East of Ecstasy (Hearts of the Anemo)

by Laura Kaye

  A terrible scream rocked through Devlin’s head so loud that he put his hands to his ears. Eurus. Howling in agony and absolute outrage. For a long moment, a battle for the East played out inside him, a push and pull that felt like getting punched from the inside out. And then his father’s presence inside his mind was gone.

  The lights crashed into Devlin’s psyche, tearing him apart and remaking him as a new and stronger god. He hummed with a new energy now—one that combined the rage and fire of the infernal rivers with the strong flow of the East Wind.

  A moaning, angry gust of wind burst through the hall, causing all the Anemoi to brace and crouch against its force. But not Devlin. As far as he was concerned, the whipping gusts simply represented Eurus’s fear and desperation about their proceedings. He took a perverse amount of satisfaction out of his father being the one to be afraid. For once.

  Zeph yelled out over the roar of the wind, “Now it is time for your light to guide and lead the East Wind, Devlin. Place it within so all will know you as its master.”

  His hair whipping around his face, Devlin nodded. The ball of translucent fire flickered from his hand the instant he raised it. With a small mental push, Devlin braced his muscles against the savage gusts and willed the flaming orb inside the lantern. Zephyros secured the lock with the key and lifted the lantern high. “Long live the East Wind.”

  The preternatural wind slowed, then ceased altogether. He could feel the wind in his blood, in his mind, ready to be called forth. Soul-deep gratification roared through Devlin.

  “Long live the East Wind,” everyone answered, the collective voices echoing against the tall ceiling.

  “Now we put an end to what has for so long divided us!” Zephyros shouted to great cries of support and applause. “Chrysander!” Zeph waved him over as the ceremony broke up, and the Southern god offered Devlin a handshake and quick words of congratulations. “Are you sensing any difference?” Zeph asked.

  Devlin stepped closer, hope and curiosity mingling inside him. Had the transfer of the East Wind and the loss of his divine energy been enough to take Eurus down?

  Chrys’s expression blanked for a moment, and then he frowned. “That screaming wind was E, so it definitely had an impact. For a moment the storm sputtered, but then it picked up again.”

  “Exactly what are we talking about, Chrys?” Zeph asked, crossing his arms.

  “I’m sensing this storm along almost the whole U.S. eastern coast. The lesser Anemoi report sustained wind speeds of one hundred sixty miles per hour right now and getting stronger.”

  “Damnit! And the loss of his wind didn’t change anything?” Zeph braced his hands on his hips.

  Chrys’s frown deepened. “It had been at two-ten.”

  Zeph’s eyes went wide.

  Fuck. Then it hadn’t done as much as they’d hoped. Two hundred and ten miles an hour? Nothing on earth could stand up to those kinds of winds.

  “Straight up, this hurricane has all the makings to be the biggest ever to hit the Atlantic coast,” Chrys said, dragging his hand through his hair. “There are two things contributing to this. The lack of an Anemoi of the West Wind is throwing everything out of balance, and Eurus is using that to his favor right now.”

  “Yes,” Devlin said, itching to free his brother now that he’d become master of the East.

  “And the second—”

  “Is the fucking Firestone ring,” Zeph said through gritted teeth. “Which means it’s time to get back what’s rightfully mine.”

  “It’s clear the loss of the East has weakened him some,” Chrys said. “But yeah, I think it all comes down to the ring.”

  Zeph nodded, his royal-blue eyes flaring. “While he has it, he has all of us. So say your good-byes. Quick. We fly in fifteen minutes.”

  …

  Anna had never felt prouder of someone in her life. How she wished for his sake that his ceremony hadn’t had to be done with so much danger and uncertainty hanging over his head—over all of their heads. Still, to hear Zephyros stand up for Devlin that way and see him be embraced by a family it seemed he’d long been estranged from made her so happy that she was aching to hug him.

  But she’d have to wait a few more minutes. Devlin was deep in conversation with Chrys and Zeph, and it was clear from their expressions and tension in their bodies that something bad had happened. Was it about the storm? Anna shivered in dread thinking about what her father and friends back in Jarrettsville might be going through.

