by Karin Tabke
Like an octopus, he wrapped his legs around Lazarus and restrained him from moving. Lazarus arched his back for separation, but Marcus narrowed his wrapped arms around his upper body and held his maker in a death grip. Now Marcus knew he had the advantage.
“Equal in strength, superior in mind,” he whispered into Lazarus’s ear. Marcus looked up and closed his eyes. The warmth of the dawning sun was all around him, and he could feel it. He could feel it like no time before, and it reminded him of his life before darkness. How he longed for that life again, except this time with Jax. But he would never have it.
Lazarus continued to struggle for his very existence. “You cannot escape me,” Marcus said. “We will die together, Colonel. The maker and his creation.”
“Marcus,” Lazarus pleaded. “I will let her live! I will give you your mortality!”
“And then you will find a way to destroy us both.”
Lazarus’s struggles began to subside. His strength was waning in the morning sun. His flesh began to simmer, and he knew the end was near.
“Save us, my son!” Lazarus pleaded. “Now, before we are both ashes! You owe me your life!”
Like a constrictor, Marcus tightened his arms and legs around him.
Lazarus was beginning to really cook. He let out a small sound that steadily grew into an agonizing shrill. Marcus could feel the heat against himself. The stench of burning flesh assaulted his senses. It hissed and popped. He pulled his arms tighter around Lazarus and tucked his hands under his forearms for protection. He needed to hold on until it was finished. Lazarus stopping moving. A frozen prisoner to the sun. In a moment, he would combust into ash, and then Marcus would suffer the same fate.
Marcus.
The sweet tone of Jax’s voice filled his ears. His end was near, yet he smiled.
“Marcus!” He opened his eyes to find Jax standing above him. His hands momentarily loosened, and Lazarus slid off. Blindly his nemesis reached toward the safety of the corridor, but his legs would not move. Jax turned from Marcus, reached into her jacket, and withdrew a silver scythe.
Lazarus looked up at her, his eyes aflame. He had reclaimed his original form as the Viking Thorkeel Rus. “Kill me and you will be hunted by my maker and destroyed.”
“He’ ll have to catch me first, you son of a bitch,” she sneered. She raised her scythe. As she brought it down, she cried, “This is for Shane!”
His head did not separate from his body. She brought the other one down and cried, “And this is for Marcus!”
Lazarus’s head rolled from his body. He immediately burst into flames.
As Marcus watched his maker’s death, he squeezed his eyes, fighting back the fire on his skin. His body quaked as it succumbed to the sunlight. Nausea overcame him. He struggled to reach out to Jax.
“Jax,” he whispered, his strength nearly gone now. “You live.”
Marcus smiled even as Jax cried out to him, “Marcus! You’ re burning!” She covered him with her body and screamed toward the corridor. “Someone bring me a blanket. Help me get him out of here!”
No one moved.
“Help me!” she pleaded.
Frantically, she pulled off her jacket and covered Marcus’s face, then grabbed his hands and pulled him across the grass. But her strength was not what it had been. Her body had sustained damage. He tried to push at the earth with his heels to help her, but his strength was gone. She slipped on the wet grass. His heartbeat slowed, his eyes closed, his chest burned.
The sun was too much for him. Marcus felt himself being carried off to a dark, comfortable place. The last thing he remembered was Jax’s hysterical screams. Then he heard nothing. He felt nothing.
He was . . . nothing.
Jax watched in horror and disbelief as what she could only describe as a demonic-looking angel emerged from the trees and landed beside Marcus. He was big. Long black hair swirled about his wide shoulders. A black tattoo she could not decipher crept up from beneath his black shirt, twisting around his neck to his jaw. Full red lips twisted in anger, and his furious red eyes looked as if they would spout fire. He was magnificently terrifying. He glanced at the burn spot where Lazarus had been, then he reached out and effortlessly took Marcus from her. She grabbed at Marcus, unwilling to let him go. “No! He belongs with me!” she challenged.
