“No!” Naram attempted a yell, trying to move in the direction I’d thrown Rose’s lifeless corpse. Hamīd grabbed Naram and muscled him easily back to the ground at my feet.
“Enough weeping. Be strong brother. There is much yet to come.” I motioned to one of the guards. He dropped a satchel of food on the ground. “You should eat. Perhaps next time we’ll take a field trip and you can see the destruction I’ve created. See the monster the people of this world fear.” I stepped closer, leaning down until I could smell Naram’s putrid breath. “See the monster you created.”
“You should never have gotten this far, brother. Now I see our mistake.”
I raised my eyebrows in curiosity. “What mistake was that?”
“Not killing you immediately. Not fighting. Instead we ran from a coward,” he spat as me.
“Me? Bah! You were the coward. Bowing to love.” The words tasted like acid in my mouth. “Before I’d chosen Cera as my first, you and I had planned to make the entire sisterhood our harem. We would’ve shared everything. But you chose Rose over me. We could’ve ruled the world together.” I hissed out in a level tone. “Instead, you let your dick command you. You abandoned me for her. You abandoned everything for her. So I changed the plan.”
“You’re a fool, Xerxes. I was never going to rape the Sisters and join your world domination plot. Everything I did was a ploy. I stayed close so that we would know what you were planning. It would’ve worked, too, except—”
“I never told you the whole plan,” I said, leaning against a cold stone pillar. “And I took everything away from you because of your betrayal. Every. Single. Thing.”
Naram took a deep breath and stared again at the limestone floor. “Kill me. Give me this one mercy, brother.”
I laughed. “There is no mercy inside me. You all deserved what you got. What you will get in the end.”
They all did.
I held my hand out to Cal, my personal Djinn guard. He went everywhere with me. Completed every task. Faithful and as black-hearted as they came. His bloodlust rivaled even my own, and I fed him often.
He took my wrist, and the world swirled around me as we teleported from the tomb where my brother would rot until he died.
Chapter 8
GODRIC
I walked slowly through the abandoned streets of the little town my sister had pointed out on a map. There hadn’t been a name on the creek bordering the south edge, but it was easy to follow to find the road into town. The smell of blood and soot and magick filled the air. Smoke rose in the distance. Fires had ravaged dozens of the buildings. The storefronts along the main circle were dark. I heard a few heartbeats inside Rose’s Café, but no one stirred or attempted to stop my progression.
Asa’s plan was stupid. I might look like a vampire, but the second they got close enough, my beating heart would let them know I wasn’t exactly what I seemed. I was good at winging it, though.
Except there was this deeper urge inside me to teleport closer. I battled my inner demons, demanding the Djinn inside obey and walk. But something pulled so hard. So deep. I blinked between breaths, finding myself right in front of the castle. “Fuck. Fuck.” I hadn’t teleported without meaning to since I’d very first been turned. Now I’d done it twice in a matter of five minutes.
I glanced around, hoping no one had seen me. Hoping I hadn’t just signed my own death warrant. I half-expected dragonfire to come barreling down the street toward me, toasting me into a nice Godric-shaped piece of charcoal. According to Asa, Sanctuary considered all Djinn enemies.
Why was I doing this again? Right. Mandana. I loved my niece. If nothing else my sister claimed or promised was true, I wanted to do this for Mandana.
The castle was taller than I’d first thought from across the town. Now that I was in front of it, I realized just how massive it was. The stones in the outer walls were easily eight to ten feet in length and probably close to that in width. Didn’t matter, though.
The world folded around me, and I slammed into magick that singed me from head to foot. A protection ward of some kind that blocked teleportation. I dropped to the ground. “Fuck.” I’d teleported yet again without desiring to do so. “Fucking town. What the fuck is going on?”
I touched the slick smooth wall and glanced up, higher up on the wall, the dark granite turned white. The entirety of the stone castle was covered in ice that grew up out of the walls, closing off the open courtyard to keep anyone—like me—from jumping over. “Fucking igloo castle.” I glanced around the circle again. No other buildings were icy. Why was this one? What was its icy lid protecting that was so damned important?
