The Entity Within

by Cat Devon

  “Obviously not.” Bruce pointed to Zoe. “The poor girl is still in her nightgown.”

  “I need a shower,” Zoe said.

  “I brought a box of a dozen cupcakes.” Daniella waited for Pat to remove the illuminated manuscript and set it inside the Victorian armoire for temporary safekeeping before setting the goodies on the coffee table. “I brought a lemon ginger and a salted caramel as well as your fave red velvet. Oh, and a couple of maple bacon ones, too.”

  “Bacon?” Bella’s ears perked up. “I love bacon almost as much as caviar!”

  Daniella handed Bella a piece of bacon from the top of the cupcake and gave one to Morticia as well.

  “Thank you,” Morticia said politely.

  Daniella’s eyes widened in surprise. “Both your cats talk now?”

  “And we’re immortal,” Bella added.

  “I’m taking that shower now,” Zoe said and headed upstairs. She did not want to try to explain anything. It was beyond her. Gram and Pat would have to do that, accompanied by Bella no doubt. Too bad. Zoe was done for the moment.

  Once locked in her bathroom, she tore off the nightgown and cursed it so it dissolved. She never wanted to see it again as long as she lived. But wait, that would be … forever.

  She turned the water on full tilt and stepped in for her shower. She used the strongest soap she had but still kept washing, trying to scrape the memory of Silas touching her from her skin, not to mention those damn spiders. It was a very, very long shower. She only stepped out when the hot water ran out.

  She’d washed her hair as well. Reaching out, she wiped the steam from the old-fashioned mirror above the sink. She didn’t look any different. One eye was still green, one still blue. But everything had changed. She’d had sex with a vampire and, well … that part had been awesome. The trauma came after that. She’d gone from having no magic to being immortal. Talk about a change in circumstances.

  Zoe wrapped a big bath towel around herself and stepped from the bathroom into her bedroom.

  Damon was sitting on her bed, waiting for her.

  She hadn’t expected that.

  “What are you doing here?” she said.

  “Waiting for you. We need to talk.”

  “Right.” She tightened the towel around her body. “I have questions.”

  A smile lifted the edges of his lips. “You always do.”

  “How did you know to add those last two words in Latin to get rid of Silas?”

  “Ad finum. To the end. They were on that weird chair with the words on it you have downstairs. They were on the seat where the cats usually sit, and the words were glowing.”

  “What about the images on the tunnel wall of you being tortured? Were you really in hell?”

  “Only the first level.”

  “What happened?”

  “You remember I told you about Eve?”

  Zoe nodded. “The witch you killed because she betrayed you.”

  “Her betrayal resulted in my being ambushed. I ended up in hell. Silas hated that I was the one who got away. No one gets away from hell.”

  “He did.”

  “And the two goons that were his Guys. But only because of the book.”

  “He did that deliberately. They weren’t two Guys, they were really just a part of him. He just did that so that I might take pity on them. Their story about my mother sending them to hell was a lie.” She took a deep breath. “That dark magic my mother was working on when she died? She was directing it at Silas. Somehow she knew and was afraid of what would happen. So did our coven. They cast the spell that was the reason all those books in the library talked to me. They were trying to keep me away from books although they never told me that. I’m not sure why. Perhaps they were forbidden by the rules of magic. They didn’t tell me. They didn’t give me a choice. Just like you didn’t give me a choice. Didn’t the vampire Demon Hunter who turned you give you a choice? Weren’t you asked if you wanted to be turned?”

  “You weren’t turned. You’re not a vampire. You’re still a witch.”

  “Forever.”

  “What, you were hoping to come back in your next life as a cat?”

  “No. But I was hoping I’d be reunited with my mother on the other side someday,” Zoe admitted quietly. “She’s the one who charmed my bangle so we’d find the Latin chant to destroy Silas. I know she was.”

  “You could be right. At least you’ve got your grandmother forever. I didn’t have any of my family. In fact, my brother died on the same battlefield I did.”