“He belongs to me,” the dark one thundered. He took Marcus into his long, muscled arms. He looked up and, as enigmatically as he had descended, he rose with Marcus, disappearing into the morning sunlight.
Jax watched Marcus become one with the clouds as tears blurred her vision. Anguish twisted her heart.
He was gone! Sobs wracked her. Gage tried to console her. She shook him off and stood. “Don’ t,” she said. She looked to the corridor and saw Godfather, Dante and the rest of her team watch her with a mixture of admiration, awe and compassion. She strode toward them and stopped several feet away. Emotion so painful that it felt like a knife in her chest made it hard for her to breathe. “You let him die! He saved my life and you let him die!”
She would never forgive them. She turned away from them all and started to walk.
Thirty-Four
Three months later
Clearlake, California
Jax felt just as alone as she had the night Marcus had disappeared. Despite her begging and pleading for him to come to her, he remained only a heartbreaking memory. Yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that he was out there. Somewhere. Alive. And today, as she sat in her rental car in front of his small lake house, and every day since she had last seen him alive, she daydreamed of him. In the night she’d awaken hot and breathless as he invaded her thoughts.
She sighed and sat back in the seat. The dreams were always so real. Like the first one in Chicago, even though Chicago seemed so long ago. So much had happened since then.
She closed her eyes and exhaled. “Marcus, where are you?”
Like always, a part of her hoped he would answer, but she knew he would not. Then the anger would surface, as it did now.
“You’ re a coward, Marcus Cross,” she yelled at the cottage. He obviously didn’t want to face her. But why? Had she meant nothing to him?
Then, quite predictably given how often it had happened in the past, her mood shifted and her emotions ebbed and flowed like the tides. She reminded herself that she had meant something to him. He had saved her life, twice, only to leave her, but he hadn’t left her on his own. He’d been swept away by a dark demonic enigma.
The one called Rurik.
Had he punished Marcus for attempting to kill his maker? Had he taken his life, just as Lazarus had predicted? Her eyes burned. He’d been willing to give his life for hers. The only reason he wouldn’t have returned, she reasoned, was because he couldn’ t.
Yet, again, reason didn’t match what she felt. That faint though unreasonable feeling of hope had begun to take its toll. Her anger at her L.O.S.T. team had not subsided. It had mushroomed.
“Cassidy, we had no idea what that thing was. I was not willing to lose a man when it was obvious Cross was on the way out,” Godfather defended.
She’d told him and every other operative to fuck off. She had not stepped back into the compound for nearly three months. She wasn’t going back. Not for a long time. Maybe never. They could erase her, she didn’t care.
The pull to this place, Marcus’s only home, had been too much. She had resisted, not wanting to feel more miserable than she had, but she’d come. And now, as she had for the last four hours, she sat in the car unable to move. Unable to go in. To say good-bye.
“Go, Jax,” she said out loud. “Go in.”
Slowly, she got out of the car. The November air was heavy with coming rain, but cool. She liked the rain. An image of her snuggled up close to Marcus as the rain poured outside the window tugged at her emotions. She stood for a long time, looking at the place. It screamed neglect. The planters were overgrown with weeds. Several tumbleweeds clogged up the stone path to the s
mall porch. It was as if he’d never existed. Her heart sank. She’d hoped that he had come home and she would find him here.
She walked down the stone path to the door. The lock was still broken. He had not returned to fix it. She pushed the door open and could not help a small smile. It was exactly as she remembered it. The sturdy oak table they had made love on was unmoved. Her empty plate, her coffee cup in pieces on the floor. The frying pan on the stove. She fingered the knife he had used to cut his chest so that she’d been able to feel what it was like to take from him.
Jax closed her eyes, remembering the sublimity of everything about him. As she opened her eyes, she exhaled and moved down the short hall to the bedroom. She pushed open the door. His scent wisped around her head. Faint but there. She reached down and picked up the sheet from the floor, exactly where they had left it, and brought it to her nose and inhaled.
