She leaned back and lay on the grass, her arms spread at her sides and her eyes on the sky above her. Pale fluffy white clouds scudded across the azure canvas, catching her focus. She followed them one by one, until she fell into a sort of trance, lazing in the sunshine and letting the world drift by as she relaxed.
The sense of peace returned and with it came the calm she needed. She embraced it this time, using it to keep all the questions at bay so she could steal all the pleasure she could from this moment.
Minutes ran into each other until she lost track of time and her thoughts turned back to Lucifer.
Did he own the castle? She wanted to believe that he lived there by choice, but she couldn’t make herself swallow that lie.
He had said that he couldn’t leave it, and she hadn’t believed him until he had pressed his hand to the invisible barrier that kept him caged within the walls of the fortress.
Like a prisoner.
One who longed to taste the freedom she could eat to her heart’s content in this strange valley.
Nina slowly lifted her left arm above her head, so the sleeve of her blouse fell back to reveal her watch. The second hand ticked in a steady rhythm, the sound cutting through the silence. How long had she been in the valley? It felt like hours, but nothing seemed to have changed.
She sat up and frowned at the position of the sun.
It hovered above the mountains.
In exactly the same place it had been when she had entered the valley.
Nina checked the shadows, sure she must be wrong, but their lengths and angles were all the same too.
Did time not move in this valley? She would have thought herself insane to ask that question just hours ago, but now anything seemed possible. But the water flowed and the clouds drifted. It was only the time of day that didn’t change.
“Food is being prepared for you.”
Nina jumped and quickly looked back over her shoulder, towards the tunnel. Lucifer stood there, shrouded in shadow, the golden light from the torch playing over his handsome features. They were sombre again, clouded in a way she found she didn’t like. One that made her want to say or do something to lift the sorrow from his heart.
She rose onto her feet and padded up the short incline to him, stopping on the grass just a few metres from him.
“How long have I been here?” Nina turned and looked back down at the river, watching the water sparkle in the dappled light as it raced around a bend near the bridge.
“In the valley?” he said, his soft voice soothing her almost as much as the sun on her skin and the beauty surrounding her.
More so in fact.
It comforted her, chasing away the lingering trace of fear in her veins. When she looked at the red bridge to the forest now, she wasn’t afraid of what might be in those woods.
She felt safe with Lucifer standing at her back.
She felt he would protect her.
A ridiculous notion. She barely knew the man. Just because he had protected her once, didn’t mean he would do it again. And what was there out here that she needed protection from anyway? There was nothing in this valley but her.
And Lucifer.
She turned her face towards him but stopped just short of looking at him, keeping her profile angled slightly away from him instead. She felt his gaze on her face, slowly roaming it and then lower, igniting that low burn in her blood that she felt sure would always be there when he looked at her.
She nodded.
“Fourteen hours.” He sounded distant. Lost in thought?
Lost in looking at her?
A blush climbed her cheeks and she looked away from him, needing a moment to compose herself so she could focus on what was important. It didn’t feel as if she had been here fourteen hours, but she had lost track of time. She checked her watch again and frowned as the second hand ticked past the minute mark.
If she had been here fourteen hours, it should be dark. Presuming time moved in the same way here as it did back in London.
Heck, she really had lost her mind if she was beginning to believe it was possible she was in a place where time flowed at a different pace.
“Does it ever grow dark?” She lifted her gaze to the bright orb in the sky. Was that even real? Was any of it? What if it was all just an incredible illusion and she was really standing in another grim black room?
Or the valley was in fact as dark and bleak as that land she had seen beyond the trees?
Did Lucifer have the power to make that happen?
He had said that he had created this place.
When he didn’t answer her question, she looked over her right shoulder at him and found him staring off into the distance.
“It can,” he murmured and his eyes slowly dropped to rest on her, losing their glassy quality and gaining a sharp edge that pierced her with its intensity and sent a bolt of heat shooting through her blood. “But why would you desire to see the darkness?”
Nina supposed it was a strange question considering that she hadn’t enjoyed her time inside the gothic fortress, shut away and unable to leave. She had made it painfully clear to Lucifer that it felt like a cell to her too, and that she craved light and air. Freedom. Now she wanted it to be dark. Why?
“It just seems strange as it is,” she whispered and then found some strength to place into her words as his eyes narrowed on her, a flicker of curiosity in them. “The sun never moves… the stars never shine… the seasons probably remain the same. Time never flows. It’s static and you must grow bored of seeing it always the same?”
Lucifer’s eyes left her, returning to the valley and remaining there, the distant edge back in them. He looked absorbed in the scenery, but she knew he was thinking about what she had said and she feared she had overstepped the mark and offended him by finding a flaw with this place of his creation.
“Do you desire to see the stars?” He didn’t look at her, not even when she nodded.
He looked taller in the shadows, wrapped up in them, with only the flickering light of the torch illuminating his face. He looked as if he belonged in the inky black with them, and she began to feel he had been asking about more than the valley when he had asked why she desired to see the darkness.
