by Donya Lynne
All the King’s Men
Book Four
Rebel Obsession
AKM Rebel Obsession
Published by Phoenix Press
Copyright 2012 by Donya Lynne
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher or author. Requests for permission to copy part of this work for use in an educational environment may be directed to the author.
This book is a work of fiction. References to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or persons or locales, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Cover Art: Reese Dante http://www.reesedante.com
Contents
Dedication
Acknowledgements
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
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Epilogue
About the Author
Books by Donya Lynne
Connect With Donya Lynne
Dedication
To you. You’re a tough one. I didn’t think we could make readers like you, but you proved me wrong.
Acknowledgements
First, a special acknowledgement goes to Zach Tesar, my cover model, and Joem Bayawa Photography in Chicago. Joem took the fabulous shot of Zach that appears on the cover of Rebel Obsession. Both Zach and Joem are talented, wonderful people I’ve gotten to know through the course of writing Rebel, and I am so thankful they granted me permission to use Zach’s picture. He made the perfect Io, and the photo represented Io’s personality impeccably. I hope we get to work together again on another project. Many blessings to both of you.
Thank you to all who have joined me on this journey. Each book brings new readers, and I’m grateful for each and every one. I want to issue a special shout-out to my fans in Italy who continue to push for an Italian publisher to print these books in Italian. I hope you’ll be pleased to learn that I’m trying to learn Italian so I can better speak to all of you.
To my beta readers goes my gratitude in helping me to make these books better than even I thought they could be. The feedback you gave me for Rebel helped me to find Miriam’s voice, and guided me to make the story and characters stronger. I love the discussions I have with each of you. You truly are what make these stories as good as they are.
And finally, thank you to Laura, my editor, and Carla, my assistant, for keeping me on course and finding new ways to reach new readers.
CHAPTER ONE
“Hi, my name is Io, and I’m a cobalt addict. Welcome to our first meeting.”
Six new faces sat around Io in a circle. One particularly scrawny male squinted and blinked as if his eyes hurt.
“Is everyone comfortable?” Io gestured toward the light dimmer. Cobalt detox was hell on the eyes. “Should I turn down the lights?” He nodded for effect, receiving a couple of polite nods in return.
He had a shy bunch this time around.
The meeting room inside the AKM facility was small, and in a jiffy Io had dimmed the lights and was back with the group. Each of them wore a similar visage, all in various states of shame. Io had seen faces like theirs over and over in these meetings. Hell, he had been one of those faces.
A year ago, he had dragged himself into his commander’s office, head bowed, disgusted with himself. Tristan, I need help. Four simple words, but Io had never found it more difficult to speak than he had in Tristan’s office that day.
When had he ever needed help? When had he ever fallen so low he couldn’t pull his own ass back up? Talk about a disgrace.
Had it really been only a year ago that he had confessed he was an addict and admitted himself into the drug treatment program? Now he served as one of AKM’s drug counselors, leading a group twice a week to help other recovering addicts as they fought through withdrawal worse than anything humans could imagine.
Tonight was the first meeting for this group. These six vampires were fresh out of a month-long detox, but they still had a long journey before they could consider themselves recovered and in remission, because cobalt wasn’t just an addiction. It was an affliction.
“I’m an enforcer here at AKM, but obviously, not even enforcers are immune to cobalt.” He held out his arms, presenting himself.
For recovering addicts, hearing his tale gave them hope and made them feel less ashamed. If an enforcer, whose job it was to battle the drecks who manufactured and sold cobalt—or blue as some called it—could become addicted to the drug, then maybe they weren’t the total losers they thought they were. The sentiment was painted all over their faces, just as it was over every face that passed through the door to participate in one of these sessions. Each one of them carried an incredible amount of humiliation and guilt for being an addict, and it was Io’s job to show them they didn’t have to shoulder that burden. Not anymore. As a member of AKM’s rehab team, he was committed to making sure as few people as possible went through what he had. If only he could get someone higher up to listen to his ideas to proactively seek out the true origins of the drug.
AKM stood for All the King’s Men, an agency set up to police the drecks and maintain the tenuous truce established between the two races centuries before. Drecks historically resented the strength and stronger genes of the vampires, which had led to several wars as they tried to rise up and overtake the vampires. This was why Io didn’t trust for one second that the drecks were blithely sitting by, not trying to find a way to rise up against them again. Cobalt gave them the perfect means to do so.
