered as his magic hands—some unseen touch of his—guided her through it. “You have to respect it, though. It’s not something to take for granted. Don’t abuse it.”

“It’s a responsibility,” she murmured. One she couldn’t abuse.

“Yes. It is. Not many understand that, and that’s what makes you different, makes you more.”

As she drifted now, she touched lightly on the minds of those she passed, never really intruding, just testing herself, refining the ability.

She’d need it desperately one day, she suspected.

A sudden jolt of terror filled her, a foul evil touch that locked her breath in her lungs, and turned her belly to ice.

A scent, one that she logically shouldn’t be able to place, flooded her mind. It wasn’t something she was actually smelling, in the here and now, but something else.

A scream filled her mind. Terrified, pain-filled, hideous.

Alone in her room, she pressed her hands to her temples and struggled to block it out, and her eyes fell on the mirror.

It was a good thing the terror had frozen her lungs.

Otherwise, she would have screamed. Pure bloody murder.

It wasn’t her reflection she saw, wasn’t her room in the mirror.

It was Marcus. She could see him, but only because he was standing next to a mirror as he lifted his hand, a hideous, leaded cat-o’-nine-tails held in his grip, and he brought it down on the back of a person.

Too bloodied, too broken for the sex to be easily determined, the person cowered and screamed and moaned under the lash of the evil whip.

Hands came up to grip her shoulders, but before she could whirl around, screaming and terrified, a soft, gentle growl of a voice whispered, “Shhh… It’s a merging. A deep one. His fury opens his being up to you.”

Ben’s warm, protective presence at her back steadied her and she whispered, “How do I stop it?”

His voice was odd, questioning, when he asked, “Stop the merging? Is that what you really want? Or do you want to stop him?”

Shadoe couldn’t stop the whimper in her throat any more than she could stop the shudder of fear that racked her. “Stop him? I can’t. Don’t you know what he did to me? What he could have done?”

His hands rubbed soothing circles on her shoulders and he said, “Yes. I know. But then, you didn’t know what you could do.”

His words ran through her, sending a frisson of something unrecognizable skittering down her spine. Heat sparked in her gut, unfurling and spreading through her before she even recognized it as anger. Wind blew around her, whipping her hair about her face as she continued to stare through the window of the mirror she was still bound to. Around one blood-streaked wrist, she saw a charm bracelet, silver, thin and delicate. Delicate, like the wrist.

He was beating a woman, beating her bloody.

And the way his mouth curved up at one corner, she knew he was enjoying it. Rage flooded her. Heat spilled through her, rolling like a river, building and building, but she didn’t know how to focus it. Sending a pretty ball of visions wouldn’t do shit against him. Her skin started to ache and she whimpered softly. “It hurts—” she choked out. “Why does it hurt?”

“You just don’t know how to release it,” Ben said slyly. “I do.” He slid his hands from her shoulders to her hands as his power slid inside and mingled with hers, his magic guiding, taking hers. “Watch.”

He cupped her power. She could think of no other way to describe it. He cupped her power in her hands and forged a solid beam of magicked heat that he then urged her to focus on Marcus. “Now…you know what to do.”

She opened the bowl of her hands, both psychic and physical.

As Marcus lifted the whip to strike the helpless, bloodied girl again, Shadoe released it.

Her eyes could see little, just a ripple like the heat shimmering above pavement. But she could feel it inside as it burst from her, leaping toward Marcus, through the distance that separated them.

And she watched through the mirror as it struck him, knocking him off his feet, charring the front of his shirt with the heat of the power, sending him careening back into the wall behind him. Her gaze narrowed as it landed on the whip he still clutched. Cocking her head, she studied the whip. She wanted it wrapped around him, the leather biting into his skin, cutting him. A short, startled scream left her lips as the whip snaked up with a life of its own and wrapped around Marcus even as he swore and struggled against it. Big, powerful hands gripped the lashes and tried to keep it from him, but still it constricted, tighter and tighter.

“Sweet heaven,” she whispered shakily. Behind her, she could feel Ben’s approval as he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tight.

Marcus was jerking against his bonds, swearing furiously, wrapped from shoulders to toe in leather. More leather than the whip had been made of, and still it continued to enshroud him, until not one untouched inch from the shoulders down existed.

“Fucking pathetic, sniveling little bastard—come out and face me,” he snarled, the bones in his face rippling.

“He’s trying to change,” Ben said quietly. “Do you feel it coming on him?”

She could, but only distantly. The power was raw, primal. Alien, yet somehow familiar. Something inside her stirred, and frightened, Shadoe shoved it all away from her.

“I’ll be damned…” Ben whispered.

The bones in Marcus’ face, elongating, a muzzle forming, froze in mid-shift and they watched as it was absorbed back into his skin, sliding in like water.

“You stopped his shift. His power, I feel it, you displaced it somehow.” The low, gravelly words were soft, awe-filled. She could feel his pleasure warming her like the sun.

“Who the fuck are you?” Marcus bellowed, and she watched as fear entered in his eyes.

Unable to stop herself, she moved forward, toward her mirror and reached out, laying her hand on it, feeling it ripple under her palm.

“Don’t you know?” she asked coolly.

The jolt of his eyes struck her to the soles of her feet, but she refused to show the fear that bubbled inside her along with her rage.

“Forgotten me already? I never forgot you,” she said flatly.

Ben couldn’t stop the smirk that curved his lips as he stared at Marcus through the mirror, struggling against the leather bonds, and snarling furiously. Marcus could see them now.

“Fucking whore, stupid bitch,” he spat, his eyes gleaming maniacally.

“Touch her again and I’ll tear you apart,” she whispered, ignoring him, not listening to the fear roiling in her gut. Her eyes went to the bloodied mess of the woman and her heart skittered.

She wasn’t breathing anymore.

Marcus started to laugh. “Your threat is a little late, Tiffany,” he said in a singsong voice. “The little bitch’s body was too weak. She’s gone, chasing after her tail in the great beyond.”

Rage ripped through Ben, but he lashed it down, chained it up tight. The Wolf inside him struggled against the bonds Ben slammed down, keeping the animal hidden. Death. They both wanted the man dead.

“You’re going to pay,” Shadoe whispered raggedly. Her hands slipped from the mirror and she asked in a voice thick with tears, “I want him out of my head.”

Cupping her face in his hands, Ben focused on the bond that merged Marcus to Shadoe. Through it, he could feel Marcus’ torment of her as he jeered, “I’m going to live inside your head, fuck that mind that you opened to me. I’m gonna make you suffer, Tiffany.”

“My name is Shadoe,” she rasped as her eyes met Ben’s.

“Good girl,” Ben murmured as he simply severed the link between them.

At the severing of the link, the strength seemed to evaporate from Shadoe and she stumbled against him, air burning in and out of her throat. “Good girl,” Ben again whispered against her ear. “That’s my Shadoe.”

* * *

The leather was wound so tightly, biting deeply into his flesh that Marcus couldn’t get the leverage he needed to tear it. Shifting would have done it, the larger mass of the wolf simply shredding the leather as it exploded out of his human form.

But she had done something.

Blocked the animal inside.

“You are the animal…” a soft, disgusted voice said. It was a familiar voice, one that Marcus either ignored or abused, depending on his mood.

“Shut up, you old dog,” he spat at the Wolf. Try as he might, he couldn’t rid himself of that sly, snivelling wolf that had come along with the ability to shift. It was the creature his shifter abilities had come from.

“Oh, you could rid yourself of me. Find a silver bullet,” the Wolf taunted nastily.

“You shouldn’t want me so easily dead—if I die, you die,” Marcus growled, struggling to find the path that would lead to the Wolf’s power and let him shift and tear free of the leather binding. How could there be so much? The lashes of the cat had been less than eight feet long. He had so much leather hugging him, he could hardly breathe, and his body was growing slick with sweat.

The soft chuffing sound of the Wolf’s laughter filled him and the Wolf said, “If only you knew how wrong you are. If only you had learned as much of me as I have learned from you.
I cannot die. I simply am. So I can wish for the end of your pathetic life and stay alive and well.”

Marcus had the impression of something big and wolf-like studying him as he lay struggling, so he snarled, “Stop fucking watching me! Give me the wolf back. She stopped me from changing…or was it you?” Marcus cocked his head and hissed, “It is you…the little bitch couldn’t. You did something.”

More chuffing, and the Wolf’s laughter echoed in his mind once more. “You are such a stupid thing. How did my power land inside you.”

Marcus struggled within his leather cocoon as he shouted out in fury, “Give him back.”

The Wolf laughed dryly. “I did not take him. And truly, neither did she. She just…split the two of you. You’ll have to find a way to get him back yourself.”

Then there was total silence as the Wolf withdrew, ignoring all of Marcus’ demands and furious cursing.

The fury inside his gut ate a burning hole in it as he threw back his head and roared.

Of course, none alive were there to hear him. The Alpha had retreated, pulling back from his clan. The betas hid or chased the bitches.

Well, just one bitch to chase now. The other lay dead just inches from him. The one who could have freed him, he sulked. Stupid whore. If she had just done what she was supposed to—

Not that Marcus really knew what she could have done to lessen his rage.

The last bitch was probably pressed between the two betas, when they should have been watching Tiffany. With a last, furious jerk, he stopped fighting and lay there.

Stewing, fuming, his anger roiling inside him.

When Sam finally finished cutting through the leather binding him, she scurried away on her hands and knees, her shoulder-length hair spilling around her shoulders as she trembled with fear.

She should have stayed with Linus. Stupid, stupid bitch…always running your mouth, she thought furiously, lowering her head and waiting for the beating to start.

“Get up, you little cunt,” he snarled, striding by her. He had resolved not to kill this one. He needed the remaining wolves as extra eyes.

And fodder.

Just in case the Wolf hadn’t lied.

And until he had Tiffany cowering under him, for good this time, he needed the wolf bitch around. He didn’t fancy going without pussy indefinitely.

Sam couldn’t stop the surprised gasp that left her, but she sure as hell didn’t stay huddled on the floor. If he changed his mind, she could run faster if she was already on her feet.

Chapter Six

Linus didn’t like the way the woman looked at him.

Her amber eyes, almond-shaped, exotic and cool, narrowed on his face. Behind her, Jude was held motionless, his eyes half-empty, his body sitting limply in the chair.

If it wasn’t for the occasional rise and fall of his chest, Linus would have thought his former second was dead.

How in the fuck had he managed to end up under the eyes of a Hunter? He’d gotten himself out of that situation, damn it.

“Well, now… What have we here?” the tall, lean witch asked, her eyes narrowed, her husky, softly accented voice stroking down his spine like silk dipped in poison. Deadly.

She was deadly.

“My man there, he has your stink on his skin,” she mused, lowering the cup she had been drinking black tea from. “I oughta know, I’ve been smelling that foul stench for two weeks now.”

She cocked her head, thick black braids falling over one shoulder as she studied him. “You know him. I saw that in your eyes when you walked in here. You didn’t run, though. I have to wonder why.”

Linus sighed, shoving a hand through his hair. “Would it have done any good? You can’t run from a Hunter. They will find you. You have to hope to not be noticed by them, witch.”

He lowered himself into the seat across from her and waited with a cocked brow. At least death from a Hunter would be quick, and more merciful than anything Marcus could offer.

Two weeks away from him, and still Linus wondered if the bastard was going to come after him.

The woman laughed, the husky sound falling from her lips without amusement. “I’m not a Hunter,” she said, shaking her head. The wooden beads on the end of her braids clacked together as she leaned forward.

His brow pinched and he shook his graying head. “I’ve never seen anybody more clearly a Hunter. And I’ve hidden from a lot.”

“Whatever,” she said, shrugging. Under the black straps of the camisole she wore with her jeans, her shoulders gleamed a soft mellow gold, rounded, firm with muscle.

“If you’re not a Hunter, then what are you doing with him? He a date?” Linus asked sarcastically, sliding his gaze to his ex-pack mate. “He needs to liven up some, but since I know him, I know this isn’t his normal behavior. I’d say he is drugged. Or bespelled.”

“Oh, he definitely is not a lively boy,” she chuckled. “Not since he tried to lay his filthy hands on me once we left Cross and his new lady. He thought that a lone witch was weak. Eh, he is a man, of course. I could forgive his stupidity.” She smirked. “I just chose to take offense instead. He’s bespelled, all right. Chasing his tail, caught in the maze of his own mind. So now, he is like a baby, and I must lead him everywhere we go. No wonder it is taking so damned long.”

“Why do I not think you are just being figurative?” Linus murmured, tugging on his short, iron gray goatee, stroking his mustache.

“Maybe because you be a bit smarter then he is,” she suggested.

“Smart… If I was smart, I would have taken off running the minute that bastard stepped foot into my town. I thought I could wait it out, that he’d get bored and leave. But he wants the little witch,” Linus murmured, rubbing his hands over his face, lifting tired eyes to study the menu painted on the wall. One last meal…in a hole in the wall diner.

Cocking a winged brow, she asked, “What witch?”

“Her name is Tiffany Morgan. She just got out of jail for killing a man—self-defense, plain and simple, but they put her away for six years in the next town over,” he said. “Some college punk, a werewolf that I ignored for the most part, attacked her in Buxley. I knew him, vaguely. Knew the wolf that bit him. And I remember reading about the mess in the paper. He was an infected wolf, not a born one, and young, stupid. When he tried to rape her, she killed him. She moved here once she got out of jail, on the outskirts of town. Looking for peace, I imagine. She won’t find it there. Not with Marcus around.”

The witch stilled, cocking her head. “Marcus…”

“Have you been unlucky enough to make his acquaintance?”

“No. No, I haven’t—but his name, it stills something inside of me. The Council… I have an urge to share his name with them,” she said, her voice wry. “Just the sound of one man’s name. Why is that?”

He suspected she was talking more to herself than him. But still…

“They say the Hunters know prey simply by a name, a voice, a whisper of his evil deeds,” Linus said quietly. “Are you sure you are no Hunter?”

She smiled, a tiny, evil curve of her lips that chilled Linus to the bone. “If I were a Hunter, then you’d be dead. You have much blood staining you—I can feel it. So aren’t you glad I’m no Hunter?”

“You aren’t planning on killing me?” Linus asked warily.

“I’m the last one on earth who should be casting judgement,” she said quietly. “If you can keep your hands clean, they just might let you live when you do meet up with a real Hunter.”

She rose, and like a puppet on strings, Jude followed, his motions short and jerky.

Linus sat there, staring at their backs, not even hearing the waitress as she finally approached the table.

He was still staring in the direction the woman had gone, though. Whether she called herself a Hunter or not, he knew what had just walked away. He hadn’t ever seen a truer Hunter.

Malachi pushed away from the table where he had been cuddling a plump, sweet-faced witch. Casey was fun enough…and nowhere near as sweet as she looked. She was fiery and wild and wicked. All in all, not a bad way to spend a night. But he doubted he was going to be spending the night with her as he eyed the woman who came striding through the door.

It was still swinging on its hinges as Leandra stood a few feet inside and surveyed the crowd gathered inside, a determined look in her eyes.

Hmmm…not so broken now, are ye, sweet? Mal mused as Casey drew her legs up to her chest and rested her chin on them, studying Leandra curiously.

Behind her, a man walked—forced, stuttering steps, eyes half-dead, a dumb look on his features. A spell. Mal could feel it, and under the purity of the spell, the man’s foul, evil soul lived, cursing the bitch who had locked him in his own body.

“Taking up Hunting, have ye?” Mal drawled, moving across the rich Persian carpet to meet her. His large bare feet were soundless, his hair spilling around his shoulders, a gentle smile on his face.

Leandra met his eyes squarely. “Ha, ha. No, don’t worry. I’m not about the sully the legacy,” she said, smirking at him.

Reaching out, Mal took her hand and lifted it to his lips. “It wasn’t a joke. Just a heartfelt wish,” he murmured.

A minute shudder ran through her at his touch and for a moment, her eyes gleamed hot with lust. But just for a moment, because Mal felt the distinct lock of shields between them.

Cutting herself off from him, and weakening the effects of the vampire’s call. With a wry grin, he said, “Have you been talking to Kelsey, pretty witch?”

“Save your charms for somebody who wants them, Malachi. I prefer to actually have a say in who I take to my bed. That call of you doesn’t give me much say,” she drawled, gently tugging her hand away. “Now, would you be so kind as to take this nasty thing away from me? His thoughts, they are like dirt in my brain. I need a vat of bleach.”

“Drop the spell from him, let him speak,” Malachi said with a sigh, moving his eyes from the witch to the weakling at her side.

“As soon as I take the spell away, he is gonna to try to get his hands on me,” she said, turning to study the drooling, slack-jawed wreck that followed her. “And I just might break them.”

“Are you afraid you can’t handle yourself against him?” Casey called out from the table.

Casting Casey a bored glance, she said, “The day I can’t fight a pathetic whelp like him is the day your Council starts taking in strays like him off the streets. Don’t be tiresome.”

The spell holding Jude dissolved and he lunged for Leandra, the rage fueling the change inside him and he was wolven by the time he reached her, swiping with one clawed hand to rip her throat out.

Leandra sprung away, drawing the dagger at her hip as she wagged her finger at him. “Now… What did I tell you? Try to touch me again and I’ll see you dead.”

“Little cunt, you had me drooling like a damn freak!” he snarled.

“You are a damn freak,” Leandra pointed out.

Settling beside Casey, Malachi folded his arms across his chest and watched Leandra at work.

She was behind Jude now, having him spinning like a top as he tried to catch her. With the light of battle in her eyes, she struck out, the silver knife sliding through his hide like butter. Hot blood spilled, striking the floor, running in rivulets down his side. “Silver, wolfboy. That hurt?”

He roared and lashed out, catching her in the face. She flew back, blood trickling from her lip. Flying into the wall, she hit and slid down, but had barely touched the floor before she rose to her feet, wiping the blood away and tossing her head back.

She dove forward, tucking her body into a somersault along the floor, coming up tangled under his feet as he tried to reach for her. With a nasty laugh, she plunged her knife upward, into his unprotected balls, twisting the knife and jerking it up before pulling out and rolling away from the flow of blood.

Malachi winced and muttered, “Ouch.”

Casey whispered, “I wonder if she can teach me that little maneuver.”

The wolf rose from his crouched position, whining low in his throat and in one final desperate lunge, he attacked.

Malachi stiffened as Leandra went down under the wolf, the sound of powerful teeth clacking together a final sounding echo in the room. Rising, he was at her side in an instant, grabbing the wolf by the scruff of his neck, digging his hand into muscle and bone as he threw him away.

Only to realize he was already dead, the fur receding and melting away into human form, the knife buried to the hilt in his chest. Piercing his heart.

Leandra lay there, a brow cocked up at him. “Honestly, now… you didn’t think he was going to get me that easily, did you?”

He took her hand and pulled her to her feet, shaking his head in amazement. “What in the hell is it going to take to get you to come home where you belong?”

* * *

Malachi frowned darkly into the night as Leandra spoke, telling them about the witch who had been locked away for protecting herself. If they had found her, none of this would have happened.

“He calls her Shadoe?” Mal asked, casting Leandra a questioning look.

“Yes, he does. I found her real name before I left the town. It’s Tiffany Morgan. She was released from prison just a few weeks ago.” A snarl curled her full, red lips and she said, “When that wolf tried to attack her, Cross took care of him. But she killed another one. On her own. Never been trained, hardly even knows what she is, but she took care of herself. That Marcus, he wants her.”

“I imagine he would,” Malachi murmured. “His kind prey on the weak, the untrained, the young.”

“She is not weak,” Leandra said, frowning. “Untrained…and her magic, it smells new, like she has never used it before. But she is not weak. Now she’s scared. I’ll give you that. But she’s not weak.”

“Ben Cross has been searching for years to locate a woman that was stolen away from his pack when he was but a boy,” Malachi said softly. “Right when the murders started to happen. Some zealots who thought the Inherents and the werewolves should run wild and feed on humans tried to overtake the pack. They lived in a blended pack, both were and Inherent. Many good shifters died. The girl simply disappeared when they went to find her. She was gone, like she had never been there. Her mother was a witch—it’s said she magicked the girl away, and none could find a trail to follow. Ben’s father was killed as well, but the Council had learned of the murders and sent the Hunters in. We got there that night, the night they killed Ben’s da. Ben was just a little thing, maybe five years old, and they had him locked up like an animal, using him to try and draw others out, so they could kill the non-believers, as they called the saner folks.”

Leandra was silent, listening to him, her arms wrapped protectively around her body.

“He was just a baby,” Malachi murmured, looking down at his hands, flexing them. He had enjoyed the blood he spilled that night, far too much. As one of the witches whisked Ben away, soothing and shushing his panicked crying for his mama and daddy. “Just a baby. They had him locked in a cage, for pity’s sake.”

“You think he has found the girl that went missing?” Leandra asked, gently guiding the conversation away from memories of a boy caged like an animal.

“He’s been searching for her for years. He…I don’t know, I guess I can’t blame him. She’s one of the few that might have survived. If I was him, I’d want to find her, too.” Brooding, he stared off into nothing. “Her mother was a witch, her father a shifter. She’d be a powerful one, if she carried both abilities. And…she’d likely be a lot of fun for somebody who liked to hurt others.” He blew out a sigh and tried not to think of a broken, scared boy.

Chapter Seven

Her taste was divine.

It had been close to a week since Leandra had left them, since Shadoe had knocked Marcus on his ass and tied him with his own whip, all without even being in the room with him.

More than a week since he’d first made love to her, and Ben was didn’t think he’d ever get enough of her, but damn if he wasn’t trying. Pushing his tongue deep inside her cleft, he growled against her, the demon of lust on his back riding him harder and harder.

She moaned in climax, her fingers tangling in his hair as she arched, moving her hips up, riding his mouth. Her pussy convulsed around his tongue and while the orgasm was still tearing through her, he moved up on her body and drove deep inside her.

She went tight around him, pulsing and hot, so damn sweet. He clenched his teeth against the urge to come.

This sweet, hot little witch… He’d never have enough of her.

* * *

Hours later, he rose from the bed, the moon high overhead and mocking him.

She still didn’t fully know what he was. Not completely. He had never shifted in her presence, and the need to shift, to hunt, was becoming strong. He could go a long time without it, but weeks?

It had been more than a month since he had run the night as a wolf, since he had last hunted. And the need to do so was driving him mad.

He feared her reaction, though.

She needed to know—had to. The beast that lurked within him dwelled inside her as well. She needed to know, and come to grips with what she was.

But her fear…

Sweat was forming thin and fine on his body. Moving out of the room, he left his clothes scattered on the floor, and Shadoe sleeping deeply on that bed.

He moved into the backyard, the full moon streaming brightly on his naked flesh. His skin rippled. Power flowed.

He sank to his knees, welcoming the rush as fur flowed and bones shifted and reformed. When he lifted his head, he was wolven, a giant timber wolf crouching low to the ground, then he took off running, bounding over the grassy lawn, and into the forest.

The scent of a deer, hot and rich with life, flooded his senses and he took off after the buck, hunger driving him on.

Malachi watched from the roof as Cross shifted. It was a smooth change, almost magical, silent, full of none of the hideous sounds of breaking bones that normally accompanied a shifter’s change.

He was hungry, that wolf was.

Nearly mad with the need to hunt.

But it didn’t stop him from protecting the witch within the house. Malachi felt the shimmer of a spell settle over him, inspect him and accept him as Ben ran away.

A smart one, Ben. He hadn’t tried anything as foolish as keeping everything out. Newer witches, untrained ones, panicky ones, they had tried such things, and failed. It was a waste of time and magic because the defensive spells attacked every bug and bird that flew in. No, Ben set a web around the house, something that would withhold anything evil, and cling to it.

Of course, it didn’t alert Ben to Mal’s presence. Because Mal wasn’t evil.

A bit of a deviant. But not evil.

Damned good witch, Malachi thought with approval. The Council had few of his ilk, both witch and other. Not many—one usually cancelled out the other, but it happened.

The woman sleeping inside the house carried the abilities of both, shifter and witch. An interesting mix.

He leapt from the roof, turning as he jumped and landing in a crouch facing the house.

Drawing in a deep breath, he felt his fangs start to swell and throb in their sockets. Enticing scent… What was it about the witches lately? Sweet, sweet Lori had drawn him terribly, and Kelsey—

He scowled when he thought of her. Damned contrary bitch, and then he had to deal with his own self disgust for calling her such. She was not a bitch, exactly.

She just…

Doesn’t want me…

And that made her so much more intriguing. And she had been intriguing enough, tempting enough, before. She didn’t need anything added to make her even more tantalizing.

Kelsey…

A soft, hungry growl rose in his throat as he thought of her and frustrated, he shoved the thoughts to the back of his mind. Tempting…too tempting.

He’d think of nothing but her if parts of him had their way.

Striding to the back door, he laid a hand on it, absorbing the simple spell that had been placed there much earlier, the simple hearth binding that so many people unwittingly put on their lands over time as they made a home. Absorbing it, and letting his form shift slightly, just slightly, so that the spell didn’t see him as a vampire, or as any sort of threat. As the spell tingled over him, he stepped inside.

He had gotten into many houses this way. The hearth binding spell was a simple but powerful one, the one that kept vampires out. Most vampires. As a human lived on one piece of land for a time, his essence started to mark it, stain it, permeate it, forming a barrier between the undead and the living. That’s what it was…the house was that of the living, and it rejected those who weren’t full of life. The owner of the land had to accept the undead before the land would. Very little hocus-pocus involved, and all of it unconscious.

Nothing so difficult had been done here and Malachi entered the house easily, wandering around, studying the house. There was little to study, outside of a small office.

She left no marks of herself in this house, nothing that shouted to the world…this is mine! Outside of the office that is. The office was most clearly marked, a few prints of faeries on the walls, tons of books, many of them ancient tomes she had no business owning.

He felt her wake and he paused, wondering if he should… Shit.

“Who in the hell is in my house?” a low, angry voice demanded.

Anger, fury, and indignation. This was definitely a woman who was tired of being trifled with.

She had felt him. And worse…a distinct snick settled over the house, a locking spell, binding him in.

How the bloody hell had a new witch learned that so damned fast?

At the sound of her feet on the stairs, soft, silent, and certain, Malachi shifted to mist and hovered. No bloody way he was taking a chance at scaring her. The Good Lord above only knew how she would react and it might not be pretty.

If she was already managing a locking spell that entrapped a vampire, certainly she could manage fire. And he doubted she’d merely torment him with it, like Kelsey and the diabolical Leandra so enjoyed doing.

Testing, he tried one of the few unvampire-like skills to slip out from under the spell, but it didn’t work. Bloody hell, Mal mused, settling in a corner, hovering in the darkness and waiting. She came around the corner, her bright blue eyes snapping with fire, full of rage and nerves and power. A dangerous combination.

A rather dangerous package, he mused, feeling something inside him stir as he shifted his insubstantial gaze from her eyes, down to a kissably soft mouth, the full lower lip making him pause—a very fuckable mouth, he thought.

Hmmm… His gaze rested there for a very long moment and his lust started to heat. Too fucking bad he could smell Cross all over her.

Her slender neck was left bare by the messy knot she had piled her hair into, loose tendrils corkscrewing all over strong, proud shoulders. Her breasts rose full and firm against the simple cotton of the button-down she wore, the darker shadow of her nipples catching his gaze next. Her softly rounded tummy and sleekly curved hips showcased a body that was distinctly female. Long, slim, tautly muscled thighs were bare under the hem of the man’s button-down.

Hmmm…delicious, he decided, slowly moving his gaze back up to her face. He heard the wolf bounding back, running on swift feet through the woods. The magic had called to him. Ben had felt Shadoe’s magic and given up on his hunt, determined to get back to her side.

It was only moments before Malachi sensed the energy burst that came with a shape-shifter’s return to his mortal skin. That was closely followed by the door blowing open, as targeted magic filled the room, seeking out Malachi, hovering below him.

“Shadoe? Go upstairs, I’ll take care of this.”

Malachi chuckled, letting the sound echo through the room. Ben started, looking around him, and then his eyes closed. “Your arrogance grows constantly, old man.” When Ben’s eyes opened, they were glowing, backlit with a gleaming golden hue.

His gaze flew to Malachi, locking onto his invisible form. Ben cocked his head and asked, “Are you going to show yourself, Mal? Or can I have the pleasure of making you?”

Malachi was still laughing when he reformed, holding a hand up in peace offering. “Honestly, Ben, if I didn’t know better, I’d think that was a challenge,” he said, grinning rakishly at Shadoe as she narrowed her eyes.

“You know this bastard that broke into my house?” she demanded, jabbing a thumb in Mal’s direction. “And what in the hell are you doing walking around outside naked? This nudist streak of yours is getting disturbing.”

“Nudist streak?” Mal questioned, but she barely even glanced at him before turning her angry eyes back to Ben.

“Yes, I know him,” Ben answered flatly, staring at Mal with a dark, unreadable gaze. He conveniently didn’t respond to the second half of her comment.

Mal could usually read a man easily, but Ben was—unique. Nothing about Ben Cross was as it should be, not his reactions, not his attitude, not his methods or his madness. Mal kept his gaze on Shadoe. She was the unknown here, though, and the inexperienced. An inexperienced witch was often the most deadly. They simply didn’t know what they could do.

“Then maybe you could tell me why the hell he is here?” the woman demanded.

Mal quirked a brow and before Ben could answer, he offered, “Ye could ask me yourself, pet. Did that occur to you?”

Through gritted teeth, she answered, “But that would mean acknowledging you. I don’t care to talk to you.”

A frown darkened his face and Malachi had to bite his tongue to keep from snarling back at her. A man breaks into her house, what do you expect?

Well, maybe some of the female appreciation he was so used to would be nice. Even if it did grow tiresome from time to time, at least he wasn’t facing such a sharp tongue from those ladies.

“Malachi, would you care to tell me why you are here?” Ben asked, biting the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling. Yet another witch who wasn’t too keen on the idea of falling to her knees to worship slavishly at the ancient one’s feet. Or his cock.

Malachi was too used to that, and entirely too bored from it. And he didn’t quite know how to handle a woman who didn’t react in the normal way. From the arrogant tilt of his chin and the cool look in those blue eyes, Ben surmised that again he was left floundering by this reaction, and totally intrigued, if the way he was watching Shadoe was any clue.

Every protective, possessive instinct in Ben rose to the fore and he moved toward Shadoe, resting a hand on her hip and drawing her closer. She slid him an odd look, but didn’t move away.

Mal tracked the move and as Ben met the ancient one’s eyes, Malachi smiled, a slow, sardonic curl of his lips. “According to Leandra, there is a man who is rather interested in you, Miss Wallace. Something about his name sat uneasily with a number of my compatriots. I’m here at their request.”

That caught Shadoe’s attention. Ben bit back the snarl that bubbled in his throat. Your own damn fault, he told himself. Only yours. He should have told her sooner. Much sooner.

“Compatriots,” Shadoe said flatly. “Exactly who are these compatriots?”

Yet again, her world had shifted on its axis.

As Ben’s words sank in, she sat silently on the couch, her arms wrapped around her legs.

A Hunter.

The Hunter’s Council. Words Leandra had used, but Shadoe somehow had just not latched onto them, or realized there was much significance there. Of course, she had been latching onto a little too much at the time. Like magic, and the fact that werewolves really existed.

Ben belonged to this nebulous Council.

And he had come searching for her. A Hunter who fought monsters like Marcus, Ben Cross had been seeking her for years before he’d finally found her when the trial had splattered her face, however briefly, on national news. And why had he been seeking her? Because this Council he said he belonged to thought she would be of use to them.

Wanted her to join them.

And her father…he had been one of them, before he met her mother. He had begged for release from the Council, wanting to live a normal life with his bride, to raise children and watch his family without fear that the monsters he Hunted would one day turn and hunt him.

The monsters had come, all right, but from his own people, not from the evil he had feared.

Her father… She could barely remember him, even now. A big booming voice, strong, wide hands, but so gentle.

Ben had been looking for her for a reason, she accepted that. But there was more to it than what she had thought. Much more.

“What else aren’t you telling me?” she asked, her voice ragged and rough. “There’s more, I know it.”

Ben’s eyes flicked to the silent, red-haired giant and she felt the air ripple as some silent communication flowed between them. The man Ben called Malachi inclined his head and leaned back against the wall, arms folded across his chest as he waited.

“We aren’t human,” Ben said without preamble.

Her eyelids flickered. “You look pretty damn human to me. Just because you can do magic doesn’t make you nonhuman,” Shadoe said, as a hard little knot of fear started to form in her belly.

“It’s not just the magic,” Ben said wearily, reaching up and rubbing his face. “There’s so much more.”

Her eyes moved to Malachi. “Are you human?” she asked warily, unwilling to ask what the “more” was.

He flashed a toothy, brilliant smile. “I was. Once. It’s been so long ago, I scarcely remember it,” he said, lifting one shoulder in a shrug.

She fell silent. She wanted to laugh at him, at them both. Laugh hysterically, because that had to be better than the slimy knot of fear that was forming inside her belly.

It had to be…

“Don’t you want to know what I’m?” Ben whispered, moving closer, slowly, gracefully, his eyes locked on hers. “What we are?”

When his hands came up and cupped her face, her skin heated, and she could feel herself shaking. As he brushed his lips against her cheek, he murmured, “You are safe with me, always.”

Another telling look passed between Ben and the silent Malachi, and then Shadoe jolted as Ben’s complete attention focused on her.

“I won’t hurt you, ever… I want you to remember that,” he murmured and then he stepped back.

She jumped when a rough growl trickled from his throat as he buried his face in his hands. Dizzying little streaks of pure terror flooded her belly as some wild energy filled the air around him. Fur was sprouting on those long, gentle hands that had loved her so thoroughly, touched and stroked every last inch of her body.

“Ben?” The word wobbled, full of fear. Shadoe didn’t want to admit that voice was hers—so small and scared sounding. His hands fell away and she flinched when he met her gaze, through glowing, gleaming eyes as smooth, dusky skin melted away inside him, under the flow of fur—short, thick black fur that covered his entire body within moments. It was a soundless thing, even as his body jerked suddenly, and she muffled a tiny scream. She realized the bones inside his body were breaking to reform, elongating his arms and legs, changing his sleek body into a walking powerhouse of black fur and gleaming golden eyes.

It was smooth, so much quicker than Marcus’ change had been while she fought him, almost eerily beautiful.

And she was so damned scared, she couldn’t speak. There was a dry click in her throat when she swallowed, and her heart raced so damned fast and hard, it practically hurt.

Unaware she was even doing so, she backed away, shaking her head. Nonononononono. The word echoed inside her mind, chasing itself around until it was all but vibrating inside her, growing louder and louder until it tore from her mouth in a scream.

“Shadoe, you are safe.”

The words flooded her mind, almost overpowering her. She had been moving for the door, sidling along the wall when Malachi appeared in front of her—poof, like magic—he moved so fast. He caught her shoulders, then her face in his hands.

“He’s no danger to you, Shadoe. He’s the same man he was just moments ago.”

But memories too damned strong to fight refused to let her hear. Tearing away from him she ran, bolting out the door and running into the trees that bordered her house. Nonononono. This wasn’t happening, couldn’t be happening. It just wasn’t possible.

Branches tore at her face, scratching her, jabbing her, tripping her. The moon had risen, a lovely half crescent that provided too little light, yet she ran through the woods, navigating them as though full sun shone upon her path.

Growling…

She heard growling.

Ben silently watched the slim line of her back as she disappeared, running away from him. With a weary sigh, he shifted from wolfman to full wolven form in the mere seconds it took for him to hit the floor. Stretching his long form out, his belly pressed the cool stone of the fireplace’s hearth, and he rested his head on his paws.

“Well, I think she handled that rather well,” Mal said into the silence.

Ben stared at him balefully, the gleaming gold of his eyes speaking volumes.

Malachi chuckled and settled on the floor beside Ben, absently running a hand through Ben’s fur. “Don’t look so glum, Cross. She had a shock—just a shock. She will come around,” he said softly, a slight smile canting his lips up. “Wait until she realizes what she is…or you tell her what I am,” he said, his voice full of wry humor. “That will be the true test…”

Mal’s voice trailed off and both vampire and wolf turned their heads, each cocking their heads and listening. The sounds were faint, very faint. Most likely nearly a mile away, a low growl, then the sounds of scrambling and struggle came drifting to them.

She was already letting the wolf inside her become part of her, speeding her movement, as she hurtled through the trees. They hadn’t heard a human stumbling blind through the woods at night, just the occasional crash as a branch slapped at her, followed by total silence.

And then the growling.

A woman yelling now…screaming Ben’s name.

Shadoe!

With a furious roar, Ben tore out of the house, Malachi moving in his wake like a silent wave of death.

The tableau before them was horrifying, Shadoe pinned to the ground by two men, a woman crawling all over her supine body, and Marcus standing against a tree, laughing as she screamed out in fury, blistering curses turning the air blue all around them.

“You’re so much more…feisty than you used to be. I’m going to enjoy breaking you,” Marcus announced.

A growl rent the air as Ben lunged, shifting from wolven form to wolfman in mid-leap, diving instinctively for Marcus. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Malachi coming down on the two men holding Shadoe.

Malachi had already killed the first beta and as he tore the other one away from her, Shadoe threw the Inherent bitch away and lunged, taking her down and driving a fisted hand into the woman’s surprised face.

Malachi stared up at the beta he had pinned against the trunk of a towering oak, opening his mouth in a wide smile and letting him see the deadly fangs. “Do you know what I am?” he purred.

Mal felt the fear that rolled through the small clearing as Ben Cross’ rage spun out of control. One of an Inherent’s most deadly skills was the paralyzing power of fear, creeping from them until it damned near froze the mind and body of their foes, leaving them totally helpless. The beta’s eyes widened in uncontrolled terror and the hot, sour smell of urine filled the air.

