by Keary Taylor
“Exactly,” Anna continues. “They disappear for weeks at a time. They could be traveling in from Montana for all we know.”
“Nah,” Danny says, shaking his head. “They’re watchin’ what’s going on. They planned that attack. If they aren’t keepin’ the whole army close by, they’ve at least got spies around, watchin’ us.”
“I can’t believe we’re having this problem with Bitten,” Samuel says in disgust. “They never have any idea what they’re doing. They’re idiots.”
“Excuse me,” Danielle calls out in offense from the foyer as she passes by. She walks up to the doorway, her eyes instantly glowing yellow in anger. “You Born may be stronger and more manipulative than us, but don’t forget we’re still people. And we’re at least not walking corpses.”
“You will watch your tongue,” I tell her coldly, and she immediately closes her mouth. “Please,” I say, turning to those around me. “You should show some respect. It’s not like those Bitten have any choice in the matter.”
“If you want me feeling sorry for the Bitten, that isn’t going to happen,” Samuel says with the shake of his head. He turns from the desk and collapses into a nearby chair.
“Then, you can leave,” I say coldly. He meets my eyes with surprise at my harshness. His brows furrow as if to test and see if I’m being serious. And when I say no more, he gets up, and walks out.
I wish Nial were here. He’s always been good at keeping me calm and even—something I’m losing a hold on lately. But he’s at work at the hospital. I hate that he has to continue working there, but we need the blood with such a full House.
“I don’t know that there is any more we can do at this point,” I say, my eyes once again studying the map. “They will attack again; I think we can be sure about that. But we will be more vigilant.”
“I’ll have three guards out at all times, patrolling town and the grounds,” Anna says, slipping instantly back into General mode.
“I volunteer for day watch,” Danny says. He pulls his goggles out from his vest pocket. I wonder how often he leaves the Institute during the day, like he requested I not ask about. I wouldn’t know since I’m not often there. “I think Bridget will go with me.” The older woman who volunteered to come to our House.
“Take Trinity with you, too,” Anna says. “She needs to keep herself busy and useful.”
Danny nods and slips out of the library without a word.
“I’ll get working on the other shift schedules,” Anna says. She gathers the map into her arms and heads out. “Come on,” she says as she passes Danielle. “Come help me and make yourself worthwhile.”
She peels away from the wall and follows after Anna.
Leaving Raheem and I alone.
It’s the first time we’ve had a few moments alone in weeks. And I find myself afraid to meet his eyes.
“This will end in war,” he says quietly from behind me.
“I know that,” I respond. Gathering my courage, I stand, turn, and lean against the desk, finally facing him.
He stands beside the fireplace, the flames casting shadows on his form. He wears a tan tunic and a keffiyeh that’s red with geometric black patterns. His expression is long, serious. Those dark eyes dance as they stare at me.
“You know it’s all an act, right?” I say quietly. I stand, crossing my arms over my chest.
“You are a pretty damn good actress,” he says. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you really might be the Queen and that you really might have feelings for the King. You sure put on a convincing show.”
“But you do know better, right?” I ask as I take two steps toward Raheem.
We’re toeing that dangerous line once more. So many beings with enhanced hearing inhabit this house, but most are asleep. Cyrus and X have retired to a vacant house to work on running the world. That doesn’t stop just because he’s investigating me.
There’s little to no one around to overhear us. But it’s still incredibly dangerous.
“I don’t know,” he says. His body language is screaming guarded. The tense shoulders. The wary expression. “Do I?”
“You should,” I say as I take another step toward him. The distance between us closes and I feel the electricity in the air spark. “We all have our roles to play in this game. But it’s just a role. Not the truth.”
“And what is the truth, Alivia?” he asks as I stop just a foot away from him.
“That you make me feel alive again,” I say, my voice growing more and more quiet. I reach up and grab a fistful of his tunic and pull him closer to me. “That there’s something electric between us. And that doesn’t go away when you’re not around.”
I feel his breath on my chest, and my eyes drop to study the strong arms he possesses, the wide chest. My curiosity burns inside of me, like a wild animal searching for a desperate meal.
“Is it me you think about when the King touches you?” he whispers as he leans in, his lips brushing my ear. “Do you dream of deserts and caves when you sleep? Do you long for sand and pyramids?”
My eyes slide closed as his lips move down to my neck. I let my head fall back, exposing more flesh for him. His hands wrap around my back, pulling my body to his.
“Yes,” I breathe without fully comprehending his question.
And I’m left breathless for just a second as Raheem disappears. The doors snap closed and the lock slides into place. We’re alone, no longer exposed for anyone who may wander by.
Suddenly, my back is pressed against a bookshelf as Raheem molds against my body. He holds my hands high above my head, his face just a breath from mine.
“Were you not a regent, I would take you somewhere far away,” he says as his eyes study mine. “Somewhere remote and beautiful and warm. Just the two of us.”
The breath hitches in my throat and I feel everything surging inside of me. Wanting to get closer, so much closer. Wanting more. Being terrified, because this is so much, too soon, so dangerous, so the wrong-
I shut that thought down before it can fully form.
I can’t go there.
I’ve let that go.