  Suddenly, Devlin broke from the group and made right for her.

  He seemed to walk taller, more forcefully, and radiate a power that drew her in. God, how she wanted him.

  An arm’s reach away, Devlin halted. A series of expressions shifted over his darkly handsome face—concern, determination, desire. “Anna, I—” He blew out a breath and tugged his hair out of his eyes.

  Anna couldn’t stand the distance anymore. She threw her arms around his waist and laid her head on his chest. “Congratulations,” she said. And, God, his lean hardness felt so good against her.

  His arms came around her on a groan. And the need in that single sound reached into Anna’s chest and gripped her heart. She wasn’t sure she’d ever met another person more in need of love and acceptance and a place to belong than Devlin Eston, which made her just perfect for him. Because her heart overflowed with love for this god who could be fierce and gentle, strong and vulnerable, giving while refusing anything for himself.

  And she was so thankful he was safe. He’d faced whatever hell awaited him in his father’s realm, those horrible black creatures, and Eurus’s displeasure during the ceremony. And he’d come back to her again. Which made it all the harder to know he was going to have to leave her one more time.

  Finally, Devlin pulled back. “I need to say something.”

  She smiled. “Okay.”

  Violet eyes flared with the most mesmerizing light. “I don’t have a lot of time, so I have to lay this out more directly than I otherwise would.” Anna nodded, curiosity rolling through her. “I want you, Anna. I want you like I’ve never wanted anything. But even with who I am now, I’m still nowhere near your stature.”

  He glanced away to where Zephyros and Ella were embracing by the door. “You’re a primordial, Anna.” He met her gaze again. “That means something here.”

  “I’m the only one who gets to decide who’s right for me, Devlin. And if you want me like you say you do, I pick you.”

  Gently, he clasped her hands in his. “Be sure, Annalise,” he said, his voice a raw scrape.

  “Oh, Devlin,” she said, pulling his hands close so she could kiss his knuckles. There were a lot of things she didn’t have a good grasp on yet. If it weren’t for her Technicolor vision, the way she’d darkened the compound on command during the attack, and having seen her resemblance to Iris with her own eyes, she’d be sticking with common sense and…you know, reality, and saying the very idea that she was a goddess was ridiculous. But she couldn’t, because all those things had happened. And somehow, in just a few days’ time, her reality had taken a hard left turn into the unimaginable…and led her to this beautiful, broken god—whom she had no doubts about whatsoever. She stepped closer, so close she had to tilt her head way back to see him. “A primordial god might be what I am, but it’s not who I am. And who I am is a woman in love with a man. With you. So I’m sure.”

  Red-hot desire darkened his eyes and sharpened the angles of his face. Like he couldn’t hold back anymore, he clutched her in his arms and pulled her into the elements.

  Surprised laughter bubbled up inside her soul. And then they were back in their bodies and up against a wall in a quiet, dim hallway—Anna didn’t know exactly where and couldn’t have cared less. Because Devlin was kissing her as if she were the air he breathed, the water he drank, the source of all his power in the world. Even as Anna’s body flashed hot at the fervor of his touch and his tongue and his lips, tears pricked at the backs of her eyes for the intensi
ty of his surrender, for the battle of wills he’d played out inside his own mind. And won.

  “I don’t have long.”

  Icy dread skittered down Anna’s spine. “You have to confront Eurus,” she said, not knowing exactly what that entailed but knowing it couldn’t be good. Anna had known this battle was coming all along. She just didn’t realize how much all these people were going to mean to her when it happened. How much Devlin would mean to her.

  He nodded as he grasped her face to control the kiss, and kissed and sucked and nibbled at her lips until her pulse pounded, and her panties grew damp, and his muscles were all that held her up against the wall.

  Her breath caught at the competing floods of desire and worry rushing through her. “I don’t want to lose y—”

  Devlin kissed her, silencing the words. “The only thing I can control for sure are these next minutes. I have so few left. And I just want…” He rested his forehead against hers and shuddered out a breath.

  “What? I’d give you anything,” she said, caressing his hair.

