by Jessica Lee
“I’ve handled this wrong.” Markus sighed. “I should have never allowed things to get this out of hand.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s just…” He raked her with his gaze. “Not touching you when…” Fuck. He couldn’t get the words out right. Communication had never been his strong suit. For the majority of his life he’d been more of a man of action. Kill first. Ask questions later.
“A lot of words, Markus.” Alexandria strode closer, putting them face-to-face. “But as usual, you haven’t given me the real explanation. Why, when it comes down to you actually making love to me, do you try to escape my presence?”
Markus cupped her face, and his eyelids shuttered. “Don’t you want to return to your beloved Enclave family?”
“What kind of question is that? Of course I do.”
“Then I have to keep my hands off you, or more specifically, it’s my other body part that has to keep its distance.”
She frowned. “Are you saying that if you make love to me, you don’t think…?”
“If I ever got inside you, Vixen,” he gritted out with a shake of his head, “once would never be enough. And do you think your sister, or anyone else back at that mansion, would ever approve of you being in my bed?” He scoffed and turned away to drop his ass on the edge of the bed. “Once I’ve taken care of things, I have to let you go.” His fingers curled into the denim encasing his thighs. “We have to stop before there’s no going back.”
Alexandria eased down onto the mattress beside him. Close, but far enough away there was no way they’d touch.
“What can I say?” he said. “I have a bit of a possessive streak. I tend to like to keep what’s mine.”
“What’s yours, huh?” A short burst of a chuckle came from her, but he could tell from the sound the laugh hadn’t originated from a place of humor. “Where have I heard those words before?”
“I’m going to fix this, Alexandria.” He nodded even though he wasn’t sure if she was watching him. “In my gut, I know Enrique was responsible for that ambush. I’m going to find him, and when I do, he’ll wish he’d never come back here.” The image of Alexandria lying on her back in a pool of blood flashed before his mind’s eye. A burst of rage lashed through his veins. Markus lunged from the bed, snatched one of the chairs into his grip, and sent it flying into the rock wall. The wood shattered into a hailstorm of splinters. He watched as the broken bits and pieces fell to the floor, his chest heaving.
“Did that help?”
“For a millisecond,” he said, panting, working on reining in his control.
He glanced over his shoulder. Alexandria sat there watching him in the long pale pink T-shirt he’d snagged for her before returning to the cabin. The sheer material did little to hide the dark nipples of her full breasts. Shit. His mouth watered. He’d never forget the way they’d tightened between his lips. The sweet and salty flavor of her soft flesh against his tongue. His cock swelled and bucked against the constraints of his zipper. Dammit. Why hadn’t he thought to grab her thicker clothing? He cleared his throat, wishing he could clear his mind so easily.
“You going to talk to me now?” Markus snatched the T-shirt he’d hung on the back of the remaining chair and pulled it over his head. “I answered your question. Now tell me what’s really going on with you, Vixen.”
Alexandria drew her legs up, resting her heels on the bed’s rail, and wrapped her arms around her knees. “You don’t own the market on having an ugly past that you’d like to keep buried,” she said, her attention falling to the dark red polish on her toenails.
He’d never asked her about the years before she’d stumbled onto his radar. Probably because he never wanted anyone picking around in his past, so he’d stayed out of hers. He liked who she was in the here and now. Liked what he’d seen in her. Why did it matter who she’d been before? Yet here they were, and whatever she’d gone through, like him, had left a scar. And the thought of it didn’t sit well in his gut.
“Who hurt you?” The question clawed its way out of his throat. The veins on his forearm swelled with his restraint not to tear out of there the moment she revealed the answer so he could relieve some prick of his head. “Why did you feel as if it had cost you something to tell me that you wanted me?”
Alexandria didn’t look up. She kept her head low, staring at the same place on her toes. Damn. He wanted to reach out, touch her, and hold her until she could tell him everything. But something told him if he did, she’d retreat even further.
“You were my first,” she muttered, the words barely audible.
