Desire the Night

by Amanda Ashley

  “ARE YOU GOING TO FEED ON ME TONIGHT?”

  “It depends.”

  “On what?”

  “On you.” His gaze moved over her, lingering on her lips, the swell of her breasts beneath the white silk shirt. “I’ll leave you alone tonight in exchange for one kiss, freely given.”

  “A kiss?” Was he kidding? How could he think about kissing at a time like this?

  Gideon nodded. It had been a long time since he’d had a woman. He could have compelled those the witch brought him. He could have taken them by force. Neither option appealed to him. Nor had any of the women. But this one … there was something about her that intrigued him like no other. “So, what do you say?”

  She eyed him warily. “How do I know you’ll stop with a kiss?”

  He shrugged. “I guess you’ll just have to trust me …”

  Other titles available by Amanda Ashley

  A WHISPER OF ETERNITY

  AFTER SUNDOWN

  DEAD PERFECT

  DEAD SEXY

  DESIRE AFTER DARK

  NIGHT’S KISS

  NIGHT’S MASTER

  NIGHT’S PLEASURE

  NIGHT’S TOUCH

  IMMORTAL SINS

  EVERLASTING KISS

  EVERLASTING DESIRE

  BOUND BY NIGHT

  BOUND BY BLOOD

  HIS DARK EMBRACE

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  Desire The Night

  AMANDA ASHLEY

  ZEBRA BOOKS

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  “ARE YOU GOING TO FEED ON ME TONIGHT?”

  Other titles available by Amanda Ashley

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Copyright Page

  To my critique group—

  Carol Amato, Molly Dillon,

  Judith McAllister,

  and

  Mart Shaughnessy.

  I couldn’t do it without you.

  Prologue

  Gideon Marquet stared into the darkness, his limbs aching from the weight of the heavy silver chains that shackled his ankles to the thick cement wall behind him. His body felt like it was burning from the inside out, causing his veins to shrink, while his skin grew painfully tight with the need for sustenance.

  So long since he had fed.

  So long since his thirst had been satisfied.

  His eyes narrowed as a tall woman appeared in the basement. Clad in a shimmering white robe trimmed in white fur, she looked like an angel when, in truth, she was anything but.

  The hem of her velvet robe made a soft, swishing noise as she drew closer, then knelt outside the cell. Verah.

  Gideon groaned inwardly as she picked up the slender, silver-bladed dagger that rested beside a golden jewel-encrusted goblet on a low wooden table. His body tensed as she began to chant, her voice soft, almost hypnotic. He winced as she reached between the bars and dragged the blade across his right thigh. Lifting the goblet, she held it under the wound to collect the dark red blood that leaked from the long, shallow gash. When the goblet was half-full, she made a similar cut in his left thigh, chanting all the while. When the cup was full, she left the cellar.

  She returned a short time later.

  Gideon sat up a little straighter, his fangs extending as the cell door opened and a woman clad in a wrinkled brown dress was pushed inside. She fell to the floor, crying out as she scraped her knees on the cold cement. His hands clenched as the warm, sweet coppery scent of her blood filled his nostrils.

  Blind with panic, the woman scrambled to her feet and ran to the iron-barred door.

  “Please!” she cried, her hands fisting around the bars. “Let me out! Please, oh, please, let me out of here!”

  But her frantic plea fell on deaf ears.

  His prey sobbed hysterically as Verah turned and left the basement.

  With her only hope gone, the woman darted to a far corner of the cell, her back pressed against the bars, her arms wrapped tightly around her waist. Tears flooded her cheeks as she murmured, “Please, don’t.”

  But all he heard was the frantic beating of her heart, the whisper-soft sound of the blood flowing through her veins.

  “Please.” She fell to her knees, hands raised in supplication.

  But that wouldn’t save her.

  Nothing could save her now.

  It was feeding time.

  * * *

  Chapter 1

  Gideon stirred, then awoke with an oath on his lips. Another day lost in oblivion, another night in hell. If he could have ended his own existence, he would gladly have done so long ago.

  Sitting up, he cursed the witch who had captured him, the enchantment that had blinded him to her true identity, his insatiable lust for blood, the heavy silver chains that rendered him powerless.

  Damn.

  He glanced at the dark-haired woman curled up on the floor beside him. Her breathing was shallow and erratic, her hair and clothing disheveled. How many women had he killed since this nightmare began? He tried to resist the siren call of their blood, but in the end, no matter how he tried to fight it, he always surrendered to the hunger that burned through him, relentless, impossible to ignore. He felt a twinge of regret for this, his latest victim. She was middle-aged, married with four children, and doomed to die by his hand.

  He clenched his fists as remorse gnawed at him. Regret had become his constant companion, along with an intense hatred for the witch who kept him in captivity, who bled him and starved him to the point of death, until whatever scrap of humanity or mercy remained within him was erased by a hunger too excruciating to deny.