  “You never told me that before.”

  “I know, and I realize we’ve only known each other a few days.” He stood and came close to brush her damp bangs away from her eyes. “But we’ve got forever now.”

  “Did you really kiss me and say you love me?” she whispered.

  “I did.”

  “Were you telling the truth?”

  “I was.”

  “Do you still love me now that I may be immortal?”

  “I’ll have forever to prove it to you.”

  “Or you could do a vampire pinkie swear,” Zoe said.

  “How about an immortal pinkie swear?” Damon murmured against her mouth.

  He linked his pinkie with hers.

  “Are you swearing to be mine?” she asked.

  “Are you swearing to be mine?” he asked in return.

  “Yes.”

  “Then there’s only one more thing left to be done.” He whipped the towel from her body.

  Grinning, Zoe shoved Damon back so he landed on her bed. She lowered herself onto him. He’d removed his clothes in that millisecond.

  “I showered. Downstairs,” he said.

  She straddled his thighs and propped her hands on his chest before leaning in to lick droplets of water from his collarbone. “I’ve got you now, vampire.”

  “Yes, you do.” He lifted her hips and brought her down on his erection. “And I’ve got you.”

  His tumescence filled her. She rocked forward and then back before pausing. “Is this going to rob me of my magic again?”

  “No, that was a onetime thing. This…” He reached down to thumb her clitoris. “This is not a onetime thing.”

  His caress was direct and forceful yet tender and tantalizing as well. He was so erotically skillful, introducing her to new avenues of bliss.

  Her earlier fears and misgivings scattered, blown away by the intensity of her increasing pleasure. She rode him and he guided her so that his long steady strokes created maximum ecstasy.

  Her vagina clenched around him as she climaxed. He made her come again as his hips surged up, driving ever deeper into her welcoming depths.

  This wasn’t just awesome hot sex. Damon loved her. He didn’t just drive her mad with his stubbornness, he drove her mad with his lovemaking. He’d saved her. They’d saved each other.

  There was no holding back. She shattered in his arms, wild pulses of bliss oscillating through her.

  She collapsed, unable to speak for a long time. “I love you, Damon,” she whispered against his throat.

  “It sure took you long enough to say the words.”

  “There’s no rush.” She ran her fingers down his chest past his navel to his vampire privates. “We’ve got forever.”

  He grinned. “True enough, little witch.”

  “Admit it.” She held him in her hand, her fingers gently caressing him. “You’re glad I came to Vamptown, aren’t you?”

  “Damn right!” He flipped her onto her back and slid his fingers into her moistness. “And you’re glad you’re here, aren’t you?”

  “I’m more than glad. I’m over the moon.” She ran her fingers over his tattoo so close to her own talisman. “A shooting star is only in the sky for a brief period of time.” She touched the talisman around her neck. “A star is there until the end of time. Just like us.”

  Her eyes flickered from the fiery joy he was creating with his caresses—but before they closed, she saw his t
attoo shift so that the shooting star became a star. Magic. Pure magic.

  “Just like us,” Damon murmured. “Just like us.”

  Read on for an excerpt from Cat Devon’s next book

  LOVE YOUR ENTITY

  Coming soon from St. Martin’s Paperbacks

  When Sierra Brennan opened the door to her new house in Chicago, she didn’t expect to find a naked man standing there. A very hot, sexy, well-built, and well-hung man, looking like he was hung-over. He made no attempt to cover up while she made every effort to keep her eyes on his face and not his privates.

  “Thank God you’re here,” a woman wearing a corset and little else said from right beside Sexy Naked Guy. Sexy Naked Trespassing Guy. “What took you so long?”

  “What do you mean what took me so long?”

  “Who are you talking to?” Sexy Naked Guy asked. His voice was low and rough.

  “Your girlfriend,” Sierra said.

  “I don’t have a girlfriend,” he said.

  “Look, I don’t care what your relationship is with her, but you are both trespassing so you need to leave right now. As soon as you get dressed, I mean.”

