But Tess couldn’t move.
Unseen hands held her still. Unseen hands of ice that clawed at her breasts and curled over her mons. Terror sliced through her, cold and absolute. God help me. She stared at the writhing smudge of color that was the librarian’s body. Help us.
“Get out NOW.”
Robyn’s cry filled the room, just as the room began to change.
The library office warped. Pulsed. The temperature plummeted, crystallizing the sheen of perspiration on Tess’s body into tiny beads of ice. Freezing.
She sucked in an icy hiss…
… and stood terrified in a dim, candle-lit shack, surrounded by rusted corrugated steel walls that shrank toward her.
“Mine.”
Gone was the immaculate mahogany desk. In its stead stood a wide, metal frame bed, resplendent in blood-red silk sheets, copious pillows, and four shiny metal shackles attached to a short length of heavy chain at each bedpost.
Tess shrank away, petrified. “Jesus Christ…”
And all the while the cold hands on her body continued to maul her flesh.
* * * *
Jared’s cock grew harder.
“This should be for me, slave.” Long nails sank into his bulging balls, and Mistress K gave them a sharp tug. “This hunger that boils your blood and fills your sac.” She pushed on the teardrop ring’s point, pressing it harder into Jared’s perineum. He clenched his jaw, choking back a groan. “It should be my face in your head,” she continued. “My musk in your nose… Yet it isn’t.” She pressed the cock ring again. Harder. “So whose is it?”
Sweat beaded on his flesh, ran down his torso and spine in chilly streams. The leather straps on his wrists and ankles creaked as his muscles tensed. He hadn’t expected this—this interrogation. He needed to feel pain right now, pain that sliced through his borrowed flesh to destroy the source of his desire. Yet, Mistress K knew more than she should. Knew how to punish him in ways he hadn’t planned. Tess Darcy grew more and more absolute in his being with each exquisite bite of leather on his flesh, and the Domme seemed to know.
He lifted his head and stared hard at the far wall, sweat stinging his eyes as he willed the image of Tess from his mind.
The hand on his balls moved, dragging five burning lines across his hipbone before leaving his flesh completely. A ragged gasp burst from Jared and his cock throbbed with aching need. His debasement might not be destroying his desire for Tess, but it sure as shit was making his body thrum with sexual power.
Channel that power, Jared. The upcoming battle will soon begin. You need every weapon you can—
Mistress K suddenly stepped in front of him, eyes locked on his. Long, slender fingers danced a wicked path up the line of his abs until they found his left nipple. She tugged on the tiny metal bar pierced there. “Who is in your head, slave?”
Hot pain flared across his pec, down into his gut and his cock twitched. He gritted his teeth, nostrils flaring. “You, my Mistress.”
A slow smile pulled at Mistress K’s almost black lips. “Liar.”
Before Jared could react, she tugged on the nipple-bar again and white pain consumed him. His cock grew harder, longer—a pulsing shaft of angry, defiant hunger.
Fingers wrapped around it and gave a brutal tug. “Tell me.”
Wet heat licked through his veins as he stared into her face. “You, my Mistress.”
His cock was pulled again, fingers strong and punishing. “Who?”
“You, my Mistress.”
His body thrummed with need, every sinew and muscle burning with rapturous pain, his balls rising higher, swollen and aching for release. All it would take was one more wave of pain and he would erupt.
With Tess Darcy still in his head and soul.
Gold-chipped eyes bored into his as Mistress K ground her thumb against the sensitive glands below his swollen cockhead, sending a ripple of scorching pleasure through him. Smearing the beads of pre-cum leaking from his cock on his fevered flesh, Mistress K pressed her lips to his ear. “You will tell me, slave,” she stated, husky voice smug and confident. “You will tell me who makes you crave so much.” She dragged her thumbnail down the underside of his distended organ. “You will scream her name so loud Hill Street will shake,” she commanded as exquisite, painful rapture consumed him.
“The Almighty have mercy.” Jared cried out, bucking against his restraints and Mistress K’s punishing fist as cum gushed from his cock in arcing spurts.
