A silver net of chains had him pinned to the floor and a sob clawed its way out of my throat as I saw that it was slowly imbedding itself into his skin, criss-crossing along his body with angry sizzling welts. Whoever did this didn’t want Ian to just die; they wanted him to suffer first.
I grabbed the edge of the heavy chains and yanked at them. “Damn it Justice, help me!” I shouted when she didn’t make a move to lift them.
She stood across Ian’s body from me, frustration twisting her features.
“I can’t.”
Before I could respond she bent down and reached for the chains, a look of regret and sorrow in her eyes as she bored them into mine. Her hands passed right through them like mist.
My eyes widened and my jaw grew slack. I scrambled away from her. Justice is a ghost?
“Leah. I’m sorry.” She attempted to grab Ian’s hands but again, she passed right through them.
Then her head snapped back toward the front of the house. “You have to move him now!” Justice yelled, snapping me out of my daze. “They’re coming back!”
I shook off any thoughts of what I’d just learned and shoved them into my “shit to deal with later” box.
I moved back to Ian and lifted the chains off his body. Each tug pulled another section of silver out of his body so that I had to jerk each link chain from him. I felt tears and sweat mingle together and drip off my face as I wrenched the last piece of chain out of Ian’s sizzling flesh. I bent and pulled Ian’s shoulders off the floor and dragged him toward the back door while Justice kept watch for any coming attackers. The loud slide of metal on metal followed by a resounding thump froze me in my tracks. I glanced to Justice and with one small nod she disappeared.
I stared after her, disbelief filling me. She just disappeared. Had she been doing that all along and I just hadn’t noticed?
I lowered Ian’s shoulders to the floor and heard him groan. I knelt down beside him, cradling his head on my lap and wiping his sweat and blood-streaked hair out of his face.
“My Love?” Confusion touched his voice as he started to regain consciousness.
I held a finger to my lips, urging him to remain quiet. He moved, pulling himself up so he was leaning on one elbow and I heard his breath strain with the effort it took for him to get that far.
Justice reappeared. “They’re gone.”
“Find Bear,” I ordered.
“I’m right here,” Bear croaked as he hobbled into the room, pulling heavy metal chains off him.
“You okay?” I asked.
He nodded. “They drugged me with something.” He blinked his eyes hard and shook his head.
“Can you drive?”
Bear widened his eyes, trying to wake himself up, and nodded.
I remembered that I left Ivelisse lying in wait amidst the brush around the house. “Check on Ivelisse, Justice.”
Ian touched my face. “Who are you talking to, My Love?”
Oh shit. “You really can’t see her, can you?” I realized Justice had only been visible to me.
Ian’s eyes widened a bit at that.
“Justice is a ghost.”
Chapter Fifty
By the time Justice came back, Bear and I had Ian moved closer to the garage door. His body was criss-crossed with red welts and every move was extremely painful. The marks were burns, and they were excruciating, but they would heal.
We went as slow as we could but the acrid smoke was so thick now it was painful to take more than a shallow breath.
Distant sirens echoed through the canyon. Help was on the way. Unfortunately, Ian could accidentally be exposed to sunlight.
“Bear, meet the fire department. I’ll take Ian to my house, you can meet us there.”
Bear hesitated.
“I need you to help Mouse and find Shia, Bear. She shifted, but I don’t know where she is.”
“What about the others?” Bear argued.
“We will get them back, but right now, I need you to focus on Shia. Okay?”
Bear agreed and made his way back into the house. He couldn’t leave from the garage door without exposing Ian to the sun. I said a silent prayer that he’d find a safe exit out of the house. Fortunately, the fire had started on the opposite side of the house and while the smoke was getting thicker, it was still breathable. For now.
I was helping Ian into the car when Justice reappeared beside me.
“Where’s Ivelisse?” I questioned Justice as Ian’s pained look grew concerned again.
“She’s gone.” Justice bit the words out in anger.
“Dammit! I told her to stay hidden. Let’s get out of here.”
I climbed in the driver’s seat and the car roared to life. I was never more grateful for the window modifications that prevented the sun from scorching Ian.
We sped past the approaching fire trucks and a little of the worry eased from me when I saw Bear and Mouse frantically waving them toward the burning house. They had gotten out safely.
I spared one last look in the rearview mirror and stifled a gasp as billows of black smoke tainted the sky above Ian’s home.
Chapter Fifty-One
I got out of the car first and ran inside to make sure all the blinds were secure, and then helped Ian into the house.
He was weak. Ian needed blood and he needed to rest. Vampires heal fast but the abuse he’d taken by the silver had caused extensive damage. I didn’t know if he’d come out of this completely unscathed or if the silver chains would permanently scar him. The angry red welts were raw and Ian winced as I settled him into my bed and laid a clean sheet over him.
“You need to rest and you need to feed.” I held out my wrist. “It’s okay, Ian,” I insisted when he pulled his face away from the pulsing vein in my arm.
“May I make it less painful?”
I knew he was asking if he could use mind control to make me feel pleasure instead of pain and the fact he asked filled me with calm reassurance and an emotion stronger than any I had ever felt before.