“Who are you?” A husky female voice called from around a protruding bit of castle wall.
I stared at the woman. Her dark eyes shimmered in the mid-day sun. Her skin glowed with life, and her long dark hair, almost black, fell in waves over her shoulders. My fingers itched to feel it. To see if it was as soft as I imagined. Blood rushed south, and my cock hardened as desire filled my veins. I wanted her with every fiber. Only a will of iron stopped me from teleporting to her side and taking her right then and there against the wall.
I shook my head, trying to get a hold of my suddenly overactive, irrational sex drive. What the fuck? I wasn’t some hormone-driven teenager. Women had long ceased to be anything more than a pleasurable pastime between eating.
She cocked her head, like she was puzzling me out, then stepped out from behind the shelter of the stone wall where I could see the rest of her body—long, lithe, strong. Biker boots. Blue jeans that fit her curves like a second skin. Her top was an icy blue color, and the neckline hung just low enough to show she had perfect tits. Tits I wanted to suck and nip, and creamy white skin I wanted to bite. She smelled like pure sunshine and heaven all rolled up in a delicious cinnamon-scented treat just begging to be enjoyed.
Gods. There is something wrong with my control today.
“You didn’t answer me.”
That smooth-as-silk voice rubbed all the right places for me. She licked her lips, and I could nearly imagine her tongue tracing a line down my now very hard cock. Damn. She was going to have me coming in my pants if I couldn’t get a handle on my hunger.
“I’m Godric Devereux. I’m here to speak with a Lycan female called Charlie. Are you Charlie?”
She nodded and walked forward, her hips swaying to a tune only she could hear. “What do you desire?”
My mind flashed to a vision of us naked, wrapped in each other’s arms, sweaty, and lost in bliss. I wasn’t reading her mind; she wasn’t human. But I couldn’t tell by her scent what she was...just that I had a raging hard-on and she was—smiling.
“You.” Fuck. Had I just said that out loud?
She tilted her head to the side and stared at me, confusion lined her beautiful face along with a hint of amusement. I knew she wasn’t a Lycan, I could smell that much, but maybe she knew where I could find Charlie.
“You are something intriguing.” Her tone dripped with sexual suggestion, undermining my rational thought. She was certainly affecting my Djinn and my vampire halves. I wanted to be next to her and drinking her at the same time, leaving very few brain cells free to converse like a functioning adult.
“What are you doing to me?” I hissed, taking a step back. This wasn’t right. I didn’t feel right. My heart raced, and I heaved in a deep breath, fighting the overwhelming urge to teleport so close we’d be touching. This…she…was the reason for my lack of control. She was pulling me toward her. But with what?
“Vampires don’t have heartbeats. Well, most don’t,” she said, adding that last bit with an effervescent laugh that clawed right through the steel walls I’d erected around my heart and mind centuries ago. “But you do. And you breathe, not because you want to, but because you still require oxygen. And you can do other things, too.”
Her eyes twinkled like she knew my secret. Like she knew I was a Djinn. Had she seen my uncontrolled blink to the side of the castle?
Toward her.
“Why do you want Charlie?” she asked, repeating herself while taking another step closer. Her boots crunched on the grass where we stood at the base of the castle walls.
Her scent reached me again on a sudden breeze of cinnamon and sunshine. “What are you?” I asked, ignoring her question. To hell with me being different; something was different about her, too. Something about her pulled at a place so deeply hidden inside me it hadn’t seen the light of day in thousands of years—my soul.
I didn’t want her to see the ugliness there. For the first time in centuries, I was conscious that I was a monster. That I was something—not someone.
Fuck.
The fact that I cared what she thought at all made my stomach turn over. But in spite of it, I still wanted to touch her and kiss her and feel her as much as I wanted to flee the town. Flee her. Only a second. That’s all it would take. And I would be back in my flat, listening to the waves crash on the Santa Monica beach while I waited and watched and hunted for the next monster to kill.