Io couldn’t deny the irony. This was the king’s agency, set up after the last truce had been agreed upon so that the king could keep an eye on the drecks. Rightfully so, he didn’t trust them and feared they would att
empt another uprising, despite the peace agreement. And yet, King Bain refused to see the threat cobalt presented, even when the danger and evidence were right under his nose, hitting him at home.
Io’s mind flashed to Princess Miriam. Two weeks ago, she had been brought in to AKM, suffering from an overdose. Her first, or so the report had said, but who really knew? He hadn’t known she was the king’s daughter. Not at first. Not until later, after she had already burned a place in his heart, had he found out that the most beautiful female he’d ever seen was the one female he could never have. Never touch. Never see again. The short time they’d spent together was all they would ever get unless he found a way to steal time with her again. Fat chance of that happening with all the rules the king had instituted to keep Miriam sheltered.
What was she doing now? Was she keeping clean? Most likely she was still using, so it was only a matter of time before they brought her back into AKM from another overdose. Io frowned and pressed his teeth together, because the thought of Miriam coming back under such circumstances shouldn’t have given him hope the way it did.
But Miriam overdosing again was Io’s only hope of seeing her again, especially since her father had refused to admit her for treatment, which Io didn’t understand. King Bain’s daughter was on a fast track to death by cobalt. Why wouldn’t he admit her to the treatment program?
It wasn’t like her overdose and drug use were big secrets anymore. Rumors of Princess Miriam’s overdose and subsequent drug-induced forays in the public eye had been splashed all over the Internet in the past two weeks.
But his hands were tied. He had been commanded never to attempt contact with her again. Even when he had approached Tristan with his concerns over her well-being, Tristan had told him that Miriam wasn’t his problem and that her condition was to remain a private affair of the royal family. Io had left Tristan’s office feeling helpless, relegated to see her picture only on the gossip sites littering the Internet. And he was sure that pleased the king to no end, being that he had worked so hard to keep Miriam’s identity and reputation protected since she had been born.
He smiled weakly at the six sets of eyes staring at him. He hadn’t said anything for nearly a minute. Nothing like making them feel more uncomfortable than they already did. Bonehead. He needed to get his mind back in the room and out of the Miriam-induced clouds.
“Sorry, I lost my train of thought for a second there.” He paced to the side and cleared his throat, pushing Miriam to the back of his mind as best as he could before continuing. “For me, using cobalt was about taking a risk.” He steepled his fingers in front of his torso. “It was about rebelling against society, as well as myself.” He walked slowly around the circle, touching the shoulders of each vampire as he passed, connecting with the members of his group. “See, I’m a gambler. I like to give life a run for its money. To me, life isn’t worth living if you don’t take chances once in a while. And if you never experience the bad, how can you appreciate the good?” He stopped and shrugged. “Think of me as the human who rides a motorcycle without a helmet and his mouth wide open. You know, so I can swallow as many bugs as possible.”
As he had hoped, that got a few yucks and a couple of quiet chuckles, which was good. Io needed them to open up. He needed them to feel safe here, and smiles and feedback were signs they were beginning to feel that way. Trying to be funny always seemed to help make that transition happen.
“I know, I know. Pretty stupid, huh?” Io continued his slow trip around the circle, chuckling to himself. “But I thought I could beat it. I thought I could be that one person who wouldn’t get addicted.”
A few nods answered him, the six vampires watching him with more interest now. They could relate.
Io smiled to himself. Each opening speech was the same, and each group reacted the same, too. In a few weeks, they would look at each other as family.
“How many of you felt the same way? That you could do the blue demon once or twice and never need another hit?” He raised his hand, glancing around the circle.
One by one, the hands of the six group members crept upward.
Had Miriam thought that way after taking her first hit of cobalt? If she were in the room, would her hand be in the air like all the others? And what were her reasons for turning to cobalt?
Io dropped his hand, acknowledging them with a compassionate nod. “Sucks, doesn’t it? Feeling so helpless, wondering how you got to this point so quickly, trying to hide your drug use from those around you while falling deeper into its grasp.”
Io’s arms began to itch. He noticed a couple of others scratching their arms, as well. Would the itching ever stop?
