by Laken Cane
The cop on the left sighed. “We’re sorry to have bothered you.”
“It was Mrs. Watson, wasn’t it?” I asked. “I swear, that woman is a pain in my ass.”
“Not just yours,” the second cop said. He and his partner traded glances, shook their heads, and headed for the door.
“Well, thanks for checking,” I said, uncertainly.
Clayton followed them to the door, then shut it gently behind them. “You’ll have to move,” he said, all signs of his former softness and smile gone. “You can’t have neighbors. I’ll begin looking for a suitable place for you in Bay Town.”
I put my hands on my hips, then quickly lowered them when my wound began screaming at me. “Vampires are in the city. I need to live here.”
“You can hunt in the city,” he said, calmly. “You cannot live in it.”
“I can live wherever I want.” I gestured at the door. “Goodnight, Clayton.”
“I’m not leaving.” He walked to the sofa and sat down, crossed his legs, and picked up the remote.
“Oh,” I said, suddenly angry. “That’s right. You’ve been given orders by the tiny woman who owns you.” I didn’t even try to keep the contempt from my voice.
He looked up, slowly. His eyes were empty, but still, I took a quick step back. His expression didn’t change. “I will protect you until I’m pulled away. If that’s something you can’t accept, call Miriam.” He went back to the TV.
“Shit,” I whispered, and turned to leave the room. He could do whatever he liked. I’d get dressed and go out into the night to see if I could find a vampire or two to test Silverlight on.
At the thought, the excitement was back. My heart began to pound, my stomach tightened, and a slick sweat broke out on my face. Cold chills chased each other over my body, and when I lifted my hand, it was shaking.
My legs weakened, and I swayed as darkness descended. The floor rose up to meet me and the next thing I knew, Clayton was bending over me, patting my cheek—a little too hard—and calling my name.
“What happened to you?” he asked, as he leaned forward, slid his hands beneath me, then lifted me to his chest. He stood smoothly and carried me to the couch.
He smelled good, like vanilla and…cake. Why would a man smell like cake? I had no idea, but I liked it. My stomach growled.
“Put me down,” I told him.
“Answer my question.” He lowered me to the sofa. “The wound on your chest. Who gave it to you?”
“Silverlight,” I murmured.
He narrowed his eyes. “What did you say?”
“The sword I held,” I told him. “Its name is Silverlight. Amias stole it for me.” I gave a soft laugh, then stopped abruptly when pain shot through me.
“That’s impossible.” He dug his cell phone from his pocket without waiting for me to answer. “Where is it?”
I struggled to sit up and glared at him. “It’s mine.”
“I need to make a phone call. May I use your bathroom?” Blankly polite, no matter what.
I sank back against the pillows and nodded. I heard the bathroom door close before I remembered that Silverlight was in the bathroom. With Clayton.
There was nothing I could do about it now.
He needed privacy to make a call. He would have no reason to go rummaging through the bathroom cabinets. He’d never see the sword.
I fell back against the sofa cushions and waited impatiently for him to emerge from the bathroom. My stomach rolled, then stopped, then rolled again, as though it couldn’t make up its mind about whether it should dispose of its contents or not.
I wasn’t going hunting. I was in no shape to kill vampires, mystic badass sword or not. The excitement from the mere thought had made me pass out. All I’d do if I went out in this shape was get myself killed and my sword stolen.
Finally, I heard Clayton’s footsteps, and I gingerly swung my legs over the edge of the couch as I waited for his large body to darken my doorway.
But when he stepped into the room, he wasn’t alone. He held Silverlight in his fist, and he didn’t look like he was in any sort of hurry to let her go.
Chapter Ten
“Amias Sato was here,” he said, before I could open my mouth. “He was here, and he brought you Silverlight.”
“I told you he did.”
“I…” He shook his head, frowned, and looked at the sword, as though he still didn’t quite believe me, though he held the evidence in his hand. It sparked once when he squeezed it, and he shivered. “I didn’t believe it until I felt her. I didn’t think it was possible. And you tossed her into the bathroom. Do you have any idea what he’s given you?”