“Uhm…we didn’t…” He shook his head. “The first what?”
“I didn’t mean I was a virgin,” she clarified. “I meant my first—you know…” She glanced in his direction, then back down. “Orgasm,” she whispered.
His head whirled. She was beautiful, fiery, and passionate. “How is that possible?”
“God, Markus.” She surged onto her feet, keeping her back to him. “Make me feel more like a freak, why don’t you?”
Christ. He sucked at all this emotional shit. He stood and approached her, keeping enough distance so they didn’t connect. “I’m just trying to understand. I mean, when we were together…”
“I know,” she whispered. “That’s never happened before now.” She glanced at her fingers, her attention going to a chip in her index fingernail as if concentrating on something else allowed her to bring what she needed to the surface. Something she hadn’t wanted to think about in a long time.
“Tell me what happened to you, baby,” he said, more of a command this time than a question. He slid his hands inside his pockets. It was safer that way. Because he had a feeling he wasn’t going to like what she told him.
“Since you were a part of the Enclave way back when Elle came to live there, you probably remember that she’d been on her own for a while,” she said.
“I do.”
“After she’d gotten on her feet, she helped me get out as well. But before I was old enough to leave, my mother went through some pretty bad ‘relationships.’ And I use the term loosely. The men who came through were more about keeping her in enough money to supply her drug habit than building any kind of lifelong commitment.”
The thought of her growing up watching her mother self-destruct in front of her sickened him. “That had to be a nightmare.”
“Definitely wasn’t The Andy Griffith Show. Watching the door on my mother’s bedroom revolve was nauseating.” She nodded, then resumed her position on the bed and crossed her arms. He could have sworn a small tremor rocked her as if the room had suddenly turned cold. “Yet things got even worse when one night the door to my room opened, and I found out my mother’s bed wasn’t the only place her current boyfriend wanted to get his kicks.”
Markus’s gut boiled, a cauldron of rage bubbling, spilling over, blistering hot and ready to blow. “That bastard touched you,” he bit out, fangs erupting.
She nodded, and her eyes squeezed shut. “Having him on me was vile enough, but it was the things he whispered in my ear every time he crawled on top of me that made me want to vomit.” She shook her head as if she could dislodge the memory from her brain. “No matter how many years go by, some nights I swear I still hear his disgusting voice. Smell the beer on his breath.” Her expression twisted, and she clutched her abdomen.
Keep it together, Santini. He clamped down on his molars, his jaw ticking like a damn pulse. He grabbed on to the bedpost for support, a reinforcement to stay put. She needed him present. Calm. Like she’d been there for him. But fuck, this wasn’t him. His palms itched for action.
Inhaling deeply, Markus turned back around, searching inside himself for the right words to say. Christ. Words weren’t exactly what he did best. But what he found there obliterated whatever he’d been about to say.
Tears streamed down her cheeks, the sight a blow to his heart. Had he ever witnessed her crying? She’d been a fighter from day one. Very little he’d ever said to Al
exandria had appeared to intimidate her. Others would have shaken in their boots from his growl. But not her. Not his vixen.
From that first night, he could tell Alexandria possessed a fierce and determined spirit for life. She was a fighter. An atypical female who had balls enough to go toe-to-toe with a more-than-century-old vampire. A male who had held the power in the palm of his hand to snuff her existence from the planet.
She was perfectly exceptional.
At this moment, watching as her hard shell cracked from the pain of her past, his own damn heart shattered. He wanted to kill the bastard who’d done this to her. The sick son of a bitch had left a deep and permanent scar. Until recently, with him, she’d never fully allowed herself to enjoy her sexuality.
“You trusted me enough earlier to open up, show me your desires, and I shut you down,” he said, the words almost choking him.
She looked over at him, and her throat worked up and down. “With other men, sex has been a chore. A task I felt like I had to go through to make them happy. But with you, it’s different. Maybe I’ve changed. Or you’ve changed me. All I know was at that moment, I trusted you. And I wanted you.”