“For pity’s sake, Cross, how can I enjoy killing this bastard when you have him so shaking with fear, he does not even see me?” Malachi said drolly, tossing Ben an amused glance.

“My abject apologies,” Ben snarled as he backhanded Marcus just when the weaker Alpha was lifting his head to howl, to call his wolves to him. With a deep sigh, he stopped radiating fear throughout, focusing instead on Marcus as he leaned forward and growled, “You touched my woman.”

Rage enabled Marcus to throw the fear off and he rasped, “Mine. I saw her before you did—all but marked my claim on her. You’re too late.”

Ben laughed, the sound an odd, chuffing sort of gasp as he stared down at the lesser Inherent. “Too late? We’ll see about that.”

A howl fell from Marcus’ lips and the struggle ensued as he tried to ram a hand up into Ben’s throat, failing as the great wolfman powered him back down and lowered his head, snapping deadly fangs mere inches from Marcus’ throat. “Consider yourself lucky I haven’t already killed you…”

His voice trailed off as he sensed the odd surging of power in the clearing. Both heads swung to where Shadoe was standing over the pitifully sobbing female, her chest heaving as she glared down at the smallest of her attackers. The Inherent bitch still clung to human form, and her blonde hair was a bloody tangle around her face.

“Not my fault,” she whimpered, her breath whistling through broken teeth. “He made me!”

Shadoe’s skin rippled.

Cuffing his prey across the side of the head, Malachi warned, “If you move, I’ll kill you slowly, instead of turning you over to the Council. You would much rather face them, believe me.” Then he dropped the whimpering beta and turned his eyes to Shadoe, watching as she felt the change arc through her. Her back bowed.

“Stupid cunt—” Marcus snarled and he twisted, throwing Ben off in the brief second that Ben’s eyes met Shadoe’s over the distance. Ben turned to run after him, cursing himself for allowing his attention to wander, however briefly. But he stopped in his tracks as a soft sob filled the air.

The first change always hurt like a sonovabitch, worse than any other, because your mind was still clinging to the insistence it was human, and the fight was more painful for it.

He walked to her, slowly, carefully, releasing the wolfman form so that he stood in front of her in human skin, albeit very naked human skin, but he figured she was less likely to freak if he showed his dick, than if he stood there looking like…well, a wolfman.

“Shhh, baby,” he rumbled against her ear as he drew her straining body against him. “Don’t fight it. Please, just let it happen, and I’ll help you through this.”

“What is…happening?” she gasped, then she doubled over, knocking him back as her body started to spasm.

“Ahh…”

Malachi knelt beside her, lifting her up off the dirt, cradling her body against his, supporting her as Ben knelt in front of her, cupping her face in his hands, bending his brow down to rest on hers. Behind her, Malachi murmured, “It is just the change… Stop fighting it. This is what you are, nothing to fear.”

“Ben…” the word left her in a strangled gasp as her heels scrambled against the ground. Her skin itched…it burned, aching, hot, tight. She screamed, throwing her head back, baring her throat, unaware of the heated, hungry look that started to fill Malachi’s eyes.

“Oh, bloody hell, Ben,” he rumbled, dragging air in.

Fur started to flow, and bones broke and reformed. Ben felt his throat lock as an agonizing scream filled the air. Smoothing his hand down the side of her face, he whispered, “Baby, it’s almost over…almost over.” And then it was and there was a beautiful wolf lying in his arms, her body shuddering. She had gone to full wolf, not stopping at the half-wolf, half-woman form, and the slimly built wolf in his arms weighed next to nothing. Her pelt was a golden brown, and her blue eyes gleamed as she lifted her head to stare at him.

“You’re a shape-shifter,” he said quietly, answering the question in her eyes. “That is what gave you the power, the strength to kill the man that was with Marcus all those years ago.”

A soft whimper left her throat and Ben sighed, cuddling her close. “It’s not permanent, not even a form you will want often, just when the urge to run overtakes you, when the wildness takes over. Just rest a while, and I’ll help you back. I’m right here…right here.”

Chapter Eight

Hours later, exhausted, Shadoe lay silent as Ben helped her between the sheets. Her eyes felt heavy, and her entire body ached. “Do I have to be like this?” she whispered. “Can’t I just go back to what I was? I wanna be human.”

“You were never human, Shadoe. Your mother wrapped spells around you to keep your true nature from showing, but what happened to you let everything inside you come out. It was all going to come out sooner or later anyway. Now that it’s happened, you can’t put it back inside a neat little package,” he murmured, stroking her hair.

“But I don’t know how to do this, I don’t know where to go from here,” she said, tucking her hand under her cheek as she rolled onto her side, staring out into the enveloping darkness. “How do I wake up every morning and just keep on writing, telling stories? It used to mean everything, mean my sanity. That was what Tiffany did. Now…I just don’t know. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

“You don’t have to do anything,” he responded, pressing his lips to her temple. “Just be Shadoe.”

Silence fell for a long while as she dealt with the burning inside her gut. “But Shadoe has to do something.”

There was no doubt about it—she was one of them. Ben cuddled her sleeping body against his, the scent of her filling his head, the wonder of her filling his heart.

She was so damned perfect. The power that simmered under her skin left him stunned at times. She was full of power, full of magic.

And so uncertain of herself.

All of that made her vulnerable, and dangerous at the same time.

Tomorrow, it starts.

Closing his eyes, he was dimly aware of Malachi leaving as he followed her into dreams.

She woke in bed alone, her skin drawn tight, heat burning in her belly. The questions she had expected to find burning in her gut weren’t there. But hunger was.

Ben’s scent filled her head and her mouth watered. The image from last night of his long, golden body was burned on the inside of her eyelids and every time she closed her eyes, she saw him.

Curling her hands into fists, she pressed her nails into her palms, the sharp little pain doing nothing to clear the thick fog of need that clouded her mind. Slowly, she sat up and threw her legs over the side of the bed, breathing slowly.

She could smell him…and something else.

No, someone else.

Malachi.

That tall, pale giant with the streaming red banner of hair, and that sexy Scots burr.

They were downstairs, talking in low, hushed tones. The deep timbre of Ben’s voice stroked over her, and she felt her nipples tighten and throb. Climbing from the bed in a dreamlike state, she padded down the stairs, following the aching in her gut. When she saw him, she crossed to him, and stopped his morning greeting with her mouth.

Malachi forgotten, she slid her hands inside Ben’s open shirt, seeking hot, hard skin, the gleaming, smooth perfection of his chest vibrating under her hands as he moaned. Tearing his mouth from hers, he whispered, “Shadoe—”

Unable to think past the need in her gut, she whispered, “Hungry. Want you…” She slid her hands past the waistband of his jeans, restlessly stroking the skin she bared as she worked his jeans down.

“Shadoe—damn it, can you…fuck.” Ben groaned, thought fleeing as her hot mouth closed over his aching cock. Bent over from the waist, her hair hanging in a curtain around her, she licked and sucked on his cock, making soft, mewling noises in her throat.

The hunger was on her, the driving sexual urges that could overtake an Inherent. It had hit her hard, and fast, and it was going to pull him under with her.

Gathering her hair in his fist, he stared with hungry, fascinated eyes as she moved her head up and down, the ruddied flesh of his cock disappearing between her lips with each downward stroke.

“Cross, you must think I’m made of stone,” a soft voice murmured. Ben lifted his gaze as he felt the jolt go through Shadoe, her mouth pulling away from his cock. Malachi’s eyes were on her naked ass, bared by the shirt when she bent over. It slipped back into place as she straightened slowly, each move achingly sensual. When she turned and looked at Malachi, Ben saw something in her eyes, and jealousy tore through him. Wrapping his arms around her, one hand came up to cup a full round breast, the other hand roamed restlessly at her waist.

“Get out, Malachi,” Ben groaned as Shadoe lowered her head and kissed his hand, her tongue darting out and caressing the skin. Ben pumped his cock against the firm curves of her ass, nestling it between the rounded cheeks, clenching his jaw, restraining the need to throw her down and mount her as he stared at Malachi.

Malachi laughed and said, “I hear that so very often. One of these days, I’m going to get tired of it.”

Ben’s hands were already busy on Shadoe’s torso when Malachi turned and left. Her head fell back to rest on his chest, his hand slid down and cupped her cleft, grinding the heel lightly against her mound. Her heat flooded his hand, burning him, branding him, like he was dying to do to her.

Lowering his mouth and raking his teeth across Shadoe’s exposed neck, he sank them in gently, beating back that urge to brand and mark. Mine…mine… She is mine. He knew it. He wanted her to know, he wanted the world to know. He wanted his mark on her for all the world to see.

Such a hard demon to fight, this crazed kind of lust. And now Shadoe’s demon had come to the fore and he was powerless under the force of both.

He could smell her, the musk of her desire that was creaming in her pussy, the blood that was pounding hot and heavy in her veins. And he could hear her—the quick, hard beating of her heart, soft, excited breaths—each sound fueling his own desire.

Gripping her shirt in his hands, he tore it away. Grabbing her now naked hips, he bent her over the table. He stared hungrily at the exposed, wet folds of her cleft for a long second, licking his lips. Dragging his finger through the sweet heat, he lifted it to his lips, groaning in pleasure as the tangy taste exploded on his tongue.

Taking his cock in one hand, he aimed for the wet, exposed heart of her.

“Hold onto the table,” he growled, kicking her legs apart.

Too fast…too fast…he told himself, trying to focus on something besides burying his aching sex inside her and riding her until they both collapsed. But flowing from her was a wave of need and hunger, so deep, it nearly surpassed his.

“Damn it, Ben, please… I have to feel you inside me,” she whimpered, wiggling her hips and pushing back against him.

“Not yet,” he rasped, shaking his head, clearing the fog of lust so he could think. Everything was magnified. He could feel the ends of his hair whisper against his neck at the movement, everything multiplied and unbelievably clear as his hunger grew.

Closing his hand around his cock, he dropped to his knees behind her, trailing his tongue along the back of her thigh. “Sweet, sweet Shadoe,” he purred, pumping his cock slowly, teasing himself with the mental image of her pussy sliding up and down his cock in the same rhythm, up and down, over and over until he flooded her as she came around him with a scream.

Pressing his mouth against her, he spread her folds with a long, slow stroke of his tongue, and then he penetrated her, so that his tongue was sneaking into the heart of her, fucking in and out of her spasming core, as he cupped one cheek of her butt in his hand and spread her open to him.

In and out, slow, torturing strokes of his tongue until she was writhing against him, pushing back hungrily on him and whimpering, begging, pleading with him to fuck her.

Rising, he kissed a slow path up her spine, smoothing his hands over her hips, nestling his cock between the cheeks of her ass and pumping slowly, tears of pre-come seeping out to lubricate as he kept up the teasing torture.

“Damn it, fuck me,” she demanded, pushing back hungrily. Her voice was low and rough with lust, and her skin was searing hot, hot enough to burn. The scent of her hunger was thick on the air, closing a tight fist around Ben’s throat as he breathed it in.

He shifted his angle and breeched her pussy, sliding in just the first snug inch. “My pleasure,” he murmured, bracing one hand on the base of her spine as he started to probe, pushing ever deeper inside her, slowly; the tight, silky inches of her closing over him like glory. Her wet heat spasmed around his cock and he growled, his lids dropping low over his eyes.

Hunkering over her bent form, he started to shaft her slowly, watching as his cock slid from her sheath, the dark flesh glistening from her cream. “You feel amazing, baby, you know that?” he muttered, surging back inside her. Her whimpered moan made his heart skip a few beats before it started to pound manically in his chest. Mine…mine…mine…

A soft keening cry tore from her lips as he started to drive harder and harder inside her, his pace keeping time with the raging beats of his heart. Reaching around, he pinched her clit, stroking it with firm, quick circles as she started to sob and plead mindlessly beneath him. “Mine,” he growled, tweaking the hard, budded flesh of her clit.

She screamed as the climax hit her, the sleek muscles in her pussy clenching around his cock, milking him. Heat flared at the base of his spine and he gritted his teeth, holding the orgasm back, riding her harder and harder. He left off playing with her clit and started to stroke the puckered rosette with his slickened fingers, slipping the tip of his finger inside her and feeling her jump. She clamped down harder around him, the rocking motions of her body freezing, her entire body going still.

Ben smiled, a hot, hungry smile as her head lowered, her spine curved down to the table and she started to whimper. Pushing deeper, he shuddered as the tight, virgin little hole locked down around him, trying to resist the slow, thorough possession of her ass. “You’ll close over my cock so tight,” he murmured. “I can make you feel so good.”

Shadoe gasped, the air locked in her lungs, a scream building in her throat as he started to plunge his finger into her bottom with the same rhythm he pounded his cock into her aching core. Heat suffused her, tingling chills racing up and down her spine. She sobbed and pushed back against him, a tiny scream falling from her lips when that small movement took his teasing finger even deeper inside.

“You like that,” he whispered, his deep, sexy voice an added caress against her. “You’ll like it even more when I start to fuck you here, in your hot little ass. It’s gonna drive you mad and you’re gonna scream and beg for me. I’ll slide my cock inside you, so slowly, we’ll both damn near die from the pleasure before I’m buried inside you.”

Hell, could she come just from him telling her about it?

Then she felt a second finger sliding in, stretching her. “Oh, hell,” she sobbed, freezing, scared to move. She felt stretched too tightly, achingly full. Unconsciously, she pulled away as the hot, tingly chills coalesced into a bright burning nova, robbing her of the ability to think, to breathe. He surged deep inside, growling when she whimpered and tried to pull away.

“Mine,” he rumbled, that deep, sexy voice stroking over her like a tangible caress. “You’ll take it. Don’t pull away from me. Feel it.”

“Ben—” Her breath caught in her throat as he surged back inside. This time, he changed position so that the plum-shaped head of his cock was stroking over her G-spot.

“Come for me,” he purred, working his fingers deeper and harder into her ass.

She fought it, clenching the muscles in her pelvis and trying to pull away, away from the deep pleasure-pain that shot through her with his every stroke.

“Come!” he barked, pulling out all the way to the head and driving back inside her with bruising force.

She screamed. She came. She writhed around his impaling cock, deep, harsh groans coming from her throat. A dam inside her broke and cream flowed from her in a river, bathing his cock, flowing out to coat his balls and trickle down her thighs. He removed his fingers from her ass and dug them into her hips, pulling her tightly against him. Shadoe felt a heated splash inside her, just at her G-spot, followed by the pulsating throb of his cock as he rode his climax to the end. “Perfect,” he murmured, holding still within her, arching his spine, his head falling back.

A vibrant curse slid from his lips, followed by a long, shuddering groan and then his body came down, covering hers just briefly before he pulled her to the floor, cuddling her spine up against the front of his body, still locked inside her.

A shudder coursed through her as his cock pulsed again, teasing nerve endings that should be half dead by now. She whimpered, pushing her butt back against him. “Not enough,” she whispered raggedly. “I need more…can’t think…”

Ben pushed up onto his elbow, spilling her onto her belly. Taking her thigh, he opened her and lifted her leg up over his, keeping it there with a firm, demanding grip as he started to rock against her, tiny, teasing movements. She tried to push back against him and take more and he growled in warning. Falling still, hardly able to move in the position he held her body, Shadoe arched her hips just a little, clenching her muscles around him each time he stroked inside her, trying to hold him in.

An approving rumble left him with each little clutch of her pussy, until he was all but growling constantly. The sound fired her even more and she slid one hand up her torso, cupping her breast, pinching the hard, peaked nipple. “Ben, oh… there,” she sobbed as he moved higher against her, now stroking over the buried nerve bed with each caressing stroke. “Harder, harder!”

“Mmmm, slow down, Shadoe,” he purred. “There’s no rush.”

“The hell there isn’t,” she panted. “You’re killing me.”

He laughed and the sound vibrated down his body, his cock jerking within the snug embrace of her cleft. “I can’t think of any better way to go than this, buried inside your sweet, wet pussy, feeling those little muscles stroking me, listening to you call my name when you come,” he whispered, releasing her leg and hooking his hand over her mound, grinding his palm against her clit, pushing her hard back against him.

“Sweet,” he praised, staring down at her body, a soft pink flush spreading up from her breasts, tinting her neck, coloring her cheeks. Her face lay cushioned on her palm and she lifted her head slightly, staring at him over her shoulder, one rounded pink breast caught in the curve of her folded arm, the deep berry-colored nipple peeking out at him. “I can smell you, how hot, how hungry you are. It drives me insane.”

His words stroked over her like a hand, drawing her tighter and tighter. “Ummm…” she whispered, her eyes glassy and bright with desire. “More…please.”

With a feral grin, he started to pull out, then he surged hard back inside. The wet, sucking sounds from her pussy had him swearing, pulling out, driving back in, harder and harder until the slap of his flesh against hers filled the air, the scents of their combined hunger perfuming the heated room. Sweat gleamed on his body, the hard, convulsing muscles of his belly as he worked his cock into her sheath, gleaming on the rounded, bunched muscles at his shoulders, his arms, his back, all damp with sweat.

A harsh cry filled the air as she tightened around him again, a deep, spasming climax locking her pussy around his cock. He could barely work it back inside her as she rode the climax, her sheath tighter than a fist, wet, her tissues swollen from his hard thrusts.

“Mine,” he gasped as he started to come, flooding her already wet depths with a hot stream of his seed before he collapsed against her, resting his brow on her shoulder. Little, minute shudders still racked her body, a soft whimper falling from her lips. “Perfect…”

It was past noon before the burning, driving hunger inside her core was briefly satisfied. Ben held her against him in the shower, his muscles feeling like putty, a dazed, sated feeling pumping through his veins with every beat of his heart.

She was nearly limp with exhaustion. As he worked scented suds through her hair, he murmured, “Don’t sleep yet. You have to eat. Your body needs to refuel after last night…and this morning.”

Lifting her head, she stared at him with a cloudy look in her pretty blue eyes. “What’s going on? Why do I feel like I have to have you inside me every second of the day? You even speak and I want you again…or more. I can’t stop wanting you,” she mumbled, shaking her head.

A brief smile canted his lips up. “The wolf inside. She is hungry to mate, to be mated,” he said. “She’s been locked away from you all your life, unable to let her wishes be known. She’s making up for lost time.”

“She…?”

“The part inside you that made you change last night. Your subconscious, if you will. It makes you hungry, makes you want… It is what guided you through the change last night when you were attacked. It’s the animal within you.” He watched her face as he spoke, looking for some sign of revulsion or disgust. He saw only a weary resignation.

“Will it always be like this?” she asked plaintively.

He chuckled and cuddled her against him. “No. The wolf is merely stamping her mark on you. Soon, you’ll be able to beat her back into submission, letting her out only when needed. But for now, I wouldn’t fight it.”

Good thing, Shadoe thought later as she stared at the heaping plate of food Ben had slid under her nose. She wouldn’t have been able to fight this anyway, not now. Not yet. She was weak, tired, exhaustion permeating every inch of her being.

And still…as she watched him return to the stove to toss fluffy eggs, golden brown biscuits and crispy bacon onto his own plate, she wanted him. Still. His tight, perfect butt in his snug jeans caught her eye, and she had to clench her nails into her palms to keep from reaching out and grabbing him.

Welcome, little sister…

Shadoe jerked, her fork falling unnoticed to the floor.

A voice.

She heard a voice.

A soft, amused noise flooded her system, filling her, echoing around her. Like laughter…but not from a human throat.

You’ve been lost to me, the voice whispered. I knew it had to be so, but then… I missed you, and tried to call to you. It took forever for you to hear me. She must have been strong to keep us apart this long.

Who? Shadoe wondered, her eyes wheeling around the room, looking for the one who spoke to her.

“Your mother,” Ben answered. Turning, he met her eyes and moved across the room, setting his plate on the table before coming to kneel beside her, taking one of her stiff, cold hands in his. Then he glanced around the room, as though searching for something. “Wolf…be nice. She’s had a rough time lately.”

That odd, chuffing sort of laughter again and then the voice came, but this time it was aloud, not just spoken within her. “Brother…am I ever not nice?” the creature asked in a purring sort of rumble.

Ben laughed. “Stop playing games, Wolf. Bad enough she has to deal with this animal you’ve unleashed running rampant within her. She doesn’t need a cocky totem making things worse,” he said.

“It is not an animal within her…it is my essence.” The voice was haughtier now, and smug. Then she sensed a sort of softening in this presence, a fondness, and something almost like an invisible hug settled over her shoulders. “My pretty, precious sister,” the being whispered lovingly. “Listen…learn…feel…”

Shadoe’s breath locked within her throat as she was pulled out of her body, and she could feel herself being flung through time and space. Then a soft grayness took her and she could think of nothing else.

Floating infinitely inside that warm gray cocoon, Shadoe felt bathed in love, warmth, acceptance. Then she felt solid again and her eyes opened. But she wasn’t in her home.

A forest, vast and ageless, surrounded her and everything around her shimmered with life. The trees, the moss growing on the tumbled rocks—those very rocks seemed to gleam with life. And lying in front of the rocks was a massive gray wolf, his eyes deep satiny pools of silver, unlike any wolf she had ever seen or imagined.

“Welcome, sister, to the dreamscape.”

Although the wolf’s mouth didn’t move, the words came from him.

At her back, she felt a warm, familiar presence and then Ben’s hands came up, gripping her shoulders, holding her firmly against him, a solid, silent pillar of support.

“Duh…dream…dreamscape?” she stuttered.

“My home within.”

“Within what?” she asked, jumping when her voice echoed, vibrating around her, filling her.

“Within you, within Ben…within every creature that I have blessed with my touch and who listens to my call.”

Her eyes were confused. “Blessed… You mean, people who can change, like Ben? Like me? Like…”

The Wolf studied her, his eyes gentle, understanding. “Marcus is a being who has my touch, through the blood of his parents. He can shift from wolf to man, like you. But he is no longer mine. He cannot feel my touch or know the greater powers I can bless my brethren with. Although, I do torment him from time to time and make him hear my voice. He strayed, long ago. He is corrupt. Foul…and he has to die. Will you do it?”

Her mouth went dry. “Me?”

Rising, the great pony-sized wolf padded over to her. “Yes… You. You’re strong enough. Your man has the skill. You, more than most, understand just why he needs to die. He wants to create more like him, but he can only do it through mating. His sickness may well bear weight on his young—that cannot be allowed. Would you see him do to others what he has tried to do to you?”

“I can’t just kill somebody. That’s murder,” she whispered.

“Is it murder to put down a sick animal?” the Wolf murmured, nuzzling her thigh with his head.

Against her ear, Ben whispered, “It’s justice. That is what the Hunters do.”

“I’m not a Hunter,” she whispered, hardly able to think of this near-mythical group of men and women who battled in the night.

Ben cuddled her back against him. “Aren’t you?”

The words from last night came to her, unbidden. But Shadoe has to do something.

Lifting her eyes, she met the fathomless gaze of the Wolf. In that gaze, she saw an understanding, an acceptance that she had never felt before.

She saw home.

Chapter Nine

Malachi stopped dead in his tracks.

Bloody hell.

Both Ben and Shadoe were frozen in the kitchen, eyes staring, as though gazing at each other in wonder.

But the odd tingle in the air told him otherwise, even before he had thoroughly taken in their motionless stance. Sighing, he settled on the counter, drawing one knee up to his chest and resting it there. Long, long moments passed and still the two Inherents remained motionless, their eyes blank and unseeing.

“You know, you blasted bloody mongrel,” Malachi said mockingly. “This could be so very dangerous for them, pulling them under like this, keeping them so unaware.”

He sensed amusement filling the air around him. Then, shockingly, spoken words… “As if I would leave what is mine in danger.”

Malachi grinned. A rare honor, having the protective spirit talk to one who wasn’t his.

Nearly an hour later, a great sigh seemed to fill the room and the Inherents stirred, eyes blinking, bodies stretching, shifting around. Cocking a brow at them, Malachi said, “Have a nice chat?”

Ben couldn’t actually claim surprise at Malachi’s apparent knowledge of the Wolf. He’d been around forever. If there was anything about the…not-normal shit that Malachi didn’t know, Ben would be surprised.

Later, as Shadoe slept, her body still trying to adapt to the changes thrust upon it, he passed by the door leading to the basement.

Malachi slept down there…or rested. Fortunately, the family room was down there, and the old couch she had would hold him better than the twin bed in the only other furnished bedroom.

Another thing they still had to educate her about.

Baby, I know we surprised you with the wolf thing, and you took it well. And I know you’re handling the witch thing pretty good, too. Yes, there’s also the Hunter thing, and the totem animal thing. But there’s one more surprise. Well, maybe just one, but it’s a big one.

You know vampires? Well…they are kind of…real.

But they aren’t all evil?

Most of them are fucked up creatures, but they aren’t all evil.

Yes, that was going to be fun.

Although she had taken every surprise in stride, Ben was wondering if maybe she hadn’t realized, somewhere inside her, that she had never been normal, never been just like everybody else around her. The books he had been sending her over the years revealed more of the unspoken world and hopefully, she had absorbed some of the matter-of-fact images and language in which the books were written.

Life had just been flopped on its head for her, though. How much more could she take without breaking under it? Plenty of others had over the years. It wasn’t like they had the easiest lot.

Suicide was high among their kind, the Hunters, especially with werewolves and vampires. For the witches and the Inherents, it was less so, because they had been born into their powers. But that wasn’t what had happened with Shadoe. She hadn’t had a lifetime to adjust to this, and it wasn’t even done for her.

Was he pushing her too hard? Forcing her to that limit where sanity broke and she ended up lost?

Hell. He didn’t know. But he also knew he couldn’t let her remain in ignorance, either. Not with Marcus riding hot on their heels.

It didn’t help that she was taking this so well, either. If she’d just freak out, he might feel better. Even the few minor freak-out she’d had…well, shit. She’d taken off running from him and who wouldn’t? The first time they saw a shapeshifter. She should have screamed, run, and kept on running. Once she got out of the mess they’d been in, she should have screamed and run, and run and screamed.

But she just handled it and it worried him.

Why, brother?

Ben started as the Wolf woke and sensed his discomfort, his confusion. You have been preparing her for this, the best you can, since you first learned of her whereabouts. Part of her had already accepted that she was different, that something unknown had happened when she killed the cruel bastard who attacked her. You’ve just been guiding her down the path of knowledge.

She will be fine, the Wolf assured him, whispering quietly, comfortingly into his mind.

“How can a handful of books give her that confidence?” Ben asked.

Not just the books…the acceptance. You already accepted her and the part of her that is mine acknowledged that. Your being here when she was released further confirmed that. She isn’t alone in this world. You’ve made sure of it.

Ben dropped onto the couch, staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. He closed his eyes, pressed his hands to his face with a ragged sigh.

“It’s not that easy. It can’t be.”

The Wolf chuffed with amusement. Of course it can. The harder parts are yet to come. The question is…who will it be harder for? Her or you?

Before Ben could puzzle that one, the Wolf was gone, leaving Ben in the silence.

“First, you are going to learn to fight…” Ben had told her when she woke with the knowledge that she would kill Marcus.

She’d bared her teeth at him. “I sort of had this training. Years in prison saw to that, thanks.”

“Different sort of world we’re talking about, baby,” he’d told her. “You fought humans and you probably kicked their asses without trying. But it’s time you fought your own kind. A soldier doesn’t go into battle on his first day in the Army,” he had insisted. “Later, we will hunt down Marcus…when you are ready.”

So they walked the streets of St. Louis. Hours from home, but both Ben and Malachi had insisted. She’d find nothing in her hometown that would help her.

“All the lesser monsters, human or otherwise, will flee when a badder bastard comes to town,” Malachi informed her. “There is nothing worth Hunting here. Marcus has seen to that. Those who aren’t his are long gone or long dead.”

“Hunting…you mean, killing,” she said faintly as she walked between Ben and Malachi.

“Some people are worth killing,” Mal said enigmatically. He gestured to the alley across the way. “Like there…”

She heard it, an odd scrabbling sound that made no sense to her ears. But the soft strangled cry did.

She didn’t even remember running but now she stumbled to a halt, frozen at the sight before her. A woman lay cowering on the ground, kicking at the hands that sought to restrain her. A bloody, dirty cloth had been shoved into her mouth, muffling her cries. That was what the soft, strangled noise had been, her fighting to scream around her gag.

Shadoe saw red.

Ben had to force himself to hold back as Shadoe lunged, her small, compact form hurtling through the air as she took down the man who wasn’t fighting to hold the woman still. He had been too busy unfastening his jeans and smirking at the woman’s distress and fear.

Human monsters. Just humans, the kind of monsters that walked the streets everywhere.

“I told you not to go to the cops, bitch,” the man was saying. “I warned…oomph—” His words were broken off as Shadoe took him, snarling viciously, her pretty face tight with anger, her eyes flashing with it.

Skin rippled and this time the change was quicker, from human to wolfwoman, and she snapped out with her teeth as the man started to scream in fear.

“How does it feel?” she asked haltingly, forcing the words through her alien mouth.

Malachi moved in, blocking the other woman’s eyes, catching her gaze and murmuring, “Sleep…” When her body went limp, he looked at the man holding her arms and said coolly, “Let her go.”

“What the fu…” The man was paying no attention to Malachi, instead staring at the furred, lithe form crouched atop his friend’s prone body.

“Don’t worry about her.” Malachi gave him an evil little smile. “Worry about me.”

“You waste too much time talking,” Ben said absently, flicking his wrist as he gathered the wind elements in the air, directing them to the bastard who held the woman’s feet, eagerly shoving her thighs apart, unaware of the danger around them. Ben knew why. He could smell the stink of alcohol on him, smell the lust.

He was jerked up and away, pinned to the wall by magic. Ben smiled at him, a nasty smile that made the blood run cold.

Malachi said, “Are you going to fuss at me if I play with my food?”

“Mind your manners, Mal,” Ben said drolly as he released the wind elements. Obeying him, the elements dropped the struggling man to his feet, some four feet below, and he landed with a crash, only to swarm back up, drawing a wicked six-inch switchblade from his pocket.

“Now, you really want to put that away before you piss me off,” Ben murmured, nimbly moving out of reach as the man slashed out with the blade. “You shouldn’t play with things like that if you can’t handle them. You might hurt yourself.”

Then he kicked out, driving his heel into the man’s unprotected belly, the blade narrowly missing Ben’s chest.

The man hit the wall, struck his head, and fell to the ground, unconscious.

Shadoe’s arm lifted but before she could hit the now unconscious man, it was caught and held firmly. “I think you’ve made your point, baby,” Ben drawled, cocking a brow at her.

He was an unconscious bloody mess, air whistling in and out of a surely broken nose. His chest rose and fell fitfully.

“Oh, shit. What have I done?”

“Justice.”

Shadoe looked up as Malachi slid out of the shadows, the woman cuddled in his arms, unbelievably sleeping. “They would have raped her, passed her around like a rag doll, and killed her,” Malachi said, rubbing his cheek against the woman’s tangled black hair. “All because she went to the police about this bastard selling drugs to children.”

“All you did was stop them from killing her…you saved her life. It’s justice,” he reiterated, a dark look entering his eyes as he stared at the bloody waste of the man beneath Shadoe.

She rose slowly. “How do you know what he has done?” Her eyes moved to the listless woman in his arms, her head slumped forward in the position of deep sleep, her skin pale, bruises ringing her wrists now, bloody scrapes marring the ivory flesh of her face and legs.

“From her. She holds the knowledge in her mind, and when I touched her mind to make her sleep, I saw the answers,” Malachi said obliquely.

“How can you touch her mind?”

He smiled gently. “Haven’t you had enough shocks coming at you lately? You don’t need this one tonight,” he murmured. Studying the woman with unreadable eyes, he said, “I’m going to take her now…she needs medical care. There is a cousin of hers not far from here.”

Shadoe hadn’t so much as blinked before he was gone. Her eyes met Ben’s, large, far too dark in her face, full of fear and confusion. “I almost killed him,” she whispered raggedly. Her eyes moved to the unconscious man, and she would swear she could hear his heart beating, the breath moving raggedly in and out of his chest, whistling through his busted nose and swollen mouth.

His eyes were still closed, discolored and swelling, turning that deep blue-purple of a new bruise. Blood that had flowed from his nose in a gush was drying on his skin in a nasty maroon red smear, streaked with mucus. What bothered her the most was that it pleased her to see him like that. Hot satisfaction filled her and she couldn’t stop it, even though she knew it was wrong to have so enjoyed hurting a man.

But this man was worse than an animal, less than human. She could sense evil in him, a desire to hurt, to prey upon the weak. She rubbed her arms, and saw with surprise that she was naked, the shreds of a shirt clinging to her arms, the rest of her clothes lying in tatters around her. From changing. The wolf form was so much larger, so much more powerful, it had torn apart the clothes she was wearing when she changed.

But before she could even begin to puzzle out what to do about it, Ben shrugged a backpack off his shoulder and tugged out a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, his eyes hot on her body as he approached, holding them out to her. After she took them, he lifted one finger and traced it around a budded pink nipple in a slow circle.

Then his hand dropped away and he clenched it into a fist, before turning away. “Get dressed before I start something we can’t finish,” he muttered. “This isn’t the time or place.”

Heat pooled in her belly at the sound of his gruff voice, her nipples tightening to the point of pain, her cleft starting to weep with want. Tugging the shirt over her head, she shuddered as the cotton abraded her bare breasts. As she zipped the jeans, a weak whimper left her lips, because the seam of the jeans was rubbing against her naked folds, and each movement teased her clit against the rough cloth.

Lifting smoky eyes, she stared at Ben as he walked through the tiny alley, collecting the shreds of her clothes and stowing them in the backpack before tossing it over his shoulder.

Their eyes met and she felt the look like a caress, stroking over her unfettered breasts, down her torso, onto her belly, down to the apex of her thighs where she ached and hungered for him. Ached to feel the hard, hot drive of his cock inside her, filling her, fucking her until they both screamed at the pleasure of it, and then doing it all over again, and again until they collapsed.

As one, they turned their gazes when the man on the ground started to shift, and move. He moaned, a choked, garbled sound and his lids started to lift, a slow struggle due to the pain he was in. Wrapping her arms around herself, she watched as Ben approached him, cocking his head and smiling a gentle, terrifying smile.

“How does it feel?” Ben purred, crouching down until he was on level with the man’s eyes. The pain-filled, terrified eyes met Ben’s and in his stupor, he didn’t realize that Ben was the enemy.

“Dude…hurts…fucking bitch… Is she gone? How…”

Ben smiled and from her position, she could see it as his teeth started to lengthen, almost like a Hollywood-style vampire, a spine-tingling, frightening beauty that made him cower on the pavement even more. “What…what are you?”

Ben ignored him as he asked, “Does it hurt? Do you enjoy how it feels to be at the mercy of something that is so much stronger than you?”

“Help!” The shout was pitiful, choked, barely more than a strangled yelp. Turning his eyes back to Ben, he begged, “Don’t…please don’t.”

Ben grinned, displaying that deadly, toothy grin and reaching up to stroke his chin with a hand that now displayed long, deadly hooked claws. “Don’t? You have the balls to actually beg me not to hurt you? To beg for help? Like you wouldn’t let her beg? And you laughed at her. As she fought, as she cried. You laughed.” His voice dropped to a low whisper and Ben murmured, “I won’t kill in cold blood, but you’re never, ever going to hurt another soul again. Not ever.”

In a lightning quick movement, he reached out, seizing the man’s face in his hands and squeezing, as his lids drooped. A harsh whisper that Shadoe couldn’t comprehend escaped Ben’s mouth and the battered man on the ground screamed, arching his back up as his feet scuttled on the ground for purchase.

Shadoe had no more than blinked when Ben moved away from the man and now stood at her side, a hard, grim set to his mouth. “He has an evil mind. Very evil,” he murmured. “His punishment shall be very, very long.”

“His punishment?” she echoed, confused.

Ben smiled. “He’s caught in a loop. For every wrong he has done, it will come back to him. Only in his mind, but it will seem so very real. And it will continue until he breaks it himself. That will happen when he admits what he’s done and tries to fix it, make amends for it. That’s all that can free him. I believe in repentance—if it’s real, we should all have a shot at it. But that will never happen. Not for him.”

“So he will just live like that?” Shadoe asked, staring as the man tried to curl into his body, pleading and whimpering like a child one moment, then bellowing with rage as he threatened to eat the heart of some unknown assailant.

“Hmm. Until he has had enough most likely, and ends it.”

Shadoe suspected ending it meant ending his life.

Yes, it seemed fitting enough. And part of her was desperately pleased. The other was still horrified.

“Is this what I will do? How I will live?”

Ben studied her with quiet eyes and simply responded, “You tell me.”

She let him drive her home, or at least to the outskirts of town. But then she jumped out of the van, ignoring his voice and she left, walking away as fast as her feet could carry her. The confusion that filled her brain made an answer impossible. Ben didn’t follow her, and she no longer worried about walking the streets alone at night. She had become something more dangerous than any scumbag trolling the streets.

Circling through the streets, wandering aimlessly as she tried to filter all the new information, all the new problems she now had facing her. It was nearly three hours later when she arrived at her doorstep, in the dead of night, midnight already passed, dawn not even a dream upon the horizon.

Opening the door, she froze as something assaulted her senses, heating her blood, stroking over her like a velvet hand. Her heart kicked into high gear and she whimpered as heat flooded her before she even knew what was going on.

Breath locked in her throat, she closed the door behind her and took a step further into her house, quivering with each tiny movement. Sounds made themselves known to her. A low, husky male voice crooning, a woman’s pleasure-filled moan, wet sucking sounds that had her vagina clenching in recognition.

Another slow, shaking step, then another and another until she stood in the arch that opened into her living room. On the floor, Malachi was sprawled next to a petite, dark-eyed brunette, his tongue circling around her nipple, his hand between her thighs.