  Blazing purple eyes bored into hers, and then his hands unfastened the button and zipper of her jeans. “I want to give you pleasure. I want to feel you fall apart in my arms. Because of me. Just in case…” He swallowed hard as he slipped his big hand under her panties. “I want to experience your ecstasy one last time.” His fingers rubbed soft circles over the bundle of nerves at the top of her sex.

  “Devlin,” Anna whispered, the arousing movement of his fingers and the urgency of his words making it hard to know what else to say. “Oh, God.”

  He devoured her on a breath-stealing, bone-melting kiss Anna felt everywhere. He kicked at the inside of her foot, forcing her stance open and allowing his hand to slip down until his fingers found her opening. “Mmm, Annalise, is this because of me?” he asked, spreading the evidence of her arousal around.

  “Yes. All you,” she murmured. “All you, Devlin.” Anna gasped and clutched at his shoulders as he pushed a finger inside her and ground the heel of his hand against her clit.

  Kissing her cheek, her ear, her neck, Devlin fingered her while he held her pinned against the wall. “I wish I could be inside you right now,” he rasped, slipping a second finger inside her.

  “So do I,” she said, and then the need for him overwhelmed her. She pulled his hand away, shoved her jeans down to her knees, and turned against the wall. “Do it, Devlin. I need you.” Heart racing and nearly panting in anticipation, Anna peered over her shoulder.

  “Good gods,” he rasped, tearing at the fly to his jeans and shoving them down. And then his hardness was right there, pushing into her, filling her. They both groaned when he was fully seated inside her. “Fuck,” he whispered in her ear.

  And then he started to move. Slowly at first and then faster, harder. Anna rocked her hips backward into his thrusts as Devlin’s big body enveloped hers against the wall. In that moment, Devlin was her whole world. His cool, crisp scent filled her nose, his hard muscles bunched all around her, and his little groans and rough breaths were music to her ears. And, holy hell, his cock was a delicious, driving fullness inside her. A tingling pressure stirred low in Anna’s belly, building and tightening until she nearly whined in need.

  He sucked at a maddening spot just behind her ear and alternated fucking her with quick strokes and slower, punctuated thrusts that made her moan his name. Anna was pure physical sensation as her body barreled toward what promised to be an explosive release.

  “You feel so fucking good,” he growled.

  The words, the tone, his breath in her ear all shoved her a giant step closer to the ecstasy they both craved. Anna ground her hips as his fingers came between her legs and found her clit. He stroked his fingers over her harder, faster, more urgently. Suddenly, she was right there, an amazing tension holding her on the edge of shattering to pieces. “Oh, I’m—” The orgasm stole her words, her breath, her mind. She cried out as her release detonated, sending her soaring. Again and again, her body milked at his cock inside her.

  “Anna,” Devlin groaned, and then he was pulsing inside her over and over. He moved through the orgasm, setting off small aftershocks that made her gasp. When his body calmed, he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her to him. He remained deep inside her, and Anna was in no hurry for him to go. Ever.

  In the stillness of the moment, Anna’s brain just caught up with what they’d done. No protection. Just as quickly, Anna decided she didn’t care. If the gods gave her his child, she would want and love it no matter what. And if he doesn’t make it— Anna refused to finish the thought.

  “That was beautiful. Perfect,” he said against the shell of her ear. Anna nodded. Gently, he pulled away. Fabric rustled behind her and then something soft pressed between her legs, cleaning her. His shirt.

  When he was done, she turned and put herself together as he did, too. “You didn’t have to—”

  “I’ll get another.” Wide eyes peered down at her. “We didn’t use anything. I’m so—”

  She pressed her fingers to his lips and shook her head. “I’m not sorry.”

  His eyes went wider, and slowly the hint of a smile played around his lips. “Thank you,” he whispered, pressing a kiss against her fingertips.

  “No, thank you, Devlin.” She kissed him in a warm expression of appreciation and love. “Do we have to leave now?”

  The question seemed to pull him out of a haze and his eyes narrowed and head tilted. “Not we.”