  The woman stirred, her eyes growing wide with fear when she saw him staring down at her.

  “No, please.” She scooted away from him, but there was nowhere for her to go, nowhere to hide.

  No escape for either of them.

  Resting his head against the wall behind him, Gideon closed his eyes, his thoughts drifting back in time, back to the night he met Verah… .

  He had gone into the city in search of prey, but all thought of feeding had vanished when he entered a seedy nightclub and saw a woman dancing in the middle of a crowd of cheering men. She had been beautiful beyond compare, her movements as sinuous as silk as she dipped and swayed to the pulsing beat of the music. Like every other man in the place, Gideon had been caught in her spell, mesmerized by the veiled promise lurking in the depths of her sea-green eyes.

  When she s
miled at him, he was lost.

  When she invited him to her house, he had no thought to refuse.

  When he asked her name, she laughed softly, then took him by the hand and led him out of the tavern and down a narrow winding road that led to a large two-story house. Once inside, she locked the door with a flourish, then led him into her bedroom where she had indulged his every fantasy.

  When he awoke the next night, he was in chains, the beautiful woman was gone, and an emaciated, gray-haired hag was collecting his blood in a jewel-encrusted gold cup. He had been imprisoned in this wretched cage ever since, held captive by strong silver chains that drained his strength and weakened his preternatural powers.

  It hadn’t taken him long to figure out what was going on. The woman who had beguiled him was a witch who had cloaked her ugliness in the guise of a young siren. She had been searching the world over for a vampire and Gideon had walked blindly into her trap. With his blood, Verah had regained her youth and beauty and now she sold his blood to anyone who could pay the price. Some paid in cash, some in gold, and some in humankind, hence the females that were brought to him from time to time.

  Gideon glanced at the woman cowering beside him. When Verah had first brought her to him, she had been robust, her blue eyes bright, her fair skin luminous. Now, she was pale, her eyes sunken and shadowed with fear, her hair stringy and unkempt. The witch brought the woman water once a day, but no food. Why waste sustenance on one who was doomed?

  Gideon swore softly. He didn’t want to hurt the woman or deprive her children of their mother, but sooner or later the urge to feed would become uncontrollable, the pain of resisting excruciating. Even now, the frightened pounding of her heart stirred his instinct to hunt. The scent of her blood flowed warm and red in her veins, promising instant relief from the agony that engulfed him.

  Sooner or later, he would have to feed, and when he did, he would take it all. Perhaps it would have been more merciful to have killed the woman the first night Verah had brought her to him instead of letting her linger, her dread growing as she waited for him to strike.

  In an effort to resist the inevitable, he rested his head on his bent knees and closed his eyes. How long had he been imprisoned in this place? A year? Two? He had lost track of the time. There were no windows in the cellar, no way of knowing whether it was summer or winter. The floor beneath him was always cold.

  He closed his mind to the woman sobbing beside him. Women. They had ever been the cause of his troubles, from the mother who had abandoned him when he was thirteen to the treacherous female who had stolen his mortal life and turned him into a monster.

  Verah was simply another in a long line of women he had foolishly trusted. Morbidly, he considered the fact that she would most likely be the last.

  A deep breath carried the scent of the poor doomed creature who shared his prison. She was destined to die, whether by his hand or Verah’s.

  He groaned softly as pain clawed at his vitals. He had spent the last five nights resisting the urge to feed on the woman. Each evening, the agony inside him burned hotter, brighter, like a fire that could not be quenched. His fangs ached, his veins were shriveling, starved for nourishment, for relief. Relief that lay curled up in a tight ball on the far side of the cell. He could feel her watching him surreptitiously, taste her fear as she waited for him to sink his fangs into her throat.

  The hunger growling inside urged him to take her, to put an end to the physical torment that racked his body and the mental anguish that tormented the woman.

  Muttering, “Forgive me,” he dragged her into his embrace and put both of them out of their misery.

  * * *

  Chapter 2

  Kiya Alissano spoke softly to the frightened dog quivering on the examination table. The Rottweiler stilled immediately, its liquid brown eyes suddenly filled with trust instead of fear.

  “I don’t know how you do it, Kay,” Wanda Sandusky said. “I tried to calm that monster down for ten minutes with no success. One word from you, and voilà! She’s practically asleep.”

  “I guess I just have a way with animals,” Kay said, scratching the dog’s head. And it was true. From the time she had been a little girl, animals had trusted her—dogs, cats, birds, deer, squirrels, horses, even snakes.They never ran from her, never showed any fear which, all things considered, was pretty strange. It was a definite advantage in her job, though.

  “A way? Girl, it’s more like magic.” Wanda glanced at her watch. “Since you don’t need any help in here, I’m going to lunch. I told my mom I’d meet her over at the mall around noon if I could get away.”