As Shadoe watched, his fingers slid out, wet and shining, and then he pushed those two fingers back inside. Closing his lips around her nipple, he suckled hungrily, and the woman arched up against him, her fingers sliding through his hair, her hips lifting to meet his hand.

“Come, Melissa…come for me. Come…”

Shadoe jolted when Malachi rolled his eyes to stare at the woman, his gaze hot and hungry. As she watched, the woman started to come and Malachi lifted his head, moving his lips up to her neck. His head arched back, and Shadoe froze, her heart stuttering to a stop. There were fangs in his mouth, not the jagged, ripping teeth she had seen in Ben’s mouth, but two long incisors, and she watched numbly as he pierced the woman’s flesh with those teeth, before fastening his lips around the freely flowing blood source.

She lunged, and the movement had Malachi lifting his head, a startled “Fuck” escaping him before he rolled to his back to catch Shadoe and move her away from the still screaming woman.

Her screams of ecstasy reduced to sobs as her body trembled and arched up, as though seeking a cock to fill her. Malachi tossed her a short look and whispered, “Sleep,” before he lifted his eyes to the woman he had on top of him, wrapping his arms around her and staring irately into her eyes.

“Do you mind? I haven’t had a good feed in weeks,” he snapped, a scowl twisting that perfect mouth, now swollen and red. At the corner, she saw a drop of blood and that only enraged her further.

“Monster.” She jerked angrily in his arms, trying to dislodge him.

“I’m not,” Malachi snapped indignantly. “I’m a bloody vampire… There’s a difference.”

Vampire—

Her brain struggled to process that. But her body in the middle of dealing with something else. That hunger, roaring inside her, burning under her skin.

Malachi stroked his thumb across her skin. “I’m no more a monster now than I was earlier, pet.”

She barely heard him. His cock pulsed at the vee of her thighs. The jeans covering her might as well have not been there as he transferred her wrists to one hand so that he held her in a secure grip, leaving one hand free to cup her ass and hold her still as he pumped against her.

“Malachi,” a low, rough growl trickled into the room and Shadoe froze. The hand holding her wrists released them and she sat up slowly, staring down at Malachi’s beautiful, hard face, his midnight blue eyes glowing with a hunger that had her belly clenching.

“Your woman called me a bloody monster and flew at me while I was having my first good meal in weeks,” Malachi said, grinning at Ben, his eyes hot and wicked.

His hands lay on her thighs, not restraining her, just resting there as though testing her. When she still sat motionless, his hands moved higher, higher, until his thumbs met in the middle over the throbbing bud of her clit. Circling, scraping, pressing, each slow stroke drawing her tighter and tighter, until she was rocking hungrily against those strokes.

“You’re touching my woman, Malachi,” Ben growled.

“Your woman wants to be touched,” Mal murmured, watching her face with rapt eyes. Her head lifted and she tracked the ragged sound of Ben breathing, held in place by the fire in his eyes.

Her body arched and she whimpered as the hunger that she had thought was sated returned full force.

“The wolf’s hunger is on her,” Malachi whispered. “Fuck me, but she’s lovely with it.”

Ben’s eyes moved over her face and his cock started to swell, his own lust roused by hers, mixed with a mad desire to fuck and possess her like she had never been possessed before.

He crossed to her, stalking them, each move slow and deliberate as he knelt behind her, one knee on each side of Malachi’s legs. Cupping her hips, he jerked her back against him, the surprised, aroused little gasp from her drawing his gut tight. He pumped his cock against the soft curve of her ass as he lowered his head to her neck, raking the delicate skin with his teeth.

Malachi moved his fingers over her clit, over and over, circling, pressing, and she started to rock her hips, back and forth, between the magic of Malachi’s wicked fingers and the pulsating pressure of Ben’s cock against her ass. Shadoe’s head fell back as Ben’s hands slid up her sides, cupping her breasts, plumping them together, tweaking the nipples, milking them. Malachi watched with hooded eyes, the dark blue of his gaze swirling, shifting, gleaming with a deep light under the fringe of his lashes.

Shadoe sobbed as Malachi’s fingers worked her closer and closer to the precipice, arching under Ben’s hands, his teeth sinking into the skin of her shoulder, marking her.

Ben and Malachi both stilled as a soft, sighing breath came to them, but Shadoe was unaware, riding the hand between her thighs, working her clit up against it, wishing her clothes were gone and she was pressed between the two men.

Their eyes moved to the sleeping woman only feet away from them.

“You have something you need to attend to, Malachi,” Ben growled. Shadoe cried out as his arms closed around her and he rolled them clear of Malachi, ending with her sprawled on her belly and Ben half-draped over her.

Malachi said slyly, “I think your woman would like us both to attend to her.” His eyes met Shadoe’s as she turned her face to his voice, her body clamoring once more for the stroke of his fingers against her clit.

Ben’s face split with a hot, slow smile as he gripped the waistband of her jeans. “Then you had better hurry,” he responded softly as he tore the denim away.

Malachi’s eyes widened and his face went stark with hunger as he stared at Shadoe’s prone form.

And then the vampire was gone so fast neither Ben nor Shadoe could track his movement. Alone in the room, Ben finished tearing away the shreds of her jeans, reaching for her shirt next, ripping it with one hard jerk, before he leaned over her body and whispered, “You let him touch you. You wanted it…” Covering her body with his, he pinned her hands down and purred, “I hope you are ready to deal with the consequences.”

He plunged his finger deep into her pussy and she gasped, rocking against him only to have him pull away. Her eyes opened with terrified arousal as he started to probe between the cheeks of her buttocks, seeking out the rosette there and pressing insistently against her until it opened and he sank his lubricated finger in. Pushing past the tight ring of muscle, and working in and out, he pumped and rotated his wrist as he stretched her.

She shrieked and tried to pull away, the hot, burning desire mixing with fear as her skin grew tighter and hotter and her hunger spun out of control. “Naughty girl,” Ben whispered, lifting his hand and bringing it down with stinging force on her naked ass. “You wanted it—you’re gonna get it. We have to get this tight little ass of yours opened for me.”

She sobbed at the painful pleasure of it as he sank his finger deep inside, the flesh clutching at his penetration, spasming around it, trying to hold him out, or keep him inside.

It was bad…it was naughty…it was so unbelievably good, Shadoe couldn’t think past it.

Electricity seemed to fill the air around them, smothering them, and they both lifted their heads as Malachi materialized in front of them, still naked, his cock hard and thick against his belly as he dropped to his knees at her side.

Ben’s arms came around her waist and he lifted her up, revealing her naked body, while he continued to work his finger in her ass, now moving with a steady, driving rhythm that had her pushing her hips back, seeking more. Malachi’s long-fingered, graceful hands—a warrior’s hands, a poet’s hands—came up, cupping her face as he lowered his mouth to hers, stealing her breath as he drove his tongue inside with no preliminaries, setting up a rhythm that matched Ben’s thrusts into her rear. One hand, cool and hard, left her face and cupped her, and he pushed his finger inside her pussy as he circled his thumb over her clit.

Shadoe shuddered and gasped as the climax hit her, coming in a hard, body-racking shudder, writhing between them as she pumped herself up and down, riding the orgasm through to the end.

Ben’s hands left her and his presence withdrew. Not seeing the nod that passed between them, she mewled, aching for the loss of his heat, even as Malachi fell to his back, taking her with him as he kissed her deeply, stealing more of her taste, swallowing her down.

“Ben,” she whispered, pulling her mouth away and trying to lift her head.

“Shhh,” Malachi purred. He started to move beneath her, working his rigid, pulsating cock back and forth between her slick folds, caressing her clit. The rustling of clothes being removed came to her, although she could hardly make sense of it. The aching hunger inside her robbed her of thought, and all she wanted was to feel it again, the sensation of their bodies crowding her, stroking hers, bringing her to mind-shattering climax.

Ben’s hands were on her waist again now, and she cried out with pleasure at the heat of his nude body. Something cool and wet spread over the tight pucker of her ass and then worked inside, in and out, until she was well lubricated. Her eyes met Malachi’s and he whispered, “He’s gonna sink his cock into that sweet, pretty ass of yours, nice and slow, then I’ll fuck me own cock into your soft little pussy. It’s gonna be good…better than good…”

His voice was thickened now by a heavy Scots accent and the rough sensuality of his words and his voice stroked over her, adding to the myriad sensual delights she was drowning in.

Something flooded the air, flooded her, a hot velvet stroke of sensation unlike any she had ever known, and her eyes locked on Mal’s. An urge, heavy and insistent filled her, the urge to sink her pussy down on his cock and ride him until she could no longer move.

“Vampire!” Ben’s harsh bark barely filtered through the haze of desire that surrounded her.

“We canna let her feel the pain, Cross,” he rasped, his lids low, hooded, eyes locked on her face. “She’s never taken two men at once. Do you want to hear her cry out in pain?”

“This is my woman,” Ben growled, and he jerked her ass back to meet his body as he spoke.

“Then give her what she wants and I’ll keep her from hurting for it,” Malachi snapped, his hand fisted in her hair, keeping her head up when she would have wilted against him. “Watch me, pet…watch me…”

His hand slid between their bodies and he started to tease her clit, circling over it with quick, darting touches, retreat and stroke, over and over until she was rocking her hips back and forth to meet each caress.

Ben growled and gripped her hips, holding her still as he started to probe her ass, butting the head of his cock against the tight little hole, the sensation of his heated flesh sliding, moving just barely against her, driving her mad. She pushed eagerly back against him, and shuddered as he stilled the teasing motions and started to possess.

The hard, thick head pressed against the hole until it flowered open around him, and he worked the first inch inside.

Her lids closed as the delirious pleasure arced through her. But the moment her eyes left Malachi’s, the pain returned and she whimpered, her body stiffening. “No, damn it,” Ben growled, holding her hips still and steady as he pushed another inch inside. “You will take it. Hold her eyes, Mal.”

“Watch me,” the vampire purred, and she stared at him mesmerized, as his eyes started to glow, the dark blue midnight gaze turning to sapphire jewels in his hard, handsome face. Circling his thumb over her clit, he stroked her with fast, firm circles, using his body and the vampire’s call to hold her in thrall as Ben pushed deeper inside her.

She shuddered, her body arching as she moved helplessly against their restraining hands. “You’re tighter than a fist,” Ben panted. “Hot, silky…mine. Remember that, as he fucks his way into your pussy… You are mine…”

Shadoe arched and cried out as he sank home and the pain of it burned through her despite Malachi’s gaze holding her prisoner. It bloomed into a dark, burning pleasure that robbed her breath as she writhed and bucked under his hands.

He pulled out and sank back in, slow and steady, three times before he stilled and said, “Fuck her, Malachi.” Bending over her prone body, he whispered, “You wanted this…take it, take me.”

Malachi grunted at the tight clasp of her pussy on his cock as he slowly forged through the tissues, feeling Ben’s throbbing presence just beyond the delicate membrane between them. “Fuck me, you are tight,” he gasped, his eyes slitted, his neck arched back as he sought to control the urges that flooded him.

She was wet, slick and sweet; every breath she took vibrated through her and caressed his cock, humming down his length, tightening his balls. Staring into her eyes, he purred, “Tha’s the way, pet. Bloody hell, you feel good. Hot, tight, snug little pussy. Take more…”

Arching his hips up, he worked his length deeper, listening to her mewling, her nails digging bloody little crescents into his shoulders. Once he was buried to the balls inside her, he stilled and then Ben moved. Then Malachi…then Ben…alternating thrusts that filled her full. The tight hot thrusts of Ben’s cock, then the warming presence of Mal’s, each a counterpoint to the other.

Breathless, barely able to think past the pleasure of it, her vagina going into spasms around Mal’s cock, her ass clenching at Ben’s swollen length, she came and they continued to fuck her. Fucking their cocks past the tight, convulsing tissues, Ben panted, swearing as sweat dripped off of him, and Malachi arched his powerful body, driving up into her pussy with bruising force.

She came again before she had even caught her breath from the first, and Ben swore, his hand lifting and coming down on her ass with stinging force as he panted, “Again, sweet heaven, damn it, Shadoe…tight, hot, sweet little fuck.”

He drove into her, harder and harder, and Shadoe sobbed, her teeth sinking into her lip, cutting it. Malachi’s hands caught her face and he crooned, “Hmm… dessert…” as he sucked the oozing cut on her lip. He rotated his hips against hers, pumping in and out, sliding his hand between them and finding her clit.

She shivered as he stroked it, pulling with them as each man started to work his cock harder and harder into her, each one nearing orgasm. As Ben sank his thick length inside her one last time, she cried out and it was like light and the world exploded around her, stealing her breath away.

The shudders racked her body and it lasted forever, the pleasure slamming into her, over and over…and then darkness blanketed her and took her down.

Malachi fucked harder and harder into her pussy even as she passed out, grunting as her still convulsing sheath stroked over his aching penis. The sensation raced down his spine and he exploded into her, bucking hard enough to nearly throw Ben and Shadoe from him.

Ben snarled as he held firm, riding his climax through to the end before he sank down, rolling to his side, taking Shadoe with him. Mal rolled with them, keeping his cock snug inside her, and both men cuddled her body between them.

An hour later, she woke to find Malachi cleaning her up, a hot washcloth passing between her thighs. Her face flamed as she saw Malachi toss the rag aside before catching her hips in his hands and lowering his mouth to her cleft. She flinched at the sight of elongated fangs and he purred, “Not to worry, pet… I won’t bite…unless you ask.”

His tongue pierced her folds, his nose nuzzling her clit. She heard the shower but couldn’t think and recall what it was. Then Ben was in the doorway and he asked, “Getting started without me?”

Malachi rumbled, “Having a treat, go fuck yourself,” before catching her clit between his teeth and sucking. Ben laughed as he flung his body down on the floor next to Shadoe, cupping her chin and lifting her mouth to his. “No…I’m gonna fuck her. Be nice and I might share.”

Shadoe’s mouth fell open and she wanted to snap at Ben but Malachi’s tongue chose that moment to dance over her clit in a particularly clever fashion and she whimpered, deciding she’d rather like being shared again.

Strong arms came around her waist and she shrieked as Malachi stood, his arms under her ass, holding her full weight on level with his mouth as he fucked his tongue inside her sheath, shifting her thighs so that she had one knee on each of his shoulders.

Ben rose slowly, closing his fist around his cock, pumping as he watched the vampire eat at her until she came for him, the sharp scent of her climax heavy in the air.

Taking her around the waist, Ben lifted her down, turning her, before he lifted her this time, and drove his cock inside her still convulsing pussy. “Did you like how it felt when he ate you?” he whispered against her lips as he lifted her up and down on his impaling cock.

She whimpered, her face flaming.

“Did you?”

“Yes,” she sobbed.

Malachi was at her back now, and she shuddered when she felt his cool, slick fingers working over her, inside her, lubricating her anal passage inside and out.

“Let him feed from you as we fuck you, baby,” Ben whispered.

“No,” Malachi growled. He grasped the back of her thighs, pulling them up against her chest, so that her weight was all on Ben’s cock. He was now nudging at the puckered opening, the slick head of his cock pressed against the tight entrance of her ass.

“Yes,” Ben argued. “Let him feed…you ask him, he won’t be able to say no. He’s dying for the whole fucking feast a witch can offer him. Give it to him…”

Shadoe shuddered and screamed and begged, “Feed, Malachi.” Desperate to feel everything he could offer her—that they could offer her—desperate to make them feel as good as they had made her feel.

Mal swore, brushing her hair away and striking, his teeth sinking in her neck, his mouth fastening on and drawing from her, sending hot lightning bolts coursing through her. At the same time, Ben’s hands gripped the cheeks of her ass and pulled her open, and he pushed her down, driving her completely onto Malachi’s cock.

The pain blistered her for a slow, agonizing second before exploding into a white-hot pleasure that arched her between their two bodies. Her body shuddered and writhed uncontrollably as she keened out Ben’s name. He took her in a rough kiss, nipping at her lower lip, biting her tongue before sucking it greedily into his mouth.

A deep groan rumbled against her spine as Malachi pulled his mouth away, licking at the mark on her neck gently as he started to shaft her, his hands lifted her up before bringing her down so that their cocks were driven into her body together.

She shuddered and clenched around them as her orgasm continued to tear through her, the spasms slowly growing weaker, each one rocking through her, leaving an echo of it still coursing through her when the next one started.

It seemed to last for hours, yet no time at all. As she finally rode her orgasm through to the end, Malachi reached around to cup her breast, pinching the nipple between his thumb and forefinger, shifting his movements so that he and Ben fucked her body in tandem, one pulling out as the other drove in.

Her G-spot lit up as Ben shifted his stance, pushing her weight farther back against Malachi. Malachi wrapped his hands around her waist, supporting her weight against his chest, slowing his thrusts to gentle rocking motions, rolling his hips against her ass, the throbbing pulse of his cock teasing her mindlessly.

Under the caress of the plum-shaped head of his cock, hot and cold chills started to tear through her, splashes of fire hitting her belly. A whisper in a language she didn’t know fell from Ben’s lips, and his eyes flashed gold for a brief moment, then wind whipped through the air, coursing over her body, and then something caressed her clit.

She keened as the invisible touch started to vibrate against her clit, squeezing the air out of her lungs. Twin sensations focused on the tips of her breasts, plucking at the nipples, plumping them together like a pair of male hands. A harsh choking cry echoed through the room as the orgasm built in her belly.

“Not…yet,” Malachi purred and she felt him sinking into her soul, into her mind, holding the climax just out of reach.

“What are you doing?” she sobbed, working her hips as best as she could, trying to come.

Malachi chuckled. “I could stroke you with my mind alone until you came—I can also hold you from it,” he purred. “Let’s let it last a while.”

Ben laughed, cupping her ass in his hands, pulling the cheeks apart, stretching her more open for the slow, torturing glide of Malachi’s cock. “He wants to drive you insane, sweet. I’m insane—you’ve done that to me, making me hot to see you fucked by him, making me want to have you eat my cock while he fucks you from behind. How have you done this?”

“Ben, please!”

She tightened her pussy around his cock, clenched her buttocks together, milking the hard columns of flesh. Ben swore and started to fuck her harder, wet sucking sounds filling the air, his cock ruddy, the flesh glistening from her, breath sawing in and out of his hard, carved chest.

Malachi laughed shakily, seeking purchase on her body as he started to pump his cock into her ass with rough, quick digs. “It has lasted long enough, I think,” he muttered. Gripping her hip with one hand, his other held firm on Ben’s arm and Ben gripped Mal’s arm so that they were locked together, her body connecting them as they pounded relentlessly inside her arching body.

Ben bellowed out her name as he started to come, his seed splashing inside her pussy. Malachi moaned against her neck as he followed, his cock jerking in the snug confines of her ass. “Sweet little fuck,” Mal murmured, stroking his hand down her sides gently.

He pulled out gently, whispering against her neck, praising her, kissing her neck, her shoulders. She whimpered in pain as his semi-rigid cock left her ass, Ben still pulsating within her cleft. He sank to his knees and laid her on the ground, draping her thighs over his. “Look at me,” Ben whispered hoarsely. “Say my name again, let me watch you…”

He stroked her slowly, his fingers teasing her clit. They never even noticed Mal leaving the room as they loved each other, slowly, sweetly this time. Ben worshipped her body with his eyes, his hands, his mouth as he rocked slowly within her.

“So pretty,” he murmured as he bussed her lips with his, cruising over to her ear. “I love you.”

He rocked within her, keeping his thrusts slow and gentle, even though the tightening of her pussy had him craving to plunge and ravage. He licked away the tears that seeped out of her eyes, and found his own eyes stinging, emotions unlike anything he had ever felt coursing through him.

“You are so wonderful, so amazing,” he murmured against her mouth, the salt of her tears on his lips.

“Ben,” she cried, arching her hips. She came with a long moan, feeling him climax inside her before his head fell to rest on her chest, pillowed between her breasts.

“I think I love you too,” she said with a watery chuckle, wrapping her arms around his head, holding him against her as she ran her fingers through his thick silken hair. “I think I love you.”

Chapter Ten

But late the following afternoon, after spending the rest of the night and late into the day with him, making love with him on the dining room table, reality started to intrude, and heat suffused her as she remembered what she had done.

She had fucked two men.

She had gloried in it, and she wanted it again.

What was going on with her? The monstrous lust wouldn’t let her rest, and it was driving her insane. But she was thinking clearly now and her skin chilled, her mind filled with an incessant blathering that made no sense, meaningless words chasing one after the other without any understanding to them.

Slowly she slid from the bed, her feet soundless on the floor.

She dressed in complete silence, her eyes on Ben’s sleeping body, praying he wouldn’t wake. If he looked at her again, she’d fall back into the spell of the last fourteen hours.

Shadoe needed to think.

Needed to understand what had happened to her, what had taken her from quiet, shy Tiffany to Shadoe, a shape-shifting witch who would fuck two men at once and crave more.

Marcus licked the inside of his cheek. The cut there had healed, but he could still remember the pain. Could still remember every bruise. He could still remember the beating he’d taken at the hands of Ben Cross.

Cross.

Hunter. A fucking Hunter. Here…and because of Tiffany. She’d brought them down on him and she’d suffer for that, but Cross was going to pay, too.

Cross had made him hurt.

And Cross would pay for it.

Marcus was going to take it out of his slut’s hide. He had seen them, watching them through a pair of binoculars as he hid on the rolling hillside hundreds of yards away from her house, watching the curtains they hadn’t closed as a vampire who walked in daylight fucked her pussy and that shape-shifting bastard Cross fucked her ass.

Marcus was going to get a piece of her ass, her hide, and her magic.

As she walked the streets with her head down, and her eyes unfocused, he waited in the house out in the boondocks, away from town, away from prying eyes, while his message was delivered.

In the corner, a small girl sobbed, crying noisily.

But she fell silent when Marcus lifted his head and stared at her, his eyes dark and raging with all the evils in hell.

Shadoe stared at the Inherent woman who stood in front of her, her chin lifted arrogantly, false bravado in her eyes.

In her hand, she held a note.

Shadoe jerked it and sneered at her, unaware of the wave of power that rolled from her, only glad when the stupid bitch’s eyes shifted and then fell away.

A small golden braid fell out of the note when she unfolded it. With the amazing sense of smell that she still wasn’t used to, she caught the hint of lotion and innocence, something forever associated with small children.

Want to be responsible for the death of a pretty little girl? Then ignore me and walk away.

I’ll take another in a week. Then another. And another. Until you come.

M.

Her fingers clutched on the note, balling it into her fist as she lifted her blue eyes to the bitch in front of her. The remainder of the ballsy smile on her face fell away under the weight of Shadoe’s angry, glowing eyes.

“Where is he?”

* * *

So now, she stood in the basement of a tiny house, miles outside of town, her eyes on Marcus’ face, careful to keep from looking at the small girl. If she looked, she’d lose it. Fear was gnawing a hole in her belly as she faced down the man who had tried to rape her. Something dirty and slimy seemed to roll over her skin, clinging to her like a cloak that grew heavier the longer she was in there. It made her feel ill.

It was coming from him…his evil had fouled the very air around them. Her belly pitched and roiled as the fear and nausea warred side by side in her belly, along with a helpless, futile anger.

Part of her whispered that she could do this, that she could face Marcus…but the other part, the larger part that she worked to keep hidden, was almost stupefied, frozen with the fear that raged through her.

That part of her remembered the pain.

That part of her remembered the fear.

And that part of her wanted to run away in terror. Wanted to scream for Ben, for him to get her away from here.

But that little girl…she couldn’t walk away from that little girl.

Licking her lips, she told herself…It will be okay…you aren’t who you used to be… Now if she could just believe it.

First, she had to figure out how to get the pretty little child with the tear-stained face out of here.

“Who is she?” Shadoe asked flatly. “What do you want with her?”

Marcus grinned. “With her, not a damn thing. I saw her playing in the yard. And I took her, because I could. Idiots like you are always do shit like this when it comes to kids. I knew it would work. Knew it wouldn’t take anything more than a threat to her. Now…we are going to finish what we started.”

“Let her go.”

“And if I do?” he offered silkily. “What will I get?”

Dread curdled inside her, and even before she asked—she knew. “What do you want?”

“You. Here. For as long as I want. Doing whatever in the hell I tell you to. And if you try to run, I’ll kill the next child I see. And if there’s a mama around, I’ll rape her while the kid watches.” Marcus’ words were flat, unemotional, and Shadoe saw the truth in his eyes.

“Are you insane?” she asked quietly. “I can’t do that. I can’t agree to whatever. For a bastard like you, that could mean becoming a murderer, a drug dealer, a million disgusting things that I refuse to do. I won’t sell my soul to the devil, not even to save somebody from him.”

Marcus chuckled. “Such an innocent little bitch you are. The Hunters would be proud to have you—but they won’t want you when I’m done.” He paused, a thoughtful look on his cold face. Then a smile lit his face and he offered, “If I give you my word that I won’t force you to harm anybody, physically, mentally, emotionally…will you agree?”

“Whose opinion of harm are we going by?” she asked warily.

He grinned, revealing a charming, deceptive smile. “Yours, since I’m feeling so benevolent.”

“And how do I know you’ll honor your word?”

“You don’t. But if you don’t make a decision soon, you get to see her die…unless you think you can stop me.” Marcus cocked his head and said, “Time is wasting, Tiffany Morgan. Will you run with me? Or let the kid die? And I’ll make sure you watch.”

“I won’t run with you. But I’ll stay here, doing whatever you ask, so long as I don’t have to hurt anybody. That means, no drugs, no nasty spells, no murder,” she said softly. Does he really think that Ben won’t come? Then her heart clenched as she thought…What if he makes me hide myself? “I’m going into town with you when you take her back. Make sure she makes it back.”

Marcus inclined his head. “So you can try to escape after I let her go? No. My bitch will take her into town.”

Shadoe laughed, a chilly harsh sound that bounced off the walls in the basement. “Bullshit. You’ll have her dispose of her like trash. If you want me, then we do it my way. I ride in the backseat with the little girl and we drop her off in front of her house. Once I see her in her mother’s arms, we go and I’m all yours.” As she said those final words, a memory loomed large…of him, holding her down and laughing at she fought and struggled.

Sick, sullen fear rocked her, but a little girl… God, how could You let him get his filthy hands on a little girl?

The small child, no more than three, snuffled in her sleep. Downy butter-colored curls tangled around her face as she slept, tiny little shudders racking her, as though she had cried herself to sleep not very long ago.

Slitting her eyes, Shadoe said, “And if you think to touch her again, or anybody else in order to control me, think again. I’ll kill you if you try.”

Marcus snorted. “You? Kill me?”

Shadoe grinned, unaware her teeth had started to lengthen, a minor shape-shift that was a precursor to the complete change. She flashed a smile at him that felt wild, even to her. The woman cowered in the corner and whimpered. Marcus fell back a step before he realized what he had done.

Then fury rippled through him and he rasped, “If you think you can kill me, why don’t you just try? Get it over with now.”

She just stared at him.

“That’s right. You can’t. You’re too fucking soft.”

Shadoe cocked a brow. “I spent five years in prison because of you and a bastard like you. All the softness I had left after what you two did to me died in prison. I can kill you and I will enjoy it. Don’t fuck with me.”

Shadoe sat curled in the corner as the female shifter, Rachel, hauled the shivering child out of the car. “Hurt her, and I’ll hurt you. You know I can,” she said when Rachel carelessly let the girl’s head thunk against the door when she leaned in to grab the shoe that had fallen off. Rachel stilled, then shifted the child from under her arm to cradling her against her chest, awkwardly, but much more gently.

“Don’t threaten my bitch,” Marcus growled.

Coldly, Shadoe said, “That wasn’t part of the bargain. I’ll threaten her if I want to. There’s no reason for her to hurt the baby.” Turning her face away, she drew a knee to her chest. Resting her chin on her knee, she watched Rachel set the girl on the sidewalk right by the house. The girl was kicking and struggling, sobbing for her mother, recognizing her home. As soon as her feet hit the ground, she took off running, stumbling, skinning her knee but back up again without blinking.

Rachel jumped back in and they sped off. “Damn it, I want to see her get to her mama,” Shadoe snarled. “Stop the bloody car.”

“So the bitch can give a vehicle description to the cops? You crazy or do you just think I’m stupid?” Marcus sneered.

“Both. This isn’t the deal. Stop at the end of the street, jerk-off, or I’m gone. If you don’t think I can…try me.”

“Stupid bitch, do you think I’d just let that happen? Don’t you realize I could easily go back there and grab that little whelp up? Kill her right in front of her mama, the cops… and you?” Marcus demanded, slamming on the brakes as he stared at her, his eyes wide with derision…and maybe something else?

“You do that, and you’re going to attract attention you don’t want,” she said softly, thinking of Ben and Malachi. “I know all about the Hunters now, you know that. And I know you’re afraid of them. You aren’t going to do something that will attract too much of their attention. Of course, grabbing me is going to do that anyway…but you go on a slaughtering spree and I bet you won’t live a week. They’ll see to that. They are close to you now…you know that, and you’re afraid, I can feel it.”

Marcus growled, his eyes flashing at her in the mirror. The insidious fear that she had tried to shove aside reared its ugly head, but she only stared at him blankly, refusing to let him see it, afraid he’d see through her bravado.

It had worked, though, bravado or not. The car stopped. Shadoe craned her neck, watching as the child hit the front door just as it opened. A weary young woman with swollen eyes saw her, then snatched her up, cuddling her to her chest, eyes studying the street. Although Shadoe could see her with startling clarity, the woman couldn’t possibly make out anything more than a vague color of the car as Marcus punched it.

Feeling his eyes on her as they slowed to a more sedate pace inside town, Shadoe lifted her head and met his eyes in the mirror. His malevolence washed over her and she lifted her chin, refusing to let him see the fear that was gnawing at her. With a dismissive glance, she turned her head away. Seconds later, her head crashed into the window as he hit her. “Don’t you turn away from me, bitchling,” he snarled, fury in his eyes.

Her hair hung in her eyes, and she tasted the blood in her mouth where her inner cheek had split under his blow. Under that blow, her fear started to shift, mixing with the helpless anger, and hatred. The hatred gave her purpose… Hatred was good, much better than that blinding fear she had been living with until just this second.

Narrowing her eyes, she met his gaze in the mirror and held it, her hatred oozing from her pores. She held his gaze and watched as the arrogance started to fade—she held it until his eyes fell away.

Then she settled down and looped her arm around her knee. It was time to plan.

With a bone-deep knowledge, she knew she could outrun him, outwit him, escape and melt into the background as he searched for her. Outwit, outrun…hide, she could do that, she was certain.

What she wasn’t so certain about was killing him—no matter how bravely she made herself act as she faced him down. And if she escaped, it would leave him free to finish the promise he had made, and that wasn’t to be allowed.

He would have to die, and if that meant she would had to try to kill him, then so be it.

Of course, I can always hope Ben beats me to it, she thought sardonically.

When he woke up alone, Ben had a gut-deep feeling that something was wrong.

The bed next to him was cold, and Shadoe wasn’t in the house. He couldn’t smell the soft fragrance of her skin, nor could he hear the telltale beating of her heart.

Rising, he paced the small room, uneasy, as time passed.

He had pushed too much on her lately, made her accept too much.

And then there was what had happened earlier. She’d gone from virgin to…whoa. Ben couldn’t even explain what had happened earlier, even as some part of him longed for more. None of that, though. He wouldn’t share his woman again.

But damn it, where in the hell was she?

When he finally wandered out of his room, he resumed his pacing in the living room. His hair was disarrayed from all the times he had run his hands through it, and his scowl grew darker and darker as more time passed.

Finally, after four hours of her not walking through the door, his patience snapped. Stalking to the bathroom, he grabbed a comb.

Not a damn hair on it.

Not one strand on the sink.

Not on the towel, nor in the shower drain.

All that long, thick hair and not one bloody strand.

He stepped on top of the toilet and looked on top of the shelving unit, his eyes gleaming when he saw the brush sitting there amid a light film of dust, a few hair bands, and a box of tampons.

A few strands were woven through the rough bristles. Gently, he tugged them free and smoothed them straight before he laid the strands in his cupped palm. Heat flooded the room, centered over his palm, gaining in strength, light starting to swirl.

When the golden ball lifted from his palm, it glowed translucent as it spun. But it wasn’t Shadoe’s face it showed. It was a child’s, tear-stained, peaceful in sleep. As Ben watched, a woman’s hand stroked over the sleeping child’s cheek and the focus shifted.

Now he was watching from a point beyond the girl’s shoulder and he could see a woman, the woman who had been caressing the girl’s cheek. Her mama, most likely. The facial structure was the same and both had a rather unique shade of hair, true platinum blonde and thick with curls.

Her mouth opened but Ben knew he’d hear no sounds.

However, he did see something almost as enlightening. Two policemen.

The mother gestured wildly, her eyes tear-filled, frustration in every line of her face, every move of her body.

The cops exchanged glances as the woman lowered her head into her hands and started to sob. The younger one moved over and sat down beside her, rubbing her shoulder, making gentle hushing sounds by the looks of it. After a moment, she calmed and the cop moved his hands, spread them wide as if to say, help me out here…

Pulling a notebook out of his pocket, he listened and nodded, jotting down a few more notes as the woman spoke.

Ben saw some of the scrawl. And a growl trickled loose as he read pretty lady with “glowy” eyes.

He would kill Marcus.

Ben raced on, keeping to the outskirts of town. He couldn’t find her scent.

He should be able to find something.

It was almost as if something had erased her scent. A town of less than a few thousand, she was here somewhere. But even if she had been taken out of town, he should still be able to catch the scent from her presence over the past few days.

But the whole damn town was wiped clean.

Even her own home.

Shadoe watched through the vision orb Ben had been teaching her to use. It hovered above her palm and she felt tears sting her eyes as it tracked Ben’s dark furry hide as he ran in wolf form throughout town, pausing from time to time to lift his head and scent the air.

Her scent was nowhere to be found.

Marcus had told her to wipe the town clean of it, and when she had said she didn’t know how, he had backhanded her again. Tonguing her lip, she winced as the pain bloomed afresh in her busted lip.

After that, he ignored her, taking his bitch to his room, and she could hear them as they fucked. Marcus made damn sure of that, leaving her in the room right next door, leaving the door open.

He was going to pay for this. Holy hell was he going to pay.

An hour later, he shoved the woman out of his room, and Shadoe winced at the look on Rachel’s face, like that of a puppy dog, full of worship and the desire to please…and shame.

She saw Shadoe looking at her and tossed her hair, trying vainly to give a pleased smile—but she failed and her face crumpled. As she whirled and left the room, still naked, Shadoe felt the smallest trickle of pity well in her.

“Get your skinny ass moving and stop moping around,” Marcus growled as he stalked into the room. “You placed yourself in my hands. Be mad at yourself for being such a weak little bitch.”

The ball he couldn’t see glimmered out, fading away, leaving darting sparkles lingering in its place. “What in the hell do you want?”

Marcus smiled. A nasty, evil smile. “I’ve never had a witch under my hands before. You are going to come in very handy. Starting now.” He started to pace around her in a slow circle as he continued, “The bank in town… You can use your magic to slide in and out without the cameras seeing you. I know quite a bit about witches. When you unleash a burst of power, it tends to fry the more complex equipment, cameras, security alarms, motion sensors… You’re going to go into the Grand National Bank and relieve them of some of their money.”

“I never agreed to become a thief,” she ground out.

“Ah, but you did. Whatever I want, so long as it doesn’t harm another. This won’t harm anybody. So get ready,” he ordered, trailing one hand down her face, her neck, circling his finger around her nipple.

Her skin started to crawl.

But she couldn’t figure out if it was from his touch or the fact that she was going to break the law.

Jerking back, she said, “If I have to break the law, then I need to concentrate. I can’t do it with you touching me.” The bravado was pretty impressive, even with the trembling voice.

Firm up, Shadoe… Tiffany would be trembling and incoherent with fear. You’re more than that now. Angling her chin, she held firm when he moved closer, close enough for her to feel his body heat. Her skin crawled. Disgust and nausea roiled through her, yet she kept her face impassive when he moved close enough for her to feel the rock-hard, furnace-like heat of his body, then the pulse of his cock through his trousers.

He was horny.

Turned on like never before. All over terrorizing her, threatening her. His eyes narrowed as she failed to react to his threatening body language. “You went and grew some balls, didn’t you? What did that bastard lead you to believe, Tiffany? You aren’t invincible. You’re less than nothing, nothing.”

At his words, she felt the anger inside expand until it eclipsed everything else…even the fear that had held her almost numb.

Nothing? she thought, enraged. I’ll show him nothing. Lifting her hand, she couldn’t stop the small, cool smile that spread over her lips as heat flared from her hand and jumped from her to him, knocking him ten feet back, scalding his flesh, singeing his clothes. “Nothing?” she asked coldly.

Like most shape-shifters, Marcus had a deadly fear of fire. Fire was one of the few things that could kill him. Eyes wide with panic, he pounded at his chest as he swore and Shadoe laughed. “You’re not on fire, idiot,” she said, turning around and sauntering away. “But I will remember how much it scared you.”

Damn it, he was…just pathetic, she realized. Why hadn’t she seen that before?

“Bitch!” Marcus seethed, his shirt hanging in charred tatters around his shoulders, his chest beneath red and blistering. He started to charge her and Shadoe whipped around, flinging her hand out. The words whispered into her as though from somewhere else, bringing her a knowledge she hadn’t before known.

“Incindiaire,” she whispered, the unfamiliar word falling awkwardly from her lips.

When a ring of fire surrounded her, separating her from Marcus, she yelped instinctively. Wide-eyed, she stared around her at the barrier of fire. “Wow,” she murmured. Then, unable to stop the cocky smile on her face, she met the shape-shifter’s eyes insolently.

In his eyes, she saw the knowledge that maybe he had bitten off more than he could chew.