“Yeah, I do.” I pressed my hand to my wound and felt the sticky wetness beneath the thick robe. The wound was once again bleeding. I’d caused that when I’d passed out in the living room floor. “That blade tore into me like it was alive.”
“It is alive,” he murmured. “In ways you and I can’t really understand.”
“It attached to me,” I said. “It drank my blood like a vampire and now…” I shrugged.
“And now it belongs to you. It will fight with you. For you. He couldn’t have given you a better guardian.”
I nodded. “I was going to take it hunting tonight but after being stabbed in the chest I’ve had to rethink my plans.”
“Silverlight,” he said, slowly, as though trying to convince himself. “Did he say where he got it?”
“He said he stole it.”
He sighed. “I imagine he did.”
I held out my hand, something greedy and urgent inside me. “Give her to me.”
There was only a slight hesitation before he gave me the blade. “The scabbard,” he said. “Where is it? You need to sheath the weapon before you hurt yourself. I’ll tend your wound and then make something to eat.”
“I’m not your responsibility.” I stood, and wobbled only a little. “Stop fussing over me like a little old lady. If you’re staying here until Miriam tells you to go, then we’re going to need some ground rules.”
He stared over my head, carefully blank. He said nothing, just waited.
I gave up waiting for him to speak and continued. “Rule number one. Don’t bother me.”
He completely ignored my words. “Where’s the sheath?”
I growled, feeling slightly less weak and a lot less dizzy. “On my bed, damn you.”
He turned immediately and left the room, returning a couple of minutes later with the scabbard in his hand. He handed it to me. “Sheath the sword,” he said, quietly.
“Obviously you’re not good at following the rules,” I snapped. “It bothers me when you try to tell me what to do.”
“Of course,” he said.
I rolled my eyes. “What’s your story?”
He didn’t answer my question, and I wasn’t surprised.
“You’re a stubborn golem,” I said.
I’d almost forgotten that his blank eyes could sometimes hold a world of hate, but they were overflowing with it when he met my contrite stare.
I couldn’t look at it. I dropped my gaze to my hands. “I’m sorry, Clayton.”
Fear lay like metal on the back of my tongue, but not only fear. Shame, as well. I was not an asshole. I wasn’t. And I’d seen Clayton’s pain. I’d seen his humiliation at the hands of Miriam. I knew she held him against his will. I didn’t know how she did, but she did.
“Clayton.” I put my hand to my chest. “God, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that. I’m just…” I waved my hand, then flinched at the flare of pain. “I’m sorry.”
Then I swayed and he reached out to steady me. His grip was tentative, and the look on his face said he’d rather have been doing just about anything other than touching me.
“Ouch.” I tried to breathe through a fresh wave of pain. “This sword can be an asshole.”
He waited, saying nothing, until the pain passed—sort of—and I lowered myself gingerly to the sofa.
“Where are the pills Rhys gave you?” he asked.
I looked up at him, frowning at the tight anger in his voice. “Nightstand drawer.”
“I’ll get them and the first aid kit. Sheath the fucking sword.”
I stared after his retreating body, bemused. He was nothing like I’d thought. But then, I’d never been alone with him. Miriam was always with him, and when she was with him, he was just an insubstantial shadow at her back.
I looked at the beautiful but small sheath, then shrugged and slid the tip of the blade into the leather. “Get in there,” I muttered. “Before Clayton has a stroke.”
The sword began to shrink. It slid smoothly into the sheath, growing smaller as I pushed, crumbling in on itself, changing from a sword to a…knife.
“What?” I held the sheathed blade up and examined it. “What in the world are you?”
It was like a shifter. A sword shifter. And that was something I’d never heard of.
Objects didn’t shift. Swords didn’t shift.
Yet Silverlight had.
