by Lauren Dawes
Bryn frowned. “Why are you doing this, Mason? What’s happened? Does this have something to do with what happened to Eir?”
Mason dropped his eyes to the desk. “Not entirely.”
“Are you not happy here?”
His eyes darted back to Bryn. “Of course I’m happy here. Bryn, you and the club are my life.”
“So, why are you leaving us, leaving me?”
Christ. “I’m not,” he replied. “I wouldn’t.”
Bryn stared at him for a long minute before asking, “Mason, do you remember the day we met?” He nodded. “You were this close,” she showed him her thumb and index finger, less than a quarter of an inch from each other, “to ending your own life.”
Fuck, how had she known that?
“And don’t even try to deny it. Mav told me all about what she felt off you that day. What I want to know is why. What’s happened? Because I’m not letting you just walk out of here without giving me a good reason. I simply won’t let you drop off the face of the planet and out of my life.”
She got up and walked around to sit on the desk in front of him. “Mason, you mean too much to me.” Her words were soft, and for the first time, Mason truly saw and felt the depth of her love for him. “So, tell me what’s really happening with you.”
“I’ve just got a lot on at the moment, and my work is going to suffer. I won’t allow that to happen. You and this club are too important to me.”
“I can respect that, Mase, I really can. But you don’t have to quit on me. How about you take a bit of time off to get your head back on straight? Come back in a couple of weeks when you feel like you’re ready to.”
That wasn’t what Mason wanted. He needed a clean break.
“I’m really sorry, Bryn, but I have to quit. I’m … I’m relocating to Florida,” he lied.
“Florida? Why?”
He shrugged. “I need a change.”
Bryn exhaled slowly. “I can respect that, Mase.” She stood up and Mason did the same. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she pulled him into a warm embrace. Against his neck, she said, “I’ll miss you Mason. You’re the first human I’ve actually liked.”
Her last comment made his lips twitch into a smile. “I’ll miss you too, Bryn.”
She pulled away, staring at him, trying to figure him out. “If you don’t find what you’re looking for in Florida, come back here to me, will you?”
“I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else, Bryn, but this is something I have to do.”
Mason left Bryn’s office with his decision to leave weighing heavily on him. He hadn’t felt this bad since that day over ten years ago when he was getting ready to end it all. He was right back to where he had started.
And he needed to get away from it all.
He didn’t drive off straightaway; he just sat in his car in the parking lot outside the club contemplating his options. He had two really, although one of them wasn’t that great. He could eat a bullet, as he’d intended to, or he could do what he’d told Bryn he’d do and move. Where? Fucked if he knew. Florida? Chicago? Cali? He supposed it didn’t really matter. He would be miserable because he wouldn’t be in Boston.
After three-quarters of an hour of contemplation, he turned the key and fired up the engine, making his final drive home from the club.
Chapter 36
Darrion’s eyes twitched open, surveying the loft apartment he had taken this time around. There had only been one human living there along with three cats. He had killed the woman, but allowed the cats to live.
He liked how arrogant they were.
The apartment itself still smelled of the woman, her stench in every fiber, every fabric, on every surface. Darrion clenched his teeth against the odor so close to his face, his head resting on the woman’s pillow.
He closed his eyes once more and let his mind drift to thoughts of Taer. She had to be close to cracking. He had been tormenting her relentlessly, and nobody could withstand that much without fissures forming in their sanity.
Normally, he could blow right past Taer’s non-existent mental shields, breezing right into her weak mind. But it was different tonight. She actually put up a fight. When he first thought of her, he found the endless expanse of an icy landscape, bare of any trees or shrubs, and felt a frigid wind against his face. Looking to the left and right, he could see there was nothing else in sight.
He laughed at her attempt at keeping him out and then blew past the shield of her mind with one thought. The whole scene seemed to shatter, as if a stone had been thrown at a piece of glass. Giant cracks formed, spidering out from the center, and it crumbled around him in sharp shards that glanced off his body.
Behind the shield, the long hallway of Taer’s mind was revealed. Darrion began walking down the hall, his footsteps echoing around him as he approached the glossy, black door that would give him entry. Anticipation was making his heart pound with excitement. Tonight was the night he would break her. He could feel it.
Reaching out, his fingers wrapped around the cold metal knob. The door opened about an inch before suddenly shutting in his face with a sharp bang.
What the fuck?
Darrion tried again, but this time the door didn’t move at all. With gritted teeth, he tried one last time before shoving his shoulder into the wood. A harsh curse escaped his throat as he was thrown back again. Staggering to his feet, he scowled at the lacquered wood until the sound of a dark voice gave him pause.
“Leave.”
Darrion frowned, taking a step closer to the door. Was that …
“Korvain?” he asked.
“Leave, Darrion. I won’t tell you again.”
Is he telling me what to do? Darrion threw his head back and laughed. The sound boomed loudly around the dark hallway, ricocheting off the walls like gunfire. In a few steps, he was back in front of the door, his mouth less than an inch from the wood.
“This little bitch’s mind belongs to me,” he said in a controlled voice. “You can’t protect her twenty-four hours a day, Korvain.”
