Provoke Me: A Reverse Harem Vampire Romance (The Last Vocari Book 2)

by Elena Lawson

  The worst part was the way my heart slammed in my chest. How I couldn’t look away as his compulsion took hold of me like a clenched fist around my heart and tendrils of iron around my mind.

  I fought him with everything I had, my teeth bared to try to shake the force of his compulsion. I squirmed under his gaze like a rat under a microscope. A whimper escaped my lips and a tremor ran down my spine when I realized I couldn’t break free. He was too strong.

  It was no use.

  “You will obey me,” he growled, his deep voice bellowing in the cavern. He had a crazed look in his eyes as he pushed the command into me, and I buckled under the weight of it.

  No.

  Fuck.

  No!

  “Yes.”

  “Fuck…you,” I said between gritted teeth.

  Azrael grinned, and some of the malice left his eyes. I felt his hold on me weaken and I managed to break the connection, dropping my head so he couldn’t compel me again. “You’re stronger than I thought,” he said, and I shoved myself away from his touch, feeling utterly violated. My body shaking. “I’ll take you to see your friends. But then you will do as I say.”

  My lips parted and my stomach dropped.

  “Whether you like it or not.”

  4

  Azrael hadn’t spoken since our little chat in the devil’s spring. He just got out of the bath and gave me a full and unobstructed view of his backside in the flickering torchlight and waited for me to follow him.

  Still dripping, we made our way through the underground passageways. He matched my slow, hobbling pace, staying only two steps ahead of me the entire time. But when I began to see light up ahead, I realized he wasn’t taking me back to my chamber, or even outside into the fresh air to go to my guys as I’d hoped.

  No. The light I saw was too bright to be natural. Too blue-hued and fluorescent. And as we approached the open mouth of the chamber ahead, I gaped in awe at what was contained within. The underground room was enormous, built right into the rock walls of the cave. It was a…a lab?

  Stainless steel, hard glass, and microscopes. Bright lights and Bunsen burners. It looked so out of place among the jagged stone and mineral deposits. The floor here was smooth, too. It’d been ground down into a polished surface and if my feel could’ve sighed, they would have.

  After the long trek through the tunnels, even my not broken foot was beginning to grow sore.

  “Come,” Azrael said finally and walked to a long steel table, gesturing to a stool beside it.

  Swallowing hard, I lifted my chin—not moving a muscle. “I said I wasn’t going to help you until you—”

  “I’m helping you,” he hissed, turning his sights on me. His blue eye looked brighter in the white light, and the way it played over his face deepened the shadows under his jaw and cheekbones. It made him look even more menacing. If that were even possible. But it also made his muscled chest and sculpted back look more defined. And his long hair, still damp from the water, seem darker, bringing out the lighter flecks in his eyes and the natural shade of his lips.

  I furrowed my brow. “Help me?” I asked, incredulously, eyeing the equipment laid out on the table that, to me, looked distinctly surgical.

  “Your foot,” he explained, gruffly. “It’s broken. It’s maddening watching you hobble around like that.”

  Total. Dick.

  But truth be told, I’d been eager to get the bones set since I awoke. I wouldn’t be doing any killing or running until it was healed properly.

  “Come,” he repeated. “Before I change my mind and leave you a cripple.”

  Barely able to conceal a scathing retort, I clenched my fists almost to the point of breaking skin, and attempted to stomp over to the stool. I only managed a weak limp-stomp, but I hoped it got the message across. I was pissed. And the only reason I was accepting help from him was because I didn’t want to fucking hobble anymore either.

  “Sit,” he commanded with a glance in my direction. Our eyes met and the force of his compulsion washed me like a wave, shoving me back and down until I was sitting like a good little girl in the stool.

  I shook my head and blinked away the compelling force. “Don’t fucking do that!” I barked at him. “Don’t compel me.”

  “Then listen.”

  Goddamned, motherfucking ass—

  “Damnit, woman! Would you stop it with your infernal cursing? It’s an insult to the ears. Are you not properly educated?”