  “I’m the only one here,” he said.

  “Clearly that’s not true as I am here as well.” She punched 911 into her smartphone.

  He moved closer and looked deep into her eyes. He had chocolate-brown eyes and thick lashes. His chiseled cheekbones made his face as sexy as the rest of his chiseled body. “You don’t want to do that.”

  “You really don’t want to do that,” the corseted woman said.

  Sierra already knew what she didn’t want. She didn’t want to screw up her chance to inherit this house. Several others had tried and failed to fulfill the thirty-consecutive-days residency requirement. She’d only met her great-uncle Saul Brennan once yet he’d listed her in his will. Yeah, he’d listed two older cousins of hers before her, but here she was anyway. They hadn’t stayed in the house. She would. Because she had a huge advantage.

  Sierra was not afraid of snakes or spiders or things that went bump in the night. Especially things that went bump in the night. That was her specialty.

  Sierra saw things most people didn’t. Yes, maybe it was a cliché, but she saw dead people. Ghosts. Spirits who for one reason or another didn’t or couldn’t move on to the other side.

  Which was why she was able to write such good paranormal novels. Write what you know. That’s what all the pros said, and it was what Sierra did. Her S.J. Brennan books featured a vigilante ghost hunter and the challenges she faced in finding justice and punishment where needed.

  Yep, she saw ghosts, and she was seeing them now as the corseted woman moved closer and shimmered with translucency. Which meant Sexy Naked Guy was a ghost too, right? She put out her hand to check. Her fingertips rested on his bare chest. His solid bare muscular chest.

  “Why aren’t you leaving?” he growled.

  She yanked her hand away as if burned. “Because this is my house and you are the squatter.”

  “The house is mine,” he said.

  “In your dreams,” she said. “Who do you think you are?”

  “I know who I am,” he said. “I’m Ronan McCoy. Who are you?”

  “Sierra Brennan, the owner of this property.”

  “Since when?” he said.

  “Since yesterday.”

  “Forget him. I need your help,” the ghost said. “My name is Ruby, in case you were wondering.”

  “One thing at a time,” Sierra told Ruby. “Get dressed,” she told Sexy Naked Guy. Wait, his name was Ronan.

  He looked deep into her eyes once more. “Get out.”

  Sierra shook her head. “No way.”

  She saw the confusion there before irritation took over. “Leave!” he bellowed.

  “You leave,” she bellowed back at him. She’d driven her U-Haul truck nine hours across three states and she was beyond exhausted. She had PMS and she was not a happy camper.

  “How long has he been here?” Sierra asked Ruby.

  “Who are you talking to?” he demanded.

  “He’s been here a few days,” Ruby said. “I’ve been here for decades and decades.”

  Sierra frowned. If Ronan was a recent arrival, then he couldn’t be the reason Ruby hadn’t crossed over. He obviously couldn’t see Ruby. She should have realized that Ruby was a ghost faster than she had, but Sierra chalked that up to the fact that she was so tired. Usually she could tell a ghost from a human but nothing about this Saturday had been usual.

  She’d done a book signing at nine this morning in Ohio. There had been a good turnout, but a majority of the audience had wanted her to pass on messages to their departed loved ones. Sierra had had to tell them that she wasn’t a clairvoyant, she was a writer.

  Yes, her books revolved around ghosts but that didn’t mean they were real. That was her story, and she always stuck to it. The rest was between her and the ghosts she helped to the other side. She wasn’t about to reveal her ghost whisperer side to the general public. She knew all too well the stigma that carried, the mocking laughter when as a child she’d told friends that she saw ghosts. She’d been labeled weird and ostracized. Ever since then, she’d been careful not to reveal her hidden talent.

  Sierra would deal with Ruby the Ghost later. First she needed to get rid of Naked Ronan. “Look, I don’t know why you think you have a right to be here,” Sierra told him, “but I’m telling you that the previous occupants did not fulfill the requirements of the will.”

  Ruby raised her hand and had a sheepish look on her translucent face. “That may have been my fault.”