He didn’t just want to control me. It mattered to him how I felt.
I mattered to him.
I bent and touched my lips to his. “Now bite me.”
The points of light in his eyes swirled with desire and need as he kissed his way down my arm. I let go of my shields and suddenly felt as weightless as if I’d been floating atop a cloud. When he sank his fangs into my wrist heat built within my chest, a slow comforting circle of warmth that rose in intensity and pleasure with each suckle of Ian’s mouth. The sensation engulfed my entire body until I erupted in an orgasm so intense it stole my breath.
Ian fed gently yet urgently, then with one final lick across my wrist, he pulled me to his chest. “Thank you, My Love.”
I angled my head to look into his face. “I want you to do something for me, Ian.”
His brow furrowed in question.
“Mark me.”
Ian sat bolt upright in bed. “Why?” He was suspicious and I couldn’t blame him. “I know you want to save them, My Love. Marking is not something to be taken lightly. It can not be undone.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, suddenly chilled from the inside. I closed my eyes and shook my head.
I didn’t realize I’d been silent for so long—pondering the demons living within my own mind—until Ian brushed his thumb across my cheek.
I sucked in a breath as if waking from a dream then smiled and let my emotions freely seep from me.
I shifted to my knees and cupped his face in my hands. “This is not about saving them, Ian.” I closed my eyes, searching for the words to do this right.
I’d been running in circles like a hamster in a wheel for most of my life, dodging what and who I was, striving to be “normal” in an abnormal world.
Then Ian swaggered into my life and made me see something in myself I’d spent a lifetime denying.
I tried not to love him, I really did.
In the end it was just one more aspect of my li
fe I tried to deny.
While I did want to bring the others back, the person I really needed to save was me.
Selfish, I know.
“This isn’t about that.”
Ian cast his eyes down, intentionally not meeting mine. “I cannot,” he shook his head solemnly, “I will not, My Love. I am sorry.”
I felt the sting of rejection pierce my heart as the first tear fell down my cheek.
Ian lifted his finger to my tear and held it like a precious jewel, studying it for just a moment before flicking out his tongue. His eyes closed, fanning his long, dark lashes like half-moons over his cheeks. “I don’t think I would care to continue my existence if I was bonded to you, yet unable to have you with me.”
“You think I would ask you to do this and then walk away?” The thought took my breath away. Once we were joined together it would literally be painful for Ian to suffer any great distance from me. While my risk was that I would die if he did, Ian would have a need to be near me. We would draw strength from one another, or weaken with separation.
“Open your eyes, Ian.” I sighed.
He did so slowly and a piece of my heart broke knowing I was the one who caused such agony to darken his eyes.
“I balanced on a thin precipice for most of my life, holding my breath for fear of falling and knowing that I couldn’t teeter on the edge forever.”
When he started to look away I took his face in my hands and pinned him with my gaze, hoping he could see what was truly in my heart and soul.
“I’d peek over each side, one at a time, and was only greeted by a never-ending abyss of black uncertainty.
“Then you walked out of the shadows and the path widened enough for me to fill my lungs with the spicy sweet scent of fresh air. Suddenly the chasm wasn’t so dark, or so unfathomable.
“The possibilities both excited and frightened me.” I brushed my thumb across his full lips.
“Hell, they scared the crap out me.
“Yet with each passing day, the haze cleared and the chasm became a little less foreboding.
“I love you, Ian. I won’t regret this. Mark me.”
He swooped me into his arms and kissed me breathless. “I have waited so long to hear those words, My Love.”
Straddling him, I ran my hands around his face, cradling it, and slid my tongue along his lips.
His hands glided over my shoulders and down to the hem of my shirt, playing with the small strip of skin exposed there.
I ran my fingers down his bare chest, toying with the nest of coarse hairs there, then followed them down as they trailed to his erection, already thick and throbbing.
I freed him from the waistband of his sleep pants and gripped him, slowly stroking up and down his large shaft, and was rewarded with a groan of pleasure.
Ian pulled me away slowly, oh-so-slowly unfastened the buttons of my blouse, his fingers sliding under the edge of my bra and sending enticing little shivers of ecstasy coursing through my body before finally stripping my top half bare. He slid his hands like feathers sweeping across my skin then held the weight of each of my breasts in his palms, encircling each nipple with the rough pad of his thumb. I sucked in a gasp as his mouth captured first one breast, then the other. His mouth was wet, hot and greedy, yet he took his time tasting and kneading until I was finally struggling to free his legs from his pants. I rolled off him and slid my own pants off and left them to tumble to the floor.
When I turned back, Ian had already removed his and was lying next to me in all his naked glory, his beauty not the least bit marred by of the welts still crossing angrily over his body.
I pulled myself on top of him then followed one welt with my tongue across his chest and down to his navel. His back arched, pressing his erection into my chest. His hand glided between my legs, one finger tracing the folds of my body before slipping inside to taunt and tease.
I responded by shifting lower and taking him into my mouth, just the tip at first, circling the sensitive bulb and sucking lightly. Then drawing him deeper into to me, sucking and releasing until his body writhed beneath me.