“I do want to see the stars, Lucifer,” she said and his golden gaze fell to her, narrowing slightly, as if hearing his name leaving her lips had been as thrilling as when she heard hers leaving his. She pressed on, wanting to get her point across before her nerve failed. She was sure she might offend him, but she couldn’t let fear of that deter her. She wanted to talk to him and the valley had opened up an avenue of conversation. She also wanted to know why this place remained as it was. “I want to see the stars but that wasn’t my point. My point was that nothing changes in this valley. I’ve been here fourteen hours by your calculation and nothing has changed. It all remains the same. The temperature. The position of the sun. The sound of the river. The breeze. Everything here is static.”
“Static,” he murmured and stared across at the mountains. His expression darkened, the black slashes of his eyebrows drawing together, turning his golden irises a full shade closer to amber. Those eyes slid down to her, piercing her with their intensity and stealing her breath. “Not everything here is static. You are not. You are changed.”
Nina felt keenly in that moment that she had. Seeing the valley and discovering more about Lucifer had changed her. She was no longer afraid of him or the castle, but she didn’t understand why. Perhaps understanding was part of the reason. She felt she knew a piece of him now. She felt there was a part of them that was the same.
They were kindred spirits.
“If I show you the stars, will you be inclined to leave this place and dine with me?”
Her eyes leaped to meet his, her heart stuck on the part where he had asked her to dinner while her head screamed at her to focus on the first part of what he had said—the part about the stars. The logical part of her won and she looked up at the blue vau
lt above her.
“I would, but is it really possible?” Her eyes scanned the scattered clouds and their backdrop. A star could never penetrate such light. Not even a planet had the brightness to shine through the strength of the sun here.
But Lucifer had said she could see the stars. He had offered to make them shine for her but she still wasn’t sure how that was possible.
He moved behind her and she looked back at him, her chest aching as she caught the sorrow in his amber eyes as he stared beyond her at the valley. He raised his left hand and she wanted to press hers to it, wanted to feel his fingers slide between hers and close over her knuckles, needed him to know that he wasn’t alone.
She was here with him.
He pressed his palm to the invisible barrier that stopped him from entering a valley of his own creation and closed his eyes. The muscles of his jaw popped, his sensual lips compressing into a thin line as he frowned, his eyebrows drawing tight together. His nose wrinkled, his top lip drawing off his teeth in a grimace that spoke of pain.
Pain she wanted to ease.
He was hurting himself with whatever he was doing.
Why?
Nina took a step towards him but stopped dead when his canines lengthened. She blinked, sure she was imagining things, but they remained longer, almost like small fangs.
Lucifer grunted and made a sound that was close to a snarl, and she swore the shadows in the tunnel flickered and moved, dancing around him like smoke.
The light dipped.
She whirled to face the valley, her eyes growing enormous as a shiver ran down her spine and thighs.
It was changing.
Her lips parted, the shivers growing in intensity as she stood on the brow of the hill, awed by the sight before her.
The air grew cooler as the sky rapidly changed, the sun drifting lower towards the mountains to her right and the forest there. Another shiver danced down her back as the white cragged peaks of the mountain changed to gold and threads of pink and yellow laced the fluffy clouds as they all raced to her right. The blue vault turned orange beyond the mountains and then a rainbow of colours burst upwards, from pink to yellow to green and then the deepest blue she had ever seen.
Her breath hitched as the sun sank below the cragged peaks on her right and a huge full moon rose on the left side of the valley. It glowed red as it ascended into the darkening sky and slowly turned orange and then paled to a white so bright that it hurt her eyes, but she couldn’t make herself tear them away from its beauty, not even to see the valley stretching below her bathed in blue hues.
Stars emerged, one by one, gradually brightening until they broke through the light of the moon to shine above her, like nothing she had ever seen before.
A chill erupted across her skin as she tipped her head back, her breath lodging in her throat and her heart pounding as she took in the most beautiful heavens she had ever witnessed.
She was amazed.
Her gaze followed the spine of the Milky Way above her, her mind numbed by the beauty of it, empty of thought as she stood beneath it and tried to take it in.
It was incredible.
A laugh bubbled up, born of the joy bursting to life in her heart, and she turned to face Lucifer to thank him for what he had done, because he had done it purely for her.
That laugh died as her eyes met his. They were intent and focused on her, sending a different sort of shiver through her, an awareness of him that stole her breath.
“Is it to your liking?” he whispered and drew his hand away from the barrier, lowering it to his side.
Nina nodded and swallowed hard as she realised something. He was to her liking too. He was handsome, charming and considerate. He had been treating her well and taking care of her, all because he had found her outside his home. She knew that now. He was the one who had found her and had brought her inside to protect her, but she still didn’t know why she was here or who had taken her, or if it had anything to do with her ex-husband and his demand that she return to him.
She still only had a vague memory of the events that had happened and it frightened her.
Lucifer shot his left hand out and grasped the wall there.
Nina gasped and rushed into the tunnel, grabbing him by his waist before he could collapse.
He snarled and pushed her away, sending her back out into the valley.
