Demon Hunter

by Jacquie Underdown

  He pressed his lips to hers and lingered there for a long moment. She breathed him in, her body drifting against his. Her nipples prickled, touching his hard chest.

  “What is that, Jonty?” She needn’t explain her question to him. He knew she was referring to the feelings they derive from one another.

  “I told you, Sammy. You were made for me, only for me.”

  “And you for me?”

  “Yes. And me for you.”

  He kissed her then with so much emotion she could feel it sliding down her throat, spreading its loving energy through her entire body. She swallowed his passion as their tongues caressed each other, and burned as he slid his hands over her body. She wanted this man so much, would do anything to see that he was safe, and that he stayed in her life. Her feelings were so true, so powerful, it overwhelmed her. A tear rolled down her cheek and onto her lips, where it was kissed away by Jonty.

  He drew back from her mouth and fixed his eyes on hers.

  “I would die for you, Sammy,” he whispered. “I would murder for you.”

  She ran her hand down his cheek, over his defined jaw, trailed her finger along his luscious lower lip. “And I would for you,” she said, and believed her words. “If there is no other choice, would you desert the Grey soldiers for me too?”

  Jonty flinched, but managed to keep his expression impartial, offering her a wry smile. He lifted her leg and rest her knee over his elbow.

  She watched his unfaltering gaze, and her breaths grew heavier as he glided his other hand between her thighs and pushed his finger into her crevice.

  “I made that decision right before I entered you here,” he said, his voice hoarse.

  She released a low, shuddering moan as he drove another finger inside, pressed his thumb against her clitoris and circled there slowly.

  “Hmmm… Jonty.”

  He hoisted her into his arms, and she straddled her legs around his taut waist.

  “But right now, Sammy,” he said, his voice deep, husky, his eyes still penetrating hers, “all I want is to make love to you.”

  “I can’t think of anything more I would want.”

  He gripped her ass and lifted her up a smidgen before letting her fall onto his swollen cock, where it impaled her to the brink. She felt so full.

  Oh, my, fucking…

  “You are…” she rasped, pleasure alighting every nerve-ending, “so hard, so…big.”

  Jonty pushed her back against the cool, tiled wall, pressed his body against hers, and devoured her lips. While sliding his deliciously solid cock in and out of her sex, his mouth trailed across her jaw, nipped at her neck, and sucked at her throat. “I fill your tight… I fill you up perfectly,” he breathed.

  Yes, you do. So perfect.

  The warm shower washed over them both, increasing the fire he generated in her body.

  “I’m going to come already,” she whispered.

  Jonty released a guttural groan, his pace quickening. “Come, baby,” he breathed into her ear. “Come.”

  She gripped at his shoulders, digging in her fingers, pulling him tighter to her chest.

  Oh God.

  Waves of bliss saturated her entire body, and her juices of rapture and his come slid down her thighs to join the stream of water as it gushed down the drain.

  She fell against his chest and nestled her head on his broad shoulder, his muscles hard from exertion.

  “You’re mine, Sammy,” he whispered, his lips grazing her hair.

  “You have me.” As long as you can keep me alive, you have me.

  Chapter 12

  With Sammy still slumped against his body, Jonty heard his commander’s voice. It was weak, yet there like a shadow on the outskirts of his thoughts. “Stay where you are, Grey soldier.”

  Jonty’s stomach wrenched. He hastily lowered Sammy to her feet.

  “He’s coming. We need to hurry,” he ordered.

  Sammy’s eyes widened. “Who? Who’s coming?”

  Jonty twisted the taps and reached for some towels, handing one to Sammy and using the other to haphazardly wipe his body down. “Commander Terse. He’s almost here.”

  Sammy began to frantically dry, following Jonty’s lead. He ran, gathered his clothes from the floor, and pulled them on. He scouted for Sammy’s and flung them at her.

  “Quick. Get dressed.”

