by Cynthia Eden
“Mina who?” Rayce wanted to know.
“Got a pic of her?” Julian asked at the same time.
Garrick’s skin couldn’t get much redder. Beside him, Agent Lang glanced around nervously while the woman—she kept glaring at them all.
“Of course, he has a picture,” Luke announced, after a beat as the tension mounted. “Garrick keeps it in his inner coat pocket. Right next to the heart she wanted him to cut out.”
Garrick surged forward.
Luke put his hand on the man’s chest. “You don’t want to do that.” He didn’t use any force, though he was sorely tempted to shove the man back. To toss him twenty feet. To throw the guy’s ass into the ocean. “I have cameras all over this island. And I’m sure the last thing your boss at the FBI wants is for you to suddenly appear on the evening news, starring in a video as you attempt to attack me.” He paused. “Attempt being the key word. Because that video would mostly show you getting your ass kicked.”
“Get your hand off me,” Garrick spat.
The female agent had circled around them, moving off the little path. Her hand went to her holster. The other agent, Lang, was still standing there, and sure looking as if he wished to be a million miles away.
Luke let his hand linger a moment longer, long enough to prove that he was moving it away from Garrick only because he wanted to do so.
“There are two ways to do this,” Garrick informed him as the agent’s hands went to his hips.
“Oh, tell me more…” Luke invited, sounding bored, because he was.
“You let me search your property. You and your guards stay out of my way. You let me get Mina James and my team will walk out of your life.”
Julian leaned forward. His hands moved languidly in the air, the movement imitating wings. “I think you mean fly out. ‘Cause you can’t walk on the water.”
Garrick sent him a killing look. “Option two,” he snapped.
“I can’t handle the suspense,” Luke said.
Garrick’s hands had fisted on his hips. “Option two is that we leave now…and we’re back in the hour with a full force of FBI agents and local law enforcement authorities. We tear your house apart, and we still find the woman. Only we take her and all three of you…” His index finger swept over the group. “And you’re charged with harboring a fugitive. All of you are locked up. No more private island. No more mansion. Just a new cell buddy and a pot to piss in as you wait for trial.”
Luke couldn’t help it. He tossed back his head and laughed. Oh, damn, but he hadn’t realized that Garrick would be amusing. It was just…
Adorable.
“I’m not fucking kidding,” Garrick snarled.
Luke couldn’t contain his laughter.
Garrick shook his head. His fingers were hovering so close to his holster.
It will take more than tranqs to stop me.
Luke sucked in a deep breath, then another. “Sorry,” he finally managed. “That was just…so cute. That you think I don’t have a dozen of the highest priced lawyers in the world at my beck and call, just waiting to deal with any shit that comes my way. Or…” Another chuckle escaped. “That you don’t think half the senators in D.C. owe me favors—that I don’t have pull at the FBI or every other government agency.”
For just an instant, worry flashed on Garrick’s face.
Luke had no more laughter. He did have a cold promise to offer. “You’re playing out of your league with me. I’m warning you about that now. Tread carefully or you will get burned.”
“Did you just threaten a federal agent?” Garrick demanded.
Luke shrugged. “Take my words however you will…”
Garrick motioned toward the other two agents. “We are searching this island. You can’t stop us, we—”
“I’ll go with you on that search,” Luke announced. “I’ll personally escort you around my home. Then you and your friends will leave—minus this mysterious Mina James because she isn’t in my home—and you will never show your face here again. If you do, I’ll be calling my lawyers and all of those friendly senators I mentioned.”
Garrick was seething. “Then get the hell on with that escort.”
Luke rubbed his chin. “You know, it wouldn’t kill you to use some magic words. Have you ever heard of please?”
Oh, if looks could kill…
“What about thank you?” Julian wanted to know. “That’s bloody magical, too.”
Disgust flashed in Garrick’s eyes. “You guys think this is a joke, don’t you? People are dying, and that’s no laughing matter. Mina James is a monster. She will be stopped and anyone helping her…I will take them down, too.”