In an equally restrained voice, Korvain said, “If I didn’t want to give Taer the pleasure of killing you herself, I would let you in here right now and finish you myself. But your death will be at her hands and nobody else’s.”
“Do you really think she would be able to take me on?” Darrion laughed again. What could one female do against him? He had centuries of training, centuries of experience and centuries of pain to fuel his ever-present rage. Lowering his voice, he added dangerously, “I’ll finish the job I started when I killed her brother. I’ll finish it with her. You can tell her that, too.”
“I wouldn’t be too hasty to judge what Taer is capable of now, Darrion.”
Darrion gave a primitive snarl. He was so close to breaking Taer, and he wouldn’t sit back and let Korvain fuck it all up again. Korvain had interfered in his plans once before, and he wouldn’t let it happen again.
Stepping back from the door, still glaring at it, Darrion pulled out of Taer’s head. Blinking up at the ceiling of the apartment, Darrion sat up, with Korvain’s final words still taunting him.
“Mother-fucker.”
Chapter 37
The ocean was absolutely infinite, the surface of the water as smooth as glass. An icy wind blew across the surface, carrying with it the tang of salt. Taer shivered, fear skittering down her spine. She wrapped her arms around herself in an effort to stave off the cold.
She had wanted to do this.
She had wanted to get inside his head, but …
It was almost as if Korvain’s shield was as aggressive as the man.
Gritting her teeth, she forced Adrian’s death on Korvain’s mind, making him relive it in every terrifying detail as she’d had to for the past month in her dreams. She made him experience it all—the scent of blood, the gasping of Adrian’s final breaths, her feelings of desperate despondency.
She didn’t know what she’d expected to happen, but she’d at least ex
pected something. There was no response, nothing changed—she’d had no effect at all. If anything, the wind that had been blowing only got stronger, sending Taer’s loose hair billowing behind her.
She tried again, upping the intensity of her attack, summoning all of her anger and grief. She concentrated on her pain, feeling the first tears of frustration fall down her cheeks. The wind was blowing even harder now, and Taer had to widen her stance to stay upright. If it were to get any stronger, she would lose her footing completely.
After a third try, Taer decided to give up on that particular line of attack. Reliving her brother’s death wasn’t working. She had to think about what would really upset Korvain. What did he love? Well, Bryn obviously, but Taer had already tried that angle without success. She had to think about what was really going to hurt him. Failing Adrian was something she knew had wounded him deeply, but he felt no fear in facing the memory. So what did he fear? Discouraged and frustrated with herself, Taer went through all her possible options again.
There was only one more thing she could try. Taer focused on her own near death, but instead of seeing herself recovering from her injuries, she forced the idea of her dying from them on him instead.
Soon she noticed the whipping wind was starting to die down. She watched on as the still black water began to ripple. Taer concentrated on the thought of her own death, waiting to see what would happen next.
The water grew choppier and choppier. Soon it was as if a tempest was raging around her, yet she was untouched. She squinted at the ocean in front of her as a visible channel formed in the water, growing deeper until she could see the sandy bottom right in front of her feet, as though a pathway had opened up for her. A high wall of water stretched up on both sides of the chasm, defying logic and gravity.
Taer stepped from the stone she had been standing on down onto the sand, the black walls of water looming above her. As she took another step, she waited to see if the walls would stay up, wondering if she was about to be drowned.
When it was clear that nothing was going to happen, she turned around again and started walking forward. After more than an hour she came to a blood-red door at the end. Reaching out a hand, she twisted the doorknob and pushed into the room.
It was completely dark—not even a pinprick of light was able to get inside—but Taer tamped down her fear and stepped forward. All she could hear was the sound of her breathing—and how it changed when she was suddenly thrust up against a wall with something sharp pressed into her throat.
Warm breath feathered across her cheek. She swallowed, feeling her throat work past the sharpness of the knife.
There was a growl, then she heard Korvain curse.
Taer gasped and her eyes flew open as he shoved her forcefully from his mind. She sat up, hearing the sound of angry footsteps coming down the hallway. A second later, Korvain was there in the doorway, staring menacingly down at her. He gripped Taer by the upper arm, yanking her out of bed, out of the bedroom, and dragging her into the living room, where he pushed her roughly onto the couch.
Korvain’s shadow tracked across the carpet as he stalked in front of her. Taer watched him cautiously, seeing how tightly wound he was.
Eventually he stopped, spinning around to face her.
“How did you do it?” he roared. From the corner of her eye, Taer could see the shadows from around the room gravitating toward him.
“How!”
Taer jumped, peering behind him to see if they’d woken Eir or Bryn. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t think it would really work.”
“You got past my shields. How did you do it?”
Taer blurted out the answer without thinking. “I projected what I thought was your greatest fear onto you.” The words tumbled from her mouth almost too quickly for her to understand.
Korvain cursed. “Why?” he demanded, spittle flying from his lips. “How did you know how to do that?”
Taer shrugged. “I was just trying some different things out to see what would get past your shields.”
