space, but his grip tightened as furious tears stung my eyes.
“That’s an interesting development,” Rolland commented. “What else can you two do? We know that if one dies, the other does. She obviously has access to the Source. Is there anything else?”
“She won’t get sick. Like us.” Daemon’s words were short, to the point. “And she’s fast and strong.”
I sucked in a sharp breath as the blister of something ugly, of betrayal, curled around my heart.
“Remarkable.” Rolland clapped his hands as if we’d performed Swan Lake instead of just standing there in front of him.
“And that is all?” Sadi asked, looking wholly unimpressed.
“Yes,” Daemon answered, and my eyes widened, but I schooled my features blank.
I held my breath, but Dee didn’t disagree. Both of them had just blatantly lied by omission. There was more. When he was in his true form, Daemon and I could communicate the way he did with other Luxen. I didn’t know what to think about that, but hope sparked deep in my chest. My gaze darted to Dee, but she was staring at the wall as if there was something amazing going on there.
What was really happening here? There was more—
My thoughts careered off, crashing in a fiery glory as Quincy, who wasn’t even looking at me but was eyeballing Daemon, slid his hand down my chest, like right on my chest. Shock rippled through me, quickly followed by red-hot rage and bitter disgust. Every part of me recoiled.
Suddenly, I was sliding across the wood floor and bumping into an empty leather chair. Startled, I lifted my head and peered through the length of matted hair that had fallen across my face.
The two Luxen were locked in an epic stare-down, and across from me, Dee was no longer staring at the wall, but was focused on her brother. It was so quiet in the room that you could hear a fly hiccup.
And then Daemon exploded like a bottle rocket.
{ Daemon }
Wrath tasted like a pool of blood in the back of my mouth, and I was unable to see or think past it. There were a lot of things I could deal with, that I could force myself to tolerate and I could wait on. But him touching her like that not only crossed the line, it blew a freaking hole in it.
Shifting into my true form, I felt the immediate bombardment from others of my kind, their needs and wants, rising in a vicious cyclone, but my rage overwhelmed them. Catching Quincy the second before he could shift, I flung him into the far wall, but this time with a hell of a lot more effort than when I found him in her room.
Body say hello to wall.
He crashed into it without changing. Plaster cracked and gave way under the impact. White dust flew into the air. Quincy started to slide down the wall. That was the funny thing about the Luxen. They hadn’t realized yet just how weak they were in their human forms.
I was on him before he hit the floor.
Slamming my fist into his chin, I reveled in the cracking sound of his head knocking backward. Nowhere near done, I hauled him up and then practically put him through the wall, all the way to the supporting beams.
Then I let go.
Quincy went down, crumpled on the floor, flickering in and out like a squashed lightning bug. Shimmery blue liquid seeped out from behind his head, and as I stared down at him, debating on whether or not I wanted to throw him like a football through a nearby window, I realized just how quiet the room was.
Leaving Quincy, or whatever was left of him, I shifted out of my true form as I turned around. I might have maybe gone too far with that, but there was nothing I could do about it now.
Rolland arched a brow. “Well, then . . .”
Chest rising and falling sharply, I spared him a quick glance before turning to where she stood. Her hands were gripping the back of a chair as she stared at me, her gray eyes so big and so wide on her pale face.
Our gazes locked, and I could tell by the stricken look on her face that she wasn’t sure what to make of any of this. There was confusion and raw hurt and fury pouring from her, choking the air, choking me.
It took several moments to slow my roll. I got my breathing in check as I forced myself back to Rolland, meeting his curious stare. “I told him not to touch her before and that if he did, I would kill him. I’m not a liar.”
Sadi’s gaze flickered to where Quincy lay. “He’s not dead.”
“Yet,” I promised.
A look of anticipation, of pure eagerness, swept over Sadi’s face as she wet her bottom lip. “Why would you care if he touched her or not?”
There were a thousand endless reasons. “She belongs to me.” I could practically feel the daggers she was driving into my back, but I didn’t look at her. “No one else. It’s as simple as that.”
Rolland eyed me intently, and then he pushed off the desk. Straightening, he clapped his hands. “Everyone. Listen up.”
I stiffened, knowing this could be real bad.
“You.” He motioned to another Luxen. “Get Quincy out of here. Let me know if he wakes up.”
Part of me hoped he did so I could beat the shit out of him again.