“What are you?” I asked, again, but the sword—the knife—remained silent and innocuous in its tiny leather bed. The blade was hidden but the hilt remained outside the case, and I caressed it, fascinated. It looked the same, only miniaturized.
The sheath’s loop would slide over my belt, and I could wear it at my side without raising any eyebrows. I squeezed it gently, then slipped it into the pocket of my robe.
A knock sounded on the door. A quiet, furtive knock. Miriam had arrived.
Perfect.
I sighed and padded to the door, miffed that Clayton had called her. She had no business there. I was not going to let her touch my sword. I was like a little kid who’d never been forced to share.
I opened the door, and barely had a second to realize it was not Miriam before a slight, hooded stranger shoved himself into the room and plunged his wet fingers inside my robe.
He fumbled my breast like a teenage virgin getting his first taste of love, smearing something thick and sticky and clingy on my sore flesh.
Maybe he was shocked at my injury, because he paused when his rough fingertips snagged on the torn edges of my wound. He pushed me deeper into the room, his hood falling back, and I got a glimpse of a deathly pale face shaped with starved valleys and sharp edges, and a slash of lips so red they appeared to be bleeding.
I opened my mouth to yell and when I did, he parted those lips, grabbed the back of my head, and slammed his mouth against mine.
Seconds. Since I’d opened the door to his attack, mere seconds had passed. He was fast like a vampire, but something about him was different. He wasn’t a vampire.
I felt the beginnings of something…awful. But before it could take hold, his mouth was ripped from mine, and Clayton was there. As I reeled back, my hand to my tingling mouth, Clayton threw the attacker into a wall so hard my entire apartment shook.
Despite his bone-crunching encounter with the wall, the attacker didn’t stay down. Clayton lunged, but the stranger rolled, jumped to his feet, and raced to the door with a dizzying speed.
Clayton started after him, but he made the mistake of turning to see to me first.
I threw myself at him.
My entire body shook with a desire so extreme it edged into pain. Even my wound screamed with pleasure. I had to be touched. I had to be. I had to have sex. I would have sex or I’d die.
I gasped as that pleasure shot through me. My stomach tightened, and I clenched my thighs against the immediate response between my legs.
My robe was in the way, so I ripped it off. I reached up to touch his face, rubbing my breasts against the fabric of his shirt. “Please,” I whispered. “Clayton.”
A button from his shirt caught on my gaping wound and I lost my breath, whether from ecstasy or agony I couldn’t tell.
I wanted him to press his lips against the wound and lick, suck, and kiss it, to take a nipple into his mouth, to swirl his tongue around it, to throw me to the floor and shove himself into me, hard.
I wanted it more than I’d ever imagined wanting anything in my life.
Shock flared in his eyes as he stood there before me, his body stiff and unmoving as I grasped his face and pulled him to me.
“Clayton,” I whispered. “What’s happening?”
I had no idea why my body was reacting so strongly, but it was beyond my power to stop it. Part of me knew I didn’t want to do what I was doing, but it was as though something else—someone else—had control of my body. My desires.
He shoved himself away from me so violently he slammed into the coffee table, fell over it, and then jumped to his feet, his stare horrified. “What have you done?”
My entire body throbbing with lust, I stalked him. “I don’t know,” I murmured. “I don’t know.”
He held his palms up to ward me off. “Stop.”
“I can’t,” I said, matter-of-factly, but my voice was thick with horror. “Clayton. I can’t.” And I reached for him.
He glanced down at my chest, at my glistening, slick skin. “The Foam of Aphrodite,” he murmured. “What have you done?”
“I didn’t do anything. But I need you to…” I gestured at my naked body as the raw, throbbing power of lust rolled through me. “Do something. Please. Please. I can’t stand it.”
It didn’t lessen, that desire. It grew.
It devoured me.
I launched myself at him as part of me stood back and watched in humiliated horror. He caught me, his arms reflexively closing around my squirming body, and I wrapped my arms and legs around him with a strength I shouldn’t have had.