“I am fine,” he bit out and glared at her. “It is none of your concern.”
It struck her that she was concerned. She was concerned because she had wanted to see the stars and now he looked as pale as those orbs that twinkled above her, drained of colour.
“Return with me.” His gruff command echoed along the corridor as he turned and strode away into the darkness.
Nina lingered, able to understand why he was upset but unwilling to obey his orders. She hated it when she showed weakness around anyone too. She didn’t like to let people see her vulnerable. Not anymore. Not for a long time.
She drew down a few deep breaths and turned her back to the castle, giving herself a minute to smooth out her feelings and admire the stars that he had made just for her.
No one had ever given her a more beautiful gift and it seemed a shame that she had to leave them. It felt as if she was wasting what he had given her, what had taken him great effort to change for her, but she also didn’t want to leave Lucifer alone up there in the castle, waiting for her.
Could she come back tomorrow?
If she did, would the stars still be here or would the valley have changed back to day?
She stared at the moon, charting its position by the peaks of the mountains below it, and realised that, just like the sun, it wasn’t moving. It gave her hope that the stars would still be here when she returned.
Nina slipped her tights on, her eyes on the sky the whole time, and then backed towards the tunnel. She knew the moment she crossed the threshold without even looking. A sense of coldness ran through her, a feeling that unsettled her. She pulled the wooden torch from the holder mounted on the black wall, turned away from the valley with a heart that felt heavy in her chest, and trudged along the corridor towards her room in the castle.
The heaviness in her heart began to lift the closer she came to that room, the cold sensation chased away by heat that steadily grew inside her as her thoughts turned away from the valley and back to Lucifer.
A greeting balanced on her lips as she stepped through the door at the other end and died as she realised that she was alone.
Nina padded across the room to a white-cloth-covered dining table that had been set up near the fireplace. Two candlesticks, each holding six black candles, provided the only light, casting a golden glow over the food on the serving trays beneath them.
And the single place setting.
She placed the wooden torch down into the unlit fireplace, turned back to the table, and idly ran her fingers over the empty end, her thoughts with Lucifer.
Where had he gone?
She had upset him, and she didn’t know how. She wanted to leave the room and go in search of him, but she rounded the table instead and sat at the opposite end to the one Lucifer should have occupied.
The heaviness returned to her heart as she stared at that spot, easily imagining him there with her, dining with her and perhaps even talking to her about things other than the man who had taken her and who might want to hurt her.
If he talked about himself, maybe she would find the courage to tell him about herself too.
Maybe she would finally lower her guard for the first time in years and let someone inside.
And neither of them would be alone anymore.
CHAPTER 8
Lucifer flashed his fangs at a lower demon as he appeared near the prison. The hideous creature scuttled away into the shadows and hissed at him from behind a rock. He flicked his left hand towards it and black blood splattered the ground where the demon had been. Vile little bastards. He did despise the lesser creatures of his realm.
>
Especially when they were dragging him away from something pleasant, something he desired to do with every drop of his blood, and were forcing him to deal with something repulsive instead.
He eyed the three male brown-skinned scaly demons kneeling in the circle in the black courtyard of the prison ahead of him, surrounded by six of his finest Hell’s angels. The demons’ huge yellow eyes all locked on him, their rough throats working on hard swallows as they spotted him. The spines that ran up their arms trembled in a wave like motion, revealing their fear to him. The one in the middle flicked his forked blue tongue out to wet wide lips.
His own men were equally as restless, their red feathered wings shifting constantly, a bright bloody backdrop for their crimson-edged obsidian armour. Two of them held curved black blades pointed at the three demons. Two stood behind them to ensure they didn’t attempt to escape.
The remaining two broke away, approaching him as he glared at the demons and did his best to ignore how bleak his realm looked when compared with the valley where he had left Nina.
Fuck, he had wanted to dine with her. A stupid and ridiculous desire, one that showed only weakness and deserved to be crushed out of existence. If his men learned he was falling for a mere slip of a mortal, they would mutiny.
Falling?
Lucifer blinked at that and then growled as darkness surged within him to eradicate the insane notion and replace it with something more fitting.
Lusting after.
Never falling.
He had vowed to never fall again, and it was a vow he meant to keep.
Nina was beautiful, a very attractive little human, and if she wasn’t part of his enemy’s plan, he would gladly fuck her and might even keep her around for a spell.
But she was part of Mihail’s plan, whether she knew it or not, and he had to remember that.
He reached the courtyard and snarled again as he felt the familiar tug in his chest, the one that pulled him back towards his fortress behind him.
His golden gaze sought the towering black block of the prison to his right, followed the drop on the open side of the cells that plunged into a boiling river of lava so broad the prisoners couldn’t even attempt to leap from the cells to escape them. Not that it stopped some from trying and burning in the river. He scanned from there to the courtyard and then off to his left, following the invisible line that marked the boundary of his own personal cell.
Dark and Damaged: Eight Tortured Heroes of Paranormal Romance: Paranormal Romance Boxed Set Page 50