“Who?” Mistress K demanded, pumping his organ, milking his desire with brutal strokes. “Her name, Watcher. Scream her name.”
“Tess Darcy,” Jared screamed, slamming his head back against the St. Andrew’s Cross. “Tess Darcy. For fuck’s sake, Tess Darcy.”
The Domme’s fist squeezed tighter around his pulsing, spurting cock and she chuckled lowly. “Yes, Jared. I know.”
* * * *
Savage fingers mauled Tess’s breasts, unseen fingers that made the icy air feel like a furnace blast from Hell. A hollow laugh bounced around the engulfing shack, maniacal and triumphant. Something cold, wet, and hard plunged between the lips of her sex, seeking the center of her being. “Mine.” Her clit was pinched—hard—and Tess yelped in terrified pain.
Seconds before red, red rage consumed her. “No.”
“There is no ‘no’, Tessa,” an empty voice snarled, vibrating all the way into her churning stomach. “There is only ‘always’.”
Fury erupted in Tess’s chest. Blood roaring in her ears, she glared at the writhing blur once Robyn Jones. “Fuck you, Chad Fisher. You don’t own me.”
The hollow laugh started again. Louder. New hands joined those assaulting her, grabbing at her wrists and ankles, forcing her legs apart. “Don’t I?” The force in her cunt drove deeper, as if to prove her wrong.
Venom scorched Tess’s veins. Contemptuous venom. “No, Chad,” she growled. “You don’t.”
Pincers of steel pinched her clit. Fangs of ice punctured her nipples. A tongue colder than death slid up the side of her face, from jaw to temple. “Who does then, blossom?”
Like a sledgehammer of blinding color, an image smashed into Tess’s head—a man with stormy eyes and a crooked grin, and with it came a sense of safety and protection so powerful her heart seemed to burn in her chest. Say his name, Tess Darcy, a husky female voice seemed to whisper in Tess’s ear. Say it.
“Who owns you, Tessa?” The fingers on her breasts curled into digging claws as Chad’s voice panted in her ear, the stench of rotten flesh invading her body with each word. “If not me?”
“No one,” she snarled back. “No one.”
Say it, Tess. Say his name now. It’s the only way to stop this insanity. It’s the only—
“Jared Pierce.” Tess roared the stranger’s name, jerking against the cruel vaporous hands to lunge forward. “Jared Pierce, you fucking bastard, now go and burn in fucking hell.”
The air squealed. The shack shrieked.
Then, before Tess could blink, she was in the library’s office—fully dressed—staring at a gasping Robyn standing opposite her.
Horrified green eyes stared back, their once sharp depths clouded with haunted pain and sickened clarity. “Oh, God help you, child,” the librarian whispered, shaking her head. “I’m sorry.” Tears streamed down her cheeks, cheeks once flushed with color now whiter than white. “If I’d known I never would have let him in.” Her voice cracked and she staggered backward, crashing into the photocopier behind her, head shaking more violently with each second.
Tess leaned forward and grabbed the edge of the desk, dragging in ragged breath after ragged breath. “What do you mean, let him in? What have you done?”
Robyn Jones wiped her mouth with a trembling hand, skin white. “I’m sorry, Tess. I didn’t know. He said he loved you. I wanted to…he said he loved you. That you were meant to be together. I should never—” A shudder wracked her frame and her eyes grew wider. “Oh, God, I felt his obsession. It’s a sick fo
rce. It’s inexorable. He’s too strong. I can’t…I should never have let him…oh, God, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. You’ll never escape him. Never.”
Tess stared at her, a terrible chill seeping into her bones. “What do you mean, he’s too strong? Who is too strong? What have you done? What have you done to me?”
But Robyn cowered away, eyes terrorized, voice rising to a screech. “You’ll never escape him. Not even when you die! You belong to him. Always and always! You belong to him and he will never let you go. You’re his. His. Always and always and always.”
A sharp sob burst from Tess’s throat. Heart pounding, she shot past the screeching librarian, out of the office, out of the library, into the baking heat of Hill Street.
And still she heard those hideous words: Always and always and always…
* * * *
Spent and drained, Jared collapsed against his restraints.
Christ. What had he done?