And Shadoe finally started to realize it, as well. He was weaker than she was… As that knowledge flooded her, she lifted her head, staring at him squarely, feeling the chains of fear that had bound her slowly flow away. Holding out her hand, she let it hover above the flames for a moment, before lowering it, palm down to the ground. As her hand moved, the flames died down until they winked out completely. Facing Marcus, she said softly, “The scared little girl you went after years ago is gone, Marcus. Deal with it.”

The fear in his belly made him mean.

He wanted to strike out, to hurt, to maim. But the one he wanted to hurt the most seemed to be out of his reach. For now.

Okay. She wasn’t just a shifter, and that stink of magic had meant something, too. She had a few tricks up her sleeve and she was more of a handful than he’d expected her to be.

Refusing to acknowledge it before now had kept him from having to acknowledge that he had been wrong when he’d thought Ben and the Hunter vampire were the ones with the power.

If he wanted to win this battle, he needed to see it for what it was. He might be a little outmatched. He needed to level the playing field a little, and he needed to do it soon, before the Hunter fucks caught up with him.

Dumas was only spoken of in soft, hushed whispers. Too many people feared him. He moved around like a Gypsy and was harder to track than dust in the wind.

But where there was a will, Marcus told himself.

Finally, by the end of the day, he had something. Not a location, but a contact. And the possibility of money—in exchange for a Hunter’s bitch.

“Fuck the bank, I have a better idea,” he announced to the small group of people.

Tiffany was still on the couch where she had been sitting since earlier that morning. The food he had ordered Rachel to fix for her sat untouched. Narrowing his eyes, he said, “You haven’t eaten. Not once since you came down here.”

“So sorry. The sight of you all makes me lose my appetite… I may never be able to eat again,” she drawled. Her eyes were cold, disdainful.

He wanted to see them bright with fear again. With terror.

The few times fear had broken through with her, she had smashed it. She was laughing at him, silently, mockingly. “Eat the damn food—that’s an order, bitch, otherwise I go grab me a snack,” he spat, shooting across the room and bending over her, fisting his hand in her hair.

Something moved in her eyes for the briefest of seconds. “I’m not hungry,” she said, slowly enunciating as though speaking to an imbecile.

“Hungry or not, eat the damn food. I know using magic will make you burn off your reserves and you have to replenish them. If you think to kill yourself through starvation…think twice. I will make you regret that choice, bitch, believe me.”

Marcus lifted his lip in a cold smile as she reached for the sandwich, her eyes shining with hate.

“Good bitch,” he whispered into her ear before releasing her hair.

Turning his eyes to the werewolves, he ignored Tiffany as she slowly ate. “We’re heading out, going to find us some fresh hunting ground. Be ready to leave as soon as I tell you,” he said, grinning wildly.

Soon…

* * *

Malachi grimaced as Ben plowed his fist into a wall.

Two days.

It had been two days since she had disappeared and there was no fucking sign of her, of Marcus, or the remaining wolves of the old pack. She had disappeared without so much as a fucking trace and Ben had pushed himself to his limits, but without success.

“Call for help,” Malachi finally said, his voice quiet. “You need a witch who is closer to her level. Then maybe we can find her. You’re good, Cross. But she is phenomenal. We need a phenomenal witch to locate her, to power past the roadblocks she has thrown up.”

“Where is she? Why did she hide herself, damn it? Bloody fuck, how did she know how to hide herself?” Ben snarled, whipping around and staring at Malachi across the room.

The muscles in Cross’ face were rippling, and his eyes glittered red with his rage. Malachi had to tamp down his own instinctive emotions that rose in response to such fury.

“She had no choice. Or at least Marcus convinced her of that,” Malachi answered simply. “She’s young, and not a true, trained Hunter either. She doesn’t know that all she had to do was whisper his name to us and he was dead. Chances are, boy, he threatened another child. Offered to release the one he had, and leave others alone in return for her good behavior. We know he’s a lying sack of shit, easily dealt with. She’s still got to figure that out.”

“She could kill him,” Ben snapped, plowing a hand through his hair. “With just a damn thought, she could end his life. With one touch she could kill him.”

Malachi said softly, “I don’t think she’s realized that yet. Give her a break. A month ago, she was just…human. Or she thought she was. She’s adjusting well enough, but we haven’t exactly equipped her to handle everything we’ve thrown at her.” He pushed away from the wall and walked over to Cross, the long coat he had shrugged into flapping around his ankles. His heavy mane of hair was woven into a tight braid and hanging over one broad shoulder in a fiery rope. Catching Ben’s arm, he brought the wolf to a halt and waited until that flashing, heated gaze met his. “Call for help. You need another witch, Cross. Do it. Now. Before it’s too late. She can kill him with a thought, you know that. And soon, he’s going to figure it out. He can’t control her, so he will give her to somebody who can.”

Chapter Eleven

Malachi stood in the corner, a silent, foreboding figure, as Ben trailed a wet hand down a mirror, speaking in some language Malachi suspected only the witches of the Council knew.

He had seen this done enough to know that Ben was placing a summons to another witch. If she was by chance near any reflective surface, she’d feel the summons and touch her hand to the surface and her face would waver into view. If she wasn’t, then a bell would echo the moment she neared, summoning Ben.

Who will he call?

Kelsey? Most likely. Sarel and Lori were powerful things, but Cross would go straight for the most powerful for his woman, one who had all the knowledge age could provide. At least, that was Malachi’s theory. He might even summon Agnes, although she was so very ancient, even for a witch, that she’d not be leaving her native England for anything short of a Doomsday sort of thing.

But the face that slowly came into view wasn’t one that Malachi had been expecting.

Leandra.

From what he could tell, she was in Excelsior. A slow smile spread across Malachi’s face.

Bloody hell. She had done it.

Her eyes met his briefly, and he felt something, a pride he rarely allowed himself, pride in doing something momentous, as she gave him a slow nod. In her eyes, he saw the beginnings of self-acceptance.

Which meant she was forgiving herself.

“What do you want, Cross?” she asked curiously. One black brow winged up and she cocked her head.

“Your help,” Ben said levelly. His eyes flickered as he looked past her shoulder and saw where she was, the library, unmistakable, vast, full of things of power that were better left alone. “You are at Excelsior.”

She inclined her head. “Somebody opened my eyes.” She glanced around her with blank eyes, but when she looked back at them, both of them could sense the awe that filled her. “I was getting ready to leave, even though that bastard Malachi had said things that made me head spin as I tried to take it in. I was leaving. And they stopped me. I thought at first they were going to do what I’ve been waiting on for years. I thought I was dead. And I was relieved that it was over,” she murmured.

“But they didn’t want me dead. Agnes was with them—she left England for me.” Chuckling, she met Ben’s eyes. “They are afraid of me, many of them. Just like you said. But not her.” Something entered her eyes that Malachi suspected was very foreign. Love, for that old woman. “Not her. She tells me that it is time I face myself. Because I can never be what I was meant to be until I can let go of my own anger. ‘Face yourself’, she told me. ‘And be free.’”

Yearning entered her voice. “I’ve never been free. But I’d like to be.”

Then she sighed and shrugged. “You knew what would happen if I got here, you bastard. You knew.”

“And are you finding that freedom?” Malachi asked.

She glanced past Ben’s shoulder. “I’m working on it.”

The moment passed then, and her old arrogance returned. Crossing her arms over her chest, she said, “You keep summoning me like this, Cross. What you want from me this time?”

The amazing thing about a flier, Ben mused, you could speak with them from thousands of miles away one moment, and then be facing them in the next.

He hadn’t even had time to finish explaining when she pressed her hand to the mirror, cancelling the spell. He was growling, furious, and ready to blast her when the air around him tightened.

She was standing in front of him five seconds later, a pack in one hand, and an apple in the other. She crunched into the shiny red fruit and chewed as she met his eyes.

After swallowing, she lifted the apple for a second bite, but first she said, “You could have gotten any witch you wanted here. Why me?”

“Because you can fight. I want a warrior as well as a scholar. Only a few of us fit that bill, Leandra. And for the record…I didn’t pick you specifically. I reached out. You answered. Basically, you chose yourself,” he said.

She ate more of the apple, insolence written in every line of her body, all over her exotic face. “Uh huh.”

Malachi laughed. “She has got to be the cockiest bitch I’ve ever met. Damn it, I like you, Leandra,” he said, shaking his head.

She arched a brow and turned away, a dismissive look on her face.

Poor kid. The thought came abruptly to Ben’s mind as he watched her walk away, looking anywhere but at them. How alone she must have been, all of her life.

But he forgot the momentary distraction when Leandra lifted a book that Shadoe had been flipping through for the past few weeks. Her eyes closed and her head fell back.

“You can’t track her scent. I’ve already tried. She erased her touch, her scent from everything,” Ben said quietly.

“Not from her—I can feel her. A soul like mine,” she whispered. “I recognized that the moment we saw each other. And so did she.” Her eyes opened, and something odd passed through them, almost eagerness, wonder. “A soul like mine… Surrounded by evil.”

Then her face drew tight with strain, and rage made her eyes start to gleam. She said, “The man with her is taking her to Louisiana. There’s a man there he plans on giving Shadoe to. He wants her broken, and he can’t do it.”

Fury flooded Ben, and with it, the primal power of the Wolf, straining inside his skin, yearning to be free and to start the Hunt. His muscles spasmed and skin rippled like water—he fought it back.

“We leave now,” he said quietly. “Nobody touches what is mine.” The setting sun was shining through the cracks in the blinds, true dark still an hour away. Casting the streams of light a glance, he told Malachi, “I’m assuming you’ll have no trouble catching up with us?”

Malachi grinned. “Well, if I let you leave without me, I’d catch up easy enough. But there’s no need for me to linger here.” His face went blank as he spoke, and Ben bit down the questions that rose. But he understood well enough what the vampire didn’t say. The sun was very little, if any, deterrent to him.

Hell, were all the tales he’d heard of Malachi true? Of course, if they were, that made him an even more powerful ally than Ben had expected.

Leandra couldn’t get over watching a vampire walk in the daylight.

She’d heard of Torrance O’Reilly, now known as Torrance Donovan. The Huntress was supposed to be only legend, a young vampire who could blend in with the mortals, one who had all of the vampires’ strengths, none of their weaknesses.

But Malachi wasn’t of her ilk. He was pure vampire, and as he flipped on a pair of shades, covering eyes that squinted at the sunlight, she suspected he had many of their weaknesses. He just had a higher tolerance. One that was probably close to immeasurable.

Her skin buzzed just being close to him. Everything about her felt pushed to the maximum of sensation, from the buzzing of her skin, the tightening of her nipples, the hot little flashes that hit her belly every time he turned those midnight blue eyes her way.

His eyes, his hands, everything inside of him, everything that made him Malachi, had the power to draw.

Yet, as she slid back behind her shields, it faded, dying down, until looking at him was like looking at the ancient works of art she had seen in Milan. Awe-inspiring, but not for her.

Of course, she did have to admit a bit of envy for the woman that man was meant for.

She folded her long legs up as she climbed into the SUV, leaving the front seat for the vamp and the Inherent. With a wry grin, she wondered if SUVs had become the mode of transportation for the paranormal population by choice or by chance. How many SUVs had she ridden in since she had fallen in with those she used to hunt? Cross had driven one, Kelsey, three of the Hunters who had tagged her in New Mexico…

And Mike…he’d driven one.

Clenching her jaw, she ordered herself not to think of him. That one would be her undoing.

Settling down, she closed her eyes and focused once more on the other woman. That done, the thoughts of the man she had damn near killed faded. For the moment.

Cradling the book in her hands, she murmured, “We’re coming, girl. We’re coming.”

* * *

Shadoe was in trouble.

She knew it the moment she stepped through the door of the isolated monolith on the outskirts of Baton Rouge. The trees damn near hid the thing from view. And some ancient magic hid it from the senses. She could feel those spells part around her as Marcus drove, following the pathway that was leading her to her doom, for certain.

Nobody would know this place was here, unless they already knew of its existence.

Lost in a forest of cypress trees and grand oaks, the front lawn dotted with magnolia trees that filled the air with a sweet perfume, it was an isolated world from an era long gone.

It was lit by candlelight and magic.

As she followed Marcus down the hall, she could feel the weight of that magic pressing in on her, testing her.

And eyes. She could feel eyes on her, eager to discover her secrets. Swallowing her fear, she took stock, reaching out the way Ben had showed her.

Only to be flung back, as though an unseen hand struck her across the face, she went flying.

Her head struck the wall and she crumpled, unconscious, to the ground.

“Fuck, Pierre, was that necessary?” Marcus growled, as he turned and watched Tiffany hit the ground.

“You should have told your bitch to keep her hands to herself,” a soft, accented voice murmured.

Out of the shadows he came, a slimly built man with gilt-colored hair falling to his ass in loose waves.

“She’s not my bitch,” Marcus said with a tiny grin. “I’d planned on selling her to you.”

Pierre gave the crumpled body a negligent glance and said, “Why should I want her?”

“Because she belongs to the Hunters,” Marcus replied easily.

When Pierre’s grass green eyes lit with interest, Marcus almost rubbed his hands together in satisfaction.

He had him. Oh yes…he had him.

* * *

As he followed the naked ass of one of Pierre’s slaves into the formal dining room, he took stock, eyeing a huddled body in the corner with hunger.

“Have her, if you like,” Pierre said. “I have something much more appetizing to look forward to now.” He moved his eyes to the ceiling. In the rooms above, his new toy was being stripped and bathed clean of the scents of the men she had been fucking, and clean of the scents that had soaked into her pores while she had been with Marcus.

Pierre Dumas could smell the scent of a wolf. Inherent, he was fairly certain. And there had been another scent, faint, but oddly familiar.

Pierre wasn’t sure what that one was.

Not that it mattered. She belonged to him now.

And the Hunters didn’t even know he existed.

His magic took care of that. Wiping his touch clean every time he moved on, choosing his prey wisely, he had eluded the eyes of the Hunters for five centuries.

It was an amusing game to him, a game of chess they didn’t even know they were playing.

But Pierre had grown tired, of late, of playing in the shadows.

And too many of the vamps he had sired were dying by the wayside. None had managed to find their way into the esteemed Council. And he had sired many, hoping for just that.

Offspring of his inside the Council meant he was inside the Council. He could slide inside the mind and never leave any trace of his passing. None of the others he had ever touched had remembered. They didn’t even remember his face after they had been sired, couldn’t recall the specifics of anything.

And he liked it that way.

Operating in the dark gave him freedom. Made it easier to hunt without being “Hunted”.

Although a select few did know of him.

Men like Marcus, who could be of value to him.

Pierre smiled at the woman who knelt between his thighs. Her lips were wrapped around his cock, sliding up and down with practiced moves, a smile dancing in her eyes.

By the corner of one of her lids, a tattoo winked.

Leandra said, “She’s in a house, but I cannot read her. She was there one moment, gone the next, like a wall came down.”

Behind that wall, something ancient lurked. She sensed the great power, the great age.

Ben blew out a breath and asked, “If we drive around, do you think you’ll be able to pick anything up?”

Leandra lifted one shoulder. She didn’t like this. She felt blind…too blind. Something odd was going on and she didn’t know how to handle it. The gifts she had alternately cursed and relied upon throughout her life didn’t seem to be working right now. As though something was blocking her.

Malachi frowned. “Something is blocking you,” he murmured, ignoring the dumb look on her face when her jaw dropped open.

A mindreader…he can read my damn mind? She knew vampires could skim through the thoughts of mortals, but damn it, she wasn’t a mortal, it shouldn’t be that bloody easy.

He cast a glance. “It’s not as easy as all that, unless you go broadcasting your thoughts like you just did, pet. The words were on your face, in your eyes. I didn’t have to read a bloody thing,” he said, quirking a brow. “Until you went and shouted just now, a mindreader… I hadn’t ever breached your mental walls. Not that I had tried.”

Her cheeks flushed but her dismay faded as Malachi started to…hell, she didn’t know how to describe what she was seeing. He just suddenly became more, his eyes glowing as though lit from within, his fangs dropping, and he even seemed larger, as though he was looming over her and Ben. Power rippled from him, the power of his very presence, stumping her into momentary silence.

It was having a similar effect on Ben and the shifter didn’t like it. She had to fight the urge to throw herself at his feet, although there might be some interesting things to do while down there. Ben, on the other hand, wouldn’t find anything worthwhile in submitting to the ancient one and the urges rolling through him were making him uneasy, restless, enough that she could see wildness swirling in his eyes as the wolf within him started to wake.

“There’s something here that shouldn’t be… Where is the closest Hunter? Is it a vamp? A wolf pack?”

Ben slowly said, “There’s a pack on the other side of New Orleans. A vamp at the border. Eli commented that it’s not a good idea to have too many of our kind around here. Too many people seem to look for us here, even though most of humanity doesn’t even believe in us. We have to keep a low profile in this sort of place. But a few members from the pack are full Hunters and they live within the city.”

“Any witches? No vampires closer than the border?”

Ben frowned. “Nobody wants any territory here. The pack is several hundred years old, one of the oldest in the country, but once several of the pack members were recruited by the Council, nobody ever felt the desire to settle here. The few kids we take from here that are inclined to become Hunters don’t want to come back. It’s watched, order is maintained.”

“Is it really?” Malachi mused. Shaking his head, he said, “There is something here that shouldn’t be. A blackness, a cloud…”

“There’s nothing here, Mal. I don’t sense a damn thing,” Ben said, brushing it aside. “We need to get moving and find Shadoe.”

Leandra shivered, as something raced down her spine at Malachi’s words. But she forgot her unease within the hour.

And as they drove, Ben grew more agitated. Shifting in his seat, slapping one broad hand against a muscled thigh, his eyes darting over the buildings and the people with a blankness that made her worry.

But as a long, powerfully built sax player on the street corner caught her eye, she forgot even her worry.

And why they were there.

Malachi felt cold dread settle in him as Ben tossed him an aggressive, challenging glance.

Bloody hell there wasn’t something there.

Ben had just circled the same block three times and was now parked at the side of the street, his eyes locked on the slender ebony-skinned woman who was dancing at the side of the sax player.

The heat had both the witch and the shape-shifter sweating lightly, the evening breeze that floated through the open windows doing little to cool them.

It didn’t affect Malachi—under normal circumstances, he would have enjoyed the scent of life that was hovering just outside the black SUV.

However, this wasn’t normal. Something was wrong…very, very wrong.

“How is staring at that pretty thing helping you find Shadoe?”

Ben tossed a disinterested glance as he reached for the door. “Who?”

Bloody hell…

Malachi was slow to move as he assimilated that response. The blankness in Ben’s gaze, the restlessness and loss of purpose now written in his eyes. He turned his head to speak softly to Leandra, only to see her sliding to the edge of the seat, her amber eyes locked on the bald, powerfully built man who was playing the sax, the sleek, ebony beauty pressed up against his back, her hands on his hips as they danced for their audience.

“Leandra,” Malachi whispered, dropping his shielding a bit.

He saw her response in the way she licked her lips, how her nipples stiffened under the confines of her shirt and bra. Cocking her head, she stared at him with a puzzled look on her face. “Ummm,” she purred, shifting forward and resting her cheek on the side of Ben’s seat, her eyes locked on Mal’s face.

“Isn’t there something you’re supposed to be doing?” he asked quietly.

“Besides going over there and getting that man away from his horn long enough to fuck me?” she asked, grinning cheekily.

Oh, that decides it, something is definitely not right. Shaking his head, Malachi leaned closer until they were nose to nose. “Wake up, witchling… Something isn’t right. You came here to do something. What was it?”

Her eyes clouded and she frowned. “I’d rather be over there with him. I’d rather do him than whatever it was,” she drawled, but he could see the confusion in her eyes. Canting her head to the side, she worried her lip with her teeth. “I don’t know…looking. I was looking for something. For—somebody.”

“Aye, you were.” He waited.

“A woman.” A shudder racked her body and her hands shot up, plowing through her braids, clutching them in her hands. “I can’t think. What is wrong with me?”

“A strong one, too. I feel it pounding at my mind, trying to get inside me.” He could feel it, battering at him, but he was far too old, far too powerful for something as meager as a spell to break into his mind.

Leandra and Ben on the other hand…it had gotten to them.

Leandra’s eyes were starting to glow now, Mal observed. Reaching out, he laid a hand on her skin and dropped his shields, watching as her body arched up and a startled gasp fell from her lips. Her eyes glowed hot and hungry and then she started to swear.

“Fucking vampire, what are you doing?” she snapped, jerking away and flinging herself against the back of the seat, lust rolling from her in waves. Her nipples were hard and peaked, swelling against the front of the plain black T-shirt she wore, and he could smell the heat gathering inside her. His own cock jerked in response and he felt like swearing in return.

But her eyes were clear.

“Are you aware now, witchling?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

“Damn straight I’m aware, you bastard. What were you thinking?” she snarled. Then her face cleared and her eyes went cold as that awareness trickled through, bringing with it memory. Her eyes moved to the sax player and she licked her lips, a nervous reaction as she tried to move her mind around what had damn near overtaken her. “What in the holy hell was that?”

“A spell. A very strong spell,” he reiterated. “It’s heavier than a rain cloud, hanging over the whole bloody city and catching everybody inside within its net.”

“How…how can that be possible?” she asked, her voice faint. “That would take so much energy, so much strength…the witch would have to be more than ancient to have built up enough energy to lay the spell, and keep it up all the time. It would take the power of centuries to create and maintain. Witches don’t live that long.”

“Not unless they’ve bonded with vampire or an Inherent, no. The bond would let her live as long as her mate’s normal lifespan. But if that is the case—” his words fell off ominously as the light in his eyes started to pulse with rage. “Why haven’t the wolves in the pack made us aware?”

“If it’s that powerful, they may have fallen prey to it as well,” Leandra whispered, swallowing the knot of fear in her throat, her eyes moving away from Malachi’s.

“Aye. They do whatever Hunting this witch lets them do to keep them thinking they are doing their bloody job,” he growled, his fangs aching and throbbing, his eyes incandescent in his anger. “Just enough, and no more.”

His rage was rolling from him in overpowering waves and he saw the reaction it was causing in her. He could see her nervousness as she moved her eyes away to keep him from seeing the angry spark his rage unwillingly lit within her. Could see it in the way she carefully inched back, all moves made in the least threatening way possible. She knew how to avoid rousing a dominant monster’s anger, knew how to avoid setting off any kind of confrontation, even when it sparked her own anger.

Swallowing it down, banking it, he said softly, “Be easy, Leandra. We need to get Cross.”

Ben had seduced the dancer into leaving the sax player and he had her currently backed up against an ivy-covered fence, leaning into her, sexual interest written in every line of his body. As he lowered his mouth to whisper in her ear, he skimmed one hand down her side, the heel of his hand stroking the outer curve of her breast.

Her eyes were hot, almost drugged.

“Bleeding hell,” Malachi swore. “He’s pulling her in.”

Leandra cocked a brow.

“You’ve been around Inherents long enough to know they can leak fear almost as well as a vampire, they can inspire it, cause it whenever they want in a lesser being. Somebody whose will isn’t as strong as his own…you know this?”

She cocked her head, waiting.

“They can do the same with lust. An Inherent can be the most seductive creature you’ll ever meet—it’s in their nature,” Malachi said, climbing from the car, Leandra at his back. “And he’s not bothering to hide any of his nature from her.”

“So I see,” Leandra murmured, angling her head and licking her lips as Ben slid his hand inside the dancer’s form-fitting shirt, pushing dangerously close to one firm, jutting breast.

“Fuck me, if he has five more minutes, he’ll be fucking her on the street and then we’ll have to get him out of jail,” Malachi snapped, striding forward.

“Cross,” he said, leaning his mouth down and rasping the word in the shifter’s ear.

“Get the fuck away, buddy,” Ben said, jamming his elbow back into Mal’s stomach. His hand was cupping her breast now, and from the look of it, his fingers were tugging the nipple. The woman was limp and already nearly mad with hunger.

Malachi could smell it on her, and smell Ben’s rising lust. The sharp pain in his belly faded quickly and Malachi thought it was a damn good thing that a cop hadn’t seen this display and gotten to them. If Ben had jabbed that elbow at a mortal and not a vampire, it would have done internal damage just from the force of the blow.

“You aren’t here to get laid,” Malachi said flatly as he reached out and fisted his hand in Ben’s hair, jerking him backward.

Ben let the woman go as he pulled free, whirling on Malachi and tensing to lunge.

“Cross…”

Malachi tensed as Leandra’s voice rolled over them, soft and seductive. She swayed between them, her hips rolling seductively, her nipples hard and pebbled under her shirt. Malachi started to swear, but then the gleam in her eyes had him relaxing.

Damn it, this was getting annoying as hell.

The woman was staring at Leandra with rage in her eyes, because Ben was now circling around Leandra like a caged animal, full of hunger, full of lust. His cock was swelling against the fly of his jeans and his eyes were glowing. And they were attracting far too much attention.

Ben jerked her up against him, fisting one hand in the thick, dark dense braids, lowering his head. The other hand he kept on her hip, holding her firmly against his groin as he rocked his hips into hers.

She smiled seductively as she reached up and laid one hand against his cheek.

Malachi felt the swell of power ripple through the air, and he watched with awe as she broke through the other spell, not with power, but with stealth, a woman’s weapons, sliding under the spell that clouded his mind, and slipping into his heart. “Does my body feel as good to you as Shadoe’s?” she purred.

Ben froze. “Shadoe…” he murmured, his mouth just a breath away from hers.

“Hmmm… you know, that pretty witch you came here to find?” she offered, smiling sweetly.

Malachi surmised, as the comprehension started to dawn on him, that all it took for the spell to shatter was to acknowledge it, to push against it. Ben jerked back from Leandra as though she was contaminated, but she only laughed.

“My guess is that I don’t compare,” she chuckled. She licked her lips and grinned wickedly. “Too bad.”

As people around them started to murmur, and the dancer pushed closer, aiming for Leandra, she said, “I think we need to be going.”

Ben was already back in the SUV, his face drawn tight and pale with fury, his eyes glittering. “Nobody fucking messes with my head,” he muttered, jamming the key in, and gunning the gas.

Leandra and Malachi tumbled in only moments before he shot away from the curb, still swearing.

“Well…the good news is that I can think a little clearer,” Leandra said blandly. “And you’re heading in the wrong direction. Shadoe is on the other side of town.”

Ben had never been so furious. Although embarrassment warred a close second.

Something had sneaked inside his head and stolen a part of him, seducing him into forgetting.

And to try to make him forget Shadoe…oh, somebody was going to pay for that. He’d turn them into a talking carpet for that, flay their skin from their bodies, laughing all the while.

He still couldn’t feel her.

But Leandra could sense her, somehow.

She was powerful, more so than Ben. And for that, he thanked God.

They were outside town now, driving down a narrow, overgrown street that was more of a path than a road. Finally, she pointed to a smaller path and said, “Pull in there. There’s nothing down that way and we can walk the rest of the way.”

“Walk?” Ben growled.

“Yes, walk. We have to figure out what we are dealin’ with,” she said quietly. “It’s something…different.”

Chapter Twelve

Shadoe’s eyes opened.

She lay on her side, surrounded by silk and lace. Naked.

She had never been so afraid in her life. Not when she had been pinned under Jimmy’s body, not when she had driven a blade into Marcus to keep him from raping her, not even when she had seen Marcus shift to wolven form that first time as she had burned Jimmy’s heart to ash with her touch.

Something insidious was inside her mind. Blackness was trying to eat away at her.

“Not yet…but I shall,” a soft voice purred from over her shoulder.

She bit back the scream that rose to her lips and rolled limply onto her back when a cool hand tugged her over. He had read her mind.

“Yes. And you’re going to be a tasty little treat, Shadoe,” he mused, lowering his head to sniff at her skin.

“I’m not a fucking treat,” she said, forcing confidence into her voice. Even though she wanted nothing more than to babble incoherently with fear.

He laughed and the sound rolled over her like silk. He traced a finger around her soft nipple and she cowered against the mattress, his touch feeling dirty and foul. Her skin shrank tight at his cold touch and she wanted to rail against her body’s reaction, at what looked to be arousal. “You are…and such a sweet, innocent thing you are. I can hardly wait for a taste,” he whispered, grinning at her.

She watched horrified as his fangs dropped. When he lowered his head, his lips hovering only a breath from hers, she struck out, her palm glowing red with fire as she struck the side of his head. “Incendiaire!”

He bellowed, rolling away and slapping at the flames in his hair. “That was a very bad move, child,” he said, a burn on his cheek. Charred bits of his long golden hair floated to the ground as he stalked around the bed, eyeing her where she cowered against the headboard.

“Come near me again and I’ll burn you to well-done, vampire,” she said, forcing bravado into her voice, but knowing she’d do it. She could do it.

He laughed. “Stupid bitch. You cannot even tell that I’m like you,” he murmured. Lifting one hand, he watched her with a smile.

Shadoe shrieked as an unseen hand closed around her and jerked her up. Something gagged her, keeping her from screaming as she was slammed against a wall and pinned there.

“You won’t catch me by surprise again,” he said, strolling over to her. “And you’re so fucking young, you don’t know how to manipulate things without using your mouth or hands, haven’t figured out you don’t need it. Bad thing about the pathetic Hunters, they insist on muzzling their own, putting blinders on them. By the time you’ve figured out you don’t need to speak…you will not be able to,” he said, smiling brightly.

As she whimpered and shrank away from him, he cupped her breast in his hand, circling his thumb over the soft nipple over and over, pinching it until it finally peaked for him.

“Very nice…oui. You are a very lovely woman,” he murmured. “I’m going to enjoy owning you.”

Her eyes blazed at him and he chuckled. “Yes, I know… You think you aren’t owned. But you will admit it, by the time I’m done. I own you, body, mind…and pussy.” He cupped her in his hand and plunged his finger into her dry passage as he spoke, smiling a pleased, satisfied smile. “And what a tight pussy it is.”

Fury flooded her and she narrowed her eyes, breathing through her nose as whatever it was threatened to gag her when she tried to drag in enough air to scream. No sound escaped her—but she did feel the ripple of magic. She rarely used words… Ben hadn’t taught her that way. Her hands, she needed sometimes, or at least she thought she did.

Her eyes opened wide and she let the fury take her.

Wind started to whip.

Heat pooled inside her.

As he jammed his fingers back inside her dry vagina, the heat erupted from her. She didn’t seek to control it, just channeled it as it shot from within her to him.

A wall of fire shot up from the floor, a muffled roar that was drowned out by the French bastard’s shriek of pain. His hands left her and he was across the room like a shot, cradling his singed arm to his chest. “Little coquette. I shall make you hurt for that one.”

The flames were dying out as he straightened, and Shadoe instinctively flinched. Forming flames, she could do. But she didn’t know how to maintain them.

“Little witches who don’t know their own powers should really be careful,” he murmured.

His eyes closed and Shadoe felt a chill wind brush by her and settle over her. Cold…very cold. It settled into her bones and made her ache deep within. When her eyes opened, she could see, out of the corner of her eye, something dull and gray. But it disappeared when she tried to look at it head on, forever trapped just outside her line of vision.

“That is your cage, chére,” he purred. “It locks all that magic inside, with you. And it stays inside, with you. If you try to strike out at me, you may not live to regret it…all of your magic is magnified with that sphere. And this could be a very bad thing, especially if you try fire again.”

He moved closer, stopping just a few feet away from her face. “This will be…most pleasant,” he whispered. “Enjoy your time away from me. I’ll be back, once you are ready to control yourself. In the meantime…enjoy your company.”

Shadoe nearly choked on bile as Marcus dragged somebody in, a small, slimly built girl, whose frightened eyes wheeled around in their sockets. He threw her at Shadoe’s feet, and while she watched, he started to stroke her body as the girl screamed and sobbed.

Shadoe struck out and pain tore through her as the energy bolt of magic reflected back at her, tearing her flesh and burning it.

Shadoe screamed her fury and lobbed another bolt before she could control it and it launched back at her, this time knocking her out. She fell into the pit of blackness with a sob, the woman’s helpless screams chasing her as she went.

Ben clung to the shadows as he slid through the woods. Leandra was behind him, her steps nearly as quiet as his.

Malachi was nowhere to be seen, but Ben could feel his presence. Why couldn’t he feel her?

Never before had he cursed his own gift of magic, strong, certain, and sure. But it wasn’t strong enough this time. He couldn’t feel his woman, couldn’t track her magically, couldn’t sense her. He should have been able to think of her face and feel her.

This terrifying blankness would have had him turning into a ravening beast, if not for Leandra’s calm assurance.

The witch with the amber eyes was nothing if not good. He suspected her gift damn near rivaled Shadoe’s. And she had learned through means other than Excelsior, so her way of using it would be different.

His lips spread in a cold smile as he came upon a still corpse. Malachi rose out of the darkness, his teeth flashing white, lips unusually dark. “She is there, my friend. And unharmed, for now,” he said. Then his face sobered, the smile fading away, his features going cold and still. “There is a Master in there, vampire with magic of his own. He is the one who cast the web of forgetfulness. This pathetic…creature was one of his minions, a werewolf who defected from the pack that is charged with patrolling this area. He is nearing his first century and this vampire was ancient when the wolf came to him.”

He stood in the moonlight, absorbing it. “I can feel it…and he knows I’m here. A Master cannot physically enter another Master’s territory unknown.” An evil grin split his face and he said, “I ought to introduce myself.” Sliding his eyes to them, he said, “There’s the distraction for you—go get your woman, Cross.”

His form faded away as he shifted to mist and then even the mist was gone.

Meeting Leandra’s eyes, Ben asked, “So, how good are you?”

She grinned and reached down, rolling the leg of her black cargo pants up and drawing a wickedly long blade. Ben saw the liquid glow of it in the moonlight and surmised it was nearly pure silver. It winked at him as she tossed it from hand to hand. “Keep up if you can, Hunter,” she murmured.

And then she took the lead, gliding in and out of the shadows as though she was one with them.

“Wake up, bitch,” Marcus purred.

The words whispered out of the darkness, sending black fear streaking through her.

She fought away from it, struggling to cling to the painless oblivion.

Sharp pain rocked her and she whimpered.

It came again, and against her will, she worked her way out of the darkness, opening her eyes just as Marcus drew back his foot, kicking her in the side sharply. The magically made cage parted around his foot, closing around his leg, keeping her from striking through the hole his strike made.

Her hand flew out and caught his ankle and twisted. She didn’t have the energy to smile as he landed on his ass.

Shoving herself up, she settled on her butt with her back to the wall. A horrified moan choked her as she caught sight of the woman lying by the wall, blood staining her thighs, bruises ringing her throat. Shadoe caught the coppery scent of her blood, too much of it. Her breathing was shallow and ragged, wet sounding.

The woman was going to die—by morning, Shadoe’s instincts whispered—if she didn’t get help.

Marcus lunged to his feet and loomed over her, drawing his leg back, a snarl contorting his face.

“Do it… I’ll set loose a firestorm that will burn your leg off at the knee, and damn the consequences,” she rasped, the pain in her side stealing her breath.

His response was cut off when the door flew open and the golden-haired vampire came in like a vicious storm, his eyes flashing, face scowling. “There is somebody on my land, somebody ancient, a Master Vampire who isn’t touched by any of my spells of protection. He is filled with purpose and drive—my spells rob a person of that. I don’t know a single creature that can withstand my magic. But I have heard tales of a vampire who just might be able.”

Though the bastard never once mentioned a name, Shadoe knew damn well who it was—Malachi. Unconsciously, a tiny smile curved her lips.

The rage rolling from him would have made her quiver with fear, except she could sense the fear that was fueling that powerful rage. Fear of Malachi, she suspected.

“I thought you said she belonged to an Inherent,” Dumas growled.

He stared at Shadoe with rage in his eyes before moving his furious gaze to Marcus. “If he’s the one I’m thinking of, Marcus, you’ll die before I do. Be aware of that,” he promised softly.

“Pierre, the bitch was fucking some bastard wolf. There was a vampire, but if he is so powerful, he would have enthralled her and she’d never go running back to that bastard, Cross.”

Shadoe couldn’t stop the smile that spread across her face any more than she could muffle her snort of laughter.

He tossed her a venomous look and responded, “I don’t think she agrees with you.” He moved toward her, with a loose, liquid walk, his body a seductive promise as he knelt beside her. “Who is this vampire who was so lucky to have a taste of that sweet pussy?” he asked silkily.

She stared at him in stony silence.

He swore softly, reaching through the unseen barrier and cupping her face in his hand. “I can make you tell me, bitch. Do you want… What is this?” he asked, frowning, brushing her hair aside and revealing the faintest of marks of her neck.

The bite had nearly healed completely. It wouldn’t even leave a scar. But it was still visible, if you looked.

And he was looking. Brushing his hand against it, everything went still as his rage grew almost palpable. “You’ve brought me used goods. I don’t want another vampire’s leavings,” Pierre whispered, his voice an insidious hiss that made Shadoe think of snakes, slithering and writhing together. Every word sent fear coursing through her, and the fear grew, overtaking her mind.

Not real… He’s making me feel this way…not real. Not real… Clenching her eyes closed, she focused, trying to think past the fear. Miraculously, it fell away and she sucked in a ragged breath, wincing as her ribs protested. Opening her eyes, she stared at Pierre who narrowed his eyes at what he saw in her face.

“If you want to live, you will tell me what I want to know. Tell me of this vampire.”

Her eyes never wavered and she didn’t say a word.

Rising, he turned, his bare chest rippling as he took a slow, deep breath. She suspected he was trying to calm the great rage she sensed within him. Great rage…and fear.

He feared the Hunters. He must, otherwise he wouldn’t live as he did, in shadows, erasing all signs of himself before the Hunters could track him.