  She did as she was told while he packed her bag.

  Within less than two minutes they were running down the hall, hand in hand, Sammy’s small bag flung over his shoulder. He quickened their pace, almost dragging Sammy toward the lifts. The commander was close; he could feel his presence so strong.

  Down in the basement they sprinted to Sammy’s car and jumped inside. He took the driver’s seat and roared the engine to life before reversing the car out with a screech. He sped up and along the twirling car-park ramps. One level from the top he squealed around the corner. The tires on one side lifted into the air. As all four wheels crashed back to the basement floor he spied movement in the rearview mirror.

  “That’s him,” he said.

  Sammy snapped her head around to look behind them. A shiny, black sports car was trailing them.

  “Oh no,” she whispered.

  Damn it.

  Jonty slammed his palm against the steering wheel. There was no way he’d outrun them in this four-cylinder car. But he was going to try. He pressed his foot even harder to the accelerator and hoped that no one else was using the car park, because he wouldn’t be able to avoid crashing into them should they reverse out in front of him.

  Sammy gripped Jonty’s forearm tightly. “What are we going to do?”

  Jonty swung the car around the final bend and sped toward the exit, out onto the rain-sodden streets, almost sideswiping another car that was coming in the opposite direction. “I can’t beat them with speed, but maybe I can with wit.”

  He raced down the road, turning left at the last possible moment into a side lane barely big enough to accommodate their small car. The sports car would be lucky to fit. Yet, still it came screaming around the same corner. Foot flat to the floor, he propelled the car up the lane toward the next street. He flung a right in front of another vehicle, which had to slam on its brakes. The strangling sound reverberated through their car’s tiny cab.

  “That was almost too close,” gasped Sammy, gripping tight to the door handle, her eyes wide circles.

  “It’ll slow down the pursuer,” he said, his words quick.

  The car flew straight along this new road before he took another sharp left into a street then right into a small lane way. The scent of burning rubber filled the car.

  “If I can lose them and get us onto a clear road, we can head out of the city, he won’t know which direction.”

  “How did he know where we were?” she asked.

  “I wasn’t careful enough with blocking him out.” He spun the car again around another corner, the tires finding flight. The car landed with a jolt onto the road. “All he needed was a second, two, with my guard down, to locate me.”

  She shook her head with bemusement. “What does he have, some internal GPS?”

  Despite everything, Jonty laughed. “Something like that.”

  He hadn’t seen the black sports car for two or three streets now. His plan may be working. Yet knowing his commander as he did, and his skill, he wasn’t going to call it this soon.

  The engine was screaming, at the very limits of use. As long as it got them to safety, that’s all he needed. After another four turns up side streets and back alleyways, he twisted the car back in the direction he had come, though via a different route. Jonty hammered along the streets, skirting in and out of any other car that slowed his progress. They kept on until the city was seen only in the shadowy distance from the rearview mirror.

  “Are we safe?” Sammy asked, peering behind her.

  “No. I wouldn’t say so just yet.”

  Sammy sighed. She was wiping tears from her cheeks.
“Is this what it’s going to be like, being chased by not only the Dark Walkers but the Grey Army as well?”

  Jonty ran his fingers through his hair. He knew from the outset that all he could offer Sammy was a brief fling. That together they didn’t have a future, couldn’t have a future. But now that he was invested in her safety and this semblance of a relationship, he had to believe that there was hope for them. He had to do all he could to find that hope and make the possibility of a future together a reality.

  He took his eyes briefly off the road to look at her. “I don’t know. Maybe if we find somewhere remote, where no one can find us, they may eventually stop hunting us.”

  Sammy’s forehead creased deeply as she frowned. “But I have family, Jonty. A mum and a dad, and my little sister. When does this end?”

  “We’ll make it work.”

  “Can we?”