Luke and Julian shared a quick look. “Well, I guess we’ve been warned. Good thing we aren’t helping that woman, eh?” Then Luke turned his back on Garrick. “Let’s get this show on the road. I have plans for the night.”
Plans that involved a woman who very much wasn’t a monster. And Luke should know. After all…
I’m the baddest monster of them all.
***
The helicopter slowly lifted into the air, sending out bursts of wind as it rose. Luke Thorne stood down there, a tight smile on his face, as he watched the chopper.
“I hate that man,” Garrick announced, voice biting. He had his headset in place and a microphone was near his mouth.
Madeline shot him a quick frown. “It was a thorough search. She wasn’t there.”
“She’s there.” He knew it. “He just hid her.” But that was okay. Because while he’d been escorted around by Luke, he’d given Thomas Lang a few orders, too. He turned, meeting the other agent’s dark stare. “Did you plant the devices?”
Lovely little listening devices that would be ever so helpful to him. It was a good thing Uncle Sam had made some nearly microscopic tech.
“In several rooms at the main house,” Lang told him. The guy had been nervous as all hell about that plan. He’d started sweating the minute they got off the chopper. “We’ll be able to hear plenty.”
And as soon as he heard Mina’s voice…
He looked down at the island, at Luke Thorne, still standing there, appearing arrogant. Cocky.
When I hear Mina, I’ll be back to take her from you.
“You think he’s under her control?” Madeline asked. “Because I’m not sure I buy it…a guy like that…I don’t think he’d be so easily manipulated.”
Garrick’s back teeth ground together. “And what? I was easy prey?”
Her lips parted. “I-I—”
“Mina is far more dangerous than she appears to be. She never used her powers on you or Lang, so you two don’t know what she’s capable of doing.” His chest seemed to burn. “But I do.” And I’ll have her back. “I do.”
He knew Mina far better than anyone ever could.
As for Luke Thorne…yes, he thought the bastard was under Mina’s spell. You’d better not touch her Thorne. She’s for me. Only me.
It was Mina’s fault. She’d made him this way. He knew the obsession he felt was dangerous but he couldn’t stop it.
She did this to me.
And he was going to make her pay.
***
“The sweaty guy left some listening devices,” Rayce announced as the chopper flew away. “Want me to destroy them?”
Luke pursed his lips and considered that. “How many? And where are they?”
“Saw him drop five of them. Bastard thought he was being sly.”
Luke was still staring at the chopper. “Nothing gets past a wolf.” Agent Lang’s mistake.
“Not much,” his friend conceded. “Not usually.”
But there was a note in the guy’s voice…worry? Luke’s brows furrowed as he turned to look at the shifter. “What is it?”
Rayce exhaled on a rough sigh. “You sure it’s safe to have her here? I mean…if they’re FBI, do you really want that kind of heat coming your way?”
Luke braced his legs. “You think I’m afraid
?”
“No!” An immediate denial. “I’ve never seen you be afraid of anyone or anything. That’s the problem. If this escalates…if it gets too big…the paranormals will be out, man. Is that what you want? No more hiding, no more secrets. Do you want the world to know that they’re living with monsters?”
He would have been happy if the monsters had come out long ago, but his brother had been the one to demand the secrecy. “Leo’s law,” he murmured.
The law that said Luke and his dark brethren had to stay in the shadows. That humans were supposed to be left alone.
A basic peace. Delicate.
Most days.
“Are you trying to break that law?” Rayce asked him.
Luke considered that question. His shoulders rolled back. “Maybe I’m just sick of all the rules.” So damn many. “Maybe I’ve decided that I’ll start taking what I want.”
Rayce glanced over at the waves as they battered the shore. “If that happens, a war will come.”
“So it’s been predicted.” For thousands of years. That one day, he and his brother would battle. Only one would survive.
One brother was of the light.