But I would be breaking my word to my sister. I’d sworn to Asa before I came to this burnt-up little town I’d free Manda or die trying—not a last attempt to atone for my sins; nothing could really do that. I ate monsters for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but I’d eaten innocents along the way when necessary. This woman, whoever—whatever—she was, I wouldn’t let her alter my course. My niece needed to be rescued.
“You walk the streets of Sanctuary, yet you are a stranger to walking. You arrive the day after your people have laid waste to our homes, but you are not warded against my powers like they were. You ask to see the one woman who befriended one of your kind in the past. But you need to answer my questions first.”
“I told you my name and my reason for coming to Sanctuary. You could at least do the same.”
“So you know what name to scream in your fantasies?”
My breath caught in my throat. I tried to respond, but what was I supposed to say? Yes, I want to strip you naked and feast on you as if the world has ceased to exist? That you make a part of me awaken that I’d long since thought had died? My mind raced, and I stared, enthralled by her presence. She stepped closer again, as if weighing in her mind whether I meant to flee or attack.
I still didn’t know myself, in truth. Then I fucking blinked. Again.
Fuck.
She said she had powers, but I didn’t care. I wanted her more than anything I’d ever desired in life—even more than the desire to save my niece, a woman I hadn’t seen in thousands of years.
I found myself directly in front of the sweet-smelling female, but she didn’t gasp or scream or run away. Instead, she looked up and met my gaze head on.
She leaned forward. Her breasts pressed to my chest, her nipples sharp enough that I could feel them through both sets of our clothes. “I am Calliope Hart.” She traced the tips of her fingers down the line of my cheek, leaving a trail of fire and hope in its wake. Her scent mixed with my own, and that small voice inside my head that rarely spoke growled—mine.
No reason still remained in my being. I was all instinct, and she was in my grasp. I wrapped one arm around her waist and buried the other hand in her hair at the base of her neck. Gods, it felt like the finest of satins. I pressed her against the chilled granite of the castle and plundered her mouth, tasting and consuming and wanting more. I parted her legs with my thigh and rubbed into her mound, eliciting the sweetest of cries. The sounds she made stirred fire in my blood. Hunger like I’d never felt in all my years awakened and rose up.
Our tongues tangled, and my body folded around hers, wanting to touch all of her at once. I nipped at her bottom lip then swept my tongue into her mouth, relishing the sweet taste of her. A growl rumbled from her chest, a warning, a hunger that sounded like it could match mine. The primal sound made my cock throb.
I licked and nuzzled my way down her neck, fighting the devastating urge to drink. I couldn’t do that, not without her permission, so I returned to her mouth, forcing myself to stay my hunger until she gave me a sign. Something. I stroked the seam of her lips, and she opened for me again. I tasted every corner of her mouth before wandering again, this time to her jawline and then up to her earlobe.
She pressed against me harder and rubbed her mound directly over my rigid cock. Her arms encircled my neck, and she took as much as she gave, nipping at my neck while I fought the urge to bite down into hers.
She gripped the back of my head, leaned her head to the side, and shoved my mouth to her bared neck. To her luscious, beautiful, unmarred, fragrant skin.
That was it. All I’d needed was consent. My fangs descended, and I sank them into the soft curve where her neck met her shoulder and drank.
She tensed in my arms and then softened into my hold with a pleased sigh.
Mine. My vampire roared inside my head again, and my Djinn agreed.
Chapter 9
CALLIOPE
His bite made me hotter than I already was. I wanted him. All of him. And I wanted him to take me. Right here. Against the wall of the castle. I wanted to feel him inside me.
I shivered through another pull from his mouth on my neck. He growled something, but I couldn’t tell what through his mouthful of—me. Shit! His mouth was full of me. When had that happened? My brain was moving as if I were wandering through a fog.
Then it cleared.
I shoved at his chest, but it was like trying to move a mountain. His arms tightened around me, and his possessive snarl sent a chill down my spine. “Stop,” I said a little louder. “Now.” I pounded his chest. I had to get away before…then I felt his tongue, and everything slipped from my grasp. Control was gone. I hadn’t meant to give it to him. He’d healed me with his blood. He’d connected us in a way that couldn’t be undone.