  “It’s either we try or I go back to the future and we never see each other again. If that’s what you want, Sammy, let me know now.” He maintained a steely expression as his eyes remained locked to the road ahead. “I don’t want to be apart from you, but if that’s what you want, I’ll give myself up. They won’t harm you, they’ll just take me.” He couldn’t look at her as he spoke, too afraid if he did, he wouldn’t have been able to say what he had said.

  She was silent for a long while, rubbing the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. With each passing second his heart knocked hard against his chest, waiting, hoping she wouldn’t tell him what he didn’t want to hear, what he couldn’t bear to do.

  Chapter 13

  Sammy’s throat was constricted, and her heart sat heavily in her chest as she watched Jonty. His shoulders were rolled forward, his lips had fallen into a sullen frown, and there was a gentle tremble in his voice as he spoke.

  Of course she didn’t want him to be taken away from her. And she certainly didn’t want him to die. God, she couldn’t bear it. But it wasn’t that simple. Even though these emotions she felt for him, this magnetism, was effortless and uncomplicated, the cost borne in maintaining this connection would be huge. Already they had faced death twice from the Dark Walkers and now justice from the Greys. It didn’t seem to matter, good or evil, they were not on anyone’s team but their own and this put them in harm’s way of all.

  Sammy peered at his face for a long moment. Underneath his solemn expression, she glimpsed that same sense of spirit she’d witnessed last night, so ethereal and honorable. In an intangible way, she could even feel him, tingling, invading her own soul with his goodness and beauty. She knew then that this was what she felt when they touched and an electrifying sensation permeated her body—a perfect paring of souls. Souls that when together made the other whole and infallible. They could operate apart from one another, sure. Sammy had done it for the last twenty-six years of her life. But together was how they were meant to be—how they were designed. She was meant to be with him and he with her. That was rightness and that was truth.

  She reached her hand to his as he gripped the steering wheel. That sparkle flickered from his fingers to hers and shot up the length of her arm. Sammy gasped. It’s even stronger.

  Jonty turned to her, his eyes wide.

  There was no denying that what they shared together, this syncing of spirit, was overwhelmingly robust and alone this gave the answer to his question, unequivocally.

  “We’re in this together. You and me,” she said.

  She heard a long sigh of breath release from his lungs, relief mixing with the air around them.

  He nodded, looking from the road to her. “I’m glad that’s your answer. I couldn’t have handled any other.”

  Sammy leant over and kissed him on the cheek. “It’s settled then.”

  They drove on for two or more hours without a stop, out of the city and onto a deserted highway. Where once the view was of boxy high-rises, motor traffic, and bridges of cement, it was now a flattened out landscape of beige grass, and craggy mountain ranges, stormy blue, in the distance.

  Jonty glanced at the fuel gauge. “We’re getting seriously low on fuel.”

  “I think I saw a sign that said there is a station just ahead.”

  He lifted his gaze to the rearview mirror. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to stop just yet, though.”

  Sammy’s heart jolted so hard she thought it bruised her ribcage. She twisted in her seat to look through the back window. A black car was following them. “What should we do?”

  Jonty’s knuckles were white as he gripped the steering wheel. “I—don’t know.”

  When Sammy looked back out the front window, she saw there were another three cars approaching them from the cross-intersection ahead. One car on each road. In moments they would be surrounded.

  Her stomach clenched and anxiety surged through her body.

  “Do you have any kind of weapon in the car?” he asked.

  It took some seconds to find her thoughts and her voice. “Um, no. No.”

  “Any tools, a spanner, a crossbar?”

  “Yes. I have a crossbar in case I get a flat tire.” She turned and hung her body over the seat to reach for a toolbox under the back of her seat. She retrieved the crossbar—thirty centimeters of hard steel, more than capable of cracking a skull.

  He took it from her fingers and laid it over his lap. With a screech he abruptly brought the car to a halt.

  “Stay in the car, no matter what happens,” he said, then opened the door and sprinted out.