Mistress K leaned forward, her grip on his cock firm as she rolled her thumb over the creamy dribble of cum still leaking from its tip. “You are not solely responsible for your wife’s death, Watcher.”
Jared’s eyes flung wide open and his spine snapped straight. “What did you call me? How do…”
“You are not the only condemned soul seeking redemption among the living, Jared Pierce,” Mistress K said, gold-flecked eyes glowing with an enigmatic light. “But you are one of the few to break His rules.”
An image of Tess turned to face him in his head. Smiled at him. Held out her hands to him…
“Punishment will not purge her from your being, Watcher.” The Domme’s fingers slid from his cock, taking the teardrop ring with them. It clattered to the floor at their feet as she smoothed her palm up his torso, resting it over the heart in his chest that shouldn’t be beating. “Only death once more will do that. To maintain the Order of Creation.”
Jared stared into her face, imprisoned more by her words than the leather straps still holding his arms above his head, attached to the hook hanging from the ceiling. “Death once more?” He swallowed at the tight lump suddenly in his throat. “Order of Creation? What does that mean? Who the fuck sent you? I’m already dead. How can I die twice?”
Mistress K’s eyelids closed and she pulled in a deep, slow breath. “No more.” Shaking her head, she stepped backward, fingers slipping from his flesh. “I’ve already said too much.”
Fury, like molten lava, surged through Jared. He glared at the retreating dominatrix, fists curled into rock-hard balls. “Too much?”
Mistress K’s eyebrows dipped into a slight frown and she shook her head again. “Check your anger, Watcher. It’s already condemned you to Hell. Don’t let it destroy you now. When the battle begins, anger will be your enemy as much as the Depraved One you fight.” With one long, last look, she turned on her spiked heel and walked toward the dungeon stairs, scooping up her cat-o-nine-tails as she did so.
“Wait.” Jared roared, jerking against his restraints. “I want you to tell me—”
“Go, Watcher.” Her husky voice floated back to him as she stepped through a hidden stone door at the foot of the stairs. “I can do no more to help you.”
“Help me?” Jared charged across the room, rage pounding in his ears. “How the fuck have you helped me?”
It was only when his fist smashed against the closed stone door, seconds after it slammed shut behind Mistress K, that he realised where he was, twenty feet away from the chain and hook, free of the binding leather straps.
Straps the dominatrix had not removed before leaving him.
Nostrils flaring, Jared snatched up his clothes. He’d never liked being played, even when he was alive. He liked it less now he was dead.
Shoving his legs into his jeans, he snarled silently at the concealed door. If he concentrated, he could “move” to Mistress K’s exact location. Demand answers from her. But if she too was a Watcher, she’d feel him coming. The last thing he needed was a spiritual pursuit through the dimensions. Christ. What would the Almighty do to him if that happened?
You’re missing an important part here, Jared. If she is in fact a Watcher, just whom exactly is she watching? You?
A dark scowl on his face, he jerked his T-shirt over his head. Before he faced eternal damnation, someone was giving him some answers.
Boots back on, he stomped up the stairs and through the door, bursting into the bookshop at the top. “You’re wrong,” he said, not looking at Kirralee as he stormed past her. “This is the right town.”
Without slowing down, he walked through the glass entry door out into the street, a black grin curling his lips as Kirralee’s shocked squeal shattered the hot air behind him.
Divine Intervention’s door had been closed when he passed through, and he hadn’t stopped to open it.
Mine.
The snarled taunt shot through Jared’s head, so loud he almost collapsed to his knees.
Who owns you, Tessa, a dead voice growled in his head, resonating with triumphant malice, if not me?
Jared froze. The Depraved One. Speaking to Tess. “Fuck.”
A tsunami of terror smashed into him, cold and powerful. Tess’s terror. “Fuck.”
Ice ripping through his veins, he closed his eyes, concentrating on Tess Darcy’s life force. He had to get to her, fast, but he had no idea where—
Always and always and always…
Robyn Jones’s voice this time. Screeching and maniacal.
Jared’s eyes snapped open. “Bingo.”