“Tell me of this vampire you saw her with,” Pierre murmured, stalking around Marcus in a close circle. Stopping behind him, he murmured right into Marcus’ ear, his voice silky, seductive. “Tell me…”

Shadoe could feel the hot, mind-fogging lust that he exuded. Using it to control Marcus, she realized. And it was working. She saw the unwitting arousal bloom in his face, watched as his cock started to tent his trousers. “Big, pale, red-haired. I heard her call his name… Malcolm…Malachi…yes, Malachi.”

Shadoe shivered as Pierre lifted his gaze, and she saw the fear and rage explode in his eyes, watched the deadly smile that curved his mouth. Marcus, however, with his back to the vampire was unaware of anything except the hot, lustful waves that rolled through the room.

She was unaffected, whether by her fear or by her own magic, she didn’t know. She watched with undisguised horror as Pierre stroked Marcus’ short, curly brown locks, fisting his hand. Marcus shuddered as though in ecstasy. Now another scent filled the air, that of the shape-shifter’s hunger, a scent she was familiar with. He was horny.

He opened eyes dazed by need and licked his lips, unaware of the death that stood at his back.

And Shadoe flinched as Pierre struck, sinking his fangs into the line of Marcus’ neck as he jerked the Inherent’s head to the side, arching and baring it.

Marcus moaned, like a man caught in the throes of ecstasy.

He was moaning until he passed out from blood loss, nearly fifteen minutes later. A wet stain had bloomed on his trousers and she smelled the unmistakable scent of semen.

The vampire had brought him to orgasm as he fed. Jerking his head sharply, Pierre drew back, licking his lips. She was surprised to see his tongue wasn’t forked. The hideous sound of flesh tearing was one she would never forget. A huge, hideous hole appeared in Marcus’ neck and blood pumped from it in a steady flow.

Dropping the limp body to the floor, he turned his gaze her way, and Shadoe shivered at the burning light of his green eyes. “I’ll be back for you later, little Hunter bitch,” Pierre swore. “I have not fought this long to fall at the hands of your lover. I don’t care that he is the fabled Malachi. He is outnumbered, outclassed… He will die for daring to come to my lands.”

She didn’t dare argue with him. If she told him Ben was her lover, he may realize that he had more than Malachi to deal with.

But the factor of surprise could work in their favor. No, she told herself. It would work in their favor. It had to.

She was left alone in the room as Marcus bled to death through the gaping hole Pierre had torn in his throat before dropping him.

Malachi simply alighted on the grand porch and waited, flinging his large frame onto the padded chaise lounge, staring up at the sky, listening to the baying of the wolves who were trying to track him.

Of course, they were searching the wrong area.

I’m up here, he thought, unable to stop the grin that curved his mouth.

And they weren’t searching Ben’s area either. The wolf was pulling the Inherent deal, menace rolling from him in silent waves. Lesser wolves would instinctively avoid the area around Ben, not even aware of why. When the door blew open and the vampire stepped through, Malachi continued to lie there, fighting back the urge to start whistling under his breath.

“Find him, damn it,” the vampire rasped. The power of his voice alone would have been enough to make some people pause.

Malachi grinned.

More wolves swarmed out of the house, some wolven, some in wolfman form, beyond them, vampires flowed out in silent waves.

Nearly twenty people, and all searching for a man who was waiting right there. Not much on searching for brains amongst your followers, are you? Malachi mused. Granted, he was not dead in their line of sight, a good twenty feet to the side, and the veranda was dark.

He might not be breathing, and they couldn’t hear a heartbeat that sounded only infrequently.

But Hell, they could have smelled him.

These weren’t mortals, who didn’t always think to look beyond what they could see in front of them. A paranormal should remember that, and Malachi knew damn well a legion of Hunters could have passed by him, and every damn one of them would have looked for him.

None of them would have been that stupid.

Because if they were, Malachi was who they would deal with when lives were lost.

With a lazy stretch, Malachi moved and drew attention to himself. “Such an intelligent bunch you have there,” he said, laughter thick in his voice.

The eyes that flew to his face were wide with astonishment, then malice filtered through. “It truly is the esteemed Malachi, feared by all, the most powerful and ancient of the Hunters,” Pierre murmured, a wide grin curving his mouth. “I never thought the day would come when I’d draw the attention of the mighty one himself. I always assumed you’d send your underlings to deal with me, if ever I was discovered.”

“Although,” he mused, tapping a finger to his chin. “I imagine my taking your lover had something to do with it.”

He paused and lifted his hand to his nose, breathing in deep.

Malachi’s lip curled and he had to remind himself to blank his face. He knew what the bastard was up to—Mal could scent the musk of Shadoe’s body, faint as it was. Ben would kill him, assuming Malachi left anything behind.

“She smells so sweet… I can hardly wait to taste.”

Malachi didn’t respond to that as he moved closer. “I don’t like killing men until I know their names. What is yours?”

Apparently he didn’t like Mal’s lack of response to his taunt. “Pierre Dumas. Your bitch will scream my name before the night is over,” he snarled, flashing his fangs and flinging a hand at Malachi.

Mal moved away from the fire, shifting to mist as the second blast came winging at him. “Pete, you should really get some new hooks when you try to piss somebody off. The threat to rape my woman, probably over my dead body, is one that has been used more times than I can count,” Malachi said, settling back to human form a few feet behind Pierre. He didn’t bother addressing the little mistake about Shadoe not being his woman. Might as well give Ben all the advantage he could.

“But why waste it? Particularly when it’s so very true.” Pierre smiled. “I’ll put my hands on her, though, and when she has no shields between us, she will fall under my thrall and scream for completion as I rip your head away from your body. She’ll scream for me, for me to love her, to fuck, to rape her, to hurt her, whatever I desire. I’ll fuck her in a puddle of your blood.”

Malachi sidestepped a blow, moving quicker than human eyes could track. “You have to spill enough of it first,” he said calmly. “So far, you haven’t even managed to lay a bloody hand on me.”

“I will not have to—I can always settle for fucking her in your ashes,” Pierre rasped as he drew his hand back and flung it forward, as though throwing a baseball, only what came flying forward was a ball of fire.

Leandra laid her hand on the house.

Ben could feel the shield she was boring through, but only just now. If she hadn’t laid her hands on it, Ben wasn’t sure if he would have seen it in time. “The witch who laid this spun it out of himself. If we break it, we’ll weaken him. If it’s the one Malachi sensed, this won’t slow him down for long.”

“Malachi doesn’t need our help,” Ben muttered, distracted. He was feeling…something…

“He stripped Shadoe of her shields,” Leandra muttered. “Once we get through these, you will feel her again.” She looked like a cat burglar, working some unseen lock, as Ben focused his gaze on her hands.

“I can already feel something,” he whispered, his big body shuddering, vibrating. He could feel the animal inside him trying to tear free. A soft, familiar voice whispered… Patience. The Wolf’s image shimmered into view just behind Ben’s eyes, so that he had to focus to actually see what was in front of him, instead of the Wolf.

Patience…listen to your head, right now, not your heart. Act like a Hunter.

“I’m a Hunter. I think I can manage,” Ben growled. Then the shield underneath Leandra’s hands fell apart.

And all he could feel was Shadoe’s terror and horror, and he tore through the widening hole, his body shifting from human to wolfman in three lunges. Leandra, still frozen as she worked in demolishing the whole of the shield, swore softly. “Damn it, Cross, use your damn head!”

But Ben was already tearing down the hall, following the direction of his heart.

Shadoe screamed as the door flew open.

When the wolf tore through, she buried her face in her hands, whimpering. Damn it, no more…no more!

Screaming it, her hands stiffened and went to her sides, clenched into tight fists. “No more!”

And then she sobbed, “Ben!”

He went from wolfman to his mortal skin as he stepped to her, the change liquid and seamless. Laying his hands on the shield, he whispered, “Be quiet…don’t move, don’t breathe… I’ll get you out of this.”

The shield was easily broken from the outside, and a few seconds later, she collapsed against Ben. Throwing her arms around his neck and sobbing, she buried her face against his chest.

“It’s all right, baby, all right, shhh,” he murmured, shielding her from seeing the pooling blood and the cooling body with his own, now naked form. His clothes were lying wherever he had shifted, she knew, and she revelled in the heat of his body. She was so cold…so damned cold.

“Damn it, Shadoe…look at me,” she heard him shout, but it was a distant sound.

“You’re going into shock—listen to me, listen!” he demanded and his voice was so insistent, she looked at him…and listened.

Listened to his voice as he rubbed his hands up and down her arms, watched his lips moving as he spoke.

Leandra paused outside the door, checking on Ben and Shadoe. She looked shocky, but Ben was taking care of her. Leandra had to take care of them. This house was too big, too open. Too many places for evil to hide and lurk.

She ought to know, after all, she hadn’t spent her formative years in charm school.

As she walked, she whispered a spell of her making. A web sort of spell, with her as the center and only those she allowed in or out would be able to approach the house. Any vampire, mortal or shifter caught within her web without her consent would die. The web was the house, and the more of it she saw, the larger the web grew.

A soft, muffled curse reached her ears, one that was in a soft, Scottish burr. The snarling and growling that came to her made her belly roll and pitch with fear. The vampire wasn’t playing nice anymore. He had called for reinforcements, in the shape of ugly, magical nasty things.

She recognized the baying that filled the night air.

Her teacher had called them hellhounds. Leandra didn’t know if they truly were anything demonic, but they were definitely bred of dark, nasty magic and they fed off pain. They ate it up like candy.

She broke into a run as she swore, following the sound of the baying, and the stink of the evil magic.

The hounds appeared just as Leandra tumbled to a stop at the door of the house. Her web had worked, keeping all she didn’t allow out and the hounds that struck the invisible line of the web fell away baying in pain.

But they had Malachi cornered, and he was bleeding. Badly.

Not even Malachi could fight that many of the hounds.

And the vampire watching knew it.

Blood trickled from his mouth as he pushed up, but there was evil pleasure in his eyes as he watched another hound launch itself at Malachi and land on his back. This one was a small one, roughly the size of an Irish wolfhound, but he sank his teeth into Malachi’s flesh and tore out chunks of it.

She swallowed and the sound was a dry click in her throat. Taking a deep breath, she stepped through the web, changing the nature of the spell as she moved, and letting it center on Ben and Shadoe. Brushing against Shadoe’s mind, she assured herself the witch would be fine.

Leandra, suddenly, wasn’t so certain about herself.

Malachi could fight, but not if he kept getting struck, and not if he didn’t get away soon. They had to even the odds a little, she figured. She could handle a few hounds. Maybe.

“C’mon, puppies…” Leandra started, her voice singsong, not revealing any of the terrible fear she felt.

Malachi’s eyes widened and he swore. “Get back, damn it!”

The vampire on the floor was pushing himself to his knees, bleeding from a myriad of injuries, his mouth swollen and cut, but knitting together, smoothing out even as she watched.

“Jacob!” the vampire bellowed.

“If you call for your wolves…well, you’ll have to expend some energy to get them here. They are…rather lost,” she said. “In a maze I made for them before we busted through your pathetic shields.”

Turning her eyes to the hounds, she released what was sure to attract them—fiery, shining displays of magic. “Make sure Ben gets Shadoe out of here,” she said, her voice calm.

But on the inside, she was screaming.

Now that it had come down to it, Leandra had decided, she really didn’t want to die.

But it took a witch to fight hellhounds, to destroy them. Just as it took a witch to call them. They were made of magic, after all.

They leapt, and as they struck her shielding, the baying started.

Malachi couldn’t cross whatever barrier she had set up.

Dropping his own shielding, he bellowed, “Cross!” The paralyzing fear he was capable of exploded from him, and the weaker hounds fell prey to it, as did many of the witch-vampire’s minions. The howls of pain and fear started. Malachi heard the roar of shrieking and sobbing out beyond the veranda and suspected Leandra’s little maze was built on an illusion that hid them from sight as well.

Ben appeared at his side, Shadoe cradled in his arms, her eyes wide and far too dark.

“Get her out of here,” Malachi ordered, his eyes on the witch he could barely see beneath the hides of the hounds. So many…too many. Not even a witch as powerful as Leandra could fight that many alone. Not when Dumas was pushing to his feet, eyeing Leandra with hatred and rage.

And hunger…Malachi went rigid as he saw the calculation in that gaze. Yes, a witch like Leandra would make a tasty meal. But more…Leandra was still human, like Shadoe was not. He could almost see the wheel’s spinning in Dumas’ mind.

Malachi could see Dumas’ lips moving as he called more hounds.

“Shit, she can’t fight that many hounds,” Cross swore. “And she damn well knows it.”

“I told you to leave,” Malachi said, his fangs dropped in his fury. Lifting his hands, he laid them on the still unseen shield. It burned into his flesh and he swore, clenching his teeth against the pain. With a whisper of power, he shifted to mist and flowed over the shield, searching for the entry, a weak point where he could slide in.

“Screw that,” Ben swore, kneeling and laying Shadoe against the wall. Her eyes flew to his, and Malachi could sense the rabid fear that filled her. “Baby, Leandra needs me…shhh, just wait here.”

Shadoe’s eyes closed and Mal sensed the battle she waged against her fear. When her eyes opened, clear and focused, he saw she had won that battle. “Go,” she said hoarsely. “I’ll be fine.” Bracing her back against the wall, she prepared to wait.

Malachi grimaced as he felt Ben’s magic strike the shield. But it was too damn strong, and they both knew it.

Malachi shifted back to mortal form, swearing.

“I can break through,” Shadoe said softly, still sitting on the ground, clutching her knees to her chest. Her eyes were glowing, the unseen winds of witch power blowing her hair all around her.

They could feel it, a needle’s lance of power, striking the shield and boring through. “Careful how you go, pet,” Malachi whispered, watching Leandra. “Don’t go damaging the maker.”

Ben’s face was pale and he said, “I’m taking care of that… Shadoe’s magic is still too raw. Get ready…it’s about to break.”

When it did, it was with a dull roar of power and Malachi flipped into the air as hounds launched themselves free of the dying shield. He rasped out a muttered, “Fuck,” and shot Shadoe a desperate look. Her magic would call to them, just like Leandra’s had.

But Shadoe was sitting untouched in a small semi-circle of clear space, the hounds snarling and gnashing at her from feet away, unable to reach her. “Smart girl,” Malachi murmured.

A pain-filled shriek rent the air and Malachi launched himself at the source. “Leandra, on the other hand, is a foolish one,” he muttered to himself. A hound’s claws raked his arm as he tried to power through their writhing masses. Unsuccessful with strength, he shifted to mist and reformed at her side as she slapped out with a glowing hand to beat at the hound that had sunk his teeth into her thigh.

She was bleeding from a dozen different wounds.

Something large and furred leapt into the small circle and Malachi turned, fangs bared and hand fisted, only to see Ben sinking one huge, deadly hand, tipped with ebony claws, into the side of the nearest hound. Smoke emanated from the hound’s mouth as it howled, and then the light died from its eyes as Ben crushed and burned his heart.

Another wave of hounds struck, and the three of them battled them back, the witches with fire, Malachi with strength.

“Somebody has to face the vampire,” Ben grunted, closing his eyes for a brief second. When they opened, flame surrounded them, trapping most of the hounds behind it, blocking them. Malachi caught the one that lunged at him and ripped it apart, severing the head from the long serpentine body and flinging the pieces into the fire.

“It can’t be me,” Ben panted, catching Malachi’s arm before he could attack another of the hounds. Staring into the ancient one’s face, he repeated harshly, “It can’t be me. I may be a powerful witch, but he’s better. You’re not a witch, but you can handle witchcraft in ways no vampire should be able to do. He’s hidden from us for this long—we can’t allow him to keep hiding. He has to die. And that means you have to face him.”

Ben waited, holding his breath, until Mal nodded. Then Ben turned and faced the hounds, calling upon ice as he placed himself at Leandra’s back. When he looked again, Malachi was gone.

“Get out of here,” Leandra snapped. “Are you stupid?”

“I love you, too,” he said with a slight smile as he concentrated on the spell building in his hands. They ached with the cold. Eying the hounds, he waited until the closest two lunged and then he unleashed it. They were hit with a rain of ice, freezing the first line of hounds solid, and several of the others behind them disappeared in a puff of smoke, fleeing the deadly cold.

When he had time to focus on their numbers again, he decided there were fewer of them.

“There’s not as many. Malachi must be distracting him,” Leandra panted.

“Good.” Ben forged a shield between them and the hounds, a writhing ring of smoke that shifted and danced, reforming each time a hound tried to break through. “That will keep them busy for a while. Let’s see to your leg.”

He had just finished leeching the poison out of the nasty bite when they heard Shadoe scream.

Shadoe’s breath locked in her lungs. He wasn’t real. Couldn’t be real…couldn’t be real.

Jimmy was dead.

Malachi slammed Dumas to the ground, lifting his head, preparing to strike. Shadoe’s scream made him pause.

Dumas laughed.

“You had better hurry, mon ami,” the battered vampire said, blood pouring from his lips. “She sounds very frightened.”

Malachi drew a silver knife from his thigh and waggled it tauntingly. “Since I can’t take the time to bleed you…let me give ye a parting gift,” he purred. Driving the deadly blade into Dumas’ heart, he twisted it, listening to the vampire scream as smoke poured from him.

As battered as he was, he wasn’t able to throw Malachi off and Dumas just lay there, screaming that hideous shriek as Malachi darted away, following the sounds of Shadoe’s sobs.

“Go,” Leandra ordered, bracing her back against one of the pillars of the veranda-styled porch. Her face was pale and beaded with sweat, her eyes glassy with pain and blood loss. Her leg was slick with her own blood, necessary for letting the poison out. But damned weakening. “I’ll be fine.”

Ben hesitated for the briefest of seconds before he tore through the ring of smoke still protecting them. When he got to Shadoe, he saw her screaming at a slim, wraith-like woman. Then he blinked and saw a man he had only seen in newspaper clippings. Jimmy Duncan. Another blink, and the woman…illusion. A bloody witch.

She was terrifying Shadoe with the one thing that was guaranteed to horrify her into helplessness. With a roar, he grabbed the woman before she even realized he was on her and snapped her neck. For some odd reason, witches rarely expected a physical attack.

Malachi appeared out of the melee as Ben let her fall dead to the ground.

“Illusion, she was making Shadoe think she was somebody else. Damn witch was playing with her mind,” Ben murmured, laying a hand on the shield Shadoe had up. “Baby, it’s okay. He’s not really here. Let me in.”

Shadoe’s shields collapsed, Ben knelt and took her in his arms. But he had barely nestled her against him when a tremendous mental explosion shook him as the smoke-shield he had left around Leandra shattered.

There was silence.

The night was filled with drifting bits of fire, wild magic and smoke, frightened hounds darting here and there, launching themselves at any target and fleeing at any movement. Their summoner had lost purpose or was focused elsewhere, so the hounds were easily distracted and easily scared away now.

Ben didn’t like what that could mean.

If the witch who had summoned them was dead, the hounds would have fled, running to seek havoc wherever they could. That they were still here, running aimlessly, didn’t bode well.

Taking Shadoe in his arms, he pushed to his feet, weak and shaky. Malachi scowled as he took that in. “What the bloody hell?” he demanded, bracing him with a hand under his arm.

“My shields were shattered,” Ben said shortly. “Leandra was inside them.” His eyes were grim, and he forced himself not to think—not yet.

He started forward, silently accepting the support from Malachi as they returned to where Ben had left Leandra.

Dumas looked up from where he was feeding at Leandra’s neck, his eyes glowing, an unholy smile on his lips as he pulled away, letting her fall limp to the floor. “Thank you, mon ami, for removing that nasty poison from her blood. A powerful, plentiful meal, and I feel…refreshed. Too bad I had to damn near drain what little blood you left from purging her,” he said with laughter.

Before Malachi could attack, he shifted to mist and was gone. They were left alone with Leandra’s still body, impotent fear and rage filling all of them.

Sinking to his knees, Malachi took her in his arms, pressing his thumb against the seeping wound and sealing it. “She’s almost gone,” he said bleakly, his eyes stark and desolate.

“Bring her over,” Ben snarled. As he laid Shadoe down, her haunted blue eyes moved to Leandra’s body. Slowly, painfully, she rolled over, laying a hand on Leandra’s still chest. Ben knelt by her head, stroking those long, heavy rows of braids, his eyes full of rage, guilt and grief. “Bring her over, damn it. Now.”

Malachi shook his head. “No. You think she would want that? Walking in darkness for always?”

“She doesn’t want death,” Shadoe whispered, lifting tear-drenched eyes to Malachi’s. “I can feel her. She actually wants to live, for the first time in years. Don’t let her die, Mal. Please.”

Tiredly, Malachi shook his head. He cupped Leandra’s face in his hands. “She can’t possibly want this.” But she didn’t want to die, he could feel that. She didn’t understand what was happening, what was going on outside her body, but she did know she was dying.

And she was terrified and furious.

“She’s a witch… She’ll not be trapped the way many vampires are,” Ben argued.

“And the change could damn well kill her,” Malachi snapped even as he absorbed some of the desperation coming from the dying witch. Her heart was starting to falter, her breathing becoming erratic. Whatever they were going to do, time was running short.

Ben’s laughter was a harsh bark in the silence. “She’s going to die regardless. At least if you bring her over, she has a chance. Now, do it. Otherwise, I’m gonna come after your ass.”

“She very well might hate us all for this,” Malachi said.

Shadoe’s eyes opened, tears spilling over to run down her pale face. “No, she won’t. Hurry, Mal. I can’t feel her anymore.”

Even though her blood was potent and sweet, Malachi had never regretted a feeding more. Drawing from the still witch was bitter, and he damned himself. Once he had taken what he needed for the bond, he tore a vein open in his wrist and held it to her ashen mouth, stroking her throat to force his blood down.

He felt her soul hurtling back into her body, although her eyes didn’t open immediately.

They wouldn’t.

Not until nightfall next.

Chapter Thirteen

Shadoe slept, Leandra in the bed next to her.

Malachi and Ben had gone back to burn the plantation to the ground. The anonymous hotel room was the safest they would get for now. But Malachi would be going after the vampire who had nearly destroyed them all. She had seen it in his eyes.

As she slept, and dreamed, part of her worried.

Shadoe woke for a few brief moments, just before nightfall, but the exhaustion pulled at her and when she saw that Leandra still slept—still lived—she closed her eyes and slid back into the arms of sleep.

Leandra had slept all through the first night.

Malachi had said she would wake tonight, if she was going to.

Shadoe woke again before sunrise and showered quickly, sliding back into the shirt one of the men had put her in before she went back to sit on the bed and watch the still woman as she slept. Her chest rose infrequently. Shadoe’s sharp hearing occasionally picked up a heartbeat.

What kind of creature would she be?

Had they done the wrong thing?

Could the change push her into madness?

Shadoe didn’t know enough about vampires…but Ben would. If it was likely to turn her mad, he wouldn’t have insisted Malachi do it. And Malachi wouldn’t have done it, no matter what anybody said if it was going to unleash a monster on the earth.

And Leandra wouldn’t have wanted that.

A thousand worries chased themselves over in Shadoe’s mind and she finally leapt up off the bed, pacing. When the door opened, she screamed, so caught up in her worrying, she hadn’t even heard them coming. Thankfully, it was Ben and Mal staring at her with bemusement, and not werewolves that Dumas had sent after her.

Flinging herself at Ben, she whispered, “What if we’ve done the wrong thing?”

He stroked his hand down her hair, murmuring, “It will be okay. I promise.”

“Too late to worry now… She’s coming back,” Malachi said obliquely.

How he knew that, Shadoe didn’t know. Staring at Leandra’s face, she saw nothing, felt nothing. And nearly an hour passed before anything changed. When her eyes opened, Shadoe was sitting on the bed, stroking the coarse braids absently, not seeing anything but the sight of the vampire as he dropped Leandra to the ground, his mouth stained with her blood.

“You’re safe,” Leandra said, her voice husky. She smiled, a sweet, happy curve of her full, wide mouth that made Shadoe’s eyes sting.

“Yes, I’m. Thank you for helping them.” She licked her lips, unsure what to say. Leandra’s eyes studied her face, moved to Ben’s, then to Malachi’s.

She was far too calm. Malachi had said she would most likely awaken frightened, screaming, and that they needed to be prepared to slam shields down on her.

But she was…calm.

“Something is wrong, isn’t it?” Leandra asked quietly, a frown marring her exotic features. Her eyes clouded and Shadoe could see her thinking. She doesn’t remember… “What happened?”

She swallowed then, and winced. The bite from Malachi had faded, healed thanks to her wondrous new vampire metabolism. But the larger, nasty jagged bite from Dumas remained, smaller, healing, but not gone. Her hand came up to touch it, and Shadoe watched with tears in her eyes as Leandra probed it and started to recall. “The vampire… He came up and broke Ben’s shield. I didn’t even see him, not until it was too late. He grabbed me, froze me with a mind spell…and he bit me.”

Her eyes closed and her mouth spasmed. Shadoe reached out and folded her hand around one of Leandra’s, the hot tears burning her face. “He bit me, whispering into my mind…” Leandra whispered, clutching desperately at Shadoe’s hand. “Why aren’t I dead?”

“Malachi…”

Before Ben could finish his sentence, Malachi stepped up, his face grim. “I brought you over. I knew the consequences, regardless of the arguments Shadoe and Ben may give in my favor, I knew them. If anybody is deserving of your anger, your hatred, it is me, not them,” he said quietly, dropping to one knee by the bed, meeting her eyes levelly.

“Brought me over,” she repeated.

Malachi inclined his head.

Silence reigned.

Slowly, Leandra sat up, tugging her hand gently away from Shadoe’s. “I remember thinking,” she said quietly, “as I went to face the hounds that I really wasn’t ready to die.”

She licked her lips. Her fangs hadn’t yet broken through, although she knew they would, sometime that night. Her eyes closed, and she gave a brief moment’s mourning to the sunrises she’d never see. But she was alive. And that was exactly how she wanted to be.

“I didn’t want to be dead. I don’t want to be dead,” she said vehemently.

Rising, she whispered, “I need to think.”

Her legs quivered and shook as she walked outside.

Once outside in the moonlight, she collapsed.

Malachi swore roughly. “She’s not dead, damn it.”

“She knows that,” Shadoe said quietly, leaning over the bed and kissing him lightly. “She needs to think. Like she said.”

He smiled tightly. “The lady has not had the easiest of lives. She deserves something easy…not this.”

“Nothing in life is ever easy, especially not for a Hunter,” Ben said softly, resting a hand on Mal’s shoulder. “It will be okay. She will be okay.”

“I hope so,” Malachi murmured. Rising, he took Shadoe’s hand and bowed over it, lifting it to his lips.

Then he shifted to mist, the echo of his voice floating through the room. “I’m going Hunting…for now.”

Ben couldn’t have gotten Malachi and Leandra out of the room any quicker if he had wished it.

As the echo of Mal’s voice faded from the room, he approached the bed, reaching down and pulling Shadoe to her feet, slanting his mouth roughly across hers. Her arms, slender and strong, wound desperately around his neck, holding him to her tightly as he tore at her clothes.

Pulling his mouth away, he glared down at her and swore, “If you ever leave me again, for anything, I’m going to tan your hide. No, I’ll pink it. I’ll spank you so damn hard, you’ll feel my hand on your ass for a month.” His heart swelled painfully in his chest and he rested his brow on hers. “Damn it, baby. Don’t ever do that again… I love you so much. I was so fucking scared I’d never see you again, that he’d hurt you…”

“I love you,” she whispered into his mouth. “I’m sorry. Spank me, I deserve it.”

He laughed. “No. I think you’d like it. You don’t get a reward for scaring me to death,” he said with a mock scowl. Then he cupped her face in his hands. “I love you…Shadoe Wallace…Tiffany Morgan…both of you, all of you.”

She gave a watery laugh. “That’s a good thing. Tiffany is the one who freaked at the vampire’s. Shadoe’s a little bit stronger.”

He smiled, pressing a gentle kiss to her mouth. “You’re both incredibly strong. They are both you. And you are amazing, and mine.”

“I’m sorry I went with Marcus. I shouldn’t have… You could have done something. I know that now,” she said, swallowing, licking her lips and looking away. “I’m not used to having anybody to depend on.”

“We’ll take care of that,” he murmured, sliding his hands under her shirt. “I’m going to change it so that I’m the first thing you think of with everything that comes…and speaking of coming…” He grinned wickedly and sank to his knees, pressing his mouth to the vee of her thighs. Spreading her thighs, he lifted one and propped it on his shoulder, opening her, before he pushed his tongue inside her with slow, sensuous movements, nuzzling her clit with his nose, fucking her tight pussy with thorough strokes of his tongue until she was rocking against his mouth and clutching at the back of his head.

He tumbled her back against the bed and shoved her thighs wide, using his thumbs to part her sex, staring at the reddened folds of her pussy for a long moment before lowering his head and drawing his tongue up the cream-drenched slit. “Yummy,” he purred, smiling as the vibrations of his voice had her shaking.

“Ben,” she sobbed, clutching his head and pushing her cleft against his face eagerly.

He muttered, “Be still. Think of this as your punishment for scaring me to death.” Then he set about driving her thoroughly insane as he slowly ate her out, sucking her clit for long moments, finger-fucking her until she was begging to come, backing off just before she hit climax.

Then Ben started to plunge his tongue inside her weeping pussy while he speared the tender hole of her ass with one long, agile index finger. She shrieked and rocked up to meet each diabolical thrust of his tongue, her hands knotted in his hair. He grunted when she pulled, the sharp pain distracting him just slightly from the sweet pleasure of her cream on his tongue, and the hot silk of her ass clenching around his invading finger.

“I’m gonna fuck you until you scream,” he growled. “And then I’m gonna flip you over and fuck your ass until you beg for mercy.”

“I’m begging now—let me come,” she demanded, arching her hips higher and rocking against him, trying to get the angle she needed for climax.

“Not yet…not yet,” he purred. Pulling back, he settled on his heels and slowly pulled his shirt off, smiling as her eyes landed on the flexing muscles of his belly and chest, lingering on the bulging biceps as he threw the shirt aside.

Her eyes again dropped to his belly and Ben felt his cock jerk in response even as he started to tug at the buttons of his fly. “I want to feel your mouth on me first,” he said gruffly, freeing his cock and standing, shoving his jeans off and kicking them away. He pulled her off the bed and shoved her to her knees, wrapping his hand in the tumbled silk of her brunette curls. “Like this… I want to see you on your knees, and my cock in your mouth.”

Heat flared in her eyes and she reached up, wrapping one hand around the base of his cock, feeling the pulse of the blood just below the skin, feeling the silk-wrapped steel of his erection. Her belly clenched as she drew her hand up and down his length in one long, slow motion.

Leaning forward, Shadoe licked a wet trail up the throbbing vein on the underside of his length. “In your mouth,” he grunted, rocking his hips forward. “Take me in your mouth.”

A tiny smile curved her lips as she dipped her head and lapped at his balls instead, raking the sensitive flesh with her teeth.

He snarled and gripped her head between his hands, putting pressure on her jaw until her mouth opened with a surprised “Oh”. Then he pushed the aching head of his shaft inside with a growl. “I said, take me in your mouth, damn it. Suck on me.”

Shadoe felt his words in the very depths of her core, cream flooding her. Her skin felt five sizes too small and hot, achy. Her nipples drew tight, her clit throbbed and she was so damned turned on, one touch on her swollen clit and she knew she’d come. Sliding her mouth up and down in a shallow caress on his cock, she continued her teasing, even with his warning grip on her head.

She was playing with fire and damn it, she loved it.

Especially after the gut-wrenching fear, thinking she’d never see him again.

With one hand, she cupped his sac, stroking the heavy weight of his balls as she licked another slow, teasing trail up and down his length before taking the head of his cock back into her mouth.

His sex jerked and throbbed in her mouth, thick and hard, salty and warm. A drop of fluid seeped out and she sucked it down eagerly, swirling her tongue across the head before resuming her slow, shallow caresses.

“Deeper,” he ordered, and then he just pushed deeper, holding her head still and starting to fuck her mouth, as though tired of her teasing.

Staring up through her lashes at him, she shivered as she saw the dark, hungry look in his eyes. For a moment, Shadoe resisted as much as she could, just to tease him, using the considerable strength in her neck and mouth to pull back, to bite down gently until he was swearing.

“Damn it, suck me, Shadoe,” he barked. “Take me in deeper.” His voice was ragged and his body trembling.

In response…she bit him. Gently, but still, she bit him.

He roared and jerked her to her feet, throwing her to her back and sprawling across her, yanking her hands over her head and holding them in one of his. With his other hand, he spanked her pussy and growled, “You like to play with fire?”

She came, in one quick hard burst that soaked her thighs, and racked her belly with tremors. When she could breathe again, she grinned up at him and said, “I like to play with you…does that count?”

He froze, and then a grin cracked his face. “Tease.” Lowering his head, he nibbled her lips gently, kissing her sweetly, all desperation and roughness just suddenly gone. “I love you so much… Are you going to marry me and put me out of my misery?”

A grin so brilliant, it damn near eclipsed the stars outside in brightness, lit her face. Tugging her hands, she waited until he let her go and then she threw them around his neck and murmured, “Damn straight I’ll marry you. Just as soon as you make love to me.”

“Hmmm…with pleasure,” he whispered, hooking his arms under hers so he could cup her head in his hands, slanting his mouth over hers and pushing his tongue into her mouth. He probed between her thighs and slid easily into her wet core, groaning into her mouth as she closed around him like a hungry, silky fist.

Pumping his hips slowly, he made love to her, feeling her heart pounding against his, her tongue tangling with his. The walls of her pussy hugged his cock tightly and her nipples stabbed into his chest, sharp, hot little diamonds of sensation.

The hot walls of her sheath clenched and tightened around him, milking his cock as he stroked deep inside her. A flush spread from her breasts up to her neck, pinkening her cheeks as she watched him through slitted eyes.

“You’re so damned pretty,” he muttered against her lips, shifting his grip on her hands so that their fingers were laced palm to palm.

Each time she started to near climax, he backed off, shifting his angle, changing his pace. “Not yet,” he whispered when she sobbed out her frustration. “Not yet…just feel it. Do you feel me inside you? Damn it, I can feel you, so tight, so hot. You’re mine—all mine.”

“And you’re mine,” she gasped, as he moved higher on her body, dragging his body teasingly against her clit. Her clit ached and throbbed, the need for climax riding her so hard, she could barely breathe with it. “Damn it, Ben…let me come!”

“No,” he whispered against her ear with a grin. “I told you I was going to fuck you until you screamed.”

Her lashes lifted as she stared at him, her body shivering all over with the need to come. He stared right back at her, a teasing light in his eyes, as he lowered his head to her ear and whispered, “You have to scream…”

She did scream, then, with sheer frustration, arching her hips and hooking her legs around his waist, tightening her pussy around him in a slow, sensuous caress, narrowing her eyes to slits as she stared up at him, her hair damp and tangled around her shoulders.

A look of tortured bliss crossed his face and she bore down on him again, squeezing his cock with her inner muscles, flashing him a slow, sultry smile.

He groaned and slammed into her, lowering his head and sinking his teeth into her shoulder, hard enough to leave a mark, to brand. He pulled out, driving into her again with bruising force, over and over, until she shrieked, the climax storming out of her and racking her entire body with shudders, her pussy clamping forcefully on his plunging cock.

“Baby,” he grunted. “So fucking tight…” He sank back in and held still as he started to come, his cock jerking as his seed spilled into her, hot thick streams that flooded her womb as she floated down from her orgasm.

Still hard, he pulled out of her, and flipped her over onto her belly, staring at her exposed rump with a smile. Stroking his finger down the crevice of her ass, he purred, “Get ready for this.”

The bed squeaked as he moved away. Shadoe couldn’t even breathe, much less move. When he returned, she wheezed out a tortured, “You’re insane…” as he started to coat her anus with something cool and slick.

“No. Just dying for you,” he said softly, pushing a long, slick finger inside, probing, wiggling. Then he added a second. She sobbed, heat sparking in her belly. Pushing tentatively back against him, she gasped as a pleasurable bite of pain lanced through her belly.

“My Shadoe,” he purred. She shrieked as his hand landed sharply on her ass—one, two, three times. “Your butt just turned the prettiest shade of pink. And I can smell your hot little pussy. You like being spanked, don’t you?”

She whimpered, her head thrashing back and forth on the bed. “Ben, yes, hell, yes,” she groaned.

Her breath froze in her lungs as she felt the head of his cock probing at the entrance to her ass. Thick, hot, harder than a length of iron, he pushed, his hands gripping her hips firmly as he forged deeper, unrelenting, until he was embedded completely inside of her. Shrieking, stuffed full, impaled on the hot length of his cock, she was caught between the pleasure and the pain.

He reached around and pinched her clit. She keened, a mini-orgasm tearing through her.

Bracing one hand low on her spine, he started to shaft her, slow and deep, as he whispered, “I love fucking your ass. You don’t know whether you like it or not…even now. Even after you’ve come. I love watching this tight little hole opening for my cock, and I love listening to you whimper and moan as I drive inside you. You want it, even if you don’t know if you like it or not…”

Shadoe screamed as he drove inside her with one particularly deep thrust, her body shuddering under the impact of it. She started to circle her fingers around her clit with quick hard strokes, her breath hitching in her lungs.

Deep inside her ass, he pushed, his cock searing hot, throbbing. He pulled out slowly, groaning as she pushed back instinctively, aching to keep him inside her.

He slapped her ass again and she sobbed.

The next thrust sent her soaring into climax, a dam breaking open inside her as she came and cream flooded from her cleft, soaking her busy fingers and his balls as they slapped against her.

“Hmmmm…perfect,” he groaned. He threw back his head, and a long, eerie howl rose from his throat as he came, his cock jerking inside the snug glove of her ass as he pumped inside her, filling her with hot jets of sperm.