“Kiss me,” I beg him, because I find I cannot close that tiny gap between the two of us.
A wicked grin curls on his face just before he crushes his lips to mine. They’re urgent. Hungry. His lips are forceful with mine, taking them as they will. A sigh works its way between my lips and his tongue finds mine.
He releases my hands and suddenly hoists me off the ground. He presses me into the bookcase harder, digging his hips into mine.
All my previous fears about being with a man no longer apply. All my reasons for caution are gone.
There’s nothing to stop me. And oh, how my body doesn’t want to stop.
But there’s that voice in the back of my head. Telling me things I wish to put behind me. Bringing up faces that have forsaken me.
“How can this ever end?” Raheem breathes as his lips trail my jawline before finding their way to the hollow beneath my ear. “What do we think we are doing?”
“Why does there have to be thought and evaluation behind it?” I ask. Before I’ve realized what I’m doing, I’ve pulled his tunic up and over his head, dislodging his keffiyeh.
And I can only stare at Raheem in wonder.
I’ve never seen him without some kind of head covering. Beneath it is dark, incredibly thick, close-cropped hair. Somehow, he looks even more dangerous, exposed like this.
And his body.
Tattoos run over his flesh in every direction. Some kind of script runs down his side from beneath his arm, down into his pants. An Egyptian eye — the Eye of Horus — covers his left breast, over his heart. A mass of tiny black lines run down his right arm. There has to be hundreds of little marks.
Beneath that ink is an astonishing body.
Every muscle in Raheem’s body is defined. Toned. Built for action and war. And war is indeed present on his body. Scars dot his flesh here and there. A thin, wide,
white mark on his lower abdomen. A burn mark on his left shoulder. Several small white pebbles of scar tissue spread over his right arm and the same side.
Raheem has seen more than a few fights.
“You’re beautiful,” I say, running a hand down his chest as I study everything. And he lets me take him in with reverence. Both hands run back up, sliding over his cheeks, up to his head. It’s at that length that leaves his hair fuzzy and soft. An appreciative smile crosses my lips.
Gently, slowly, I let my hands slide down once more, until they lace behind his neck.
“No woman has seen me…like this, in some time,” he says. A red glow burns gently in the back of his eyes as he studies me.
“Thank you,” I breathe. “Thank you for allowing me to see the real you, Raheem.”
He offers me a smile, but there’s something sad about it. He tucks a lock of hair behind my ear and presses one last, gentle kiss to my lips. Slowly, he lets me back down to the ground, though he does not move away from me.
“What is this, Alivia?” he asks as he brings his hands up to the sides of my face. “What are we? What are we doing?”
I shake my head, but I don’t have a response right away. “What do you mean?” I ask, because I’m too afraid to analyze it myself.
“I mean that I watched you almost the entire time you have been in Silent Bend,” he says, and there’s a hint of pain in his voice when he says it. “I’ve seen you with someone else. Someone you were willing to give up your life for. And we… I am not foolish enough to believe we are that.”
“You’ve confessed to having relationships with many women, Raheem,” I counter, and my voice grows more serious. “You should know not to make comparisons.”
“Yet through those relationships, I’ve learned much,” he says, and then he does take a step away from me. “I’ve learned to recognize a rebound. And it’s not a privileged position to be in, my nofret.”
I want to tell him he’s wrong. That that isn’t what this is. That I’m a deep person capable of deep feelings and being genuine.
But I can’t.
Because I’m not that kind of person any more.
“It’s okay,” he says, nodding his head, even though it looks like it causes him pain to concede like this. “I understand. Let’s just let this be what it is. It’s not love. It’s just…need.”
Just need.
And there, he’s nailed it directly on the head.
“I’m sorry,” I say, my eyes wide, and I shake my head. “I am what I am.”
“And that’s all that I ask for,” Raheem breathes as he takes a step forward. He brings one hand to my face, and presses a gentle kiss to my lips. It only lasts for a moment, before he breaks away. He bends, retrieves his clothing. Holding my eyes, he dresses once more, covering his head again. And in his eyes, I see that he means it. He only asks for the real me. And he accepts this for what it is at face value.
But I also see a skiff of pain there. The desire for more.
And he knows I cannot give it to him.
“’Til we meet again,” he says, flashing me that wicked smile, the sexy, carefree façade back on, as he backs toward the doors. And then he’s gone.
“YOU SAID THE GAMES WOULD be in three parts,” I say to Cyrus as he sits in the grand chair in my father’s office. “What’s the third part?”
I walk around in front of the chair and stop in front of Cyrus. He sets his bourbon aside and sits forward, taking my hands in his. His deep eyes search mine, as if trying to pull Sevan out through them and into remembrance.
It’s been three full weeks. Surely, he is beginning to realize that she isn’t coming.
“Are you so anxious to see this come to an end?” he asks. A lick of cold slides slowly up my spine. “Why the hurry?”
“Because my House will be on edge until it is over,” I answer him quickly. I rehearsed the response before I came and asked the question. “You make them nervous.”
“I do, don’t I?” he says with the masochist smile. It brings him great joy that he can evoke so much fear.