Narrowing his focus down, he took a step…
…and appeared smack-damn directly in the path of Tess Darcy, sprinting away from the library.
The concrete sidewalk bit into his ass as he landed on it, Tess’s elbows grinding into his ribs as she tumbled onto him.
But neither pain mattered.
He was touching her. Again.
Chapter 5
Tess scrambled to her feet, staring at the man getting to his before her. Her heart felt like someone had pumped it full of liquid adrenaline, pounding so hard in her chest her breastbone ached. “Jared?”
Those grey-blue eyes she kept seeing in her head widened as his name slipped from her lips and an expression close to irritation flashed across his face. But he covered it quickly, giving her a lopsided grin. “See. Told you there’d be a ‘in case’.”
Robyn’s voice still screeched in her head, Chad’s voice in her soul. Icy fear still gripped her like a vise, but at the sight of that grin on Jared’s face, her pussy squirmed and her breath caught in her throat. Christ, Darcy. Just get the fuck away. Now.
Ignoring the maddening urge to throw herself against Jared’s hard, lean body, to capture his mouth with hers and taste his heat on her tongue, Tess turned and took off across the empty Hill Street. Where are the cars? a distant part of her traumatized mind wondered. The pedestrians?
It didn’t matter. She was getting away from the library, Robyn and Jared Pierce.
Except Jared didn’t stay still. “Hey.” A warm hand wrapped around her biceps, bringing her to a jerking halt. “Tess? Tell me what’s happened.”
Spinning around, she yanked her arm free, glaring at him. “I don’t know what game you and the librarian are playing, but it’s not funny. Now leave me the fuck alone.”
Jared’s straight eyebrows pulled into a deep frown. “I’m not playing any game, Tess. I just want to—”
“How do you know my name, then?” Tess rammed her fists on her hips, fear rapidly being burnt away by anger. “Hmmm? Until today, I’ve never met you before, but now I can’t get you out of my goddamn—” She stopped. Christ. What are you doing?
Dragging in a deep breath, she shook her head, holding up a dismissive hand as she turned around again.
“I can help you get rid of Chad.”
The words stabbed straight into her heart and a ball of numb grief welled up in her throat, choking her. Squeezing her eyes shut against the sudden sting of tears, Tess presse
d a cold, trembling hand to her mouth. “I don’t need help,” she ground into her palm, shaking her head again. “Just leave me alone.” She began walking across the empty Hill Street again.
“I can’t do that, Tess,” Jared called after her. “And neither will Chad.”
Before Tess even spun around, she knew Jared was standing directly behind her. His heat seeped into her body, her pussy. Their eyes met, he reached for her…
…and then his lips captured hers.
Strong hands cupped the cheeks of her ass, squeezing them with a passion that bordered on worship as his tongue traced the edge of her bottom teeth. Seeking permission to go further.
Stop him. Stop him.
But she didn’t. How could she when waves of rolling heat that felt like golden light streamed through her veins? She opened her mouth to him and their tongues met, each fierce and demanding. The flutter in her pussy intensified, turning into a full-blown tremble of squirming need. Her knickers grew damp with her own juices as Jared sucked her tongue deeper into the hot, wet cavity of his mouth, rapacious and unapologetic. It should have frightened her—the force of his desire. But it didn’t. Instead, it fed her longing. The center of her being—the very essence of her sex—cried out in ravenous thirst. She’d denied it for too long. A dream lover might placate it, but only true physical contact could nourish it.
She ground her hips against his, head spinning with licentious delight when her mons pressed against a solid cock that felt like a long, thick rod of hot metal.
Holy fuck, was this true physical contact?
The hands on her ass yanked her harder into him, and he tore his mouth from hers, staring down into her face with grey eyes that almost glowed with thunderous desire. “Almighty, forgive me,” he growled, nostrils flaring as he pushed his cock against her soft mound.
A small smile pulled at Tess’s passion-bruised lips. “For this?”
“No,” Jared answered, smoothing his hands up her back to bring their heartbeats in alignment. He dropped his forehead to hers. “This.”
Their lips touched. Light blurred. For a split second the air turned icy, and then Tess felt the ground beneath her feet change.
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