  Kay nodded. Wanda wasn’t only a co-worker, but her best friend. “Bring me back a Coke, will you?”

  “Sure thing,” Wanda called over her shoulder as she closed the door behind her.

  Kay stared after her friend, wishing she and her mother shared the kind of relationship that Wanda and her mother had. Wanda went out to lunch with her mother every week or so. They went shopping together and texted back and forth and did a dozen other fun things. Of course, it wasn’t Dorothy’s fault that she and Kay didn’t do fun things together. Her father rarely let her mother leave the compound. It still amazed Kay that he had agreed to let her go away for a year.

  She looked up when Dr. Saltzman entered the examination room a few moments later. He was a tall, good-looking man with a plump, red-haired wife and six red-headed kids.

  He shook his head when he saw the Rot lying quietly on the table.

  “I see you’ve worked your Indian magic again,” he said, pulling on a pair of gloves. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  Kay continued stroking the dog’s head, occasionally whispering to the animal in Lakota, while the vet performed his examination. The Rottweiler had been hit by a car and had been brought in bleeding from several cuts. One leg and several ribs were broken. The Rot had been reasonably calm until they carried it into the examination room and then it had bared its teeth, growling and snapping at anyone who came close until Kay entered the room.

  “We’ll need to sedate her to set that leg and bind up her ribs,” the vet said, preparing a shot to anesthetize the dog. “Keep talking to her.”

  Kay nodded. “There, now,” she murmured, still stroking the Rot’s head. “Dr. Saltzman will have you fixed up in no time at all.”

  “So, what shall we do tonight?” Wanda asked as they left the office that evening. “Do you want to go to a movie?”

  “Not tonight,” Kay said. “I have something to do.”

  “A date?” Wanda asked, waggling her eyebrows.

  “No, nothing like that. How was lunch with your mom?”

  “Don’t try to change the subject,” Wanda admonished with a shake of her head. “It’s that monthly thing, isn’t it? You’re planning to take tomorrow off, aren’t you?” Wanda poked Kay lightly on the shoulder. “Sooner or later, I’m going to find out what you’re up to.”

  “Believe me, I wish I could tell you,” Kay confessed, digging her keys out of her handbag. “But I can’t. I’ll see you on Friday.”

  “All right, girlfriend.”

  Kay sighed as she unlocked the car and slid behind the wheel. She would love to tell Wanda why she had to take off one day a month, but it was never going to happen. She was bound by the law of the pack not to reveal their secrets, and the truth of what they were was the most tightly guarded secret of all. The penalty for disclosing it to humans was severe, and that applied to Kay, too. Being the daughter of the Shadow Pack’s Alpha wouldn’t grant her any special privileges or immunity if she violated pack laws.

  As far as the wolves were concerned, there was only one law—the law of the pack—and they all seemed perfectly happy to obey it. Why wasn’t she? Why couldn’t she obey without question? Conform to pack hierarchy without a qualm? Be content to do as she was told and live within the pack boundaries? Why couldn’t she be who her father wanted her to be? Was it so wrong to want to make her own decisions
, decide where she wanted to live, who she wanted to marry?

  At home, she broiled a chicken for dinner and washed it down with a glass of wine, hoping the chardonnay would calm her nerves. Too restless to sit still, she dusted and vacuumed, cleaned the oven, scrubbed the floor. And all the while, she could feel the wolf prowling inside her, waiting impatiently to get out.

  In the morning, she called Dr. Saltzman and told him she needed the day off, then she ate a quick breakfast, packed an overnight bag, and drove to her favorite haunt in the sacred Paha Sapa, the Black Hills of South Dakota.

  Ancient tribal elders Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and Red Cloud had walked these hills and valleys in days long gone. They had sought visions on the tops of the mountains, hunted the buffalo on the plains, defeated Custer in a battle still discussed by red man and white alike. Sitting Bull had called the tribes together in a last, desperate attempt to defeat the whites so they could keep the Hills and protect their way of life. She often wondered what life would have been like if the Indians had won their fight.

  The Hills were a magical place, filled with beauty and mystery, a vast expanse of pine-covered mountains with trees that were so dark a green that they looked black from a distance. The perfect spot for her monthly retreat from the world.

  Wrapped in a fluffy yellow towel, Kay stood in a lush valley deep in the heart of the Black Hills watching the moon rise. It called to her, causing her whole body to quiver in anticipation.

  The transformation came in a flood of physical sensations—the realigning of bones and muscle, the change in temperature as a thick pelt sprouted from her skin, the sudden acuity in her senses, the feel of the earth beneath the sensitive pads of her feet.

  Lifting her head, she howled at the moon. How often had she wished she could transform more than once a month, that she could experience the wonder and freedom of this moment whenever she desired? She had often dreamed of being an Alpha, like her father, able to transform at will, to have his unlimited power and authority, to give orders instead of having to take them. But there was no use in wishing for what could never be.