He sank down to rest against her quivering back as the milking sensations of her climax emptied him. His breath wheezed out of him and he asked weakly, “Are you ready to beg for mercy yet?”

“Uh-huh,” she whimpered.

“Good. I think I need a nap now,” he murmured. Easing them to the side, he slowly slipped out of her, shushing her softly as she flinched. And then they slid into sleep, their bodies spent.

Malachi alighted on the small strip of sidewalk, cocking his head. The hotel room was finally silent. “They are done… I think,” Leandra said from behind him, her voice wry.

He turned and met her eyes, not sure what he would find there.

When he saw acceptance, plain and simple, he didn’t know what to think.

She smiled at him. Folding her arms around herself, she rubbed at them, feeling cold, and weaker than she had ever felt in her life. “I can’t say that I ever wanted to be a vampire,” she told him, a smile canted that pretty mouth upwards. “But I’ve learned, over the past few months, maybe I’m not an evil person. It’s been driven home hard, over the past few weeks. I can live this life. And it is a life… I’m thankful to have it. I didn’t want to die. You saved me from that.”

Malachi stood, shocked as she moved up to him and rose to her toes, pressing her lips gently to his. “Thank you, Malachi.”

Settling back on her heels, she studied him, a smile dancing around her lips. “You expected me to hate you, didn’t you?” she drawled, sounding more like her wry, sarcastic self.

“Yes,” he said, simply. The burning in his eyes wasn’t the sting of tears. He didn’t know what it was. But it wasn’t tears. He hadn’t cried in…centuries, at least.

She grinned. “Well, if it would make you feel better, I can always pretend for a while,” she offered. “But I’d rather you offer to help me out with this new…vampire thing.”

“Vampire thing?” he repeated, dismayed.

Her eyes sparkled. “Yes, vampire thing. You know, the feeding and all. And I don’t plan on being a plain vampire,” she teased. Her eyes glowed for the briefest second.

Malachi rolled his eyes skyward and whispered quietly, “Please help me.”

So after centuries, he was finally roped into taking a student.

Shadoe studied the pile of stone in front of her.

Okay, so it wasn’t a pile.

It was a rather elegant setting, this place Ben called Excelsior. But she didn’t want to go to school.

Sliding him a narrow glance, she demanded, “Why can’t you just teach me?”

“I’m not good enough,” he said flatly, resting his hand on her neck.

The dominance of the gesture wasn’t lost on her, and the wolf inside her sensed it, and shushed the part of her that would argue.

“I’m a decent witch. You are an exceptional one. I always knew I’d have to bring you here.” His eyes closed and he licked his lips. “If I had brought you here from the first, maybe what happened could have been avoided.”

A soft comforting presence surrounded them and the Wolf whispered into his mind, Brother…then perhaps, the vampire Dumas would still be unknown to the Council. The witch Leandra and Malachi even now Hunt him. He will no longer prey on the world, unbeknownst to us. All things happen for a reason. All things.

“He’s right,” Shadoe whispered, wrapping her arms around Ben and snuggling her cheek against his chest. “Besides, I doubt I would have listened to you at first.”

He cocked a brow at her and asked, “Does that mean you’re listening now?”

She smiled sunnily. “When it’s in my best interest—of course.”

“You’re a brat, Shadoe, you know that?” he said levelly. But the pleasure, the laughter in her eyes made his heart dance. He doubted she would have been able to laugh even two months ago. He knew she hadn’t ever had that kind of joy in her laughter.

Odd, how damn near losing her life a second time had given her that kind of freedom.

With a tug on her silky brunette curls, he led her down the path to Excelsior. “Come on. I’ve been promised a temporary teaching position…oh, the joy…”

Epilogue

Sheila glanced up as she sensed somebody new entering the school. She knew Cross—distantly.

Her eyes passed over him without much interest before they landed on the woman next to him. She smelled witch, she smelled shifter… A frown briefly marred her face before she turned back to the book she held.

It was a gory, bloody mystery.

And it wasn’t holding her interest worth a damn.

She couldn’t stop thinking of Rafe.

The bastard.

Those wicked black eyes, that clever mouth…she never should have slept with him.

That was her first big mistake.

The second was falling in love with him.

But she had done what she could to fix it. She had begged Eli to let her leave…he had agreed. To a vacation.

A vacation wasn’t what she wanted but it was a start.

She wanted, desperately, to find some sunny beach, and some sexy surfer boy that she could use to forget Rafe. That is what she would have done, when she had been alive. Back in the eighties…all of thirty years ago.

What had she been thinking, falling in love with Rafe?

Closing her eyes, she turned her face to the wall and let the tears fall. She needed to get out of Excelsior and find a man. Have an affair—a hot, wild affair. No man could make her forget Rafe, but maybe she could get his smell off of her, and the memory of his touch would fade a little.

* * *

Rafe hadn’t been able to find Sheila for three days. Not that he had been looking.

But when the sweet scent of plumeria started to fade from Eli’s enclave, he knew something was going on.

Stalking into the Master’s quarters with hell in his eyes probably wasn’t the best way to start the day…but then again, for some odd reason, Rafe seemed to be spoiling for a fight all the time lately.

“Where’s the little southern belle?” he demanded, flinging himself down onto a long leather couch.

Eli glanced up from his desk just in time to see the leather molding itself to the long, rangy vampire’s form. And to see the fire in Rafe’s gaze. He couldn’t help the smile that filled his eyes, but he did manage to keep it from curling his lips.

“She’s gone away for a while,” he said, leaning back and folding his hands across his belly. “Sheila has been rather—unhappy,” he mused after a moment. “She petitioned at first to leave, but we decided a vacation might suit.”

“To leave?” Rafe growled.

“Yes. A new Master, she thought a new home might solve the problem she’s been dealing with.”

“What problem?” Rafe demanded, shooting to his feet. “She Hunts once a week, takes Erika shopping and acts like a babysitter for the kid. And cooking. Cooking, for crying out loud. What fucking problem?”

His black hair tumbled into his eyes and he shoved it aside as he started to pace, mumbling and swearing under his breath.

Eli heard every word.

“I believe she is lonely. I suggested she go find a man and get…fucked six different ways to Sunday. Well, that was Sarel’s phrase. But it suits, I think,” Eli said, bracing himself, and reminding himself staunchly that Rafe was a friend, and that killing him wouldn’t help Rafe or Sheila’s predicament.

Of course, when Rafe leapt over the desk and tore him out of his chair with startling speed, Eli did have to admit, he may have a bit of a fight on his hands. But he hadn’t been planning on fighting at all. Throttling down the instinct to battle, he gave Rafe an innocent look and forced a fake bellow, “What the hell is your bloody problem?”

“You told her to what?” Rafe demanded in a low, deadly whisper.

“Fuck me, she’s a lovely, loving young woman. And she’s lonely. You don’t want her anymore, but nobody here will give her a damn glance for fear of insulting you. She needs a man, so I told her to go find one,” Eli said, reaching up and shoving Rafe back.

Rafe went flying, but he took a handful of Eli’s silk vest with him. Glancing down, Eli scowled. “Now that was just uncalled for. Sarel bought that for me,” he snapped as he took the tattered remains off and held it up. Even Sheila, with her talented hands couldn’t fix this one. If she was around.

“You told her to go find a man,” Rafe repeated, his fangs protruding past his upper lip, his black eyes gleaming red in his rage.

“Aye. I did.” Eli allowed a tiny smile to appear as he cocked his head. “That really shouldn’t be a problem for you…but it looks like it is. Why is that?”

Rafe went completely still as he glared at Eli.

And then he stalked out.

Hunter’s Choice

A Hunter’s World Short Story

By

Shiloh Walker

Copyright © 2009 Shiloh Walker

All Rights Reserved.

"Shit."

The cold wind cut through her clothes like she wasn't wearing anything, blew her hair into her face, made her eyes water, and generally made it twice as hard to do what she needed to do. But she didn't look away from the couple in the alley, and other than that quiet curse, she made no noise, made no movement.

She held a crossbow in one hand, kept the other on a pair of military-issue binoculars with night vision capabilities and a built-in digital camera. She was more used to using the crossbow than the binoculars, but up until a year ago, the only she’d ever used the crossbow was out on a shooting range.

That had been another lifetime ago.

Before 22 February 2007.

The day her life changed forever–the day her twin brother and his wife, Sara’s best friend were found murdered in their hotel room while on their honeymoon.

Joseph and Darla had been the only family she had left and to lose them would have been devastating, no matter what. But to have them so brutally murdered and to live with the gut-deep belief she’d never know who’d killed them, made it so much worse.

The question of who would go unanswered. But Sara knew what had killed them. A creature that couldn’t exist, that shouldn’t. A monster that looked just like a man, acted, walked talked, sounded like a man. She’d been watching this one for a week now. Something about the way he moved, the way he watched people, had set off an alarm in her head.

He shifted a little, lifted his head away from the woman in his arms. The lighting in that alley was too damn dim but Sara was used to it. These freaks never made a move unless it was someplace dark and shadowy. Through her night-vision binoculars, Sara watched as the woman unbuttoned the man’s shirt, pressed her lips to his bared chest.

The man’s head fell back and Sara grinned with feral satisfaction as his lips parted, revealing exactly what she’d suspected.

Two sharp, ivory fangs.

“Got you,” she muttered, snapping a picture and then setting the binoculars aside and lifting her crossbow. The woman was about to get a very rude awakening but Sara figured it was better the woman see somebody get shot in front of her than have some bloodsucker drain her dry.

Behind her, the wind kicked up. Her ears caught a strange rustling sound, a quiet, muffled thump–and then she heard a voice. A familiar voice.

“Not a good idea, Sara.”

She spun around, keeping the crossbow aimed and ready, as she faced a man she hadn’t seen in since she walked out of his hotel room last year. Wyatt Cooper. Blood rushed to her face and a sick sensation of panic exploded inside her.

Stunned, she blinked and squinted at him in the thin light, but there was no mistaking that face. With her heart racing, she lowered the crossbow to her side. “Wyatt?”

He glanced over her shoulder and she had the weirdest sensation that he knew exactly what she’d been doing. Her heart kicked up a few beats, slamming away at her chest wall with a force that left her breathless.

A faint grin tugged at his lips and he said, “Fancy running into you here.” His gaze lingered on her crossbow. “Weird place for target practice.”

“Ahhhh...”

“I seem to recall you being a bit more talkative than this.” He cocked his head, still watching her with that faint, almost amused smile on his lips.

“Yeah, well, you caught me a little off guard. What are you doing here?”

Wyatt shrugged. The cold wind’s knife edge didn’t seem to bother him as it blew his hair back from his face.

He looked incredibly out of place, she realized, but Wyatt was the kind of man who’d stand out no matter where he was. Under the open trench coat, he wore a dark shirt that shimmered in the faint light and dark trousers. The one week they’d spent together, he generally looked like he’d stepped off the pages of GQ and that didn’t seem to have changed.

Well, when he hadn’t been naked and on top of her. Or under...

His shoes looked like they were more suited to pacing the floors of a boardroom than a busted-up, litter-strewn rooftop in the slums of Chicago. But he moved across that rooftop like he did it every day of his life, unconcerned by the cold, by her weapons, or the way she watched him.

“What are you doing here?”

He slid her a look as he approached the hip high brick wall where she’d spent the last two hours. “Looking for you.”

“Looking for me.” Shit. Alarm bells started to sound. Time to make a run for it. Her Canon digital camera and one of her bags lay just a foot away. She could grab them. Grab them and get the hell out. “Why are you looking for me?”

“I’ll answer that question after you answer one for me.” Crossing his arms over his chest, he stared down into the alley.

From the corner of her eye, Sara followed his gaze. Her heart sank to her feet as she realized he’d distracted her at the worst possible time.

Down in the alley, the vampire was feeding. The woman stood still, almost passive, in his arms and there was a look of utter rapture on her face.

Damn it damn it damn it! “I should have gone to Gary,” she muttered. Jerking the crossbow up, she aimed quickly, knowing she’d only have a second–

Less. There was no time to aim before Wyatt moved, grabbing the crossbow out of her hands with uncanny strength. “Damn it, give it back!” Sara reached for it, but he slipped away. “He’s going to kill her.”

If she thought her words might have had some sort of impact on him, she’d thought wrong. “No, Sara. He’s not. He isn’t going to hurt her.”

“You don’t know what in the hell you’re talking about.” Fine. Screw the cross bow. She reached under her shirt, pulled out the Glock holstered at the base of her spine, watching him from the corner of her eye as she aimed–again, she never even saw him move until he was pulling the gun away.

“Unfortunately, Sara, I do.”

Something cold and ugly moved through her and she lifted her head, watched as Wyatt move to stand in front of her. He studied her face with grim eyes. If her instincts hadn’t already been screaming at her, they would have started, just from that look. “What are you doing here, Wyatt?” she asked again, her voice hoarse.

Last year, just days after Joey had been buried, Sara had met a sexy stranger with eyes the color of amber, silken black hair and a wicked smile. She wasn’t the type to pick up men in bars, wasn’t the type to go back to a hotel with a guy she’d known only hours. But she’d done so with Wyatt. And she remembered it all in vivid detail.

She’d spent one week with him, one week in which they rarely left his hotel room. On the seventh day, she’d slipped out of the room while he’d been in the shower and she hadn’t seen him since.

She’d thought about him way too often for her peace of mind and what few dreams she had that weren’t nightmares had been centered around him–hot, sweaty dreams that left her aching and needy and lonely when she woke in her solitary bed. They left her wishing she could be different somehow, that she could move past the mission she’d set for herself.

She thought of him–wondered if he ever thought of her, and figured the uber-sexy man had long since forgotten about her.

But now he stood in before her, watching her with that grim look on his face. “I’m here because of you, Sara.”

“Why?” She inched backward, deciding she’d forget about her bag. The gun. The crossbow. She could get new weapons. His lids drooped and when he looked at her again, terror wrapped an icy fist around her heart. His amber eyes glowed.

When he opened his mouth to speak, she barely heard him say, “I think you know why.”

She was too busy staring at his fangs.

*

Talk about taking one for the team, Wyatt thought with disgust as Sara backpedaled away. Her pale green eyes were wide with shock, her pretty face had gone pale with fear and he could hear the rapid beat of her heart from five feet away.

Five feet and growing. Her hand slid to her waist and then fell back to her side as though she just realized he’d taken her gun away from her. A seriously mean looking gun. Wyatt had little use for such weapons, but he knew his way around them and the weapons he’d taken from Sara weren’t the kind used for recreational purposes.

They were a soldier’s weapons. A fighter’s. A killer’s.

It hurt his heart to see what grief and rage had done to her. Wyatt’s memories of that one week were crystalline–he could recall it in such acute, exquisite detail. The way her lashes fluttered right before her eyes went wide as she came, a feline smile curling her lips as she cuddled into him afterwards.

The way those pretty green eyes had misted over with tears that she tried to hold back. The reluctant way she told him that her twin brother had been murdered, along with her best friend.

Even then she’d had secrets in her eyes, some hidden knowledge she hadn’t given voice to. Thinking back, Wyatt knew he shouldn’t have let her slip away as she had. And not just because he could have happily spent the next fifty years in bed with the woman.

When she’d slipped away from him, he had almost gone after her. Almost. But he’d been sent to make sure she would be all right–not fuck her brains out. He’d ended up doing both, and the guilt he carried was lightened only a little by the knowledge that she’d needed him. And he did prefer to think it was him she’d needed, and not just anonymous comfort sex. A man was allowed a few delusions, after all.

The guilt was back though. He’d been thinking with the wrong brain and now they were both caught in a mess.

“You’re one of them,” she whispered. There was a stricken look in her eyes that was going to linger in his mind for a long, long time.

“Sara, I’m not going to hurt you.”

She laughed. It was an ugly, brittle sound that echoed through the night for just a moment. Then it was gone and she stared at him with a mixture of disbelief, hurt, anger and fear. “Don’t give me that line, Wyatt. I know what your kind do. Hurting people is all you know.”

“If I’d wanted to hurt you, I could have done so last year.”

Sara flinched, almost like he slapped her across the face. Wyatt held still when all he wanted to do was reach for her, pull her to him.

“If you don’t want to hurt me, then what in the hell do you want?” she demanded.

Her voice all but dripped with sarcasm and he knew she didn’t believe him any farther than she could throw him. It hurt. But he’d come into this knowing he’d get bloodied over–figuratively speaking. Getting his heart ripped out again, much like what happened when he realized she’d walked out on him, was much better than the alternative. That didn’t even bear thinking about.

Focus on the problem, Wyatt. Not the consequences of failure, he told himself.

“I just want to keep you from making a mistake.” He jerked his chin in the direction of the alley but didn’t look at her face. “He wasn’t hurting her. He doesn’t believe in it.”

Sara’s lip curled. “Yeah. I bet. You know, this vampire with a soul bit has already been done. Buffy and Angel pretty much covered that story line.”

Despite himself, Wyatt grinned. “Buffy and Angel are Hollywood, love. This is real life.” His smile faded and he pushed a hand through his hair, sighed. “Sara, vampires aren’t demons any more than humans are. Yes, some of my kind are monsters...” He slanted her a look and added, “But then again, I’ve seen my share of human monsters, too.”

“Humans didn’t kill Joey and Darla.”

“No.” Wyatt faced her levelly. “You aren’t mistaken in that. They were attacked by vampires. But not all vampires kill, Sara.”

She gave him a hard smile. It matched the look in her eyes. Hard. Emotionless. Empty. “Sorry, not buying it.”

“If all vampires killed...how come you’re still alive?”

For a second, she looked unsure. Wyatt pressed his advantage. “Did I hurt you once, Sara? Do anything you didn’t want me to do?”

“Just because you didn’t then doesn’t mean you never would, lover.”

He gave her a narrow look. “Sara, darling, it’s a bit insulting to imply I’m a cold-blooded murderer and then call me lover in the same breath.”

She sneered at him. “What, don’t tell me you’ve been harboring fond memories, Wyatt.”

“Fond?” His lids drooped over his eyes. Unable to stay away any more, he went to her, moving quicker than mortal eyes could track. Her eyes widened, her heartbeat kicked up and the apprehension inside her scented the air.

The predator in him stirred, the hunger rousing.

But the man ached. He reached out and hooked a hand over her neck, moving against her so that their bodies were pressed together from chest to knee.

“Fond memories? That doesn’t describe it. I remember the way you moaned in my arms, the way you smiled when you woke up and smelled coffee. I remember the way you taste.”

Lowering his head, he buried his face in the curve of her neck and shoulder. She tensed and tried to jerk away. He breathed in the scent of her, let it flood his system, and then he let her pull back.

“I remember the way you cried yourself to sleep while I held you. And I remember you walking out on me.”

He blew out a breath and shifted his gaze away from her. This was hard, even harder than he’d thought it would be. How could those few nights have left such a mark on him?

He hadn’t been with another since her and the sexual frustration alone was murder. But he didn’t want any other woman. He couldn’t see a pretty brunette without remembering her, remembering the way he’d buried his hands in her silken hair as he kissed her. The way it had spread over them like a blanket as they slept.

“I’ve got fond memories of fishing with my dad. My first dog. My first woman.” He slid her a look and added gruffly, “But fond doesn’t even scratch the surface when it comes to you.”

No. Fond was for barely recalled memories of his youth, memories of the life he’d planned to live until fate intervened. Fond was something he might enjoy reminiscing about, but nothing he’d spend his life missing. He’d missed Sara every day. Woke thinking of her. Dreamed of her. Thought about her. Ached for her.

Sara was one of those things not meant to be that he usually was able to move past. Like the life he had once so carefully planned. Like the fiancée he’d been forced to leave behind. Like his job. His home. His parents. Things, people that he’d loved. But he’d been able to move past them.

He couldn’t say the same about Sara, and as he studied her face, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to tuck her neatly away in some niche. She might be a not-meant-to-be, but he couldn’t accept it.

She started squirm, her gaze moving away as though his attention made her uncomfortable.

When he took a step towards, her gaze swung back in his direction and although she kept her expression blank, he could feel the fear in her. He didn’t stop though and she didn’t back away from him. “You’re afraid of me.”

Her chin angled up. “I’d be stupid to not be afraid.”

Wyatt cocked a brow at her. “Why? When have I ever done anything to hurt you? To make think that I might?”

Curling her lip at him, she gestured towards his face, her eyes lingering on his mouth. Although he knew there was nothing sexual about the look, his body responded as though she had pressed a kiss to his lips rather than sneer at his fangs. “Those aren’t there for ornamentation.”

With a shrug, Wyatt said, “No. They aren’t. They serve a purpose. But I decide what purpose they’ll serve, Sara. I didn’t lose my humanity when this happened–and I didn’t choose for it to happen.”

Her lashes flickered. He’d like to think he was actually reaching her but Wyatt hadn’t ever been much for optimism.

“Leave me alone, Wyatt.”

She glanced towards her things, but she didn’t try to get them. Instead, she backed away until she reached the rickety fire escape, watching him as though she expected him to pounce on her. The idea had its appeal, although not for the reasons she seemed to think. But Wyatt just stood there and watched as she swung her legs over the edge of the roof and disappeared from view.

“That didn’t go well,” he muttered.

The wind slammed into him as he stood there in the darkness, debating his next move. For now, the vampire that Sara had been targeting was safe, as were any others in the area. She’d left her weapons behind.

It was midnight and Sara was a woman alone. He’d follow her, make sure she got wherever she was staying unharmed. His train of thought slammed to a halt as his body whispered a warning. An icy cold touch slithered down his spine and every instinct he had went on red alert. His head flew up and he narrowed his eyes, following a summons few could hear. Death. Blind hunger.

He hadn’t lost his humanity when he became a vampire. But some had.

There were monsters out there preying on humans and right now, one of them was on the hunt.

*

Sara couldn’t hear the footsteps and when she turned to look, she saw nobody behind her. But she knew she was being followed.

Hell. Screw followed.

She was being stalked.

The skin on the back of her neck crawled, her gut knotted and blood roared in her ears. Her fingers itched and if she had her gun, she would have been holding onto it like a security blanket. She wanted to run. Desperately. But the calmer part knew that running was a bad, bad idea. Very bad. Things that ran got chased. Things that got chased too often got caught. No, thanks.

Then there was another part of her that whispered she needed to get back to Wyatt. That voice, for some reason, was harder to ignore. She had no logical reason to think that anything about Wyatt promised safety–even if he had just let her walk away. Even if he hadn’t tried to hurt her.

“Where are you going, pretty girl?”

It was a low, amused voice. Deep with a southern accent, soft and quiet. Not at all threatening. But she felt the threat. Sending a look over her shoulder, she looked for him, but saw nothing. Picking up her speed, she focused on the sidewalk in front of her.

And plowed right into him.

Instinct kicked in and she drove the palm of her heel upward, but he moved away, evading her strike with pathetic ease. His fingers were hard, the chill of them seeping through her clothes and freezing her to the bone. “Where are you going in such a hurry?” he asked, smiling.

Sara said nothing.

The smile faded away and he cocked his head, studying her face. “You aren’t screaming. Why aren’t you screaming?”

Again, she said nothing.

His fingers tightened on her arms and he jerked her close. Sara jerked her head away from him when he pressed his mouth to her cheek and he started to laugh. “There...that’s more like it. It’s more fun when you fight.”

“Then this is going to a lot of fun for you.”

The sound of that voice was about the sweetest sound she’d ever heard, Sara decided. So what if she had just walked away from him a few minutes ago? Angling her head, she tried to follow the sound of his voice, but the man holding her moved, dragging her into an alley at their right.

He moved with a speed that left her head spinning. She thought she heard them talking but their words didn’t make a whole lot of sense. At least not until a hand fisted in her hair and jerked her head to the side. “Unless you want me to rip her throat out in front of you, you’ll stay the hell back.”

That she heard, even though she wished she hadn’t. The vampire lowered his mouth to her neck, running his teeth along the arch. “Come any closer, Hunter, she dies.”

She focused on Wyatt’s face. She could see him now, moving through the alley, a smirk on his lips. Light and shadow played across his face and those piercing, pale amber eyes of his were glowing. “You know how this ends, boy. Let her go. I might even give you a head start. But that’s your only chance.”

The man at her back tightened his hand, forcing her head into an unnatural angle that hurt–shit, it felt like he was going snap her neck before he could bite her. “I know what happens if I let her go.”

Wyatt smiled. It was a mean smile, full of threat and menace. “That’s going to happen anyway. You just get the choice—painfully slow or mercifully quick.”

Behind her, the vampire tensed. His arm came up, angling across her upper body and his hand spread across her neck, gently, almost lover-like. “I got a better choice.”

“Like hell.” Sara snarled and reared back with her head. He either wasn’t as quick as Wyatt, or he’d been fooled by her silence, because he didn’t move out of the way in time. She hit him with a force that left her head spinning, but she heard bone crunch. At the same time, she lifted her foot and brought the heel of her booted foot down on his.

What happened next was too quick for her to process. One minute he had her, and then she was flying, careening through the air and hitting the wall with jarring force. Her head smashed into the brick, brilliant lights exploded behind her eyes.

Distantly, she heard her name. Wyatt. There was a roar. A rush of wind.

The pain in her head throbbed, blocking out anything, everything else. Hands touched her face. Gentle. Soothing. “Sara...look at me.”

Too hard. Opening her eyes just took too much effort. But he brushed his fingers down her cheek and she realized she had to see him. Lifting her lashes, she stared at his face, watched as it swam in and out of focus. His amber eyes were dark with worry, anger. Despite the pain radiating through her, she had to smile.

He actually looked like he cared.

But vampires couldn’t care.

*

Wyatt sat in the chair by the window, brooding as he watched the sun sink below the horizon. As time passed, some of the stronger vamps could tolerate ever-increasing amounts of sunlight. Wyatt’s Change had been nearly eighty years ago and he could take enough sun to watch as it made its disappearance.

His skin itched and burned, just like it would from a sunburn and it felt like there were blisters forming. But as the sun’s rays faded, his body started to repair the damage.

He knew when she woke, heard the subtle change in her breathing, in her heartbeat. Still he wasn’t prepared for the low, throaty sound of her voice. “I didn’t think vampires could handle sunlight.”

Closing his eyes, he steeled himself to see her face before turning to look at her. She was pale, but alive. The past thirteen plus hours had been awful. He’d fought his body’s natural instincts, remaining awake throughout the day to watch her.

Watch.

Worry.

Brood.

And worry some more. It had been more than eighty years since he’d graduated from medical school and saying that things had changed was putting it mildly. Still, a concussion was fairly basic and that was all she had. One thing about being a vampire, if she had been bleeding internally, he would have scented it.

She was still staring at him wide-eyed and Wyatt sighed, glanced over his shoulder at the darkening sky. “Most of the mythology surrounding vampires is either pure nonsense or highly exaggerated.”

“Like the sight or scent of blood turns you into a maniac?”

Wyatt shrugged. “Older vamps have better control than that. A new one? Possibly. But new vamps are supervised until they have some sense of control.”

“You make it sound like there are laws.”

“There are.” Wyatt didn’t bother elaborating. She wouldn’t care about their laws, about his purpose, about anything.

“Apparently the laws aren’t serving much purpose,” she said, her voice bitter.

Gently, Wyatt pointed out, “Humans have laws. But humans still kill, still steal, still rape. The law gives us a way to punish the guilty but as long as free will exists, there will be those who break the law. Mortals and vampires.”

She looked away but not before he glimpsed the pain, the anger in her gaze. “The law failed your brother and his wife. I’m sorry for that, Sara. But you can’t continue on this mission of yours. It’s going to get you killed.”

Her laugh was soft and bitter. “You think I don’t know that?” She paused and looked back at him. “These laws...somebody has to uphold them. Can somebody find justice for my brother? His wife?”

“Sara.” He waited until she looked at him and then he slid off the chair. There wasn’t anything he could to take this pain from her–even if he shared all he knew, nothing would undo the pain. This much, though, he could give. He knelt in front of her and wished he could touch her, wished she could want his touch. “It’s already been done.”

She blinked. Her throat worked as she swallowed. Her tongue slid out to wet her lips and even though it was an innocent gesture, Wyatt’s blood warmed and hunger flared to life. He had to focus to even understand her next words.

“Already done?”

He couldn’t not touch her, Wyatt realized. She’d pull away, he’d feel a fool, but he had to do it. Lightly, gently. All he did was brush her hair back from her face, a quick caress that lasted just a heartbeat. Her breath froze in her lungs and he braced himself. But she didn’t pull back. She didn’t flinch. Her eyes didn’t freeze over with disgust. Her eyes lifted and met his and slowly, Wyatt reached out, cupped her cheek in his hand. “Done. They were dead before the sun set the next day.”

Sara slumped, dropping her head down. “Dead.” She was motionless for a minute and then she stood, brushing past him to pace the room. “Dead. You tell me they’ve been dead for a year. And you expect me to believe you. Just like that?”

Rising, Wyatt tucked his hands into his pockets, watched her long, jerky strides. “I don’t expect you to believe me, Sara. Not over this. Not over anything.”

She came to an abrupt halt and turned, facing him. “Then why do I? Why do I trust you? How come I look at you and I don’t have this urge to run, when I know I should?” There was naked emotion in her eyes, confusion. Doubt.

And need.

The need hit in square in the gut, because it seemed to echo the one inside him. His voice was rusty, hoarse as he said, “It’s your brain that’s telling you to run, Sara. But some other part of you realizes I’m not a danger to you.”

“How can you not be?”

A fist closed around his heart. Wyatt took one slow step in her direction. Followed by another. Another. He was close enough to reach out and touch her, but he wouldn’t let himself. “How could I? How could I possibly hurt you?” Instead of touching her, he reached behind him, pulled the Glock from his waistband. Then he allowed himself to touch her, but gently. Only her wrist. Wrapping his fingers around it, he pushed the gun into her hand and then lifted it, pressed the muzzle to his chest. “Can you hurt me, Sara? It’s still loaded–there’s one missing because I shot the one who grabbed you. But there are plenty of bullets left for me. If you really believe I’m a soulless monster, then you should pull that trigger. I’ve faced my share of monsters and believe me, I don’t hesitate.”

She jerked against his hold, but he wouldn’t let go. “You’re crazy,” she whispered. “You think I won’t? Think I can’t?”

Wyatt smiled sadly. “Oh, no. I know you can pull the trigger. I know you have...and if you really believe I’m nothing but a monster, then you need to pull the trigger.”

Her breath hitched in her chest. Her gaze lowered to the gun pressing into his chest. This close, there was no way the bullet could miss his heart. He’d be dead before he even hit the ground, just like a mortal.

“No.”

She pulled against his hold and this time he let her go, watched as she put the safety back on, carefully...oh, so carefully. Then she laid the gun on the bedside table and rubbed her hands down the front of her pants. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Because I can’t.” She shook her head and turned to face him. “I can’t.”

There was a look in her eyes that might have made him do something that would have totally humiliated him–like reach for her, like tell her that he’d spent the past year wishing things could have been different, that he could have spent it with her. That he could spend the rest of his life with her, after just one week together—and what a fantasy that was.

She was mortal. She’d die in a few short decades. He was vampire. He could die, and probably would, considering his line of work. But the odds were that he’d be walking the earth years after Sara went to meet her Maker.

But even that ugly fact wasn’t enough to keep him from touching her. No. What stopped him was the slow, careful way she backed away from him. What stopped him was the blank, expressionless mask on her face that crept across her face with each step she moved away from him. By the time she was at the door, the look on her face was as smooth and blank as a doll’s. She reached behind to open the door without looking away from him.

He was tempted just to let her leave.

He’d known this was an exercise in futility, but he couldn’t just let her walk away. And it had nothing to do with orders from the damned Council, either.

As she eased the door open, he moved, crossing the floor, moving too fast for her gaze to follow. Her eyes went wide and his ears picked up the telltale skip of her heart as he reached over and pressed a hand to the door, keeping her from opening it. “You can’t leave just yet, Sara.”

Her chin angled up. “Why the hell not?”

“Because what you are doing has to stop.”

The fear he sensed inside her had already faded and she shoved past him. Her elbow dug into his side and automatically, he rubbed it. Mean little brat. “We have laws, Sara. Laws to protect innocent people–and innocent vampires. They do exist, Sara.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right. Because bloodsucking doesn’t actually hurt people, right?”

Reaching out, he stroked a hand down her neck and said, “Actually, you’re quite right. It doesn’t have to hurt, and there’s no reason to kill.”

She smacked at his hand. “Don’t touch me.”

The ice in her voice stabbed at him, cutting into more than just his pride. He eased a little closer, but whether he was trying to soothe wounded pride or something deeper, he didn’t know. Advancing on her, he followed her as she backed away until she bumped into a narrow table.

“I remember when you begged me to touch you,” he whispered. He pressed his finger to her lips and remembered her taste.

“Don’t remind me.”

“Do you need a reminder?” Wyatt asked. “I don’t. I remember all of it. Every...last...detail.”

Her sea-green eyes darkened to jade and her breathing hitched. He heard the acceleration of her pulse, scented the change in the air around her. “You remember too, don’t you?”

The thick fringe of her lashes fluttered, shielding her eyes. But he didn’t need to see them to know the answer. He slid his hand down, curving it over her neck, his thumb resting the shallow notch at the base.

“I’m the same man now that I was then,” he told her, his voice harsh. “The same man you picked up in a bar, the same man you followed to his hotel, and the same man who made love to you and held you when you cried. If I didn’t hurt you then, why would I do it now?”

Her body shuddered and Wyatt tore away with a curse. He stalked away but the sound of her footsteps on the floor behind him made him pause. “Sara–” he turned, certain she’d be running for the door again.

But she wasn’t. She took another step towards him. Another. Another. “You can’t expect me to unlearn everything I’ve believed in over the past year, Wyatt,” she said.

“I don’t.”

She didn’t even seem to hear him. “I’m not an impulsive person...or at least I didn’t used to be. I didn’t pick up men in bars. I didn’t go to hotels with strangers. I never would have believed I could develop some bizarre Buffy obsession and start hunting for monsters who can’t exist.”

Am I doing this? Without a doubt, the answer was yes. And it was what Sara had wanted to do from the time she opened her eyes and saw him sitting in a chair, his gaze focused on the setting sun. She’d watched as his face flushed red, as though burned, watched as blisters formed and then faded moments later as the sun disappeared.

If she’d harbored doubts over what he was, they would have died in that moment. But even the knowledge of what he was didn’t stop her.

She doubted anything could.

There was no reason in what she was doing. Couldn’t be. Nothing rational, nothing sane...but she still didn’t stop. She took another step towards Wyatt and this one brought them so close, their bodies all but touched. “And I also wouldn’t have thought, even a few hours ago, that anything could change my mind about what a monster is. What a monster isn’t.”

She lifted her head, stared into his eyes. “I’m not willing to change my mind on it. Not yet. Maybe never. I don’t know if I’m ready to give that up.”

Reaching up, she traced a finger across his lips and whispered, “But I can’t change my mind on you either...” She pressed lightly and he opened his mouth, slowly, just a little, as though he didn’t to want at all. His fangs weren’t showing, but she could remember how they looked, found herself wondering why they weren’t visible now. “Even with these.”

Sara thought back. He could have hurt her at any time during the day while she slept. Or on any number of occasions a year ago and he hadn’t. Deep inside, she knew he wouldn’t...couldn’t. As strong as her grief and rage was, her belief in him was even stronger. Her knees went weak as his lips closed around her finger, sucking lightly, nipping on her fingertip as she slowly pulled her hand back. “I dream about you and I know I’m not ready to give that up.”

His pupils flared, a harsh breath escaped him. Pushing up onto her toes, she pressed her mouth to his.

For the next thirty seconds, he stood almost frozen as she kissed him. Still, so still she was starting to develop a complex but then his hands came up, grasped her waist. “What are you doing, Sara?”

“Can’t you tell?” She slid her hands under his shirt and forced herself to smile at him. “We did it last year...I thought you said you remembered everything.”

The hands at her waist shook, a convulsive, involuntary tightening that pulled her closer. “Are you sure about this?”

“No,” she replied honestly. “But I am sure about you. You wouldn’t hurt me. I’ve spent the past year dreaming about you and I’m tired of dreams.” Holding his gaze, she pushed up onto her toes and pressed her lips to his.

And this time...he kissed her back. His arms banded around her, pulling her off the floor. The room spun as he pivoted, walking backward to the bed and falling down on it, taking her with him. The year between them ceased to exist as they fought free of their clothes. His body was hard, cool against the warmth of hers but with every passing minute, his body heated until his skin seemed to burn as hot as hers.

His hands raced over her, touching her with a desperate greed that she recognized. It seemed as though Wyatt was as greedy for her as she was for him. He nipped her lower lip, kissed his way down her neck, took one aching nipple in his mouth. As he suckled on her, he wedged his hips between her thighs and pressed against her. She moaned on his name, fisted her hands in his hair and tugged until he lifted his mouth back to hers. His taste–it was like nothing she’d ever known. She loved it. It was addictive.

Just like his touch. Just like his hands and his body...the way he looked at her, the way he stared at her as he played with her hair, the way he whispered her name as she drifted off to sleep in his arms. All of him. Everything.

He pushed inside her and she tore her mouth away from his to suck in a desperate gasp of air. His lips brushed against her cheek, to her neck. He kissed a hot, burning path down to her neck, across her collarbone before he pushed up onto his hands and stared down at her as he started to move. “You wouldn’t believe how often I’ve wanted to do this,” he rasped.

She reached up, brushed her fingers across his upper lip, lingering at the faint bulge just underneath. He tensed, tried to turn his head away, but she slid her hand behind his neck, tangled her fingers in his hair. “As often as me?” she asked, tugging his head down towards her. “Kiss me.”