  I blew out a breath to keep from yelling. “I’ll make you a deal, since my infernal cursing is such an insult to your ears, I’ll work on toning it down if you stay the fuck out of my head!” I couldn’t help how the words ended in a shout. I couldn’t help the curse there, either.

  I hated that he could read my thoughts.

  Azrael lifted his eyes to the ceiling and brushed the hair from his face. “Goddess save me,” he whispered under his breath. I wasn’t even sure I’d heard him right.

  He pulled up a stool opposite me and gestured to my leg. “Give me your foot.”

  Begrudgingly, I lifted my leg and placed it in his lap. The bones on the top of my foot were clearly malformed, making it impossible for me to put my foot flat on the ground. I’d had to limp along using the side of my foot. Whatever damage had been done caused it to pull inward.

  It looked super gross.

  “Would you like something to bite down on?” Azrael asked as he gingerly took my foot into his hands, feeling along my skin to find the areas he would need to re-set. I seriously hoped he knew what the hell he was doing.

  I shook my head. I’d dealt with worse. And the pain always faded pretty—

  The sickening snap and follow-up grind of bone being moved into place was all but drowned out by my blood-curdling scream as he jammed the bones back into their proper place.

  Tears stung my eyes and I inhaled a broken breath as the initial pain dulled into something more manageable.

  I resisted the urge to let loose a string of profanities that would have made even me blush. My body shook from the searing agony radiating up my leg. Through the haze of watery vision, I watched as Azrael put damp casting material on my foot and up the back of my leg, adding another heavy piece the front. I sucked in a breath as it connected with the still tender flesh. But Azrael never stopped, he worked quickly, his expert fingers wrapping the tensor bandage around the cast to hold it in place.

  The instant he finished, I leaned forward and smacked his hands away, drawing my leg down from his lap to place it lightly on the floor. “You could have warned me,” I seethed.

  If he’d given me a 1, 2, 3 count I could have contained myself. I just wasn’t ready.

  Azrael lifted a brow at me. And was that a smirk on his stupid handsome face? Murderers shouldn’t be allowed to be so damned pretty.

  “You think I’m pretty?”

  “I hate you.”

  5

  It looked like Azrael was going to keep his word.

  I’d refused his offer to help me back to my chamber, and when I got there, I was excited to see a new tray of food had been placed on the bed. Azrael rolled his eyes at the busted bedframe, but said ‘I’ll be back in an hour to fetch you. I’ll take you to see them. But then you’ll behave yourself.’

  Behave? Like I was some kind of fucking animal, when he was the one who…I didn’t allow myself to finish the thought. The cat was out of the bag now. Azrael knew I wanted him dead. He knew that I knew he was the one who killed my mother and almost killed me, too.

  I didn’t believe what he said about having a twin for even a second.

  But even as I thought it, an inkling of doubt slunk up my spine. I remembered that night clear as a bell. And the man who held me captive in this cave didn’t seem like the same man. The man who killed my mother wouldn’t have re-set my broken bones, would he?

  He wouldn’t feed me and make sure I was clean.

  And he certainly wouldn’t take me to see that my guys were alright—no matter
how annoyingly adamant I was about it.

  I’d seen the malice in those mis-matched eyes. I’d witnessed the red fury and the maniacal smile.

  I didn’t want to believe it, but I had to consider the option that this Azrael person was telling me the truth.

  The fact that I’d actually heard the name Raphael before, from Frost’s own mouth no less, gave me hope that seeing my guys were alright would also help me to solve the riddle that was my captor. And if he was lying, then seeing them might give me the opportunity I needed to kill him.

  I knelt to the floor and reached beneath the bed, tugging my makeshift stake out of its hiding place. The woman had lain out clothes for me on the bed next to the tray of food, and I was grateful they weren’t nearly as skimpy as what I’d had on when I arrived here.

  A thick woolen sweater that looked like it came from the reject bin at a thrift store and a pair of jeans two sizes too big. They looked atrocious and smelled like mothballs and dryer lint, but the woolen sweater worked wonders for allowing me to conceal the stake in the waistband of the too-big jeans.