Marcus’s scent engulfed her. The hot sting of tears, tears she didn’t bother to fight, welled in her eyes, blurring her vision. In slow, long streams, they tracked down her face. “Oh, Marcus,” she breathed. “Come to me. Please.” She lay down on the bed, wrapped herself in the sheets, and remembered how he had given her his blood and saved her life.
What she wouldn’t give to have him back for one hour.
She closed her eyes and, once again, dreamed of Marcus.
He stood in the darkness and watched the shallow rise and fall of her chest. Her scent stirred his primal instincts. Mate, mark and protect. He longed to do all three, but he could do none. It broke what little piece of his heart he had left into crumbles.
Rurik had nearly destroyed him for turning on Lazarus. It had only been Aelia’s influence that had allowed him to live, but perhaps that hadn’t been so merciful, after all. Rurik had banished Marcus to an eternity of nothing. He could have no purpose, no reason to wake at dusk each day. He would walk the earth truly soulless. Alone.
His chest tightened.
Jax was all he wanted, yet he couldn’t have her. He could watch her, but he’d never again know her love, for it was his very love for her that made him physically unable to get within ten feet of her. If he even tried, she would simply disappear, never to be seen again. He would not do that to her.
Take her, Marcus.
His body jerked in stunned surprise, and he spun around. “Aelia?”
Save for Jax, the room was empty, but he heard Aelia’s voice just the same.
Take her, Marcus. Bring her to our side. Rurik is too stubborn to see we need you. And her.
Her statement immediately made Marcus suspicious. Playing him was one thing, but get Jax involved? Aelia should take care. “Why?”
There is unrest amongst our kind, talk of civil war. Many are angry Rurik allowed you to live after what you did. I, too, am angry, but Thorkeel would have been the destruction of us all. He needed to be destroyed. She did that for us. She could do more.
Marcus looked at Jax. “She does not want the life we lead.”
She does not now, Marcus, but given the chance to live eternally by your side, she will come to change her mind. Take her. Regain her trust and the trust of her people. They are powerful mortals whose help we may one day need. Live among them until I have need of your service.
Marcus was not so sure. The woman he knew would never choose to be turned, but Aelia’s words? Aelia’s words caused a flicker of hope to swell within his tattered heart, a hope he couldn’t quash no matter how hard he tried.
Aelia laughed, the sound full and victorious, that of a confident woman. I was a mortal princess in love with the king of vampires, Marcus. It was just a matter of time before I realized I could never live without Rurik. I have no regrets. Neither will your Jax.
She left him then.
For long, drawn-out minutes, Marcus did not move. Fear, euphoria and more fear prevented him from doing anything, even breathing.
Testing, he moved forward until he was close. Closer. Standing within a foot of her.
He didn’t implode or collapse in agony. Nor did she disappear. Which meant he really was free to love Jax, he realized. Free to stand beside his queen and fight for her cause. He was free, free of everything except his immortality.
He took a step closer to the bed.
If Jax would be at his side, he didn’t care what he was. Mortal or immortal didn’t matter anymore. Together, they were powerful and meaningful. They could work together and affect more than a small army of mortals.
He allowed himself to breathe. Then he smiled. Finally, he took her into his arms.
“Jax.”
His voice was low and husky, full of . . . what?
It was a dream, but so very real.
Warm lips pressed to her lips, parting them.
She moaned and shook her head. Emotion overwhelmed her. She couldn’t take waking from another dream. Those moments of realization were killing her with despair. With a whimper of denial, tears leaked from her closed eyes.
“I’m real, Jax,” he whispered against her lips. “Open your eyes.”
No. She shook her head. He was not real.
Big, warm hands stroked her body. His spicy, earthy scent swirled around her nostrils. She reached out a hand and touched warm skin. Her eyes fluttered open. He smiled above her in the darkness. His blood was still in her, and she was as strong as she had ever been.