To Sadi, Rolland pinned her with a sharp look. “Take this young . . . lady over here and make sure she gets cleaned up and that’s she comfortable.”
Oh hell no. I opened my mouth, but Sadi snapped forward, her eyes glittering with malicious pleasure. “Of course,” she said, casting a half smile in my direction as she all but bounced past me. I stepped forward to intercept and make good use of the window.
“You,” Rolland directed at me, “will stay right here.” Then to Dee, he smiled. “It’s late. I find that being in this form makes me incredibly hungry. Would you get something for me to eat?”
Dee hesitated, but then nodded. Turning, she shot me a worried look as she hurried out of the room to do Rolland’s bidding.
There was a good chance I was going to punch someone else as I watched Sadi force her out of the room. The back of my neck tingled and my skin crawled as the door shut behind them, leaving me with Rolland and some dude whose name I refused to learn.
Rolland strolled around the desk and sat down. “Quincy was quite unhappy with you earlier. Said you . . . went after him because he was in the room with that . . . that girl.” Leaning back in the chair, he hooked one leg over the other. He gestured at the damaged wall. “Not that his anger seems to be a problem right now.”
I shrugged. “I’m sure he’s not the only one. And I don’t trust Sadi with her.”
His brows rose. “You don’t?”
“No.”
Folding his hands, he studied me. “I want you to answer a question for me, Daemon Black, and I want an honest answer.”
My jaw ached from how hard I was grinding my molars. I didn’t need to be in this room. I needed to be wherever Sadi was at the moment, but I nodded.
“Like I said, you’re a hard one to read. Not your brother or sister, but you’re different.”
“People do say I’m special.”
He laughed under his breath. “What does that girl mean to you, Daemon? And I do want an honest answer.”
My hands curled into fists. Time was ticking. “She belongs to me.”
“You’ve said that.”
I forced air into my lungs with a deep breath. “She’s mine and she’s a part of me. So, yeah, she means a lot, but what I feel for her doesn’t change anything here, with you.” I met his stare with my own unflinching one. “I support what you are doing.”
“Me?” He chuckled. “It’s not me you must support. I’m just a . . . busy bee, like you.”
Well then.
“Do you still love her?” he asked, flipping the subject. “Do you still want her?”
What he was asking was if I had any human emotions left over since their arrival, or was I just as tuned in to the hive as the rest of them. “I want her.”
“Physically?”
Jaw aching fiercely, I forced my chin up and down.
“Do you want more than that?”
> I chose my words carefully. “What I want is a home where my family is safe, and only we can provide that. We come first.”
Rolland’s head tilted to the side, his gaze never leaving my face. “We do. And soon you will have that safe home for your family. It is already well under way.”
I wanted to ask exactly how it was well under way, because all I had seen from them so far was a lot of nasty killing.
Tension-filled silence stretched out between us, and then he flicked his hand at the door. “Go do what you need to do, but please do not throw Sadi at anything. She has her uses that I might want to partake in later.”
Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I spun around and started for the door.
“Oh. And Daemon?”
Shit. I stopped, turning to him.
The damn smile was on his face, the same smile he’d worn when he addressed the public earlier in the day over the local news. When he’d told the city, or whatever was left of it, that everything would be fine, that mankind would prevail and a whole load more crap he’d actually made sound believable.
“Don’t make me regret not snuffing out your life in the clearing, because if you are a trataaie,” he said, slipping into our native tongue, “it will not be me you will fear, but the senitraaie. You will not only lose your family, but that little girl up there will suffer a very slow and very painful death, and her horror will be the last thing you see. Inteliaaie?”
Back stiff, I nodded again. “I am not a traitor and I only answer to our leader. I understand.”
“Good,” he said, raising his hand. A remote flew from the desk into it. “Remember. No throwing Sadi.”
Dismissed with the bite-in-the-ass kind of warning, I left the office and nearly plowed right into my sister as I exited the atrium.
She gripped my arm, her fingers digging into my skin. “What in the hell were you thinking?”
“Aren’t you supposed to be getting him a late-night snack?”
Her eyes flashed. “You could’ve gotten yourself killed in there protecting her.”
I stared at her for a moment, searching for something, anything in her, and came up with nothing. I gently removed her hand. “I don’t have time for this.”
“Daemon.”
Ignoring her, I headed through a sitting area and then took the steps two at a time. When I reached the second landing, I could already hear the shouting coming from the third floor.
Jesus.