One was of the dark.
Life. Death.
“I’ll always be on your side.” Rayce was looking at Luke as he made that pledge. “I hope you know that. You saved me from…shit, from myself. From that beast that I was meant to be.”
Because Rayce wasn’t like other wolf shifters. He couldn’t live in a pack. His beast…it was just a little bit…wrong.
Too strong.
Too powerful.
Too dangerous.
It craves blood and death. A true beast. Rayce had been running wild, on the brink of hurting far too many innocents when Luke had found him. Rayce had been the first paranormal to stay in the cells that Luke had made on his island. The first, but far from the last.
“I have your back,” Rayce added. “Know that.”
Luke inclined his head. “Getting sentimental on me, are you?”
Rayce didn’t smile. “I’m worried about you.”
That was new.
Rayce pointed toward the house. “I don’t trust her. She’s doing something to you.”
Luke rather thought that she was. “Mina isn’t to be hurt. Not by you. Not by those human fools. Not even by my brother.” He wanted that understood. Luke walked past his friend, his shoulder brushing against Rayce.
“But what about you?”
He didn’t understand. Luke hesitated.
“What if you’re the biggest threat to her?”
Anger spiked in Luke. “I don’t intend to hurt her.”
Rayce put up his hands. “Easy.” The wind was hitting harder and dark clouds had rushed toward the island, seemingly from nowhere. “Sometimes, we don’t mean to do things. You think I meant to attack those people before you found me? That I meant to scar that human? I didn’t. Sometimes, we all lose control. You’re different around her. If anyone can make you lose the control I’ve always seen you hold so tightly, it’s her.”
Luke just stared back at him.
“What if that happens? What if she…sees who you really are?”
“She won’t.” He was just keeping her for a little while. Keeping something that he wanted. Someone.
“What if you try to hurt her?” Rayce had tensed his body, as if expecting a battle. “What then?”
It wasn’t something he wanted to think about, not ever. It won’t happen. “Then you stop me.” He drew in a long breath. “By any means necessary.”
Shock flashed on Rayce’s face. “No, you don’t mean—”
“She isn’t to be hurt.” He couldn’t stand that thought. “Not by anyone.” Then he turned and began walking toward the house.
Toward her.
“What about the listening devices?” Rayce called.
“Throw them into the fucking ocean,” Luke said. Though he wished he could see the look on Garrick’s face when the guy tried to listen in to a feed…
Did you think you would come to my house and trick me? Oh, the hell, no.
His steps quickened as he neared his home. As he got closer to Mina. For the first time in longer than he could recall, Luke was actually eager to see someone. He knew Mina would be afraid, and he didn’t want that.
He wanted her to look at him and smile.
To feel safe.
Crazy, of course, because no one was ever truly safe when he was near. That was part of his curse.
You weren’t supposed to feel safe in the dark.
***
Rayce watched as Luke disappeared into the mansion. He felt something right then…something he hadn’t experienced in a long time, not since the morning he’d woken up to find blood all around him.
The morning he’d nearly killed a human.
Fear.
“He isn’t thinking clearly,” Julian said.
He didn’t look to the right. He’d known that Julian was there. When it came to lurking, the panther was an expert.
“I think she’s gotten to him,” Julian added as he came closer. “When she talked to me before, I just—I had no control. I couldn’t stop myself. I was like a puppet on her bloody string.”
That didn’t make Rayce feel any better. Like him, Julian was one of the dark paranormals who’d wound up on Luke’s island because he was too dangerous to be anywhere else. For a time, they’d both been in those cells. Both been more beast than man.
Julian liked to be the panther too much. And his humanity? Sometimes, it slipped away from him. But after the hell he’d been through, well, Rayce wasn’t surprised. Julian had learned—very early on in life—that both humans and paranormals weren’t to be trusted. “So she’s really a siren?”