  What occurred next happened in such a flurry it felt like she was watching it from the window of a fast moving train. All four cars stopped within only meters of her car and each male driver jumped out. Sammy gasped seeing them—bright white auras—so pure were these men.

  Jonty was running, crossbar in hand. They were running toward him. Four tall men moving like flashes across the landscape. But there was no malice emanating from the men and only desperation exuding from Jonty. The scene playing out was wrong, horribly wrong. Sammy’s body pulsed. Her stomach tightened so hard it cramped, and her heart reverberated in her chest. She couldn’t let Jonty hurt them. She couldn’t let them hurt Jonty.

  She unclipped her seat belt, flew out of the car, and bolted toward them all—screaming, gravel flicking against her calves, dust stirring in the air with each footfall.

  “No, stop, please stop! This isn’t right. You’re not meant to fight with each other. Take me! Do what you need to with me, but don’t hurt each other. Please!”

  Jonty reached the man closest to him and cracked him across the face with the crossbar. Bones crunched under the impact. Sammy’s stomach twisted. The man fell. The next man dodged the first swing to his head, but copped a wallop to his ribs. He doubled over, received another blow to his back, followed by a swift strike to the back of his knees. He dropped to the ground with a thud, dust stirring around him. It was all happening so fast. Sammy could barely keep up.

  Jonty charged at the third man on his right, weapon poised. Sammy’s eyes widened. The solid man on Jonty’s left was reaching toward his back pocket. Intuition told her what he was reaching for—a gun. He lifted the pistol in front of him. No, this can’t be happening. This is all so terribly wrong. The man squarely pointed the gun at Jonty and pulled the trigger.

  Sammy couldn’t recall hearing the sound of the bullet leaving its chamber, only recalled Jonty’s body slumping to the ground in a ragged, limp heap.

  “No!” she screamed. “No! How could you? How could you?”

  This wasn’t right. They were saints. Could her instincts have been so wrong?

  One of the men grabbed her, twisted, and gripped her wrists together at her back. Sammy didn’t fight him, for she didn’t care what happened to her now, or to her world. Seeing Jonty, his face smeared with dust, eyes closed, frozen on the ground, she didn’t care at all about anything but the heaving sorrow that consumed her soul.

  The tallest man, the one who had fired the gun, stepped toward her. His bril
liance was blinding, but it didn’t diminish the clenching contempt and confusion that was soaring through her body.

  “Sammy,” he said in a gentle, low voice.

  A tear spilled onto her cheek; a thousand more choked her and constricted her throat. “How could you?” she whispered, her words strangled by grief.

  “Sammy,” he said again. “I’m on your side.”

  “You just shot him!” she managed to scream. “I told you to take me. Not him! Not Jonty. Don’t you realize?” Her knees collapsed beneath her, but the man holding her wrists caught her and held her tight against him. “Don’t you realize what he means to me?” She was sobbing now. Her words ended in the softest of whispers.

  She could see the sympathy in the tall man’s eyes. “I understand more than you think. Sammy, listen to me.”

  She peered up at this man, into his crystal blue eyes.

  “Jonty’s fine. We stunned him. That’s all. He’ll be fine in a couple of hours.”

  Sammy blinked once, twice. “You—you didn’t kill him then?”

  He shook his head. “No. We just took precautions. I know Jonty better than anyone. I knew how he was going to react to us. He would’ve killed us all for you.”

  Sammy nodded, exhaling a long, low hiss of air. Each breath out expelled all her grief, and each breath in brought blissful relief. She was light-headed.

  “It was just a stun gun?” she repeated, wanting to make certain she had understood correctly.

  The man nodded. “He’s our best man. Our most courageous soldier. He’s like a son to me. I would never hurt him. But like I said, I needed to take precautions.”

  Sammy’s legs melted beneath her. She would have fallen to her knees onto the dusty ground if it wasn’t for the man behind her holding her up. “Oh, thank God. Thank God.”