  I made the mistake of getting caught without a weapon not so long ago, and I wouldn’t make that same mistake again.

  Once I was ready, all I had left to do was wait.

  The hour passed agonizingly slow and I bounced my good leg on the floor, testing the other one with varying degrees of pressure to see if the cast was ready to be removed. It didn’t hurt anymore and that was a good sign. I’d see if Azrael wouldn’t mind removing it before we left. I didn’t want to show up to see the guys in the thing. They would just worry.

  And I couldn’t very well stake a fucker as fast as Azrael was if I couldn’t lunge properly.

  I felt the vampire approaching before I saw him. I gulped and stood, ready to demand he take me to remove the cast before we left. If he refused, I’d just do it myself—likely at the expense of a few fingernails. But the usually perfectly sharp points were already all busted up and broken anyway.

  I needed a manicure bad. But I didn’t think I’d be convincing fuckface to make a pit stop at a salon along the way.

  A low whistle had me pinching my brows together and I looked up to see that it wasn’t Azrael who was in the doorway, but another vampire. I could feel the otherness with him, but it wasn’t even remotely as strong as the aura Azrael possessed.

  The vampire leaned against the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest, his jet-black hair falling forward to cover his slim face and small, beady eyes.

  Ew.

  This guy had pedophile written all over him.

  “Where’s Azrael?” I asked calmly, taking stock of the vamp. He didn’t look to have any weapons on him, but the slim bulge in his left pocket looked a lot like a switchblade. He wore an ill-fitting leather jacket over a lime green t-shirt and jeans that rose low on his hips, exposing a good amount of uncovered hipbones.

  The vamp’s lips parted, and I watched in disgust as he ran his tongue over his front teeth, his fangs slipping low. “He sent me to fetch you,” he said.

  Great.

  When I didn’t make a move forward, the vampire pushed off the wall and eyed me up and down, a taunting sneer curling his lips. “Move,” he commanded, leering.

  I stepped forward and the vampire moved out of my way. “After you.”

  I really wasn’t in the mood for this shit. Why hadn’t Azrael just come, himself? Why would he send douchy-mcgee to fetch me? Did he doubt my disdain for his kind?

  Just because I couldn’t kill him—well, not yet, anyway—didn’t mean there was anything to stop me from killing his hired help.

  I only had one stake, though, so I’d play nice unless he gave me a reason not to.

  The darkness of the tunnel swallowed us up as we left my cell and I felt along the wall, dragging my heavy foot along behind me. The vampire guided me with curt commands of left and right as we went.

  It was all kinds of boring and I really felt like I was in need of a bit of fun. “I never caught your name?” I called back to the vamp.

  “Just keep moving.”

  “Or what?” I teased with a wicked grin I hoped he couldn’t see in the dark.

  Just because I didn’t want to waste my stake on the fucker, didn’t mean I couldn’t at least have a little fun riling him up.

  “Or I’ll fucking tear your throat out,” he hissed.

  “Oooh,” I said in an ominous, spooky tone. “I’m terrified.”

  I chuckled. “Don’t think Azrael would appreciate that.”

  He took the bait and I readied myself for impact as he grabbed hold of my shoulder and slammed me into the rough stone wall. After the initial shock of the air leaving my lungs, I laughed, a little bit of blood coating my tongue from where I bit the edge of it.

  The vampire growled into my face. His hot, stale breath fanned over my face. I could just make out his silhouette in the shadows. The curve of his jaw and the shine of his hair. The glint of white fangs as they lowered the rest of way.

  Oh crap.

  Why did I have to bleed?

  That wasn’t part of the plan. I clamped my mouth shut to try to seal off the scent of it from him.

  But who was I kidding? Hadn’t I wanted this? Hoped for it.

  It’d been far too long since I sent one of these bastards to their true death. And this one wasn’t like my guys. He wasn’t smart, or kind. He didn’t live by a code like they did. I’d spotted the blood stain on his t-shirt and the blush in his cheeks from the moment he walked into my room.

