by Ana Calin
But what angers me most is something else, and unfortunately I’m too old to lie to myself about it. It’s the girl. How could she fall for Silas after she’s met me? No woman has ever—truly—wanted another man after she’s met the Grim Reaper in his human form. And yet here is this girl, happily spreading her legs for Silas in the woods, despite having known me just days before.
I search the woods for them like a mad man. It’s the reason I haven’t teleported back to the mansion, and I’m sure Maverick knows it. Whether he takes it as a sign of weakness on my part or not, I don’t know, and I don’t care, even though I should. I can’t afford my men starting to start seeing me as weak. Ascending to my position is hard, but it’s even harder to keep it, and this sure as hell isn’t the way. But here I am, sniffing the air for their scent, opening my pores to take in the air, detect whether it carries their essence.
My senses lead me to them, and I feel them ever closer, the girl more so than Silas. By the time my mansion emerges from behind the gnarled branches of black trees, rising from clouds of fog under the moonlight, I know she is there, and so is he.
I push the main doors open, my naked torso glinting metallic, my hair damp and clinging to my forehead. My feet are quick up the grand stairs, my legs flexing so hard I can hear the seams of my pants rip. Gordon cracks his door when I pass like the wind by his room, wrapping his night robe around himself as he runs after me.
“Your Excellency ? Anything I can assist with?” There’s panic in his voice, and no wonder. I don’t usually roam the corridors at night, driven mad by the scent of some woman.
“Return to your chambers, Gordon,” I grunt over my shoulder. He falls back, not daring to follow me when explicitly ordered not to, but I can hear his breath and his heartbeat as he still stands in place, watching me.
I rush up the narrow flight of stairs to the corridor where the girl’s chamber is located, and knock hard. The door trembles from its hinges from the strength of my knuckles. My blood boils with impatience. I trace his scent here, Silas’. My ears shift and adjust so that I can pick up the sounds from the room, but when I do, my hand stops mid-air. My pupils blast wide.
“No!”
CHAPTER V
Lucy
Dark clouds swim in my head until my vision clears to the face of the Lord Protector. I’m on the floor, in his arms. His hand is under my head, as if he caught me just before I hit the floor. The window is open to my left, the curtains blowing in the breeze that wraps my entire body in a cold embrace.
His hazel eyes glow, his princely features locked in an intense expression, like he’s struggling to bridle his impulses. I can’t help but reach up and touch him, my fingers grazing the side of his cheek. He’s a beautiful anchor that I need to grab on to.
“Help me, Lord Protector,” I whisper. “Don’t let those creatures get me.”
“What happened? What were you doing perched up there on the window banister?”
“The portal, I could feel it swirling outside.” I recount what happened as if through a dream. “I was powerless against its pull. I opened the window, and the demon arms reached out to me.” Chills make my body quake. The Lord Protector squeezes me tightly in his arms, driving warmth into my flesh. The fabric that wraps his arms feels like velvet against my skin, the warmth of his body permeating it. I lick my cold lips, finding my voice again. “Luckily it got sucked back to where it came from right before they could grab me.”
The Lord Protector helps me to the bed, keeping me tightly pressed to his body.
“But I don’t know why I got up on the banister.”
“Demons must have infiltrated your mind,” he explains as he seats me on the bed and gently caresses my forehead with his thumb. I have a feeling he’s saying a spell inside his mind while talking to me. He turns his head to the door. “Gordon!”
The butler quickly appears, a night robe wrapped around him. “Fennel tea, jasmine and lavender oil. Close the door, and make sure you bring everything yourself.”
“At once.”
Gordon scurries off, and the Lord Protector throws the duvet aside and lays me down on the bed.
“I’m sorry I’m so weak,” I excuse myself, feeling genuinely embarrassed. “But this whole thing has sucked the energy out of me.”
“Also common for this kind of occurrence.” He tucks me in. I don’t know if he’s doing it on purpose, but he exudes emotional warmth, the last thing I would have expected from someone as powerful and forbidding as him. Is this what kids feel like with their parents, this safety, this care?