“Some days I fear I’ll never lose the physical symptoms of what getting off cobalt felt like. What it did to me….” Io clenched his fists in front of him as if wringing a wet towel. “Cobalt is the one thing I regret. It’s the one thing I’ll never do again, because I know now that it’s stronger than I am. For us….” Io waved his tattooed arm in an arc to encompass the members of the group. “Not much can kill us. As vampires, we heal quickly and don’t die easily. But cobalt….” He spun around in the middle of the circle, eyeing each person, pointing his finger for emphasis. “Cobalt can kill us. It’s one of only a few things that can.”
And the drecks know it, don’t they? How could they not? Cobalt was the ultimate weapon for the drecks to use to weaken the vampires. A way to even the playing field. And the drecks were winning. For every vampire who got cleaned up, two more began using. And half of all overdoses ended in death. At least that’s what the numbers indicated from arrests, street talk, and medical records.
How was the drecks’ agenda so obvious to Io, but not to everyone else? Especially the king?
His fingers curled into fists, and he clenched his teeth. Knowing in his heart that cobalt was a weapon more than it was a drug infuriated him, but losing his cool in front of the group wouldn’t be a good idea. But it didn’t stop him from eyeing his empty chair like it was a football and he was being called on to kick a game-winning field goal from the forty-five-yard line.
Io had no doubt the drecks who were making cobalt knew what they were doing. What better way to get rid of your enemy than to create a drug that was not only highly addictive and could affect vampires in a way no human drug could, but also kill them? He wouldn’t be surprised to find out their scheme went all the way to the top, to Premier Royce himself. They didn’t fool him, even if they did have King Bain snowed.
How could the king not see what was happening? His own daughter was an addict, for God’s sake. Drecks had invaded the royal home, even if only by way of infecting her with their fucking toxic blue shit, made of their venom, made of their blood. How could King Bain not see this as an attack? He had to be blind.
Io returned his attention to the group. “Each of you should be proud. You’ve defeated the demon. You’ve survived.” He clapped, encouraging the others to do the same.
Once the applause quieted, Io sat back down in his chair before he could follow through on making like a placekicker. “Let’s go around the room and everybody tell us your name and how you got here.”
He motioned to the first person to his left, sat back, and listened as each told his or her story. Io was always amazed to hear the painful tales of how people became addicts and how they had finally conquered their addiction. Recovering addicts were some of the strongest people he had ever seen. To fall into such hell and still be able to find a way to fight out of it was nothing short of remarkable.
By the end of the hour, many tears had been shed and hugs given as new friendships were forged in the support system Io was so committed to.
The drug rehabilitation program had been a part of AKM for a while, but Io had made it his passion in the past year. He could practically oversee the entire program if the enforcers weren’t so short-staffed. That was his dream, to quit enforcing and run the program full time. Just the way Arion had quit to follow his dream of—
> Io sighed, cutting off the thought. He had been doing so well, not thinking about Arion all day. And now, wham! He’d gone and re-opened that wound. Just pulled the scab clean off. Again.
Arion hadn’t spoken to him since the night Io had met Miriam. The same night that he had found out Arion was gay. Gay. How had that happened? He’d never seen that coming, but sure as shit filled the crevices in the sole of a tennis shoe after being stepped on, Ari was as gay as the ocean is deep. And he had mated Severin, another member of the team.
And now Io missed his best friend—or maybe ex-best friend by now—like crazy. He’d been a homophobic gay basher since forever. It was no secret Io had always knocked the gay lifestyle. Hell, he had even bashed Severin…to Ari, of all people. After they had already…done stuff with each other. Io’s lip curled, his stomach knotting. Stuff. Would he ever be able to get used to the idea of Ari and Sev together? Like that? Could he get past his prejudice to mend the friendship he’d once had with Ari? Why did he even give a flying rat’s ass what a guy did with his own dick, anyway?
He couldn’t think about that right now, though. People were waiting on him to wrap things up.
After giving the final group member a hug, Io straightened the room and pulled out his smartphone to check his schedule. With Arion leaving AKM, scheduling patrols and shifts had become a day-to-day routine, and no one knew until right before a shift where they would be stationed.
When he saw who he was scheduled with, a pit opened at the bottom of his stomach, making his balls try to creep up and fill the void.
“Oh, come on! You’ve got to be kidding me,” he muttered under his breath. He would patrol with Micah and risk having that bastard dip into his private thoughts all night, but this? Anything but this.
He groaned and closed his eyes then opened them again to make sure he had seen right. Yep, he was scheduled to patrol with Severin tonight.
Sev.
Ari’s mate.
Shit just got better and better.
Tonight was going to be about as much fun as chewing glass.