“You’ve given them much reason to fear and respect you,” I say, smiling. I consider sliding into his lap for a moment, but the time for that game is past. I need the King to leave. He needs to finish his game, and once he does, I will tell him that I know I am not Sevan. Then, he will leave.
So, I can’t toy with him any longer.
“Fear is a strong motivator,” he says as he swings my hands back and forth just once. And I know his hope must be diminishing when the lust does not gather in his eyes. “Fear deepens loyalty. I think you’ve already learned this.”
I have. I used it once when I made Samuel feed off of me until he nearly killed me when he messed up with a human woman. And I’ve used it multiple times since.
I nod.
“You want to get the games over with, you say,” Cyrus says as he lets my hands go and stands from the chair. “Then, let’s wrap this up tonight. We’ll finish at midnight.”
“Great,” I say with a little smile. “Is there anything I can do to help prepare?”
He offers another smile, and I know I’ve made a mistake when I see the look in his eyes. “Oh no, my dear. I will take care of everything.”
“AND YOU HAVE NO IDEA what he’s got planned?” Samuel asks as I fire the arrow into the target across the ballroom. It hits dead center of the bull’s eye.
“Nope,” I reply as I take the next arrow Danny offers me. “But you can be sure it will be bloody.”
“Seems to be his favorite kind of sport,” Danny observes.
“He knew my dad wasn’t going to survive that game,” Samuel says, shaking his head. “He just wanted someone to bleed.”
“Keep it down,” I whisper as I fire another shot. “You don’t need to go pissing him off. Unless you want it to be your blood he sheds tonight.”
Samuel grunts something, but our conversation is cut off when the front doors burst open.
Anna throws a man to the ground in the foyer, quickly followed by Lexington with his own prisoner. He walks her forward with a stake pressed to her back.
Because their eyes glow bright yellow, their fangs exposed, their expressions livid and ready for a fight.
“They were at the fence line. They set off the flood lights,” Anna says, pressing her booted foot into the man’s chest. He hisses at her. Anna whips out a blade and nails his wrist to the floor. Blood seeps out as he rages in a howl. “They were spying.”
I dart to the foyer, followed immediately by Danny and Samuel. I walk up to the woman, because she’s not incoherent with pain. Her eyes burn into mine—in defiance, in hatred. And there, branded into the back of her hand, is the snake eating its own tail.
“Who are you working for?” I ask, not looking intimidated one bit. “Who created you?”
The woman cackles in a laugh, throwing her head back. She goes on and on like a mad woman, totally out of her mind. Finally, she takes a gasping breath, once again looking down to me. “You think I would tell you, even if I could tell you?”
So, she’s been commanded not to reveal her sire’s identity. She literally cannot tell me.
“Who’s your main target?” I ask, taking a step toward her, entering her personal space. “Is it me? The King? All of us?”
“You know the twenty questions is pointless.” I turn to find Danielle join our growing crowd. “They can’t tell you anything.”
“Then, what good are they?” Lexington says, and one second later, he drives the stake into the woman’s heart. He lets her body collapse to the ground in a heap, and her skin grows ashen.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Anna growls at him. “That was not your call to make.”
“She obviously wasn’t going to have any useful information, so what good was the waste of breath?” he asks, clearly annoyed. He turns and stalks back out the door. “You’re welcome for the help, by the way.” He flips us all the bird before he slams th
e front door closed behind him.
“Hot head,” Anna says, shaking her head.
Danielle shifts beside me and I turn to see the horrified look on her face. She studies the Bitten woman, now dead, with fear and moisture pooling in her eyes. She shakes her head. Her gaze darts up to Anna and I. Once more, she shakes her head in disbelief before she stalks down the hall.
“I wouldn’t have preferred Lex do it that way,” Anna says as she pulls another blade. She drives it through the man’s chest and he immediately goes still. “But he was right. They’re useless if they don’t tell us anything. They’re only a threat if we let them live.”
“Just…clean up the mess,” I say as I walk away.
THE CLOCK TICKS DOWN. AT ten o’clock, Rath declares dinner served. I still have no idea who’s cooking the food. We eat, conversations naturally flowing around the table. Now that the House and Court members have had three weeks to get to know each other, it is no longer silent. Nial laughs with Serge. Lillian and Morticia chat. Even Cameron is getting Sebastian to crack a smile.
Eleven o’clock.
Eleven thirty.
At twenty minutes to midnight, everyone begins drifting away from the table. Rath begins clearing the dishes. My heart starts to race.
“You look nervous, my dear,” Cyrus whispers in my ear as we stand from the table. I look back to see the expected smile on his lips.
“Just anticipation,” I respond with my own attempt.
“Turn around,” he says. I’m nervous with trepidation at his request, but I do it. I spin, turning my back on Cyrus. He drapes a piece of cloth in front of me, and my heart races all the faster as he ties it around my eyes, blindfolding me. “Do not worry.”
But I do. Because there is always cause to worry in a game.
“Come,” he instructs. He takes my hand in his and very carefully leads me into the ballroom. And I realize just how enhanced my senses are. I hear the echo every sound makes, can sense objects in the way. It’s incredible, being able to see without eyes. Not details, but shapes and distances.