I humped him like a misbehaving dog, trying to relieve some of the horrendous pressure throbbing and building and screaming between my thighs. I could not help it.
I could not.
I inhaled his scent and caught nothing but man, nothing but heat, and pulled it deep into my lungs. Then I shoved my mouth against the side of his neck, and bit him. I needed to devour him. To smell him, taste him, feel him.
I saw my control like a tiny bright star in the dark of my mind, and I could have reached out to grab it, I could have. But at the last minute, I turned away. I didn’t want the control. I wanted Clayton.
There was nothing but raw, throbbing need.
“I can’t,” he murmured, his voice hoarse, strained, and raw. “She won’t allow it, Trinity.”
That was the first time he’d said my name. I hadn’t felt like he really saw me until he said my name. I pulled my mouth away from his neck. “I don’t care,” I murmured, and slid my lips across his.
Lust surged and jumped from my mouth to his—I could feel it sparking between us like electricity, like fire.
He groaned into my mouth. He tightened his fingers on my thighs, pulling me suddenly and violently closer, and I climaxed right then and there, squirming against his abdomen, crying out, lost.
I was aware, vaguely, when my door crashed against the wall and someone sped into the room. I was aware, but I was too consumed by my need to care.
But when my unwelcome visitor grabbed me by the back of my neck and tore me from Clayton’s arms, I suddenly cared very, very much.
I landed on the floor almost hard enough to shake the overwhelming lust from my body, and Clayton and the intruder collided.
Angus.
Son of a bitch.
I stared up at them, a little more lucid, and then scooted back in a hurry when they began to fight. I was warped. I knew I was depraved, because the sounds of grunts and pain and hard fists slamming against flesh, of bones crunching and furniture breaking…it was like music, beautiful and exciting, and the sharp, acrid scent of blood mixing with the unmistakable scent of sex made me want to lie back, open my legs, and beg both men to end my suffering.
But then I caught a quick movement from my peripheral vision and glanced toward the doorway, and I saw Mrs. Watson peering around the doorframe, her eyes wide and a broom in her white-knuckle grip.
“Oh, shit,” I whispered.
And even as she darted a quick look my way and then disappeared—to call the police again, I had no doubt—I knew Clayton was right.
I was most definitely going to have to move.
And I was going to need a sturdier door.
Chapter Eleven
I regained some control, finally, and scrambled for my robe. I put it on and tied the belt a little too tightly, and in seconds, the cloth was bright with fresh blood. I wasn’t sure, truthfully, that I’d survive the night. I kept losing blood and I didn’t have an endless supply.
Still, a bleeding wound was preferable to the screaming lust that had consumed me. I wasn’t embarrassed, not yet. That would come later.
Miriam arrived. She swept past me, her face tight with cold anger, and strode to the fighting men.
“Stop,” she said, her voice ringing with command.
Clayton stopped immediately. His fists fell to his sides and he stiffened, unable to even defend himself.
But Angus was not controlled by any magical compulsion to obey Miriam, and he took advantage of Clayton’s vulnerability by delivering a punch to the other man’s chin, followed by a devastating blow to his temple.
Clayton dropped like a stone and Angus backed up, wiped blood from his own gushing nose, and glared down at Miriam. “I should fucking kill him,” he roared.
Miriam ignored him. All her concentration was on Clayton. She kicked him in the face, hard.
“Get up,” she told him.
“He’s unconscious,” I said, aghast. “Angus sucker punched him.” I sank down to the floor beside him and stared up at her. “He may be dying!”
She curled her lip. “He’s not dying, you silly girl. He can’t die. He just needs me to command him to rise.” She grinned, but it was the scariest grin I’d ever seen. “Clayton,” she sang, causing me to jump. “Get up. Get up!”
His body twitched.
Miriam leaned forward. “Get up!” She pulled back her foot, clad in a black, pointed toe stiletto, and began kicking him in the ribs.
Kicking him. In the ribs.
I gaped at her. “Stop it, Miriam. Stop!”