I trusted you. A groan erupted inside his head, and it was all he could do not to grab her, take her in his arms, and show her how damn much he loved her.
He blinked and stared down at his boots. Love? Since when had that rotting muscle in his chest been capable of anything else besides hate and revenge? Being a complete asshole? Now that was more his speed.
“I hope you know that my reaction has nothing to do with you,” he said.
“I do.” She nodded and sniffed.
“You have no idea how much I fucking want you.”
She smiled, but the effort didn’t quite make it to her eyes.
You’ve got to make this right.
“Oh God, I’ve made a fool of myself.” She wiped the dampness away from her cheeks. “I don’t do tears,” she said in a husky voice.
“We’ve both opened up some old wounds, revealed a few things that nobody else needs to know about.” Markus reached out and pulled her into his arms. To his relief, she didn’t resist. “My lips are sealed, Vixen,” he swore, and ran a palm down her dark tresses. He could live a dozen millennia, and he’d never tire of the feel of her hair in his palm, the feel of her body pressed against his.
She’d given him her trust. Was ready to give him all of her. But if he allowed that to happen and she didn’t know the truth—all of it—he wasn’t any better than the bastard who’d taken her against her will.
The lies needed to stop here.
If she never forgave him, he’d walk away knowing he’d at least given her the choice. After he returned her, though, he’d be hitting the door, anyway. In the Enclave’s eyes, he would have betrayed them again by taking her in the first place. But he had to hold her one more time before letting her go. He brushed his hand down her back again, savoring the silky texture of her hair.
This was the right thing to do. He swallowed hard. So why the fuck did it feel like someone was carving his heart out piece by piece?
“Vixen,” he said. She looked up from where her head rested on his chest. He stared down at her, and the moment he captured her gaze, Markus pushed inside. She flinched, but he held her tight while he sought out the part of her brain he’d shut down from her past. In seconds, he spotted the darkened cluster of neurons. It was as if they were waiting for him to return and patch the wires feeding the electrical impulses to that section of her brain.
Markus moved in, circling them, mentally gathering the broken pieces.
“Remember, Alexandria,” he whispered.
Chapter Eighteen
“What the fuck is going on?” Enrique yelled into his cell phone’s receiver at Christian, his blood pressure sledgehammering its way through his temples. “Why haven’t you contacted me before now?”
“You expect me to pull out my damn phone at the kitchen counter and call you when Kenric and Guerin are whipping in and out like a bunch of damn pit bulls looking for someone to sink their teeth into?” Christian snarled. “Shit’s gotten real around here since you and whoever the hell you’re working with coordinated that ambush last night.”
“Where the hell are you now?”
“I’m at the docks, hunting,” Christian replied. “My babysitters, Arran and Elle, are a block away, doing the same.”
“They allowed you to stray from their sides?” His spy sounded as if he was playing the game well. “You must be winning their trust.”
“I guess.” Christian grunted. “Not hard. They’re nice enough.”
“Nice?” Enrique chuckled. “You’re not there to find your BFF. You remember who your ass belongs to.” He snarled. “Who made you.”
“Like I could ever forget.”
“I heard from one of the DEADs that things got pretty messy last night. Another one of the Enclave’s warriors popped in and took out a few of them on his own, but not before one of the females got hit.” Enrique perched on the edge of his desk. “Since I don’t have Marguerite’s daughter in my possession, please tell me Markus’s bitch has at least been taken care of.”
“I don’t know if this is what you want to hear…” Christian sighed. “That was Markus who phased in and saved the day for Guerin and Eve. But we have no idea about Alex’s status.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Enrique straightened and shoved the chair out of his path.
“It means neither of them returned back to the mansion. Markus is gone, and no one knows where the hell he’s taken Alex.”
A smile stretched Enrique’s face. “You’re shitting me.”
“Markus has disappeared, and the rest of the Enclave is freaking the hell out. Especially Elle. She is about to come unglued about her sister. I didn’t think Arran was going to be able to convince her to come out tonight and feed. But somehow he got her out of the house.”