He did, but it was careful. Cautious. She hated it. Instinct drove her and she deepened the kiss, took it rougher. She felt the response inside his body, in the hard, driving rhythm of his hips against hers. Not enough...again, it was instinct that had her pulling back from his kiss–just a little. Just enough. Enough so she could sink her teeth into his lower lip and bite. He froze. A smug smile curled her lips as she met his gaze.

A rough growl escaped him. His eyes dropped to her mouth and he swore, crushing his lips to hers. At the same time, he slid a hand down her side, palmed her bottom and lifted her. One deep thrust...another. Another. It hit hard, fast, hot, slamming through them with hurricane force. Tearing her mouth away, she cried out his name while he buried his face in her neck, groaning.

Blood pounding in her ears, struggling to breathe, she closed her eyes. He rolled off her and pulled her up against him, stroking a hand up and down her back. “Are you okay?”

“Hmmmm.” Sara couldn’t quite find the energy to lift her lids, but that was okay.

“Not an answer...damn it, you’ve got a concussion. What in the hell was I thinking?”

Heaving out a sigh, she forced her eyes open and reached up, pressing her fingers to his mouth. “Stop. I’m fine. Tired. But fine.”

Very...very tired, actually. Her lids felt weighted and she didn’t bother fighting it any more. With his hand stroking up and down her back and his body warm and strong against hers, she felt more at peace than she had in...forever. Sleep dropped down on her hard and fast.

*

She could have been asleep for two minutes or two hours. Sara didn’t know. All she did know was the warmth and security she’d felt while she slept in Wyatt’s arms was abruptly gone and she was unceremoniously shoved off the bed, hitting the floor on the far side.

“Stay down,” Wyatt growled.

Blinking, trying to force her brain to wake up, she peered up over the side of the bed as the hotel door flew open. The vampire standing there was the one who’d grabbed her the night before. He flicked her a glance, a wide grin spreading across his face and then he looked at Wyatt. She saw his hand come up. Saw her crossbow.

She screamed.

Wyatt dodged away, evading the other vampire with ease. Sara scrambled across the bed, reaching for her gun. A cold hand grabbed her ankle.

Wyatt snarled. “Let her go.”

She kicked out, connecting with a belly that felt as hard as iron but the other one didn’t let go. He tugged and she lunged, made another grabbed for her gun–and this time, she got it. Because he’d let her go–or rather, been forced to let her go. Drywall cracked as Wyatt threw him into the wall.

Sara turned just in time to see Wyatt reaching for the other vampire–and the other vampire lifting her crossbow. Time slowed down to a crawl. There was a scream trapped inside her head, one that couldn’t break free. But as the silver tipped bolt pierced Wyatt’s chest, Sara jerked her gun up, sighted, pulled the trigger. The muffled pop sounded terribly loud, although logically she knew nobody outside the hotel room could have heard it.

Blood, bone and more grisly matter exploded and the other vampire slumped back. Dead. Totally dead, his body limp, the top half of his head gone.

But Sara didn’t care. She was too busy moving for Wyatt, catching his swaying body before he could crash to the floor. Under his weight, she fell onto the bed, clutching him against her. “Wyatt...”

His amber eyes turned blindly towards her. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. “Get out of here, Sara. Somebody...probably called the...cops.” He started to cough and more blood stained his lips when the fit passed. “Get out.”

“Not without you.”

His lids lowered. “Can’t. Too close to the...heart. I’m not going...” his body arched and shuddered. “Anywhere. Not strong enough right now.”

Desperate, Sara shoved him off her lap, braced his weight on his side. “You’re not dying. I’m not leaving you here.” She closed her hand around the bolt and jerked. It wouldn’t budge. “Help me, Wyatt.”

“Get out of here, Sara!” he rasped, his voice harsh, but weaker.

“You want me out, you help me.”

He swore, but reached up, grabbed the bolt and ripped it out. It fell to the bed beside him as dark, dark red blood flowed from the wound. “Get out, Sara.”

She barely heard him. She was too busy staring at the silver-tipped bolt. Her bolt. Her weapon. He was going to die because of her.

No.

His voice came back to haunt her as she studied the bloodied arrow. Most of the mythology surrounding vampires is either pure nonsense or highly exaggerated.

Most. Not all. She barely remembered reaching for the bolt. Didn’t remember pressing the barbed, sharp edge to her wrist or slicing her flesh. Didn’t remember anything until she fisted a hand in his hair and guided his mouth to her wrist.

He jerked back. “No.”

“Yes.”

Wyatt grabbed her wrist and shoved it away. “No. Get out of here, Sara. Get out, now.”

“You want me gone, you’ll have to make me. You can’t do that if you die.”

He shook his head, but even that took too much effort.

She went cold, somehow realizing that he was out of time. Sliding off the bed, she knelt so he could see her face. “Don’t die on me, Wyatt...please don’t die. I haven’t spent the past year dreaming about you because the sex was good. I need you.”

His lashes barely flickered. Breath rattled out of his lungs. All but blinded by her tears, she shoved her wrist to his mouth once more. He brushed his lips against her wrist. His lashes lifted and she stared into his eyes. “Please.”

He struck.

It didn’t hurt. That was all she could think of as his mouth worked at her wrist. It didn’t hurt–and it didn’t last more than a few minutes. Still too much time, though because as he shoved off the bed, moving far too slow and stiff, she could heard the wail of sirens in the distance. “Get out of here,” he muttered, turning his head to look at her.

The hole in his chest was no pumping out blood but he still looked too damn pale. She grabbed her shirt from the floor, her jeans and hurriedly put them on. “Sure. You’re coming.”

His lids flickered. But he nodded, stumbled towards the door, then outside. Stark naked. Sara followed along behind him and just barely thought to grab the keys from the table and his shirt. On the way outside, she wrapped it around her wrist in a messy, cumbersome bandage.

“Benz,” he mumbled.

She got the door open and he collapsed inside. She ran around, climbed in, started up the car.

“Don’t speed,” he said, his voice thick, slurred.

“I won’t,” she said, forced herself to smile. “I’ve been evading the police off and on for close to a year now.”

The next thirty minutes were silent. Too silent. She kept sending him looks, terrified he wasn’t going to make it and a few times, she almost started to panic, because he wasn’t breathing. Did he have to breathe? But then his lids would move, he’d shift and her heart would start to beat again.

When he spoke up, his voice was strong, cutting through the silence. “Pull over.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m sitting here buck-naked. Sooner or later somebody might notice.”

A familiar blue sign reflected back at her as her headlights splashed across it. “There’s a rest stop in a mile. I’ll pull over there.”

He was quiet. Didn’t speak at all as she pulled over or as he reached behind the seat and grabbed a bag, hauled it up and dressed. He managed to do it both gracefully, and silently–not easy considering he was sitting in the passenger seat of a car. Luxury car or not.

“We ready?”

“Not quite.” He grabbed her and hauled her into his lap, his eyes focused on her face. His fingers closed around her wrist, unwrapping it. Tossing the bloodied, ruined shirt aside, he lifted her wrist studied the gash. “You shouldn’t have done that,” he whispered, lifting her wrist to his mouth. She hissed as he licked it and automatically tried to jerk away.

“Be still.”

“You’re licking a very sore open wound,” she said dryly.

“Hmmm. It will help it heal, keep it from getting infected.” From under his lashes, he shot her a look. “Why did you do this?”

She went still. “I...I don’t really know. But I had to. I couldn’t stand to think about you dying.”

He brushed his fingers across her cheek. “You said you needed me. How can you need me? I’m a vampire. We’ve spent exactly eight days together. One week last year. And today. How can you need me?”

She licked her lips, leaned in and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “I don’t know...but probably for the same reason that I couldn’t hurt you. Probably for the same reason you told me to leave you there to die.” Looping her arms around his neck, she cuddled against him. “You’re okay, right? You’re not...” A sob escaped her lips and she buried her face against his shoulder.

“Shhhhh.” He stroked a hand up her back. “I’ll be fine. Thanks to you.”

She wasn’t going to cry. She wasn’t. Wasn’t. Wasn’t. And after about two minutes and dashing away her tears and sniffling, she almost believed it. Lifting her head, she self-consciously wiped the damp tear tracks from her face before looking at him.

“So now what?” he asked.

“I think maybe you should take me with you....wherever you’re going. After all, I’m not exactly safe to let out around you vampire types.”

A faint smile curled his lips even as he shook his head. “You don’t want that, Sara.”

“Why not?”

“You come with me, I won’t ever let you go.” He sighed, laid a hand on her cheek. His flesh was still cool, too cool.

Laying her hand over his, she whispered, “Promise?”

His eyes glowed, for just a second, reflecting golden light back at her. “Sara, you’re asking for trouble.”

“You’re trouble. Sexy. Broody… Not entirely truthful when we first met. Vampire. And I’m asking for you...so yeah, I am asking for trouble.” She pressed her lips to his, forgetting that he’d had his lips pressed to her bloodied wrist. By the time she remembered, she didn’t even care.

“We don’t really even know each other,” he muttered against her lips.

“So? We’ve got time, right?”

A slow, reluctant smile curled his lips and then he laughed softly. “Yeah. We got time.”

Hunt Me

A Hunter’s Word Short Story

By

Shiloh Walker

Copyright Shiloh Walker

Cover Art by Croco Designs

Editorial Work by d.y.m.k. productions

& Sara Reinke

To learn more about the Wicked Reads and The Wicked Writers, visit:

www.TheWickedWriters.com

* * * * *

Chapter One

“Hello, gorgeous.”

The low, rich purr of her voice was enough to have Drew Quentin shifting in the miserable, busted chair. He also had to fight the urge to smile as he reminded himself he’d decided to ends things with Dakota Coulter.

He wanted her, he was halfway in love with her…and she refused to so much as give him her damn phone number.

He could have handled that.

But the cop in him was a little bit disturbed by the fact that Dakota Coulter had a past that was just a little too mysterious. Oh, her background check held up—too well, actually. Something about her had his instincts quivering.

She wouldn’t open up for him.

“Drew?”

He closed his eyes. “I’m here, Dakota.”

“Having a rough night, sugar?”

The compassion in her voice all but gutted him. Damn it. This would be so much easier if she didn’t care—so much easier if he wasn’t in love with her.

“Yeah, you could say that.” He rubbed his temple. He shouldn’t have answered the damn phone. But shit, it wasn’t like he could avoid this forever. He looked up and saw Nicole staring at him. Nicole Halloway, the local DA with the pretty blue eyes, sweet smile and dynamite body.

She was there, she was steady. She was the reason he needed to break things off with Dakota. He liked Nic. Cared for her—a lot. There was an attraction there, too, one that could maybe become more. But not if he was obsessed with a woman who wouldn’t ever hang around for longer than a night or two.

“I guess you’re not up for meeting me after work, huh?” Dakota sighed. “That’s cool, sugar. I understand. I’ll look you up—”

“No.” He continued to star at Nic. He had to get this done. “We can meet. I…I’ve been needing to talk to you anyway, Dakota.”

Now Nic’s brows arched up over big blue eyes. So far their ‘dates’ hadn’t been much more than a cup of coffee, a quick lunch. She knew he’d been seeing another woman, knew he wasn’t going to get serious until he’d been able to break things off. It was time he did that.

Even if it did feel a little like he was ripping out his own kidney with his teeth. Or even his heart.

Sighing, Dakota ended the call.

Something in Drew’s voice had her heart aching.

“We need to talk, huh, lover? Yeah. I’ve heard that line before.” Then she tipped her head back, staring up at the nighttime sky. Granted, she hadn’t heard it much in recent years. Not since she’d slid into a crazy little world where vampires, werewolves and other things went bump in the night. Sometime back in the 70’s, she thought.

Yeah. She smiled absently, some echo of fondness trying to lift the melancholy settling over her heart. But it wouldn’t budge. She’d been kind of happy about coming to Asheville. Now? Not so much.

She was a Hunter without a territory or Master. Her random circuit had her rambling all over the east coast. She often ended up in this area, and she’d been just fine with that. Because this area held a lot of appeal for her, namely in the fine form of one Asheville city detective…Andrew Michael Quentin…Drew.

Drew—the cop who was getting ready to dump her.

She glanced down at her clothes, remembered she’d planned to change before she saw him. “Screw changing.”

She was going shopping.

If he was going to dump her, she was going to show him in vivid, glorious detail what he was missing.

Maybe it would make her feel better.

Although she wasn’t particularly counting on it.

The splash of murderous red on her nails didn’t do much to lift her spirits, but Dakota was pleased with how she looked, at least. The dress might have been a bit overdone, but red looked good on her. It clung to her curves, stopped just a bit short of her knees. And she could still move.

She’d passed on the really cute Jimmy Choos with the ankle straps, settling on a simpler pair of heels. She could run barefoot without falling. Even though falling wasn’t likely, running flat out in heels wasn’t as easy as people might make it seem in books or movies.

On the job, Dakota was practical, and even if she was taking some time to get dumped, she was still working. The only time she wasn’t working was when she crashed in her cabin up in Maine or when she got pulled into Excelsior for one thing or another.

The life of a Hunter.

Sighing, she made one last study of her reflection, pulling the brush through her dark brown hair. It curled around her mostly naked shoulders, the ends coming down to drape around her breasts. She looked good. She was honest enough to admit that. She looked good…like a woman who wanted a man to know it, too.

“Damn it.” She swallowed and turned away from her reflection, determined not to spend the next hour thinking about this. Next hour, minimum, because even though she wasn’t meeting Drew until midnight, she’d be circling around the city. Circling around, watching things. Making sure she wasn’t being watched. There were paranormal creatures aplenty here.

Every damn time she came through, she had to settle trouble. None of it was bad. If it had been bad in the major category, a bigger bad-ass would be here.

Dakota had yet to grow into full bad-ass potential.

But she was good enough to play cop and if things got bad, call in the big guns. Part of playing cop meant being careful.

The life of a Hunter.

A damn lonely life.

“So. You’re breaking things off.” Nic stared at him with a thoughtful frown. “Look, you know, you don’t have to do this. I…I can tell you’ve got feelings for her. And it’s not like we’re ready to move in together or anything. All we’ve got so far is a couple of casual dates and…”

He caught her around the back of the neck and pulled her close. When this woman started babbling, as adorable as it was, this was the only way to stem the flow of words. She gasped against his mouth and then sighed, moving closer. Her lips parted for him and she slid her hands inside his coat.

“Hmmm.” She hummed under her breath as he lifted his head. “What was that for?”

“To make you be quiet a minute.” Pressing his brow to hers, he stroked his thumb across her damp lower lip. “I know I don’t have to do this. But things with me and her aren’t ever going to change, and I don’t like where they are. I like where things are with us. We can’t change while she’s in the picture. Those casual dates won’t go any further until things change, right? So we change them.”

I change them, he thought.

She wrinkled her nose at him. “That shouldn’t sound so sweet. But it does.” Nic rested her head against his chest. “Call me when you wake up?”

“Yeah.” He stroked his fingers through her hair, the silken blonde strands glinting in the harsh, fluorescent lighting. “You want me to follow you home?”

“No. I’m good. I’ve got paperwork to finish up. I’ll have somebody walk me out.” She stroked a hand down his cheek. “You need to shave, baby.”

Then she pecked him on the lips and turned around, her heels clicking on the floor. Just before she disappeared around the hall, her phone rang. He could hear her voice drifting down the hall. When she suddenly snapped, “Son of a bitch!” it made him grin.

He was still shaking as his head as he turned to grab his stuff. But the grin had faded by the time he hit the door. He had thirty minutes.

Thirty minutes to figure out how in the hell to tell Dakota Coulter good-bye.

How did he tell this woman he loved that he was leaving her because she wouldn’t hang around for longer than a day? Hell, he hadn’t even told her loved her.

If she asked why he was ending it, did he tell her he didn’t entirely trust her? And that he’d rather have the sweeter, quieter woman who was there…even if he didn’t want her quite as much as he wanted Dakota?

Rage vibrated inside her. She hid in the darkness, clinging to the shadows she’d just learned to call, because she had to get control. Yeah. Dakota was being dumped. For another woman. She could smell the other woman, even above the smoke, the alcohol, the food…and that lovely, male scent that was uniquely Drew’s.

Now it was for another woman to enjoy.

Mine.

Everything inside her screamed it. But she pushed it aside. Yeah, she had feelings for the guy. She’d had them for a while, but Drew was human.

Dakota was a vampire. Her heart might still very well be human, but she’d stopped being human forty years ago. Tears pricked her eyes. She blinked them away. Nothing like leaking blood-tinged tears to really freak him out. She waited until she knew her eyes would be normal. Even though she knew they hadn’t slid from their sheaths, she checked her fangs with her tongue.

He didn’t know. Oh, he knew she had secrets. She could see it in his eyes. She had no doubt that was part of the problem between them. But what could she say? Honey, I’m a vampire. I’ll be around as often as I can, but…

He was a mortal who wouldn’t even believe in her world. She’d always known it would have to end. Now it was time. As she slid from the booth, she released the shadows. She saw the way he stiffened when he saw her, caught off guard. She allowed herself a small, pleased smile. She’d seen him looking for her, and he was a cop—he’d have looked well.

But nobody could hide like a vampire.

She came to a stop in front of him, smiled at him lazily, careful to keep her mouth closed. Now that she was closer, she could smell the other woman more clearly and she wasn’t going to risk losing that oh-so-precious control.

“Hey there.” He bent down to kiss her, not that he had to bend much with the four-inch heels she wore.

Dakota turned her head to the side so that his lips brushed against her cheek. Her heart shuddered in her chest and she eased backward, avoiding his gaze as she headed toward the bar. “I need a drink,” she said over her shoulder. Not that she expected it would do her much good, except maybe the familiarity of it. She’d have to down a vat of it before she could really get tanked.

She slid onto the stool and called out to the bartender. “Hendrix and tonic with a cucumber slice! Make it a double.”

“Sure thing, beautiful.” His smile flashed white in his dark face. White…with rather sharp teeth. She rolled her eyes. Bo was a shifter. It was one of the reasons she liked this pub. He was a decent sort. If she had to slip out sudden-like, he’d help cover her retreat. As he brought the drink down to her, he focused on her face, his nostrils flaring a bit.

“You’re unhappy, Hunter.” he said, his voice too low for Drew to hear. That didn’t keep him from trying. He slid onto the stool next to her, gaze narrowed on Bo. The shifter ignored him, stroking a finger down Dakota’s cheek. “I don’t like to see a pretty Hunter unhappy.”

“Can’t be helped.” She smiled brightly. Then she reached out and patted his hand. In a voice just as low as his, she said, “Now stop trying to piss him off. This is going to be hard enough, ’kay?”

Bo stared at her, then, with a sigh, he walked off. She took a sip of her drink. Distracted, she glanced around and saw a business card somebody had left on the bar. It had a phone number on it. For some reason, it made her even sadder to see it. Somebody else had struck out tonight.

Taking the business card, she absently started to fold it up, turning it into a neat triangle. She kept fiddling with it until Bo slid a Guinness in front of Drew.

Dropping the business card, she took a healthy drink from her glass and then turned, crossing her legs as she studied Drew’s face. His gaze dropped, quick as a wish, to her legs and then shot right back up to her face. Oh, yes. It was over.

He reached for the business card, unfolding and it smoothing out the creases. “You did that the first time I gave you my number.”

“Habit. You know that by now.” She shoved her hair back, staring at the familiar lines of his face, memorizing them. Over, it really was over. Damn it, she had to get out of here before she started to cry. “Look, let’s just get it over with, baby. I’d rather not listen to whatever pretty speech you put together.”

The thick fringe of his lashes drooped over his eyes. “What exactly do you do for a living, Dakota, read minds?” he asked, his voice conversational. Or it would have been, if he hadn’t been raising it to be heard over the noise in the bar. One hand, long-fingered and callused in just the right way, closed around his glass.

Dakota sighed. It wasn’t the first time he’d asked, although she knew he wasn’t really asking, this time. “Baby, you know what I do for a living. Security consulting. We’ve had this discussion before.”

“Yeah. And I sell bridges in Arizona.” He took a deep drink from his Guinness. “Do I even need to spell this out or did you already piece it together?”

“Why don’t you just save me the details, Drew?” She tossed back the rest of the drink and slid off her stool, ignoring the concern in his eyes. “I hope she makes you happy, cop.”

Without saying another word, she headed off toward the back of the bar. She heard him behind her. Almost started to turn—she wouldn’t mind one last kiss. Something to give him to remember her by. But something prickled along her spine.

There was a whisper of warning, those instincts that made her what she was. Part of those secrets she’d kept hidden from Drew. As much as she’d love to give Drew that farewell kiss, she knew she couldn’t. Once more, duty called. She was needed.

She shot Bo a look. He wasn’t a Hunter, but sometimes she suspected that was because he’d chosen not to be.

Their gazes met. With a subtle jerk of his head, he nodded to the backroom. He’d cover her, let her leave in secrecy, in silence.

As she slid away from Drew, he played interception.

One last time. Because she wouldn’t be seeing Drew again.

It all but ripped her heart out to think about it.

“What the…?”

Okay, he’d come here to break things off, but he’d wanted to say good-bye, damn it. Was there a fucking reason he couldn’t say good-bye?

Oh, hell, no. He was going to at least do that. She might not be what he needed—even if she was what he wanted, but he would have good-bye.

“Hey there, buddy…”

The bartender, moving with an eerie silence that was almost as disturbing as Dakota’s, stood between them. Drew tensed, his eyes narrowed. “Step back.”

“Can’t do that, cop.” Then he smiled, quick and easy. “Not unless you got a good reason for tearing off into the backroom of my business. You give me a reason, then sure, I’m happy to let you. I’m a law-abiding citizen, you know.”

“How about you just let my girlfriend go back there and she’s upset?”

The black man reached up, scraped his nails down his cheek in a thoughtful, lazy manner. “Well, you see, the problem there is this…she isn’t your girlfriend. Not any more at least. You just broke things up. Got another lady waiting for you, too.”

“That’s none of your business, is it?” And how the hell did you know that?

“Your girlfriend? You?” The man shook his head. “Not a bit. But Dakota, well, she’s a friend of mine. She walked away. That means she’s done. Let her go. Go on now, man. You got your own path to follow, don’t you? Doesn’t seem to include her anymore.”

His golden eyes glimmered in the dim light and for a minute, Drew would have sworn they glowed. The man’s face seemed something…other. But then the moment passed and the bartender smiled. “You gotta understand, man. I just don’t like the idea of a cop roaming around my place without a reason, but even less…I don’t want you upsetting her any more than she already is.”

“That’s why I’d like to talk to her.”

“Talking to her after you ditched her for another woman isn’t going to make her feel better.” Now he stared at Drew as though he was the stupidest man on God’s green earth.

It didn’t help that maybe Drew even felt that way.

It also didn’t help that Drew had the weirdest feeling he was making a huge mistake, walking away from Dakota. But she wasn’t what he needed…

Isn’t she…?

No. What he needed was the pretty, petite blonde who didn’t have a thousand secrets, who answered his phone calls, and who would be there. He didn’t want to put a ball and chain on any woman, but he’d sure as hell like to have a woman in his life who was around more often an once a month, once every two months…less.

Sighing, he shifted his gaze past the other man, staring at the closed door that separated him from Dakota. “You need to go check on her then. Make sure she’s okay…hell. I don’t know. I just…”

“I’ve always been there when she needed me. Today’s no different.”

As the cop finally left, Bo said, “Marin.”

His second, a small, sleek woman, appeared at his side. The top of her head barely reached the middle of his chest. She was one of the meanest bitches he’d ever met in his life—he absolutely adored her.

“Yeah?”

“Watch the bar for me. I think I’m needed somewhere.”

She sighed and pushed her pink-streaked hair back from her face. “Dude, you keep insisting you’re no Hunter.”

Bo smiled. “I’m not…I’m just worried about Dakota. She’s a friend. If she wasn’t, I wouldn’t worry unless it was going to present a problem for us.”

His small pack was just now getting established here. He wouldn’t risk it.

But he wouldn’t be much of a friend if he ignored that tingle on his spine, either. Dakota had problems coming her way. He didn’t know what they were, but if it was something she could handle, he wouldn’t be feeling this way.

“I’ll be back.”

As he slipped through the back door, Marin made a face at him.

Chapter Two

Somebody was going to die. Dakota tasted it, felt it. Could feel it clogging her throat and she wanted to kick her own ass. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t felt anything earlier. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t realized anything bad was going down. What mattered was that she hadn’t been doing her job. She had been with Drew.

Now somebody was going to die. She knew she wouldn’t get there in time to stop it. She could feel the blood. Taste it. It hung in the air like a cloud.

Idiot. Stupid, selfish idiot. What had she been thinking?

It was thicker now, the stink of death, thicker as she drew closer to the building, and when she started up the fire escape, it was almost enough to choke her. She heard them. Voices, whispering. A grunt. A soft, broken moan. The air is thick with the stink of violent, angry lust.

Calling on the shadows, she wrapped herself in them, hiding. Distantly, she was aware of the fading, faltering pulse. The woman, she was dying. I’m sorry...

The window was open. Dakota hesitated. How do I get in?

How had feral vamps gotten in? Had the woman invited them? There was some truth to the rumor vampires could only go where they were invited—a person set up a home, set down roots, it gave him a bit of protection. Their protection started to fade, though, when the owner died. This owner wasn’t gone—yet.

Dakota wasn’t going to wait until it was too late. Focusing her mind, she reached out. As she did it, she prayed. As the ferals were too far into the blood lust, they wouldn’t be aware of anything else. That was bad for the woman, the better for Dakota. She was clinging to life, but only barely.

Hey, sweetheart. Invite me in. I’ll get rid of them.

She felt a flicker of surprise from the woman—followed by desperation, determination. This woman wanted to live. Even though her body strength was waning with every drop of blood loss, clung to life. Help me. Help us…

Us...? Dakota frowned. Then she took a deep breath, trying to filter out the sense of blood. Death, that faint sense of food and something else... another scent, one she knew, hauntingly familiar and tugged at her senses.

And something—stronger, so strong, it threatened to overpower everything else.

Death. Not a woman about to die, the people who had already died.

She didn’t need to wait for this woman to invite her in.

The people who lived here were already dead.

Out of habit, Dakota took a deep breath and gripped the knife she had lifted from Bo’s backroom. The Kel-tech was wicked sharp and specially made, with enough silver in the blade to make any vampire very, very sorry.

The first one, stupidly standing with his back to the door, didn’t survive for more than a few seconds. She plunged the knife into his back as savage jerk of her wrist, shredded his heart. He was dead before he hit the floor.

She stared at the remaining vampire where he remained crouched over his victim. “Get up.” She stared at him and twirled her knife.

His eyes, dazed, all but drowned from the blood lust, stared at her. Dakota took one step toward him. Snarling, she said again, “Get. Up.”

He might be lost to the blood lust—barely more than an animal. But even animals had the instinct to live. As he came for her, Dakota braced herself.

Screw it.

Drew tried to tell himself that, tried to tell himself it didn’t matter. They had ended it. That’s what counted, right? They had even ended it without an ugly, dramatic scene. To be honest, he’d expected some drama. She just seemed the type.

Maybe he should be happy.

Fuck that. He wasn’t happy. Damn it, she’d just walked. How in the hell could she just walk? Two years and this was how it ended?

Okay, so yeah, he’d ended it, but…

“Shit.”

He couldn’t forget that no matter what, Dakota it made him feel like nobody else ever had.

“Shit.” He shoved a hand through his hair. “Not supposed to be doing this. Not supposed to be comparing them. Not supposed be thinking about Dakota, not anymore.”

His future needed to be with Nicole. He knew that. She was what he needed, and pretty close to what he wanted. At least what he thought he wanted. He should call her. He needed to see her—yeah. Go see her. He always felt better after he saw her, after he talked to her. Once he did, maybe this emptiness inside would go away.

Frowning, he saw the messages on his phone. It was from Nicole. When had she sent it? He tapped the screen to bring up her message.

Had to go check on a client. If you’re free, might be in your neck of the woods in an hour. Don’t know about you, but I could use the company.

“My neck of the woods?” He scowled.

A cold chill ran down his spine. He needed to see her. He needed to be there. Right now.

“Bastard.” His worthless body fell to the ground and although everything inside her screamed to get to the woman, Dakota paused to make sure the heart was completely destroyed. It was.

She checked the other corpse and heaved out a sigh. Both dead. Good. Job done. Shittily so, but still done. Moving over to the woman, she crouched at her side and did what she could to stop the sluggish flow of blood.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I should have been here sooner.”

There was no response. She was fading. Taking a deep breath, Dakota blinked back the tears, tried to think. Once more, something about the woman sent tugged at her. Familiar, very familiar. Dakota hadn’t met her before—that much she knew. But she had smelled her before. And there was something else, no, someone else.

“No. Oh, no.”

Her already bruised heart began to shatter. Her voice was thick with tears as she spoke. “Hey, sugar. Listen, we don’t have much time. I can help you—if you want to live, I can help. It can be weird, and may not be a lot of fun, especially at first. But I can help. You have to tell me you want to go. Do you want it?”

It was law. No Hunter was allowed to bring another over unless the person wanted it. No, this woman didn’t entirely understand what Dakota was offering her, but if she wanted to live and if she was willing that was enough. Focusing, she waited.

Hello. Screw acceptance—it was a demand.

You help me, damn it. Now…

From the roof, Bo saw the cop coming. Although he wasn’t surprised, he sure as hell was irritated. “Don’t need this mess.”

There was a reason he preferred to leave the Hunters to themselves. They got involved in things they shouldn’t. They tried to save those they shouldn’t. They tried to help every damn body and half of them couldn’t even help themselves.

Like Dakota, for instance. Poor girl, down there doing her best to save the cop’s girlfriend. Yeah, Bo knew who was in the apartment building. The woman didn’t live here, but her scent was all over the place. She was here, and she was here often. And because she was, he also smelled the cop.

Dakota wasn’t to blame for a couple of ferals making a snack out of the pretty lady. She’d done her job, dealt with them. They wouldn’t kill another woman, another child.

He was pissed off, and yeah, he did feel guilty some poor human had suffered for it. But that was the way of the world. Monsters preyed on the weak. Dakota would let the guilt eat her up, and because she had a connection to this victim, it would be that much worse.

And here comes the cop. “I do not need this.” Leaping off the roof, Bo landed lightly on the fire escape on the floor below.

Sighing, he ignored the sarcastic voice in his head reminding him that he didn’t have to be here. Yeah, he did. Dakota was a friend. She had trouble coming her way, trouble with a capital T. He didn’t leave friends hanging.

Chapter Three

Hurry, hurry, hurry.

It was a scream in his head, a song in his blood. Drew lived by his instincts. Like the time he had first seen Dakota— sauntering down the street, all sexy curves, feline smile and attitude. Instinct had demanded he follow, just as his instincts had screamed mine.

Right now, his instincts screamed danger. They screamed death.

Everything looked normal as he tore into the Hendersons’ apartment building. Nothing looked off. Nothing sounded off. But something was—the hairs on the back of his neck stood up, adrenaline crashed through him and every muscle inside him was loose, ready for action. His phone was silent. He had called Nicole twice on the way over. She always answered, at least when she wasn’t working.

He knew this apartment building too well. One of the elevators never worked. The other was slower than smart, and it broke down often. He took the stairs. Five floors up—it only took him minutes, but it felt like years.

Nic…

The Hendersons lived at the very end, the two-bedroom apartment housing a family of four. Up until past fall, it had been a family of five. The oldest had run away and gotten involved with a criminal type. When she had tried to leave, the bastard that killed her. The family had proof of their daughter’s involvement, though, and they had gone to the cops.

Was that why Nicole was here? He didn’t know. All he could think was…Be safe, please be safe. And because he didn’t trust that to be enough, he prayed silently, please, God, keep her safe.

If any of those thugs had gotten to her, Drew was going to tear this town apart. He wouldn’t rest until every last one of them had been arrested and put behind bars.

He reached the door, hesitating.

He couldn’t wait. He knew that. He couldn’t wait... and neither could Nicole.

Dakota heard the footsteps. More than that, she knew she wasn’t alone. Recognizing his scent, she ignored him. She couldn’t lose focus right now.

“Come on, sweetheart. You need to take more.” She held her wrist to the woman’s mouth and when she fought to turn her head away, Dakota held it in a merciless grip. She hadn’t done this much to lose her now. The problem was that Dakota wasn’t overflowing with blood of her own.

A master of the obvious, Bo decided to emerge from the shadows and point that out. “Baby, you know you haven’t fed enough to be doing this. You barely have enough blood to walk out of here.”

“I’ll be fine.” Staring at the blonde’s face, she thought she saw a bit more response, some animation there. A split second later, she felt the response as the wounded woman started to draw on her wrist.

Behind her, Bo sighed. A second later, the rich tang of shape-shifter blood filled the air and Bo’s wrist appeared in the center of her field of vision. “Feed, Dakota. You and me got about three minutes before we have company. And trust me, they aren’t bringing us tea and cookies, either.”

“What…?” She scowled, but she wasn’t looking at him. Staring at the door, she narrowed her eyes.

“Feed. Now. Her cop is on the way and what do you think he’s going to do when he sees this mess? I’ll deal with the bodies and I’ll handle the blood—throw enough chemical shit on it that no lab in the world is going to be able to get anything useful out of it, especially not vampire DNA. But you and her, you have to be gone…”

She didn’t wait another second. As the woman fed from her, Dakota seized Bo’s wrist with her free hand and closed her mouth around the wound there. It was already healing, but that didn’t matter. Her fangs pierced his skin and the rich, ripe taste of his blood flooded her mouth.

It wasn’t even a minute before Bo rested his other hand on her scalp. “Enough, baby. We didn’t have three minutes. Our time is up—that cop of yours is fast. And damn quiet for a human. He’s already on almost on this floor.”

In under sixty seconds, Bo had scattered the chemicals needed to break down the vamp DNA. Another ten seconds wasted as he gathered the bodies of the dead vamps. In another fifteen seconds, he was out the window. Dakota gingerly pulled her wrist from the woman’s mouth, grimacing as she fought to continue feeding. Already hungry—that was a good sign, Dakota supposed. Showed strength.

As she gathered the woman in her arms, she looked up and as Bo looked back through the window. “Go on. You need to be out of sight more than I do. I don’t have anything here to come back to, in the end. Your life is here, though.”

He nodded. “I’ll keep in touch.”

He was gone in another blink.

Dakota started toward the door, cradling the whimpering woman in her arms. Soon, she’d fall into the deep, dark slumber that would dominate the next few hours. It would give them some time to get safe—and they needed to be safe—

Shit.

She heard the footsteps. And she could smell him.

Don’t look, don’t look dontlookdontlook!

Lunging through the window, she peered downward. Five stories. She could jump that. The door behind her opened. Foolishly, she glanced backward. Her heart leaped into her throat as she saw Drew. Their gazes locked.

Then he looked down and saw the woman clutched in Dakota’s arms.

As he pulled his gun, the shattered pieces of Dakota’s heart shriveled. There wasn’t anything even left to heal now. “Don’t move,” he warned.

She shifted to the side, using her body to protect the woman she carried. And then she leaped.

Still unable to believe what he’d seen, Drew took off running for the window. This wasn’t happening—

He wasn’t going to find Dakota crouched on the fire escape, carrying a bloodied Nicole around like a ragdoll. It wasn’t happening—wasn’t, couldn’t be. He was seeing things…

The fire escape was empty.

Scrubbing a hand over his face, he turned and looked around. Maybe he was seeing things…?

Except the Hendersons’ apartment was a bloody mess—very, very bloody. There was a faint, odd smell in the air—something like bleach, but not quite. Remaining by the window, he reached for his phone.

He’d call this in. Then he’d call Nicole again.

He hadn’t seen what he thought he’d seen.

He hadn’t.

If Dakota had been here, she’d either still be on the fire escape or if she’d been able to haul Nicole down the fire escape, he would have either seen her climbing down, or seen them both…no. He couldn’t even make himself think of that image.

There was a logical explanation for all of this. There had to be. Nicole was at home, or she was out with a friend, or something…Dakota wouldn’t hurt anybody. She didn’t even know who Nicole was, right?

There was a logical explanation, and he’d find it.

Except there wasn’t one. And he couldn’t.

Twenty-four hours passed and as those hours ticked by, Drew was aware of too many fucking weird things.

All of the Hendersons were dead. The children had been killed in their sleep, the father’s head had been all but ripped off, and the mother had been raped, her throat practically torn open.

Nicole was missing. Her phone, her coat, her keys, all of them had been found at the Hendersons’ apartment. Her car was parked outside, just down the block. When he tried to track down Dakota at her ‘security firm’ he’d been told she’d turned in her resignation early that morning, as well as relinquishing the key to the apartment they had furnished for her. They were terribly sorry but she hadn’t left a forwarding address, promising she’d come by to pick up any needed paperwork in a few weeks—was there any way they could take a message? Naturally, they told him, they’d cooperate in any way they could.

Warning sirens were already screaming in his head.

What in the hell is going on?

Eyes gritty, head pounding, Drew pored over the lab reports, trying to understand what he was seeing. It was just a rough preliminary and it was likely about as conclusive as anything he was going to get, too.

The blood that had been found in the living room was messed up. Contaminated with something, the techs had told him. Something similar to bleach—that made him think of what he’d smelled.

But they couldn’t identify the compound. They also didn’t think they’d be able to process the blood. It was breaking down on them—it’s like sludge, Detective. We can’t even get a blood type—never seen anything like it.

“You know, you can’t work this case.”

Looking up, he met his lieutenant’s eyes. Then he looked back down at the reports. “I’m not working this case. I’m reading these reports. That’s not the same as working this case.”

“Just like you calling and hassling the lab techs isn’t the same. Just like you doing door to door isn’t investigating?” Anna Reid lifted a graying brow as she studied him. Sighing, she settled herself on the seat in front of his desk. “Drew, I know this is hard. But you can’t work this. And you need to take a few days off. Go home. Clear your head.”