  If his predatory smile wasn’t enough, he was literally wearing the remains of his last meal. Did vampires not know what the hell a napkin was? Christ, the number of times I’d caught them with human blood on their clothes was astounding.

  I didn’t go around with ketchup and blue-slushie all over myself, did I? No. Because I wasn’t a three-year-old.

  The vampire slipped his leg between mine and I choked on a sound of disgust as he tried to press himself up against me.

  He leaned in to bite me, and I kneed him hard in the groin. He bent low, gasping for breath. Not even vampires were immune to a good knock to the family jewels. While he was down, I pulled him head-first into the stone wall, moving out of the way as I did. His head cracked against the stone and I heard him let loose a sad, low mewling sound.

  He’d be back up real fast if I didn’t hurry. Hobbling around in the stupid cast wasn’t making this any easier, either. I jammed my hand into his pocket and drew out the…pocket vagina? It was hard to see in the dark, but as I twirled it between my fingers, I saw the lips on the business end of it and gagged.

  Seriously?

  Disgusted, I dropped the thing as though it were diseased—and honestly, it probably was—and regained my composure just in time to see him regaining his.

  Oh shit…

  His back was still to me as his hunched position began to right itself. I was about to draw my stake, ready to sacrifice all the hard work I’d put in making it to waste it on this lowlife leech when the heavy feeling of Azrael’s presence rushed me like a red flag before a bull.

  I had just enough time to move myself back before he was upon us.

  Or more accurately, upon the vampire who I’d taunted into attacking me.

  Their movements were a blur and all I heard was the scuffle, over in less than two seconds with a crunch, a sucking sound, and a nasty gurgle. Then the winner rose, and the loser’s lifeless body slumped against the hard rock.

  Azrael came to stand in front of me. I could tell it was him from the broad shoulders and the tickle of his hair against my cheek as he leaned down to inspect me. “Are you—”

  “Well that was rude,” I told him, flipping my hair back as I stepped past him. “I wasn’t done playing with him, yet.”

  He growled before shoving me against the wall with his forearm pressed against my upper chest. It made it hard to breathe, but I knew he was going easy. He could’ve crushed me if he wanted to, but he didn’t.

>   I stared him down and he stared back, the fury rippled off him in waves. His face was twisted in a snarl that would have made any man tremble.

  I had the sense to thank my lucky stars that I seemed to have something he wanted. Without that, I’d be long dead by now.

  All at once, Azrael’s expression changed, and his forearm disappeared from my chest. I fell the half a foot back to the ground, almost falling over from the awkwardness of my cast. I caught my breath and moved my hand to squeeze a sudden stitch in my side.

  “You probably did me a favor.” Azrael nudged the body out of the pathway with his foot and I flinched as I felt his hand come around my arm, but relaxed when I realized he was just helping me not to trip over the corpse as he pulled me after him. “I never liked that one, anyway.”

  Okay…

  Not what I was expecting.

  “Yeah,” I said sarcastically, tugging my arm out of his grasp to follow behind him. “You’re welcome.”

  6

  “You have got to be kidding me.”

  Azrael led me into a wide section of the cave. If I knew he was leading us someplace close to the exit, I would have been paying a lot more attention to the route we were taking. As it was, I could barely remember the last two turns we took to get here, still miffed that he’d stolen my kill. Behind us was the tunnel we’d emerged from, and several others like it, but ahead was a much wider opening, and if I wasn’t mistaken, it looked to be brighter than all the others.

  “Not kidding,” he responded, moving away from me to speak to a man wearing a pristine suit jacket standing next to a hearse.

  Yeah, a hearse.

  But that wasn’t the best part.

  Outside of the hearse, on a raised platform, was a coffin.

  A fucking coffin.

  I stalked over to the thing and looking inside, clenching my teeth. It was clearly meant for one person, but it was bigger than your average burial box. Inside the polished mahogany exterior was cushioned and covered in black silk. A satin pillow rested at the head of it.