“Please, My Love,” Ian’s voice was a raspy whisper, “I need to be inside you.”
“You’d think someone your age would have more patience,” I teased.
His head fell back with a whispered growl.
I kissed my way up his abdomen, letting my tongue glide across his chest while I positioned my body just over him. He throbbed against my opening, his impatience pulsing heat through me. His hands gripped my ass as I languidly impaled myself on him, inch by glorious inch, savoring the feel of his silky flesh over the steel of his readiness for me.
I rode him with wild abandon, letting the love I’d tried to deny flow out of me in waves.
Ian met me thrust for thrust, his tempo deliberately slow. “If it’s patience you wish for, My Love…” he chided huskily.
He rolled, his arms flexing as he held his weight above me. Then with sweet torture he slid himself in and out of me while his fingers drifted down and increased my pleasure.
I opened my eyes to stare into his midnight blue eyes, sprinkled with stars like pinpoints and darkened with lust. I allowed myself to look deeper into his soulful eyes and saw what I had already known all along yet refused to acknowledge.
Ian loved me.
Heat began low in my core, building like a vortex of pleasure until I was thrashing my head from side to side, screaming my release.
Ian increased the pace of his thrusts as I rose to meet him, wrapping my legs around his body. “Mark me, Ian,” I said softly. “Make me yours.”
“You must take my blood as I take yours.” I could feel the tentative hesitation in his words. He was braced and waiting for me to deny him.
I tilted my head back in invitation. “Show me.”
His full upper lip peeled back to reveal his fangs. He brought his wrist to his mouth and bit, leaving two puncture wounds, and offered it to me.
“Tell me you love me, My Love.”
“I love you, Ian Nightwalker. Now and for eternity,” I murmured as I stroked the tip of my tongue along the marks then fastened my mouth to him and greedily took what was now mine.
“I have loved you from the moment I saw you, My Love. You don’t know how long I have waited for your love to find me.”
There was no longer a difference between his life and mine as he sank his fangs into my neck. His blood was warm and velvety as it flowed down my throat, bringing me to orgasm and leaving me boneless.
Moments later Ian growled his own climax, his body pulsing into mine and throbbing with pleasure.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Justice didn’t see the attackers and Shia had been mid-change when the dart struck her. She’d been drugged and while her metabolism was fast, she still showed signs of fatigue. Bear and Mouse had been injured, but suffered no serious damage.
They took Chaos and Cougar while they “slept”. Joaquín must have put up more of a struggle, judging by the damage and blood splatters Mouse had seen when he first noticed him missing.
We called Falcon later in the day, but a late autumn storm prevented him from taking off. He would be here as soon as he was able.
I called Sam and filled him in. He’d already known about Ian’s house and the report from the fire department said it would likely need to be razed and completely rebuilt. The fire had spread quickly and caused too much damage to repair.
He agreed to meet us at dusk with Donovan and a SINS clean-up crew standing by.
I had to convince Ian to rest again after we talked with Shia, Mouse and Bear. He was poised for the oncoming battle.
He wanted to go after them.
We all did.
But it was still hours until sunset and we would have to wait until then. In the meantime, all we could do was speculate on who was behind this and plan our attack.
Mouse stayed behind to guard Ian and I. Since Bear and Shia weren’t limited by the sun they went back t
o Ian’s house. They were able to pick up the scent of Joaquín’s blood and followed the trail to an old ranch secluded in the desert.
We knew where they were.
Now all we had to do was go get them.
Chapter Fifty-Three
A sliver of moon hung above us like a lopsided grin, adding an ethereal glow to the dusty land stretching around us. Patches of brush dotted the area, along with half-dead trees, some with large branches hanging off them, ripped from their trunk by winds and time.
The ranch was once used for horses and contained several rusted corrals and a barn that looked like it would blow over in the stiff breeze whipping about us, tossing tumbleweed into our path.
It was the perfect place for an ambush.
Sam and Donovan were inside the SINS van gearing up for battle. They would separate, one with Shia and the other with Bear to patrol the outside area. We expected to find newbies inside. They would be used as pawns in this game and if they decided to flee, we needed people on the outside who could stop them.
That was the reason for their existence. Humans were being turned into vampires to be used as cannon fodder. They were drafted as soldiers into a war that couldn’t be won.
Shia jogged off to a nearby tree to shift in privacy. Bear wasn’t nearly that modest and opted to change where he stood. He fell to the ground on all fours, gave me a wry smile, then his eyes rolled into the back of his head.
His back arched with more angles than a human body should be able to accommodate, then his head fell back until he was facing the night sky. His skin began to move on its own, muscle and tendon rippling like there were small snakes writhing beneath it.
Course, dark hair poked through his skin, and the effect looked eerily painful, like needles coming out instead of going in.
The only sound was the cracking and popping of bones contorting into impossible positions, lengthening and twisting until what lay before was no longer a man or bear, but something in between. His eyes rolled back into their normal position and I swear he winked at me before a final groan that turned into a quiet roar transformed him into an enormous animal, his fangs exposed as his growl of triumph filled the air.
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