“Fuck!” I snapped. My logical brain screamed for me to stop, but the instinctual part of me knew this was different. Something about him was different…more. I’d started the seduction, pushed to this point. I’d encouraged him, practically asked to be bitten. What was wrong with me? I was four thousand years old. Resisting a man was old hat for me. But he was more than just a man.
“You gave permission. You wanted this,” he murmured against my skin. He licked my shoulder again, cleaning up a stray droplet of blood. “Stop fighting,” he said, the nature of his voice barely more than a growl.
The dominance in his tone made my arms drop to my sides in defeat. Then suddenly I was free of his touch. He’d backed away, leaving me panting and needy against an ice-cold wall of stone. My first damned thought was that I missed his touch and wanted him back. Wanted his skin on mine. His mouth on mine.
Damn it. Damn it. Damn it.
I stepped forward and reached for him.
“What do you want from me? I would never force an unwilling woman, yet I hesitated to release you when you asked. I am a monster by right, but I am ashamed of my actions.” He shook his head and backed away. “I blinked closer and closer—”
“You made a choice to bond us. You did that,” I whispered, my knees threatening to buckle beneath the reality of what’d just happened. “You didn’t have to heal the bite.” What had I let happen? I shouldn’t have wanted him to bite me. Or kiss me. He was a Djinn and a vampire. How that was even possible, I had no idea. But in that moment, I didn’t care. Everything around me pulled and tugged at my consciousness. Magick ebbed and flowed between us—faintly, but it had started. The bond had started. His blood flowed in my veins. We were in danger. Both of us now. But something had been there even before the bite. Something had drawn me to him.
I should’ve been more careful.
I was always careful. Calculating.
I couldn’t get attached. It wasn’t worth the pain that came with it. I was unlovable. That’s what he said. That’s why he’d cursed me.
But logic wasn’t what filled my mind. What filled it was the desperate need to feel him closer to me. It terrified me, and yet I couldn’t stop myse
lf. I stepped closer, attempting to close the gap he’d put between us at my loud request.
“If you touch me again, I won’t be able to hold back. I will take all of you.” He eyed my movements and danced in tandem, keeping himself just out of reach.
While every brain cell screamed for me to stop, the dark, needy part of my soul wanted him to do just that—take me. All of me. It was like trying to fight a tidal wave—futile. It would crash over me whether I wanted it to or not. I needed to drown myself in his scent. His touch.
“I need you to take me.”
I should have been pushing him away. I needed to push him away. He was too close. Already too close. The blood bond between us was faint right now. I could bury it if I tried hard enough—right?
But there was something more than the blood…
He didn’t wait for me to reconsider. The world swirled into a vortex. All I felt was him. His hard chest. The heat of his skin. The beat of his heart. The scent of his desire. Then the next moment we were on a bed inside a building I didn’t recognize. The weight of his body pressed me into the soft mattress. He slid his hand down my hip and around to cup my ass, pulling my leg up as his fingertips followed the line of my body.
His mouth sought out mine and took it, claiming me as a warrior would claim the spoils of battle. He pushed his other hand beneath the hem of my shirt.
My breasts ached. My belly ached. My entire body—heart, mind, and soul—desired him so completely I’d lost control.
His hard cock pushed against my stomach, needy and demanding. His hands squeezed, one held a breast and the other dug into the flesh of my ass. I trembled, panting for more.
But I didn’t deserve more. I didn’t get this.
This path would only lead to pain and anguish and heartbreak.
And death. Godric’s death.
He had cursed me. I couldn’t love or be loved by another.
“We can’t do this.” My words were barely a whisper. “No, Godric.” His name slipped from my tongue so easily, as if I’d been saying it for years. “You have to stay away from me.” The words grated on my soul, but I managed to push away violently enough that he released me. The blood bond between us was spreading through me like a wildfire along with the other magick…The magick that had drawn me to him first. I didn’t love him yet, but the potential was there. If we continued…
Sanctuary, Texas Complete Series Box Set Page 118