Something shattered above me, and I took off, hauling ass. I reached the last door on the third floor in less than a second. Pushing it open, I scanned the bedroom as I wondered how I was going to stop myself from throwing Sadi through something.
The bedroom was empty, but it looked like a tornado had gone through it. The olive-green armchair was toppled over onto its side, one of the wooden legs broken. The white curtains had been pulled down from the window. The dirtied and bloodied pillows were strewn across the floor.
And the shirt she had been wearing—my shirt—rested in shredded tatters at the foot of the bed. What in the hell?
My gaze whipped toward the bathroom door when I heard what sounded like a body bouncing off it, and then a shriek blasted the room.
I kicked open the bathroom door and came to a complete stop. The room was large, the kind that had a separate tub and shower, but this room, too, had seen better days. The mirror above the double sink was broken. Multiple bottles had been tipped open. White cream covered the floor in milky pools.
She stood in front of the large tub, her hair a tangled mess around her flushed face. Gray eyes snapped fire as she stood with her legs spread wide. A trickle of blood ran from her nose. In her hand she held a jagged piece of glass.
And she was only in her bra and jeans—a white bra with little yellow daises on it. Her chest heaved with indignation and fury.
Apparently, Sadi had taken the cleaning thing to a whole different level.
My gaze crept to where Sadi stood only a few feet from her, breathing heavily. Her white blouse was torn. Buttons popped and missing. Her normally coiffed hair looked like she’d been inside a wind tunnel, but the best part?
Fingernail marks were etched down the side of Sadi’s face and reddish-blue blood had been drawn. A disturbing level of pride rippled through me.
Kitten got claws and then some.
“She doesn’t play nice with others,” Sadi huffed out. “So I’m in the process of adjusting her attitude.”
“And I’m in the process of getting ready to cut out your heart, bitch.”
In spite of everything that was so damn messed up, my lips twitched into a small smile. “Get out.”
Sadi turned her hateful gaze on me. “I’m—”
“Get the hell out.” When Sadi didn’t move, I stalked over to where she stood, picked her up, and shoved her out of the bathroom. She caught herself and started back toward us. “Rolland has a use for you tonight, so if you want to be able to come through for him, don’t take one more step toward me.”
Her nostrils flared as her cheeks mottled with anger, but she stopped as her hands curled into claws. A second passed and she didn’t move from the doorway. Sadi was going to test me—she seriously was.
I slammed the bathroom door shut in Sadi’s face and then whipped around. Heart hammering, I saw her again and immediately forgot about Sadi.
She still stood in front of the garden tub, the piece of glass in her hand, and she stared back at me like an animal cornered. In that moment she didn’t remind me of a harmless little kitten.
She was a full-grown tigress, and she still looked like she wanted to do some damage. To me. Could I really blame her? Those eyes of hers shifted the longer we stared at each other, turning wet with a sheen of tears, and that was worse than a kick between the legs.
I was in so deep. We were in so deep, and I didn’t want her here. I wanted her far, far away from all of this, but it was too late.
Too late for both of us, and maybe for everyone else, too.
Her lower lip trembled as she shifted her weight from one foot to the other, her toes sinking into spilled conditioner or shampoo. An eternity stretched out between us as I soaked her up with my eyes. A collage of memories—from the day she knocked on my front door and changed my life, to the first time she said those three words that made my life what it was—bombarded me. But it was more than just memories. I knew right then I shouldn’t be feeling what I was, but every cell demanded her. My blood boiled.
I wanted her.
I needed her.
I loved her.
She took a step back, bumping into the tile ledge surrounding the tub.
“Kat,” I said, speaking her name for the first time in days, allowing myself to actually think it, and the moment that happened, the seal inside me broke wide open.
6
{ Katy }
The edges of the piece of glass were digging into my palm as I stared at Daemon. After everything that had gone down in the office, and then with that horrible woman, I couldn’t catch my breath or stop the tremors racing along my arm. I watched him take a step forward. The look in his incandescent eyes and the intent in his step sent a shiver down my spine. “Don’t.”
His eyes narrowed.
Too much hurt swelled in my chest, mixing with all the terrible things Sadi had said she planned on doing with Daemon, things that, when he’d been in the office, he hadn’t sounded like he’d be against enjoying.
My skin felt raw, my insides flayed open. I wanted to lash out and hurt something, someone. Tears burned my throat. “Are you sure you don’t want to leave with your new friend?”
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