I look into his princely face, and a cocktail of feelings run through me. Affection for someone who keeps me from harm’s way, but also attraction. He’s so sexy sitting here by my side, the sides of what looks like a black velvet cape open to reveal a chest so finely muscled it seems metallic, unbreakable. His fingers graze down my neck, cup my naked shoulder, and current zaps through me. It hits me—I’m naked.
In my confusion, I’d stripped of my clothes, that now lie torn on the floor.
“Jesus.” I grab the duvet and pull it up to my chin. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize— Oh God.”
I pull the duvet over my face before I die from shame. It smells of lavender, freshly washed. The Lord Protector found me perched on the banister, fully naked, encumbered only by my tangled hair blowing in the breeze.
“It’s not your fault,” he says with all the understanding of a man far too experienced to think ill of me. “You didn’t wait here for me naked, trying to lure me into your bed.”
But I still can’t push down the duvet, can’t look at him. Silence falls between us as he gives me the time to feel better.
“Please, keep talking, otherwise I’ll keep replaying it in my head, the moment I saw my clothes on the floor.” My voice must sound muffled through the duvet. The Lord Protector lets out a gentle laugh.
“You were in a hypnotic trance induced by the demons, and I of all people could feel that. I know it wasn’t a plot to seduce me.”
“The tea and the oils, Your Excellency.” It’s the butler’s voice. I grip the duvet tighter. Good God, he saw me naked, too.
“Place it all here,” the Lord Protector says. I can hear Gordon doing as told. He moves around, probably arranging some more things we’re going to need.
“Anything else, Your Excellency?”
“Nothing, thank you. You’re dismissed for the night.”
Gordon heads to the exit while the Lord works on the tea and oils, the dishes clattering. “Oh, and Gordon.”
“Your Excellency?”
“Make sure that you return to your chambers, and that the rest of our staff mind their own business as well. If anyone hovers around the hall, I’ll know.”
I can imagine Gordon bending his head before he leaves my room, pulling the doors closed after him, leaving me alone with the Lord Protector. I make myself under the blanket, surrounded by darkness, but feeling the brightness of his presence all around.
The spoon clatters softly against the cup as he stirs my tea, mumbling something.
“I’m going to need you to come out now, Lucia. Have this tea, it will help you loosen up, so I can take care of you.”
I emerge slowly, just my eyes at first, but the scent of the tea makes it under the duvet, and lures my nose out, too.
“Was that a spell?” I sit up, arranging the duvet around my breasts, and taking the cup from the Lord Protector’s hands. He emanates power and protection, but there’s also this forbidding aura about him that inspires respect. Argh, don’t tell me my daddy issues are coming to light, on top of everything.
“It will do you good.”
“I’m sorry, but ever since Maverick’s tea, I’m wary of the things I drink around here.”
“We do use tea to induce certain states on people, that’s true. It’s an old trick in the magic world. But I assure you, this one will only help induce calm, and a feeling of contentment.”
I sip the tea,
letting the warm liquid travel down to my stomach and relax my insides. I lower the saucer, resting my head against the headboard. I enjoy the sensation, but then I feel the Lord Protector’s eyes traveling down from my face to my neck, to my chest.
I open my eyes, meeting his. Those predatory irises are intense with feeling, his princely features so hard they seem made of metal. He breaks eye contact and reaches for the oils, mixing them in the palm of his hand. He moves so flowingly, so expertly that I’m mesmerized, and can’t look away.
“I’m going to rinse you with this, and drive a spell into your skin. It will travel to all your cells, and will unblock your magic,” he says softly, like a doctor before an intervention.
“Unblock my magic?”
“I think your magic was blocked when you were a baby or a toddler.”
“Oh? What led you to that conclusion?”
“It’s not a conclusion yet, only a theory. I didn’t see you open that portal the first time, but I did witness it now, and I got some important insights.”