  “I had a feeling,” Sierra muttered.

  Ronan frowned. “You had a feeling about what? No, don’t answer because I don’t care.”

  What kind of man stood there so arrogantly while so naked? An extremely ripped one. Not in a bodybuilder-weird kind of way but in a six-pack, shoulda-been-in-the-movie-Magic-Mike kinda way.

  Sierra was finding it increasingly difficult to keep her gaze above his neck. Okay, she’d sneaked a peek down to his navel once or twice. And maybe she’d mistakenly looked even lower.

  Right, who was she kidding? She’d seen him in all his glory. His nudity rattled her.

  Keeping her own self-preservation in mind, she had her phone in one hand while her other hand was in her purse, her fingers curled around a can of Mace. Because the bottom line here was that she was facing an angry naked guy and that was not a positive in the security department.

  A knock at the door at her back startled her. She yanked it open to find a man standing there, flashing a badge of some kind at her.

  “That was fast,” she said. She must have pushed the 911 button without realizing it and they’d used the GPS on her phone to locate her. “Come in.”

  “I’m Damon Thornheart. Is there a problem?” he said.

  “He’s the problem.” She turned back to Ronan to find that he’d donned a pair of jeans. That was also fast, but it didn’t change the fact that he didn’t belong in her house. “Get rid of him, please.”

  * * *

  Ronan McCoy couldn’t believe this was happening to him. He’d spent the past century waiting to come home and now that he had, this woman with the bad attitude and great breasts was getting in his way.

  Which was why Ronan welcomed the arrival of fellow vampire Damon Thornheart. Ronan wasn’t sure why he hadn’t been able to compel the woman to leave. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that he’d been an indentured vampire for the past one hundred years.

  Ronan had been turned on the battlefield in World War I in 1914. The trench warfare had been brutally bloody. Hundreds of thousands had been injured, Ronan among them. But his torture hadn’t ended with his death. It had only begun.

  He ruthlessly shut those thoughts down. He refused to let his past dictate his future. His immortal future.

  Yes, Baron Voz had sired him but unlike most vampires, Voz had kept Ronan indentured to him for a ce
ntury, forcing Ronan to do his bidding and his killing.

  But Ronan was done with that now. When he’d left Chicago to head off to war in Europe, he’d promised his sister Adele that he’d come back. He was keeping that promise. Her letters had kept him going for the months before his death.

  So here he was, home again. The returning warrior. Yeah, right.

  “She won’t leave,” Ronan told Damon.

  “Damn right, I won’t,” she said. “The house is mine. I have the paperwork to prove it.” She dug in her purse. “No, wait, it’s here. I could have sworn … Yes, here it is.” She handed over the forms. “These prove I am the owner of this property.”

  “Of the house, yes, but not the property,” Damon said after looking over the paperwork.

  “What do you mean?” she said.

  “That you have apparent ownership of the house, but not the land it sits on or is surrounded by.”

  “You mean the small front yard and back yard?” she said.

  Damon nodded. “That’s right.”

  “How is that possible?” she demanded.

  Damon shrugged. “You’ll have to take it up with your attorney.”

  “He’s just left on a two-week cruise to Antarctica. I can’t contact him while he’s away.”

  “Then you’ll have to wait until he comes back.”

  “No way,” she said.

  “Why not?” Damon said.

  “Because the clock starts ticking today.”

  “What clock?” Ronan demanded.

  “Never mind. You still haven’t said why you’re here. Where is your proof that you have any right to be here?” she asked Ronan.

  Her glare at his still-bare chest let him know that she wanted to add, Where is your shirt? Hmm, maybe he could read her mind and could get rid of her that way.

  Ronan concentrated on Sierra, taking in everything about her from her shoulder-length auburn hair to her green eyes to her great breasts. She had a cute nose and a stubborn chin. She grabbed her documents from Damon’s hands with slim fingers.

  Ronan wondered if she’d be so confrontational if she knew she was facing a pair of vampires.