“I can’t.” He couldn’t clear his head…every time he even closed his eyes, he’d seen Nicole. Suffering—screaming. Shit, earlier, he’d dozed for maybe twenty minutes and had the most fucked-up nightmare. Dakota had been torturing her. Holding Nicole down on a bed—

“I can’t.”

“You don’t have a choice.” She rose from the chair, lingering for a moment. “Go home. Take a few days. I promise, if there’s anything new, I’ll call you.”

Chapter Four

Go home.

Yeah. She could make him go home, all right.

But the lieutenant couldn’t make him stay. After another one of those fucked up dreams hit him, Drew left. Driving around aimlessly. Until he wasn’t—until he realized he had a direction. On a road heading north out of North Carolina.

Drew didn’t know where he was going, but he knew he had to go somewhere. He stayed off the highway, sticking to the smaller roads. When he came across a small town, he figured he’d stop and get some gas, maybe grab a bite to eat although he wasn’t hungry.

But instead of searching for a gas station, he found himself slowing down in front of the small hotel. He wasn’t sure why.

It didn’t look like much. The units were set up in groups of twos or threes.

The beds would be rock hard, the water pressure would suck, but it would be cheap.

“What in the hell am I doing here?” What he needed to be doing was calling his lieutenant, seeing if there was any progress. Or maybe heading back to town and doing his own investigating. He could stay out of the way. Nobody had to know what he was doing.

Instead of doing any of that, he turned into the parking lot of the little hotel.

Because he knew he needed to, though, as he parked his car, he grabbed his phone. A quick call to his boss, Anna Reid would only take a couple minutes. And he suspected if he didn’t call, it would make her suspicious. He didn’t want that.

“Lieutenant.” He climbed out of the car and shut the door, leaning against it as he studied the hotel. It looked even more humble up close. “Has there been anything new? Have we found Nicole yet?”

“Sorry, Quentin…there’s nothing new. She hasn’t been seen or heard from. You know I would call you if I had news.”

“Yeah. You know I can’t just sit around twiddling my thumbs either, waiting for you to call me. I had to at least check.”

“Yeah. I was surprised you hadn’t already called. I was getting kind of worried—thinking you were out doing something stupid.” She paused. “You don’t plan on doing something stupid, do you, Drew?”

He ran his tongue along his teeth. Something stupid? Hell. He just might be getting ready to do that. He didn’t know. His skin was itching something awful and his instincts were screaming.

“Nah, I want to keep my badge. Keep in touch.”

He ended the call and tucked the phone in his pocket. Blowing out a breath, he started toward the office. Although he had no clue what he was going to say once he got in there. Hello... I’m a cop. I live a few hours away from here and the night before last, I broke up with my sort-of-girlfriend and less than an hour later I saw her hauling my other sort-of-girlfriend’s body out of the window of an apartment. They disappeared right in front of me. Nobody has seen them almost forty-eight hours. Now I don’t know why I’m here. But I feel like I’m supposed to be. Any idea why?

Yeah, that would get somebody’s attention. Just not the kind he needed.

Okay, so he wouldn’t mention the fact that Dakota had disappeared from a five-story building carrying a woman who had weighed almost as much as she had. She hadn’t fallen, because they would’ve found bodies. He kept that fact quiet from his fellow officers—he would keep it quiet now. He would just go with some official line, investigating a missing persons case... yadda yadda yadda—seen anything suspicious?

No reason to get descriptive at all.

As he stepped inside the office, stale stink of cigarette smoke wrapped around him like a cloying, embrace. It was going to cling to him, too. Sighing, he moved to stand at the desk.

As the older man ambled through a door behind the counter, Drew rested his hands on the old, stained wood. It was clean, though, cleaned and polished to a mirror shine. There was a smudged fingerprint there. Absently he brushed his thumb across the small smear. When he did, his elbow bumped into a cup of pens, knocking them over.

“Sorry.” He shot the owner an apologetic glance and scooped up the pens on the counter. Then he crouched down and gathered the pens that had rolled onto the floor. That was when he saw it. If he hadn’t bent down on his knees, he never would have.

A piece of paper, maybe a receipt. Folded into a neat triangle, roughly the size of the end joint of his thumb.

She could never be still. For some reason, it had always charmed him. That wild, crazy energy she had inside her.

The little folded triangle lying on the floor could have been left there by anybody. Logically, Drew knew that. But as he picked it up, that itch along his spine got worse, and his blood roared in his ears.

Slowly, he stood. The hotel manager was at the counter now, a friendly smile on his face. But it faded when Drew pulled out his shield and laid it on the counter.

“Officer. Can I help you?”

“Detective.” His hands were sweating, he realized. His hands were sweating, his heart was racing, and he felt more than a little sick. Dakota...was she here? How could she have hurt Nicole? How did Dakota even know about her? “I’m looking for a woman who might be one of your guests. She’s about 5’3, mid-thirties, long, dark brown hair. She would have checked in yesterday or today. Have you seen her?”

Something flickered in the man’s eyes. He was good—very good. But Drew saw it, that flash, there and then gone again.

With a smile, the man said, “Naturally, Detective, I want to help. But I have a responsibility to my guests as well. You’ll need to give me some sort of warrant before I can tell you anything.”

Still gripping that small piece of paper, Drew returned the man’s smile. Then, without a word, he left the hotel’s office. The man had already told Drew everything he needed to know. The rest, Drew figured he’d just take a look around and see if he couldn’t find those answers for himself.

Sick at heart, tired and hungry, Dakota rose from the floor. Nicole was sleeping on the bed, if her restlessness could be called sleep. The fever had come on her yesterday, the Change hitting hard and fast.

As hungry as Dakota was, Nicole needed to feed. Drawing her knees to her chest, Dakota pressed her face against them. “I’m not equipped to handle this.”

She had never brought anybody over. She knew the basics. After all, she had gone through this herself, and all of the Hunters were taught—they had to be, in case they ever had to make a choice like this. Ideally, this would’ve been done in a better place. A more controlled environment. Too bad life didn’t happen under ideal circumstances.

So Dakota was doing the best she could—the best she could think of was to get Nicole to Excelsior. But first she had to get somebody here so the newborn vamp could feed when she awoke. Which meant Dakota needed to go trolling.

Her destination was the town’s single bar. Of course, it involved her leaving the security of the hotel before the sun set. She could do it, tolerate some of the evening sun, but not for long.

Nicole would sleep longer but if Dakota wasn’t back fast enough, the baby vamp would rise and hunger would drive her out on her own. She was too young to be able to control it yet. The hunger would drive her to do awful things if somebody wasn’t there to help her.

Staring at the tousled blonde head just barely visible under the blankets, Dakota sighed. “This isn’t what I signed up for. I wanted to kill the bad guys, that’s all.”

It only cost him $20 to convince the gas station owner to let him leave his car there. Not bad, and it only took him five minutes to make his way back to the hotel. And he got back just in time to see something that left him rather floored.

No. Just... no.

It was her, though. Dakota. He couldn’t see her face—he was too far away. But he recognized that hair, and he recognized that walk. Even with her head down, her shoulders slumped—it was her, all right.

Was she leaving? Did he go back for his car?

But even as he went to do just that, Dakota glanced back toward building behind her. There was hesitation in her steps.

What in the hell…?

As she started back toward her car, suspicion settled in his gut. Suspicion. Fear. Maybe even hope.

The skin on the back of her neck crawled. Dakota had the weirdest damn feeling she was being watched. The wind blew her hair back from her face and the sun was already stinging her skin. She breathed in deep, trying to pick up something on the air—the strong wind was throwing her off, though and she didn’t have time to linger if she wanted to be back before Nicole woke. And this wasn’t just a want—it was a need. She needed to be back.

So she didn’t worry about the strange sensation of being watched. Whoever it was, they were human. A witch, a were or vamp—any of those would have set off her internal alarm in a different way. Since it wasn’t that, she needed to focus on the problem of her baby vamp and keeping her fed. Safely.

Maybe God would smile on her and there would be a town drunk. Wouldn’t be a tasty treat for Nicole, but a town drunk would be pathetically easy for Dakota to use her not-so-impressive mental skills on and once Nicole had fed, Dakota could wipe the memory away. Nice, simple…

Drew circled around from the back, making sure any nosy managers peeking out from the office wouldn’t be able to see him. He’d noted the general location Dakota had looked and it had to be one of two buildings. Her car had been parked closer to this one, too. So he figured this was the best option. But he was wrong. The curtains were partially open. If anybody was using either of these rooms, they were an obsessive neat freak. The same could be said for the next unit. But the one next to it…the curtains were drawn tight. Not even a sliver of the room could be seen.

His gut was a cold, hard stone. He stood there, staring at the door. Images flashed through his mind. Nicole twisting on a bed. Crying out. Begging for help.

Swearing, he lifted his hands to his face. Yeah, he’d relied on his instincts a lot in life. Listened to his gut—sometimes he had hunches that had played out in ways that had been almost spooky. So what if this felt almost like one of those things? He couldn’t—

Swearing, he stepped back just a pace. Enough with this shit. Blocking everything else out, he kicked the door in. As it went crashing back, he braced himself. If he was wrong—

The sight of the blonde laying in the bed almost sent him to his knees.

“Nicole!”

But she didn’t move.

When he ran to her side, tearing back the covers, she barely stirred. As a matter of fact, she barely seemed to be breathing.

Dakota slowed and pulled into the parking lot of the town’s sole bar. It wasn’t even a block from the hotel, if you cut across the back lots. But since she planned on picking somebody up, using him for a pint or two of blood and then taking him to wherever he lived…well, she’d rather not be seen so much. Climbing out of the car, she sighed and stood there, studying the toes of her black leather boots, wishing she knew why she was so edgy.

Wishing—

There was a breaking sound. She tensed and slowly lifted her head. The bottom of her gut dropped away. Vampires had pretty spectacular hearing.

“Nicole!”

That voice…she knew that voice.

Swearing, she took off running toward the hotel. Screw the car. Screw catching attention. He couldn’t be near Nicole now. And damn it, how had he found them?

Chapter Five

Her skin was too cool. She wasn’t waking up, either. Lifting one eyelid, Drew peered into Nicole’s blue eyes, studying her pupils. No reaction—fuck, was she drugged? Sick? What—

“Get back, Drew.”

Hearing that familiar, low voice, he looked up.

Dakota stood in the doorway, her eyes locked on his face—for a second, they almost looked like they were glowing—

Shit.

“I think you need to get back,” he told her as his heart split in two. She’d done this. Damn it. She’d somehow hurt Nicole. How could he have misjudged her—?

She came into the room, frowning at the door for a moment and then shifting her dark eyes his way. “Drew…get away from her. It isn’t safe.”

Drawing his weapon, he leveled it at her. She didn’t even blink—damn it, she could stare at him over the barrel of a gun and not blink. Who in the hell was this woman? “You kidnapped a lawyer, Dakota. You’ve done something to her. You got any idea how much trouble you’re in?”

“I didn’t kidnap her.” She lowered her head, pressing a hand to her temple. When she looked back at him—

Drew stumbled back. Her eyes—shit—they were glowing. “Get back, Drew. Now.”

His legs started to move. He was halfway across the floor before he could make himself stop. Shit. Not right. This was so fucking not right. Spinning away from Dakota, he stared at Nicole. “I’m taking her out of here and getting her to a hospital.”

I need to call the cops. That was what he needed to do. But his gut told him Dakota wasn’t going to let that happen. His gut also told him, though, that she wouldn’t hurt him. Maybe she’d hurt Nicole and God knows who else, but not him. Yet. He’d use that to get Nicole safe, and then he’d make her pay—

Returning to Nicole’s side, he bent down to lift her, still holding his gun. He had no chance, though. A hand closed around his arm. Small and feminine…it shouldn’t have been so strong. “No.” Dakota shoved him back. Damn it—

He fell into the wall, hitting it with enough force that it left his head ringing. Swearing, he shoved off it, wobbling for a step before he steadied. “Dakota—” He lifted the Glock he held and that crack in his heart widened, ripping his heart in two. “Don’t make me use this.”

Her lids flickered. “If that’s what I have to do to keep you safe, I will, baby. Please…just leave while you can…”

A strange, whimpering moan rolled through the air.

“Not yet, damn it. It’s not sunset…” Dakota swore, her gaze shooting to the bed. Then her gaze cut to him. “You. It’s you. Damn it, get out.”

If he’d been looking at Dakota, he might have seen the fear in her eyes.

But he was staring at Nicole. Watching her chest started to rise and fall…watching as her eyes opened, revealing glowing eyes of blue. Watching as her mouth opened on a broken moan. Revealing fangs.

“Nic…?”

She turned her head toward him.

He never even saw her move.

Dakota caught her just before Nicole reached Drew. Fast brat. Wrapping her arms around the baby vamp, she pinned the smaller woman. “No, Nicole—you can’t. Not now.”

“Hurts…” Nicole moaned low in her throat. She snapped at the empty air, like it might ease that burning ache.

“I know…shhhh…I know.” Dakota stared at Drew’s stunned, pale face. I couldn’t have fucked this up more if I tried.

“Dakota, please.” Nicole, begging and pleading, shuddered in Dakota’s arms.

“Here.” Dakota lifted her wrist. “It’s not going to help for long, but it’s better than nothing. It will hold you for a few hours.” Long enough for us to get out of here, at least.

And as Nicole sank her newly formed teeth into Dakota’s wrist, Dakota stared at Drew, wondering if he’d bolt. He couldn’t leave knowing what he knew—and she wasn’t strong enough to wipe his mind. She’d tried and failed.

What now…?

“What’s going on?” Drew asked, his voice tight and rusty as he stared at Nicole, bent over Dakota’s wrist.

“What, haven’t you read Twilight, seen True Blood?” Dakota forced a smile, even though her heart was breaking. She didn’t know what to do.

Nicole, first. Make sure she wasn’t going to attack him. Then she’d figured out the next step.

Although she had an idea. She couldn’t wipe his mind, but there had to be somebody who could. He’d thought she’d kidnapped a lawyer—well, she hadn’t. She suspected she might be getting ready to kidnap a cop.

“I can’t believe you put him in the trunk.”

It was hours later, nearing dawn and she’d heard this ten times already. Sighing, she shot Nicole a look as she hit her blinker. “Babydoll, I didn’t have a choice. He saw us. He knows too much for me to just let him go merrily off. I wasn’t able to wipe his mind, either.”

“But you put him in the trunk,” Nicole repeated. “He’s a cop and you kidnapped him and he’s my boyfriend and…”

Dakota sighed. “Nicole. I didn’t have a choice. Unless I decided to stick you in the trunk, because you can’t be that close to him yet. Even though you fed, you don’t need to be around him.” She made herself smile as she glanced over. “Besides, you’ve been through enough. You don’t need to ride in the trunk.”

“And he does? Damn it, he’s got to be so worried. You should have let me talk to him.”

“I will.”

“You will?” Nicole stared at her. “When?”

“Soon.” She took the turn. “The school is ten minutes away. There will be somebody there who’ll know how to fix this.”

She hoped.

She’d knocked him out.

Taken his phone.

Restrained him.

Oh…and let’s not forget…Dakota was a fucking vampire. At least he was pretty sure she was, even though he hadn’t seen her fangs.

When she opened the trunk and his eyes adjusted, the only thing he could think was…I should have known. I just should have known—not about this insane shit, but that she hadn’t hurt Nicole. He still didn’t know what in the hell was going on, but…

“Come on,” she said quietly once he was out of the trunk. “I’ll get you out of those cuffs. We’ll talk. Figure out…something.”

Figure out something…?

As she pulled the gag out of his mouth, he narrowed his eyes. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“Drew, baby…” She shook her head and rested a hand on his cheek. “You really should have just left. Screw that. You should have just stayed away.”

Yeah. He was figuring that out fast.

His skin crawled as he looked around. Everywhere, he saw people looking at them. And almost all of them moved with that odd, easy grace that Dakota had. Dakota…or Bo. Similar, but not the same.

Fuck, just how much trouble was he in?

“Calm down, sugar. Nobody will hurt you here.”

He glanced at her. “Yeah? Somehow I’m not reassured.”

A sad smile curled her lips. “I guess not.”

“I tried.”

Dakota flinched as Malachi came into the other room and sank into a chair. He pinned her with a dark blue stared and she immediately looked down. He freaked her out in the worst way. “Tried?” she asked.

“Yes. I tried. He has a natural resistance, so it’s not just you. I can do it, but it would damage his mind.”

“No—” She jerked her gaze up, staring at him. Looking past him, she stared through the one-way mirror to where Drew had been placed. Like a prisoner, she realized. “You can’t.”

He was in there with Nicole now, talking to her, but they weren’t alone. Kelsey, the witch who ran Excelsior was in there, along with Shawn Lenning, one of the vamp instructors who stayed at Excelsior. The two of them could control her if the hunger returned. Shaking her head, she looked back at Malachi. “You can’t. He didn’t mess up—I did.”

“Dakota…” Malachi gave her a gentle smile. “Screw-ups happen. Something about his mind feels…well, strange. I think he’s probably got a bit of psychic skill and that’s why he’s resisting so easily. Your biggest fuck-up was in not calling for help when things went to shit.”

Rising, he turned to the window. “I’ve enough on my hands now—dealing with a stubborn mortal cop and breaking his mind isn’t high on my list. But we can’t let him leave here if he’s going to talk.” Over his shoulder, he looked at her. “You know that.”

As he slipped out of the room, she swallowed.

“So…”

Nicole tucked her chin against her chest, staring at the table like it held something fascinating.

“So.” Drew, on the other hand, was staring at her bowed head. This was surreal. He was sitting in a room with a woman he’d been dating…and she was a vampire. In another room, just down the hall, the woman he was in love with? Another vampire. Surreal.

“That’s Dakota.”

Now it was his turn to study the table. Yeah. Pretty damn fascinating. “Shit, Nic.”

She laughed softly. “Hey, Drew. Stop looking like you kicked my puppy…or me.”

Shooting her a glance, he pushed back from the table and started to pace. “I wasn’t very fair to you,” he said softly.

“Stop.” Nic sighed, slipping him a sidelong glance. “You weren’t unfair. I knew you were seeing somebody. I knew you cared about her. I also knew you liked me…I just kept hoping in the end, I could make you like me more.”

She snorted. “Now if I’d met Dakota earlier? Seen how you look at her?” She shook her head. “You and me, we might have had a chance, if you hadn’t met her. But as it is? Nah. We’re friends. Hopefully we can stay that way.”

He had his own misgivings about that but he wasn’t going to say anything. “You think you’re going to be okay?”

“Yeah.” A smile curled her lips. “It’s going to take some adjusting, but I’ll be fine. What about you?”

That was something he couldn’t answer.

Chapter Six

The way they kept looking at him was driving him nuts.

The big guy, his bald head as smooth as polished quartz, shot him a narrow look before focusing back on Dakota. She had her back to him and her shoulders were slumped.

If he tried hard enough, he could hear them.

He didn’t want to, though. He didn’t want to think about the insane shit going on. Nicole seemed okay and that was the main thing, now that he knew Dakota hadn’t hurt her. He didn’t want to…

“—fuck up, you fix it. How you think you can fix this, kiddo?”

Dakota groaned and dropped her head into her hands. “I don’t know, Shawn. I just don’t know.”

“Well. You need to think fast or you’ll be the one paying for it. This is serious, D.C. People will die if word of us gets out—what were you thinking—?”

Closing his eyes, Drew turned away and started to pace. Damn it, he didn’t know what to do. Nobody seemed to want to hurt him—not even that big, red-haired bastard who’d come in on them earlier. Although something had hurt—he’d felt something in his head, like somebody was pushing on it.

But nobody had done anything to him—nobody had even looked at his neck. Well, except Nicole.

Still, he didn’t see them letting him leave here, knowing what he knew. He could try telling them he wouldn’t say anything. And he wouldn’t—it would be a danger to both Dakota and Nicole. He couldn’t risk that. But nobody here was likely to believe him and why should they?

Damn it, he was fucked.

And worse…so was Dakota.

You’ll be the one paying for it.

What had that meant?

Was she in trouble now?

Blood roared in his ears. And as he stared at the floor…once more images begin to flicker through his mind, rolling like a silent filmstrip, completely and utterly fascinating.

Nicole had told him what she’d gone through—somebody had attacked her. Dakota had found her, but she’d lost too much blood. The only way to save her had been by making her a vampire. It hadn’t been fun, either. Bad fevers, like she’d been sick. Seizures. Dakota had been forced to restrain her. Like what he’d been seeing in his head. It was insane…so screwed up. But all of this was insane. All of it. Maybe this was what he needed to do. How things were supposed to happen.

They had taken his service revolver, his phone. But there was one other thing. Feeling oddly disconnected, he reached into his back pocket. The knife wasn’t good for much of anything except cutting open boxes and the like—he used it as a letter open more often than anything else.

He figured it would open a vein, too. If it saved Dakota…

The smell of blood was something any vampire would recognize. Spinning around, Dakota stared at Drew’s back. He was still standing, but he wouldn’t for long—not considering the amount of blood—

“Drew!”

She lunged for him.

“Mother fuck…” Shawn whispered behind her. He was faster than she was, and he reached Drew just as the other man started to sway.

They were on the floor now, kneeling amidst his blood. As Shawn gripped Drew’s wrists, easily cutting off the flow of blood, she cupped Drew’s face. Okay…he would be okay. He was pale, but that was okay. He hadn’t lost that much…

“Damn it, Drew, I told you that nobody would hurt you.” She stared at him, her heart tripping a bit in her chest. “What are you trying to do?”

“Save you…” He grimaced and tried to pull away from Shawn. Dark lashes fluttered over his eyes. “They can’t hurt you for telling me if I’m one of you, right?”

“Saving me—?” She could smack him. Kiss him. Shake him. “Damn it, Drew. I don’t need saving. Nobody was going to hurt me.”

“They…” Confusion fogged his eyes. Or maybe that was blood loss. “But he said you’d have to pay…”

Shawn frowned. “He’s got good ears for a mortal.”

Dakota ignored him, swallowing. “It’ll be okay. You didn’t have to hurt yourself just to keep me out of trouble.”

He closed his eyes. “And what if I kind of wanted to be with you, too?”

As her heart did another one of those funny stutters, footsteps sounded outside in the hall. “Healer’s here, kiddo,” Shawn murmured.

“Be with me?” She shook her head. “But you dumped me. Damn it, no. We’re not talking about this. We’ll get you healed and then…”

“No. Because if I’m healed, I can’t be with you…” He opened his eyes and stared at her. “Can I? Not for real. Not for good. That’s why, Dakota. I needed more and this is my only chance for it, isn’t it?”

He shot the vampire holding his wrists a look. “Let me go.”

“Don’t you dare,” Dakota snarled. “I mean it, Shawn.”

The black man grimaced at her. “Dakota…ah, well. It’s kind of his choice…”

Shawn let go.

He slept.

For now.

Dakota sat at his bedside, feeling old. She’d slept until an hour before sunset, her body forcing it on her, even though she’d wanted to stay at his side. She was there now and she wouldn’t leave until he opened his eyes, and fed…so she wouldn’t feel so bad when she beat him.

Damn it, she wasn’t ever going to forget what he’d done. She didn’t fully understand it, either. She realized he had some disturbed, twisted sense that he’d been helping her, and while it made some part of her heart warm a bit, she still wanted to beat him.

“What were you thinking?” He’d slit his wrists. Damn it. He’d slit his damn wrists.

She felt sick. Sick at heart, sick in her soul.

She needed answers. She needed...

Him. She needed him. She’d needed him for a very long time. Pretty much from the first night she had met him. The night she should’ve turned around and walked away. And now look what she had done. How badly she’d screwed up his life.

Absently, she found herself thinking about what Shawn had said—what Drew had overheard.

You’ll be the one paying for it… yeah. She guessed she was. But Drew was paying, too. And he didn’t deserve that. He didn’t deserve any of this.

None of it.

A moan came from the bed. Drew moved restlessly, tangled in the sheets. Rising, she moved to his side. The fever. It was coming back.

He was burning—so damn hot. Was he sick? Had to be…couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, so fucking hot—why was he so fucking hot? Why couldn’t he breathe?

What in the hell was going…?

Pain gripped him, twisted him. Tore at him like it was going to rip him into shreds and just when he thought it would drive him to screams, it eased. And Dakota. He heard Dakota…

It was Dakota, right? Her hand in his, her voice murmuring to him.

But she couldn’t be. They were over, right?

Images flashed through his mind—crazy images of glowing eyes, Nicole and Dakota. His mind couldn’t process it. Maybe he wasn’t sick—he could just be going crazy.

A cool cloth stroked across his brow. And he heard her again, that low, sexy drawl that had driven him mad from the first, now so comforting. He didn’t understand her words, but he didn’t have to; she was there and that was all that mattered. He wasn’t alone. Listening to Dakota’s voice, Drew slipped back into sleep. He just hoped she was there when he woke up.

She was there, all right. She was there. One look at her and he knew all the crazy dreams that had haunted him over the past hours hadn’t been crazy dreams. Not unless he really was going crazy.

He opened his mouth to speak but he didn’t even manage a word before gut wrenching pain ripped through his belly. Dimly, he heard a knock at the door. But he was too busy wondering if he was dying to worry about it. Doubling over, he tried to breathe through the pain. Then a hand touched his brow.

“You need to feed. That’s what’s causing the pain.”

Feed... what? “Feed. What do you mean—feed?”

“Sugar, you’re a vampire now. What do you think I mean?”

He sucked in a breath and that was when he smelled it. Something lush, rich… ripe.

Drew was barely even aware of the next few seconds. There was a woman there, and then she was in his arms. It was a blur—a hot, brutal blur. Some part of his mind remained sane, almost horrified. He had to stop, he knew he had to, but he couldn’t, he just couldn’t—it was so fucking good—

And then two hands gripped his head, prying him away.

Snarling, snapping, he fought with whoever it was tearing him away.

That hot, heavy fog. Only got worse. Then somebody was whispering to him. “Calm down, sugar. You can do this—you made it through the worst. You can make it through this, just trust me. Breathe, just breathe. That’s it, sugar... that’s it.”

Sugar...

“Dakota.”

A hand touched his face. “Yeah. It’s me. I’m here. You with me?”

Misery gripped him. What had he done? “That woman—what...how could I…aw, fuck…”

“Come on now. Open your eyes.”

He couldn’t. Not ever again. What had he been thinking?

“Beth.”

“I’m here, D.C.” That voice—Drew didn’t know that voice.

Opening his eyes, he found himself staring at Dakota’s face for a long moment. Then, he shifted his gaze past her and saw the other woman. She had blood all down the front of her shirt. But she was alive. Alive—how?

“What is going on?” He sat up, looking between Dakota and the other woman.

“Don’t you think you’ve got enough to process right now?” Dakota’s eyes, dark and gentle, rested on his face. “Beth, thank you.”

“Not a problem, Dakota.”

Drew called out after her, but he was ignored. Ignored, and left alone with Dakota. “How is she still okay?”

“We can talk about that later. Right now, we have more important things to talk about. Like me beating you, for example.” She jabbed a finger into his shoulder. “What were you thinking? You have any idea what you did to me?”

Scowling at her, he rubbed his shoulder. “Damn it, what are you trying to do—put a hole through me?” Then, giving into the urge, he reached for her. As bad as he had felt earlier, as sick as he suspected he should be, he shouldn’t have been able to do it. Hell, he shouldn’t even be alive. But he pulled her into his lap like she weighed nothing. He actually ended up using too much force—and they ended up on the floor when he lost his balance. That was just fine with him. Fisting a hand in her dark hair, he closed his eyes. “Well, I guess I understand a little bit more about all those secrets you. But, Dakota, security? Couldn’t you do any better than that?”

“Shows how much you know.” She sniffed. “I do work in security, just not the sort you would think. You still haven’t answered me. What in the hell were you thinking? You didn’t have to do that—you didn’t have to do this. Not for me. I don’t think you realize exactly what you have done. This is permanent—it can’t be undone.”

“What makes you think I would undo it?” Opening his eyes, he stared at her, combing his hand through her hair to toy with the ends.

“Duh.” Rolling her eyes, she shifted around. As she did, Dakota grew aware of one thing—Drew was feeling better. A lot better. Swallowing, trying not to think about it, she stared at him. “Drew. Two things, one... you dumped me. Two... your girlfriend is here, she’s a vampire—you’re a vampire—maybe you two can ride off into the sunset and live happily ever after… if you really love her. If you don’t, you’re stuck in one very long life and you very well may hate it. It’s not a fun one, and it can be pretty damn lonely. You shouldn’t have done this.”

“My girlfriend.” He rested his hands on her thighs. He had a look in his eyes, a heated, slumberous one that she knew all too well. “You know, you really ought to tell me how you knew about her. She’s not exactly my girlfriend. We were kind of dating, and we were going to get more serious. But…” He sighed and shrugged. “Then the other night happened. And we need to talk about that. About just what did happen.”

Stiffening, she stood and moved away. “I didn’t hurt her. Somebody else did. They’ve already been dealt with. I got there too late to save her—she was already bleeding out. I did the best I could, and the best I could do was bring her over. I realize it’s not good enough, but it was—”

“Hey, that’s not what I’m talking about. I know you didn’t hurt her. Already figured that much out. It just took me a while.”

She shivered as his voice sounded in her ear. Close, very close. He was already so quiet…usually, it took a baby vamp a while to settle into their skin. It wasn’t taken him much time at all.

As his hands closed around her shoulders, she set her jaw. “Then what else is there to talk about?”

“Don’t you think maybe we can worry about Nicole and everybody else later?” He pressed his lips to her shoulder. “Right now I want to talk about you. You’re right, I don’t fully realize just what I did. But I do know one thing—I did this because I knew it was the only way I could have what I really wanted. I broke things off with you because I didn’t think I would ever have that. And as I was, I guess I was right. This sounds crazy, but while you were talking with that guy, I started seeing things—images in my head—I saw me, like this, I knew this was how I had to be if I wanted to be with you. And I wanted that more than anything for the past two years. I just didn’t think I’d ever have it—that was why I ended things.”

He tugged on her shoulders, forcing her to turn around. “I leaped before I looked. There is no doubt about that. Am I going to regret it? It’s possible. But the only way that will happen is if I did it for the wrong reason—I did it for you, because I think you feel the same way about me that I feel about you. I love you. I’ve been in love with you almost from the time I met you. I just didn’t think you were right for me, because of all your secrets.” He grimaced and reached up, probing his mouth. “I wasn’t prepared for this kind of secret, though. It wasn’t you the needed to make some changes. It was me. And I’ve done that. So... am I right or am I wrong? Did I do it for the wrong reas—”

The rest of the sentence never made it out of his mouth. Dakota lunged for him.

He caught her in his arms.

“You idiot…” She muttered against his mouth. “You stupid idiot. Yes, damn it. I love you.”

He groaned and trailed a hand down her back, toying with the hem of her dress. “Good.” His other hand, he wrapped around her waist, locking her body against his.

She rocked against him, pressing closer, but it still wasn’t close enough. Questions, demands, everything else faded from her mind. The two of them had plenty of time to talk, to figure the rest of things out. Right now, a bigger need dominated her mind.

“You know what, sugar? It’s been like…three months since I’ve seen you naked.” She caught his lower lip between her teeth and tugged. “That’s way too long.”

“Is it?” He caught the hem of her short black dress and pulled—too hard.

Dakota heard fabric tear and she might have been irritated, but the befuddled look at his face distracted her. “You’ll have to get used to it…you’re stronger than you were.” Shrugging out of the remains of the dress, she dealt with her bra and panties, lifting a brow at him. “I like my pretty stuff in one piece.”

He was still staring at the ruins of her dress. With a look at his hands, he looked at her. “I didn’t…I mean…”

“Shhh.” Catching his hands, she brought them to her breasts. “That’s some of the stuff we need to talk about. But later. Touch me. I won’t break or tear, I promise.”

“But…”

“Touch me.” She moved closer, crowding closer and going to work on his jeans. “Just touch me…please. Damn it, I thought I wouldn’t have this again, be with you again.”

She could feel the burn of his hunger, too, a purely physical hunger now. But he was worried…that she could scent, wrapping in the air around them. Staring at him from under her lashes, she smiled. “Drew…you should know…I play dirty.”

For a vampire, lust and the desire for blood often went hand in hand. Her fangs had been threatening to emerge; now she let them. As she rose on her toes to kiss him, she bit her own lip just before she pressed her mouth to his.

He stiffened, went to jerk away. Chuckling, she clutched him tight. “Baby…you can’t hurt me this way.”

“Dakota…”

“You won’t hurt me.”

He shuddered. Then, with force that would have bruised her had she been human, he hauled her against him. There was barely enough room between them for her to push his jeans out of the way. She managed though. He sucked on her lip and the sensation was so damn erotic, it drove her insane…

Tearing her mouth away, she gasped, “Bed.”

“Fuck the bed,” he growled. He lifted her up.

And then, without waiting another second, he pushed inside.

Oh…hell…

Groaning out his name, Dakota gripped his shoulders, sinking her nails into his shoulders. Her head fell back and dimly, she found herself thinking, it was damn good thing she didn’t have to breathe…because she couldn’t.

Strong hands gripped her hips, dragged her up. “Look at me.”

Forcing her eyes open, she stared at him, into those beautiful eyes that had haunted her dreams for the past two years. Curling arm around his neck, she pressed her brow to his. “I love you.”

“Yeah?” A slow, heated smile curved his lips. “I love you, too…”

His hands curled into her ass as he turned and took a few steps, until she had the wall at her back. “I’m not going to break a wall, am I?”

Dakota laughed. “If you do, you won’t be the first…” She gripped his hips with her knees. “Now stop talking. Make love to me already.”

“Bossy…bossy…” His eyes glowed as he pulled back.

Then he surged back against her, deep, hard. She cried out, arched her back. He did it a second time, a third, as he worked a hand between them and stroked his thumb over the hard knot of her clit. Hot, liquid delight burst through her. Her heart ached for him and the pleasure, even as it tore into her, it remade her.

“Mine…” he muttered against her neck. “Finally mine.”

“Always. I always was, sugar.” Arching her neck to the side, she pressed him closer…she needed…

As he sank his teeth into her neck, they both exploded.

Fuck…

“I bit you.”

His head was still reeling. Shuddering, he lifted his head and stared at Dakota’s neck. Then he gaped at he realized the holes were closing. “I…fuck. I bit you. And you’re healing.”

“You bit me…and I loved it. Now take me to bed,” she said, her low, raspy voice smug and pleased. “And maybe this time, I’ll bite you. Later on, we can have that talk…”

“But…”

She pressed a finger to his lips. “Later. We have plenty of time to talk, sugar. We need a night just for us…”

Dazed, stunned, he looked back at her neck. Then into her eyes. She was smiling. Didn’t look worried at all. Shit. She was right.

“Yeah.” Dipping his head, he whispered against her mouth, “You know what…yeah.”

* * * * *

Look for more Wickedness—releasing every six weeks—all year long...

*January*

Karin Tabke

BAD TO THE BONE

*February*

Sylvia Day

ALL REVVED UP

*April*

Cathryn Fox

TORN BETWEEN TWO BROTHERS

*May*

Shiloh Walker

HUNT ME

*June*

Beth Williamson

LUCILLE’S LAWMAN

*August*

Nikki Duncan

THE BACK-UP FIANCE

*September*

Mackenzie McKade

DEADLY DESIRES

*November*

Shayla Black

WICKED TO LOVE

* * * * *

To learn more about the Wicked Reads and The Wicked Writers, visit:

www.TheWickedWriters.com

* * * * *

Biography

Shiloh Walker has been writing since she was a kid. She fell in love with vampires with the book Bunnicula and has worked her way up to the more…ah…serious works of fiction. She loves reading and writing anything paranormal, anything fantasy, and nearly every kind of romance. Once upon a time she worked as a nurse, but now she writes full time and lives with her family in the Midwest. She writes paranormal and contemporary romance, as well as romantic suspense.

Check out her next Hunters book, due out in June!

UNKNOWN PAST

Something strange is happening to Nessa. Ever since she survived a near-death experience she’s not exactly who she used to be—and enjoying every minute of it. Then she’s called upon to go to battle against darkness. If only she could remember why.

UNEXPECTED LOVER

Dominic is having his own problems with memory, sanity, and hallucinations. Sent to Excelsior, the covert Hunter training facility, he senses a female presence that seems so hauntingly familiar. That’s because he and Nessa share a forgotten past.

UNSEEN EVIL

As Nessa and Dominic regain their memories, their strange mission against evil becomes clearer. And all the more dangerous because whether they should trust each other is the still the greatest unknown of all.

Read the first chapter at Shiloh’s site

Other Hunter titles available in ebook

Hunters Declan & Tori

Hunters Eli & Sarel

Hunters Byron & Kit

Hunters Jonathan & Lori

Hunters Rafe & Sheila

Hunter’s Mercy

Hunter’s Pride

The Huntress

Malachi

Hunting the Hunter

Hunter’s Salvation

Hunters Heart and Soul

Hunter’s Need

Hunter’s Fall (6/2011)

Read more about the Hunters…

Contents

Title page
Table of Contents
The Hunters: Declan and Tori
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
The Hunters: Eli and Sarel
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
The Hunters: Byron and Kit
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
The Hunters: Jonathan and Lori
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Epilogue
The Hunters: Ben and Shadoe
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Epilogue
Hunter’s Choice
Hunt Me
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Biography
Other Hunter titles available in ebook

Table of Contents

Title page

Table of Contents

The Hunters: Declan and Tori

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

The Hunters: Eli and Sarel

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

The Hunters: Byron and Kit

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

The Hunters: Jonathan and Lori

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

The Hunters: Ben and Shadoe

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Epilogue

Hunter’s Choice

Hunt Me

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Biography

Other Hunter titles available in ebook