He takes my hand, and massages the strong-smelling oils into the back of my hand. I can’t help but roll my eyes, taking in the sensation of those skilled fingers touching me. He does it expertly, like he’s done it a thousand times before, but there’s also a tenderness in his touch, as if every cell of his body is aware of the contact between his skin and mine.
“Listen to me carefully, Lucia.” His voice goes deep, permeating my body like the oils. “Once your magic is unblocked, you won’t be allowed to step out of the Thorny Forest. Not until you have graduated from the Academy. You would be a walking portal for demons from hell, and I don’t think I have to explain to you the kind of danger you would be exposing the world to.”
It’s hard for me to keep my eyes open while his hands travel from my hand, massaging the oil into my arm, heading to my shoulder.
“It might take a while until we fully understand what you are, and how your magic works, and until then you will have restrictions.”
I want to ask what kind of restrictions, additional to those I already have, but I can’t. I would agree to everything this man says, even to putting me in a dungeon, that’s how delicious his touch feels on me.
“You will obey my commands for as long as you’re under my protection, no matter whether you agree with them or not,” he continues, gently pushing the duvet down and stroking the oil into the sides of my torso, tauntingly close to my breasts. My nipples harden, and I sigh, falling deeply under his spell. “Your life will be completely in my hands to do with as I see fit, until you’ve successfully graduated from the Academy, and are certified to roam the realms as a supernatural.”
His touch does delicious things to me, and it’s hard to hide it. My breath grows ragged. I can’t help imagining those hands slipping the oil around my breasts, then down my stomach, his princely fingers slipping through my pubic hair into my pussy. He’d find me wet for him already, but the oil would help my virgin body to receive him.
“Now regarding your essence,” he muses while he helps me turn on my stomach. “Maverick has gotten the chance to look into it. It would seem your magic emerges when you have a big emotional charge.”
He brushes my tangled hair from the nape of my neck, and begins gently stroking the oil into my sinews. I moan into the pillow, my hands gripping the sheets. This feels incredible.
“It was an emotional charge that amped up your magical power to such a level that it opened the portal,” he continues as his hands slide over the back of my shoulders, sending waves of pleasure through me. “The traumatic experience with that boy you’d liked for years, then the four goons threatening you. But what happened tonight, Lucia?” His voice changes when he asks that last question. It’s a shade deeper, darker.
“I...” What am I going to tell him? I can’t possibly tell the truth. I can’t tell him that Silas kissed me like I never dreamed to be kissed before, then declared he would not have me any more than Chase did.
“Maverick has a theory about you and Silas,” he says when he doesn’t get a reply from me. “He thinks that Silas came on to you.”
“You sound like you wouldn’t believe it in a million years,” I manage with my cheek crushed against the pillow.
“Let’s say Silas isn’t exactly a Casanova. He’s very old, has had all the possible experiences with women in the first centuries of his existence, and he, well, I think he got bored. He loves people, but I can’t imagine him being sexually attracted to anyone. Or he hasn’t been in quite some time.”
“You can rest assured that Silas never came on to me.” Bitterness seeps into my voice. “I don’t even know how Maverick can think that. Silas is a demigod who could have any woman if he wanted to. I’m mortal, with nothing interesting to offer him.”
The Lord Protector lifts his hands from my body, and I turn to face him, keeping the duvet above my breasts. When our eyes meet intimacy rises between us. I can’t help but be strongly aware of my nakedness under the duvet, of my vulnerability, and I can tell he’s thinking about it, too.
“Lord Protector,” I whisper. “If I ask you to answer just one question for me, will you do it?”
His answer is a steady, intense stare.
“What’s your name?”
Silence settles in as we explore each other’s faces.
“It’s Ramses,” he purrs. “Ramses Delacroix.”
“Ramses,” I whisper, reaching out to touch his face. I half expect him to back up, but he doesn’t, waiting like a statue for my fingertips to make contact with his skin.