He rounded on her again. “Why didn’t you warn me you were going to do that?”
Taer shrugged again.
“Fuck!” Korvain dropped on to the couch beside her, his head in his hands. After a few minutes, he lifted his head, his dark gaze meeting her green eyes. “I need to tell you something.”
Taer blinked at him. At least he sounded more reasonable now. She stared at his face, noting the dark circles under his eyes. “Okay.” She sank back into the cushions, drawing her knees up and wrapping her arms around them.
His chest rose and fell with a deep breath, and the gravity of what he was about to say settled between them with an almost physical weight. “I’ve been watching over you in your sleep.”
That wasn’t news. He’d told her that before … except …
“What does that mean, exactly?” she asked.
“I’ve been inside your head while you’ve been sleeping.”
“But how? Since our shielding lesson, I thought I’d been protecting my mind.”
“You have been, but your mental shields are still weak. For someone like me or Darrion—”
“Darrion?” she interrupted, surprised. “What does that bastard have to do with anything?”
“Your nightmares? Darrion’s behind them.”
What. The. Fuck?
But then she thought about it. Darrion was part of her dream. She’d assumed she had just imagined him, conjured him up … but this made more sense.
Darrion was tormenting her.
“These last few nights, I’ve been keeping him out, but last night we had a confrontation.”
“Why wasn’t I aware of this?” she snapped, standing up and starting to pace, needing to physically burn off her agitation and to give herself some time to come to grips with what she was being told. “Why couldn’t I feel you inside my head? Why couldn’t I feel Darrion in there?”
“We can both shield ourselves to avoid detection.”
Taer shot him a glare, but kept moving. “You need to explain this to me, Korvain. I need to understand what’s going on.”
The Mare sighed. “Darrion has been causing your nightmares for the last month. He told me he’s been trying to break you.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “Who really knows why? Darrion is a sadistic bastard. He was probably just doing it because he could … or he might be punishing me through you for taking you away before he could finish the job.”
Hearing that made her hate him just that little bit more. She hadn’t even known she was capable of that much hate. But with Darrion, her loathing seemed to know no bounds.
“All right, so he’s fucking with me. How can I stop him?”
“I can keep watching over you—”
“No. I won’t let you run yourself into the ground for me.”
“Or you can kill him.”
“But how? We have no idea where he is.”
“We don’t know where he is physically, but we don’t need to know that. You got past my shields, and they’re on par with Darrion’s. So all you need to do is break Darrion’s shields like you did mine and kill him within the dream.”
Chapter 38
Galen stared down at the phone in his hand. It had been ringing every five minutes, and would continue to ring every five minutes until he picked it up.
His last meeting with Bryn hadn’t gone as he’d planned. He had thought he’d be able to at least get a job at the club for his efforts. Instead, he was told in no uncertain terms that if he set foot there one more time, it would be his last day on Earth.
The phone was finally silent in his palm, the screen showing he had ninety-seven missed calls from Craine and ninety-seven voice messages Galen had no desire to listen to.
Four minutes and fifty-five seconds later, the screen lit up once more. With a sigh, Galen bit the bullet and pressed the accept button, putting the call onto speaker so he could have the ass-chewing in stereo.
“Galen.” Craine barked his name, making Galen grind his teeth. Craine had turned into a goddamn guild master with his demands, and there was a reason Galen hadn’t wanted to belong to one in the first place.
“Craine—”
“I want you back here.”
Galen sank further back into the pillows propped up on the headboard. That was the last thing he’d expected to hear. “When?”
“Now.” Craine hung up, and the screen went dark. Galen wondered why Craine wanted him back so soon, and the lie he told Bryn suddenly felt as if it might be true. What if he’d had enough of Galen’s fuck-ups? What if it had been a test and he’d failed miserably?
Galen stood up from the bed, pocketing his phone and snatching up the handles of his small duffel bag. Closing his eyes, he faded back to Craine’s office in Chicago. He stepped through the lobby doors and came face to face with Craine’s two henchmen.
“Gentlemen,” he drawled.
“Come with us,” Goon Two said, his tone business-like, his face completely blank.
Galen’s eyes darted to the face of the other guy. His expression was just as serious.
Fuck.
Instead of replying, Galen waited for them to turn around and lead the way over to the bank of elevators. Goon One’s chubby finger jabbed at the button impatiently. Craine must have been riding their asses while he’d been gone.
The doors opened, revealing the elevator’s mirrored walls and white marble floor, and all three of them stepped inside. While he waited for the doors to close, Galen made a decision that would no doubt raise a lot of questions.
He turned around to face the goons and waved at them before fading from sight. Rematerializing straight into Craine’s office, Galen found the man leaning back in his chair, his fingers steepled under his chin, his expression almost expectant.
Craine pressed a button on a small metal box set on his desk, and there was a crackle of static before he said, “Send Rhys in.”
Galen studied Craine as they waited for his best friend. The sleeves of his crisp, white shirt were rolled up to his elbows, the top two buttons undone. Galen had never seen the mob boss without a tie before, and it looked … strange.