Just when he’d thought he’d heard it all…
“So it would seem,” Julian told him. They were side by side now. “And Luke is so blind with lust for her that he’ll bring hell to us all.”
Quite possibly but… “I’ll still be on his side.” Fighting, burning. Whatever came their way.
“Wolves, so fuckin’ loyal.” Julian’s smile was bitter. “If you were smart, you’d be finding Marcos, hopping on that boat, and getting away from here as fast as you can. Those FBI agents? They’re not going to give up. They’ll be back. Luke knows they’ll be back. He wants the battle. He loves shit like that. After all, chaos is his thing, right? He gets off on it.”
I think he gets off with her. But he knew better than to say those words. Luke didn’t like it when anyone said the wrong thing about his new pet.
Is that what we all are to him?
Sometimes, he wondered.
“I’m not getting on the boat.” Because if they were gearing up for battle, his wolf would want the blood. His head cocked. “Are you?”
But Julian just laughed, a sound that was laced with sadness. “I sold my soul to Lucien Thorne long ago. Made a deal that I won’t ever take back.”
“And what deal was that?”
Julian’s gaze turned distant. “I…hurt someone. Someone I made the mistake of caring about. She was going to die. I couldn’t let that happen.”
Oh, damn. “You didn’t—”
“The Lord of the Dark knows how to keep just about anyone alive.”
Rayce whistled.
“I owe him. So, no, there isn’t a boat ride in my future. I’m in this thing to the bitter end. Blood and battle and death and then…whatever is waiting.”
For a moment, Rayce considered Julian’s words. “Do you have regrets?”
“Only that I never fucked her.”
Surprised laughter came from Rayce, but Julian’s gaze had gone distant. “She hates me now,” Julian admitted. “Rightly so, I suppose, but my regret, oh hell yes, mate, it’s that I never made love to her. Seems a crying shame to die without that pleasure.”
Rayce clapped his hand over Julian’s shoulder. “You’re not dead yet.”
Julian seemed to absorb that for a mo
ment. “No, I don’t suppose I am.”
“From what you said, neither is she.”
But Julian’s jaw tightened. “Undead,” he muttered.
“Whatever.” He wasn’t touching that one. “All I’m saying is…there’s time. Maybe you can get the chance to cross that little item off your to-do list.”
Julian’s stare raked him. “Sometimes, you’re an arsehole.”
“Yeah, but I’m a right arsehole.” He smiled. “And I’ve got some bugs to take care of. See you later, cat.”
Rayce was whistling as he walked away.
Chapter Nine
The door to the Chamber of Horrors opened—well, that was the name that Mina had given to the room of cells, anyway. It swung open and she cowered against a wall. There really wasn’t any good place to hide, and she hoped that—
“What are you doing?” Luke demanded.
She opened her eyes. Yes, okay, fear had made her squeeze her eyes shut.
He stared at her with one raised brow. “Closing your eyes doesn’t make the bad things disappear, sweetheart.” He gestured toward himself. “Still here.”
He was there. Just…him. Not Garrick. Not any of the other FBI goons. “Where are they?” Her voice was a whisper.
“Flying away on a chopper—”
He didn’t get to say more because she’d run forward and launched herself at him. Mina threw her body into his and held on to him as tightly as she could. “Thank you.” Her heart was about to burst out of her chest. “Thank you!” She hugged him even harder. “I will find a way to repay you, I swear, I will. I will give you—”
But her words broke off.
Because she’d just tilted her head back and met his stare. Such a dark, deep stare. The kind of stare that, if a woman wasn’t careful, she just might get lost in.
“Don’t stop now,” Luke murmured. “Tell me more…just what will you give me?”
She couldn’t look away from him. “What do you want?”
His smile came, slow and seductive. A smile that made her feel warm on the inside. A smile that made her nipples tighten. A smile that made her need things she shouldn’t.
Her breath caught and she started to back away from him, but his hands lifted and curled around her, holding her to him. “What do I want?” His voice had deepened. “So many things.”