“Well, don’t you just sound so concerned.” The stupid kid was getting under his skin. All he needed him to do was observe and report.
“I’m just saying,” the male snapped.
“I hear what you’re saying. You’re sounding attached. You get attached, you become a liability. Everything is on the line here. We’re too damn close for you to fuck this up.”
“Nothing has changed,” he rumbled. “I’m still with you. No one has any idea that you were involved with what happened last night. But based on the way Markus came tearing through the house when the shit started going down the other night, I’m sure he’s suspicious as hell it was you who put it all in motion. He’s going to be coming for you.”
“I’m not worried about that sniveling SOB.” Enrique turned and lifted the frog-shaped glass paperweight—he had an affinity for the amphibians—tossing the weight in his palm. “Unknowingly, he’s done me quite a favor. There’s one Enclave male out of the way of our real target. Plus, he’s succeeded in distracting them for us.” He laughed. “Markus was always too blinded by pussy.”
“You mentioned before that Eve was going to be the answer to everything you ever wanted, but what do you plan to do with her?” Christian’s voice held a nervous edge. “How is this supposed to work once you get your hands on her?”
“Let me worry about that,” Enrique said. “And you keep me informed of everything you learn about her.”
“You’re going to kill her, aren’t you?” Christian asked, his voice low and deep.
Oh for Christ’s sake. Enrique bit back a groan, not wanting to alarm his guest. He rose and put his back to his European buyer, Dominic Diaz, and edged closer to the window, trying to place as much distance as possible between him and the male with his payday. “Don’t tell me you’re suddenly growing a conscience,” Enrique muttered into the phone.
“My balls are on the line.” Christian’s words cut through the receiver. “So is it too much to ask what the hell you’re planning for her and whoever else gets blindsided by your plan?”
; “I think someone has grown to like his new playmates a bit too much,” Enrique sneered, his fangs glinting back at him from his reflection in the glass. “You fuck this up for me, Christian…” Enrique swore. “Hide as deep as you want behind their walls, but the Enclave will not keep me from making you wish you’d never slithered your way out of your mother’s womb.”
“Dial it back on the threats, will ya?” A heavy sigh made its way through the receiver. “What the hell? I never insinuated I wanted to stay here. This Goody Two-shoes shit they’re preaching about protecting this town makes me sick to my damn stomach. I wanted to know what you were going to do with her? You know…after?”
“Whatever her buyer wants,” Enrique said. Why not humor the son of bitch? Wasn’t like he would be welcoming him back like a prodigal son, anyway. He shrugged at his reflection. “Once she’s delivered. I’m paid.” He glanced over his shoulder at Mr. Payday himself, who sat intently watching him with a smug look plastered on his face. “It’s really not my concern.”
“You mean, we’re paid, correct?”
“Yeah. Yeah.” He shook his head, rolling his eyes. “Of course that’s what I meant.”
“What’s next?” Christian asked, his voice hushed.
“Keep me informed of Eve’s movements,” Enrique spat. “That’s all you need to know.” The less Christian knew of his plans, the better. His gut said Christian was still loyal, but he wasn’t sure for how much longer. The cocksucker was born to serve, and there was nothing like the allure of a master vampire. Enrique should know. He’d spent more years than he’d like to recall on his knees servicing Marguerite, all for a sip of her ancient blood, another stroke of her hand, or her cunt around his cock. Both had been intoxicating and addicting.
“I said I would, and I will,” Christian snapped. “I’ve got my ass sitting in the damn middle of this. I just wanted to know if you’ve got something else in motion?”
Enrique glanced over his shoulder. Dominic, wearing a suit that probably cost more than a year’s rent on Enrique’s apartment, sat with his legs crossed on one of the dinette’s chairs. The arrogant bastard had brought in a few of his associates to help expedite their mission. “Everything is moving forward on this end,” Enrique said. “Keep me informed the moment you know her next move.”