  “But my father—”

  “Will be fine. If you’re there while this is going down I’m going to be distracted with worry. And you know how you feel in the human realm because of the curse. But if you want, I’ll take you home or”—he shrugged, discomfort plain on his face—“someone else will afterward. You’d have a day, max, to make any arrangements and say good-bye. But you can’t stay, Anna.”

  Anna’s brain scrambled for a response.

  “Promise me. No matter what, promise me you’ll live.” His gaze filled with such sad pleading that Anna couldn’t help but nod. Plus, the last thing she wanted was to argue with him.

  Besides, he’d be back in a few hours or a day and then they could work out the details. As challenging as figuring everything out would be, they could put it off until he returned. Because Anna refused to accept any other outcome. “Okay. Promise.”

  “Good,” he said, pressing a kiss to her hair. “Now I have to go. Zeph is bitching at me.” He winked and pulled away, and it was like he’d reached into her chest and forcibly removed a piece of her.

  Anna crossed her arms against the pain. “Well, we don’t want that, do we?” He shook his head, and Anna stared as his face like she was trying to imprint the memory of it to her soul. “Go kick some ass and hurry back to me.” Tears clogged her throat, but she wanted to be strong for him.

  One corner of his lips quirking up just the littlest bit, he winked. “That’s the plan.” He reached out a hand. “I’ll take you back to the others.”

  Shaking her head, Anna blinked against the pressure building up in her eyes. “That’s okay.” Glancing at the hall that led to the huge kitchen, she swallowed, hard. “I know where I am. I’ll find them,” she said.

  Devlin leaned in, planted a kiss on her cheek, and met her gaze. “I…I love you, too,” he said, more easily this time. And then he disappeared.

  The words hit Anna like a ton of bricks, lifting her up in sheer joy and crashing her back down again—because the man who loved her, and whom she loved, was going off to fight an unimaginable supernatural war. Her mind resurrected the memory of those awful black demons darting through the air with their grotesque, gnashing teeth and long yellow claws, and the kind of thing he might be facing wasn’t so unimaginable anymore. And that fact did nothing to dispel her fear.

  Tears brimmed over and dripped down her cheeks, and Anna just needed a minute to hide and be alone with this awful wave of dread and panic. She slid down the wall into a tight ball and buried her
face against her knees.

  Darkness, come.

  Anna didn’t even have to open her eyes to know her command had worked and the hallway all around her had turned pitch black. Somehow, she could feel its inkiness settling around her like a cool, thin blanket. And as always, she found the darkness reassuring.

  “Please, please, please keep him safe,” she whispered to whatever god might be listening. “I don’t know what I’ll do without him.” And it was true, because everything inside her said Devlin was her future.

  Devlin was the one who had revealed her powers, exposed her to this world, and introduced her to her mother. Had she never met him, she never would’ve known this world existed, never would’ve known who and what she really was, never would’ve known what true love felt like. And given the nature of the curse, she would’ve left her father one way or the other within the next two weeks. The thought of leaving her dad, of never seeing him again, or not being there to take care of him, opened up a jagged hole in her heart. Guilt and grief threatened to swamp her, so if she had to do that one way or the other, she wanted it to be for something, to mean something. For her, that something was love. It was Devlin.

  More tears dampened her jeans.

  If he died, what would she do?

  Sitting there in the darkness, Anna wasn’t sure she had an answer to that question.

  “Okay, enough,” she said to herself. She wasn’t doing anyone any good sitting here wallowing. On a long sigh, she lifted her face and scrubbed her cheeks dry.

  In the quiet of the darkness, Anna suddenly felt she wasn’t alone. Once the idea planted itself in her consciousness, she was absolutely sure it was true.

  “Who’s there?” she asked, prickles running over her scalp and down her neck. Nothing. But the sensation of another presence grew stronger. Restore the light.

  Darkness remained.

  Restore the light. She gave the command an extra mental push. “Restore the light, damnit,” she said, uneasiness spilling into her voice. Still, nothing happened. She rose to her feet, muscles tense, instincts jangling, heart pounding out a thunderous beat against her breastbone.