Still not believing he was real, she reached her hand to his face and traced a fingertip along the scar there. “Marcus?” she asked in disbelief.
“It’s me.”
She cupped his face between her hands and kissed him with such fervor that she lost her breath.
He laughed and rolled over onto her.
“How? Where have you been?” A sudden spike of anger nipped at her. “What took you so damn long?”
“I was banned from everything that mattered to me, Jax. You, Grace, my cause. Everything.”
“Because of Lazarus?”
“Yes. Rurik would have tortured me to death to set an example, but his consort, Aelia, stayed his hand. Instead, as punishment, he gave me eternal nothing. No love, no hate, no justice for those who cannot defend themselves. That Rurik did not eliminate me has created difficulty for our king. Lazarus was one of the most powerful vampires of the realm. There is a large, powerful faction who wants me dead for what I did.”
Jax swallowed hard. Just let them try, she thought. Losing him before had been torture; losing him again once he’d found his way back to her? Not in her lifetime. As if reading her thoughts, he smiled deeply. “We have the rest of our lives together, Jax.”
“What? You just said—”
“Once again, Aelia has interceded on my behalf. While she does not approve of my means, she was grateful for the end. Lazarus, or Thorkeel, as he is known to her, was jeopardizing all of us for his personal gain. She released me from my sentence of eternal doom.”
“At what price?”
Marcus laughed. “Ah, Jax, always the suspicious one, aren’t you?”
She snorted. “It’s my nature. What does she want in return?”
“My help with the impending civil war, your help, and the help of L.O.S.T. if we should need it.”
“What can L.O.S.T. do that you cannot?”
“Walk beneath the sun. Be our eyes and ears when we cannot.”
“But—” she frowned. “Aren’t your kind bloodsucking murderers?”
Unbelievably, Marcus looked hurt by her careless words. “Uh, present company excluded,” she hurried to add.
He paused, then nodded. “Some are. But most of us are not interested in dominating humans. There is a whole Otherworld out there, Jax, one you have no idea exists. It’s a dangerous world balanced on tenuous truces.”
Jax soaked it all up. If what he was saying was true, then he would be in danger she would not even be aware of. Could she live like that?
Could she be like that herself? She’d heard his words well. Heard him use the word “we,” not “I.” Was he talking of tur
ning her, because she didn’t know—
“We’ ll take it slow, Jax.”
Her eyes narrowed. “So what are you offering me?” she asked, chin tilted challengingly.
“Life with me. Whatever kind of life you want.”
“As one of you?” she pressed.
“If that’s what you want.”
“And if I don’ t?”
He pressed his lips together, then shrugged, the casual gesture at odds with the fire in his eyes. “That choice is only yours to make, Jax. It will always be yours.”
Her thoughts were racing. Her options tempting her. And scaring her. “What if I remain mortal? What happens in fifty years?”
He smiled. “You’ ll be old.”
“And wrinkly, while you’ ll still be hot and studly.”
He laughed. “I could make love to you if you were one hundred years old.”
She slapped him. “That’s gross.”
“I’ ll change your mind. But Jax . . .” His face grew serious. “Jax, I cannot give you children.”
She shrugged. “I can live without children. I can’t live without you.”
He smoothed his hands across her face. “Are you sure?”
“Positive. We’ ll work out the details later.”
He smiled and let out a sigh of relief, then stood. Very slowly, he began to undress.
Jax sat back and, while she didn’t want to ruin the moment, she needed to tell him. “Marcus?” she quietly said.
He looked up from unbuttoning his shirt.
“Senator Rowland retired from public service. He’s taken Gracie on a world tour. They were both really torn up about Sophia.”
Marcus pulled his shirt off. “If they knew the truth about her, they would be dancing in the streets with joy.”
“She knows about you. Gracie knows she has a big brother.”
His eyes widened in stunned disbelief, and she saw the uncertainty there. “How?”
“Sophia told her after the pictures surfaced. Told her if anything happened to her and she needed help, to contact me and I would contact you.”