“I’ll tell you the truth,” I breathe. “I wanted something to happen between Silas and me. Maybe it’s my hormones raging, but I wanted it, badly, and he rejected me.” A tear rolls down my face. Normally I’d try to hide it, but I feel such a strong bond with Ramses Delacroix that I can tell him anything. “It hurts so bad. I know it sounds petty—the pain of rejection isn’t exactly the kind that kills you. But it did feel like it could have, and believe me, I know the heaviest kinds of pain. I’ve known abandonment, abuse, and an indifferent foster family. I’ve always been denied love, and I’ve never received tenderness. Until now, until you touched me.” My hand runs down his neck to his chest. My blood rises, pulsing under my skin—I’m touching the most powerful man in the world. His heart beats right under my palm. I draw closer to him, my breath touching his chin as I speak.
“Thank you for that. Thank you for being tender to me, Ramses Delacroix.”
He doesn’t move a muscle, only his chest rising and falling as he breathes. But when I move closer, placing my head between his pectorals, he bends forward to meet my embrace. My hands run under his black cape, around his waist, and his arms close around my back.
I shut my eyes, sighing in delight. This man’s embrace is warm like a loving Christmas night. I breathe in his scent of power and citrus.
But how can I feel this way about him when I desired Silas like a mad woman only hours before? How can I feel so attracted to two men at the same time, when in the mortal world I never once felt attracted to anyone besides Chase? I thought myself a saint, and look at me now, willing to open my legs for one guy in the forest, and less than an hour later my pussy overflowing for another.
Finally the mingled scents of the oils and Ramses’ metallic body go to my head, clouding my eyes and hanging on my eyelids. I fall into a deep sleep in the Lord Protector’s arms, immersing myself in a heavenly feeling of belonging.
The Lord Protector
I’M TENSE AS I WAIT for Silas in my study, failing to focus on the reports on my device. I drop it on the desk, and stomp to the window, rubbing my chin. I’ve been turning things over in my head all night.
What happened yesterday was an anomaly, something that has never happened to me before. The girl got under my skin with the way her body responded to me, her sweetness, that incredible natural scent of her skin, and the way she looked at me.
I run a hand through my hair, cursing under my
breath in frustration. No woman has ever made me feel this way. What’s her advantage? What’s her secret? And how on Earth does she manage to make me feel so insecure? Why can’t I stop turning things over in my head, wondering whether she’d still want Silas after she felt my closeness last night.
The door opens, and Gordon announces the demigod.
“Silas.” I try my best to hide the way my guts twist at the sight of him. Does she find him more to her liking than me, this demigod of warfare with his blond hair, amber eyes, and a warrior’s body?
Fuck, what the hell is wrong with you, Ramses, get a grip.
“Lord Protector,” he greets. I motion for him to approach and take a seat opposite from me at the desk. Damn, it’s hard to look at him without comparing.
“I trust you return with news from the Headmaster.”
“Indeed, Lord Protector.” A seriousness that I don’t like falls over his face. “He refuses to enroll Miss Reid.”
I frown, not sure I got him right. “I beg your pardon? He refuses?”
“He won’t enroll her without a test.”
“A test? Since when does the Headmaster set conditions for the Lord Protector?”
“He kindly informed me that he’d be going to the Council of the Arcane with the matter, should you force him to enroll her.”
I scoff. “The Council won’t even consider the matter. I, the Lord Protector, simply disposed the enrollment of a girl who displayed supernatural abilities in the mortal world. It was my obligation to do it, and the Headmaster’s to execute.”
“A girl who opened a portal to hell itself in the mortal world, without having any command of her magical powers whatsoever. The Headmaster has already gotten word of everything that happened, he knew more than I was prepared to tell him. He argues that, not knowing the exact nature of her powers, she could be dangerous to the Academy.”
I clench my jaw. I should have seen this coming. That bastard has wanted my position as Lord Protector for centuries, and now he’s finally got the right pretext to attack my authority.